Лев Гунин - ГУЛаг Палестины

prisoners in Western Ukraine before and after the outbreak of

hostilities (massacres took place in the prisons in Lviv, Zolochiv,

Rivne, Dubno, Lutsk, etc.). (Volodymyr Kubijovyc, editor, Ukraine:

A Concise Encyclopaedia, University of Toronto Press, Toronto,

Volume 1, p. 886)

(4) Mainly members of the city's [Lviv's] intelligentsia.

Before fleeing the German advance the Soviet occupational regime

murdered thousands of Ukrainian civilians, mainly members of the

city's [Lviv's] intelligentsia. (Encyclopedia of Ukraine, Volume

3, p. 222)

(5) NKVD slaughtered their prisoners en masse.

The Soviets' hurried retreat had tragic consequences for thousands

of political prisoners in the jails of Western Ukraine. Unable to

evacuate them in time, the NKVD slaughtered their prisoners en

masse during the week of 22-29 June 1941, regardless of whether

they were incarcerated for major or minor offenses. Major

massacres occurred in Lviv, Sambir, and Stanyslaviv in Galicia,

where about 10,000 prisoners died, and in Rivne and Lutsk in

Volhynia, where another 5000 perished. Coming on the heels of the

mass deportations and growing Soviet terror, these executions added

greatly to the West Ukrainians' abhorrence of the Soviets. (Orest

Subtelny, Ukraine: A History, 1994, p. 461)

(6) Liquidated with a shot at the scruff of the neck.

Right after the entry we were shown 2,400 dead bodies of Ukrainians

liquidated with a shot at the scruff of the neck at the city jail

of Lemberg [Lviv] by the Soviets prior to their marching off.

(Hans Frank, In the Face of the Gallows, p. 406)

(7) The city stank.

In Lvov, several thousand prisoners had been held in three jails.

When the Germans arrived on 29 June, the city stank, and the

prisons were surrounded by terrified relatives. Unimaginable

atrocities had occurred inside. The prisons looked like

abattoirs. It had taken the NKVD a week to complete their gruesome

task before they fled. (Gwyneth Hughes and Simon Welfare, Red

Empire: The Forbidden History of the USSR, 1990, p. 133)

(8) Many of them were found mutilated.

We learned that, before the Russian troops had left, a very great

number of Lemberg [Lviv] citizens, Ukrainians and Polish

inhabitants of other towns and villages had been killed in this

prison and in other prisons. Furthermore, there were many corpses

of German men and officers, among them many Air Corps officers, and

many of them were found mutilated. There was a great bitterness

and excitement among the Lemberg population against the Jewish

sector of the population. (Erwin Schulz, from May until 26

September, 1941 Commander of Einsatzkommando 5, a subunit of

Einsatzgruppe C, in John Mendelsohn, editor, The Holocaust:

Selected Documents in Eighteen Volumes, Garland, New York, 1982,

Volume 18, p. 18)

(9) The killed people in Lemberg [Lviv] amounted to about 5,000.

On the next day, Dr. RASCH informed us to the effect that the

killed people in Lemberg [Lviv] amounted to about 5,000. It has

been determined without any doubt that the arrests and killings had

taken place under the leadership of Jewish functionaries and with

the participation of the Jewish inhabitants of Lemberg. That was

the reason why there was such an excitement against the Jewish

population on the part of the Lemberg citizens. (Erwin Schulz,

from May until 26 September, 1941 Commander of Einsatzkommando 5, a

subunit of Einsatzgruppe C, in John Mendelsohn, editor, The

Holocaust: Selected Documents in Eighteen Volumes, Garland, New

York, 1982, Volume 18, p. 18)

(10) Hardly 20% of Ukrainian intelligentsia has remained.

Chief of Einsatzgruppe B reports that Ukrainian insurrection

movements were bloodily suppressed by the NKVD on June 25, 1941 in

Lvov. About 3,000 were shot by NKVD. Prison burning. Hardly 20%

of Ukrainian intelligentsia has remained. (Operational Situation

Report USSR No. 10, July 2, 1941, in Yitzhak Arad, Shmuel

Krakowski, and Shmuel Spector, The Einsatzgruppen Reports:

Selections from the Dispatches of the Nazi Death Squads' Campaign

Against the Jews July 1941-January 1943, Holocaust Library, New

York, 1989, p. 2)

(11) The corpses are dreadfully mutilated.

Location: Lvov

According to reliable information, the Russians, before

withdrawing, shot 30,000 inhabitants. The corpses piled up and

burned at the GPU prisons are dreadfully mutilated. The population

is greatly excited: 1,000 Jews have already been forcefully

gathered together. (Operational Situation Report USSR No. 11, July

3, 1941, in Yitzhak Arad, Shmuel Krakowski, and Shmuel Spector, The

Einsatzgruppen Reports: Selections from the Dispatches of the Nazi

Death Squads' Campaign Against the Jews July 1941-January 1943,

Holocaust Library, New York, 1989, p. 4)

(12) The prisons in Lvov were crammed with the bodies of murdered

Ukrainians.

Location: Zviahel (Novograd-Volynski)

[...]

Before leaving, the Bolsheviks, together with the Jews,

murdered several Ukrainians; as an excuse, they used the attempted

Ukrainian uprising of June 25, 1941, which tried to free their

prisoners.

According to reliable information, about 20,000 Ukrainians have

disappeared from Lvov, 80% of them belonging to the intelligentsia.

The prisons in Lvov were crammed with the bodies of murdered

Ukrainians. According to a moderate estimate, in Lvov alone

3-4,000 persons were either killed or deported.

In Dobromil, 82 dead bodies were found, 4 of them Jews. The

latter were former Bolsheviki informers who had been killed because

of their complicity in this act. Near Dobromil an obsolete salt

mine pit was discovered. It was completely filled with dead

bodies. In the immediate neighborhood, there is a 6X15m mass

grave. The number of those murdered in the Dobromil area is

estimated to be approximately several hundred.

In Sambor on June 26, 1941, about 400 Ukrainians were shot by

the Bolsheviks. An additional 120 persons were murdered on June

27, 1941. The remaining 80 prisoners succeeded in overpowering the

Soviet guards, and fled. [...]

As early as 1939, a larger number of Ukrainians was shot, and

1,500 Ukrainians as well as 500 Poles were deported to the east.

Russians and Jews committed these murders in very cruel ways.

Bestial mutilations were daily occurrences. Breasts of women and

genitals of men were cut off. Jews have also nailed children to

the wall and then murdered them. Killing was carried out by shots

in the back of the neck. Hand grenades were frequently used for

these murders.

In Dobromil, women and men were killed with blows by a hammer

used to stun cattle before slaughter.

In many cases, the prisoners must have been tortured cruelly:

bones were broken, etc. In Sambor, the prisoners were gagged and

thus prevented from screaming during torture and murder. The Jews,

some of whom also held official positions, in addition to their

economic supremacy, and who served in the entire Bolshevik police,

were always partners in these atrocities.

Finally, it was established that seven [German] pilots who had

been captured were murdered. Three of them were found in a Russian

military hospital where they had been murdered in bed by shots in

the abdomen. [...]

[...] Prior to their withdrawal, the Bolsheviks shot 2,800 out

of 4,000 Ukrainians imprisoned in the Lutsk prison. According to

the statement of 19 Ukrainians who survived the slaughter with more

or less serious injuries, the Jews again played a decisive part in

the arrests and shooting. [...]

The investigations at Zlochev proved that the Russians, prior

to their withdrawal, arrested and murdered indiscriminately a total

of 700 Ukrainians, but, nevertheless, included the entire [local]

Ukrainian intelligentsia. (Operational Situation Report USSR No.

24, July 16, 1941, in Yitzhak Arad, Shmuel Krakowski, and Shmuel

Spector, The Einsatzgruppen Reports: Selections from the Dispatches

of the Nazi Death Squads' Campaign Against the Jews July

1941-January 1943, Holocaust Library, New York, 1989, p. 29-33)

(13) Ukrainians thrown into cauldrons of boiling water.

Location: Pleskau [Pskov] [...]

The population is in general convinced that it is mostly the

Jews who should be held responsible for the atrocities that are

committed everywhere. [...]

As it was learned that the Russians before they left have

either deported the Ukrainian intelligentsia, or executed them,

that is, murdered them, it is assumed that in the last days before

the retreat of the Russians, about 100 influential Ukrainians were

murdered [in Pleskau]. So far the bodies have not been found - a

search has been initiated.

About 100-150 Ukrainians were murdered by the Russians in

Kremenets. Some of these Ukrainians are said to have been thrown

into cauldrons of boiling water. This has been deduced from the

fact that the bodies were found without skin when they were

exhumed. [...]

[...] Before leaving Dubno, the Russians, as they had done in

Lvov, committed extensive mass-murder.

[...] Before their flight [from Tarnopol], as in Lvov and

Dubno, the Russians went on a rampage there. Disinterments

revealed 10 bodies of German soldiers. Almost all of them had

their hands tied behind their backs with wire. The bodies revealed

traces of extremely cruel mutilations such as gouged eyes, severed

tongues and limbs.

The number of Ukrainians who were murdered by the Russians,

among them women and children, is set finally at 600. Jews and

Poles were spared by the Russians. The Ukrainians estimate the

total number of [Tarnopol] victims since the occupation of the

Ukraine by the Russians at about 2,000. The planned deportation of

the Ukrainians already started in 1939. There is hardly a family

in Tarnopol from which one or several members have not

disappeared. [...] The entire Ukrainian intelligentsia is

destroyed. Since the beginning of the war, 160 members of the

Ukrainian intelligentsia were either murdered or deported.

Inhabitants of the town had observed a column of about 1,000

civilians driven out of town by police and army early in the

morning of July 1, 1941.

As in Lvov, torture chambers were discovered in the cellars of

the Court of Justice. Apparently, hot and cold showers were also

used here (as in Lemberg [Lviv]) for torture, as several bodies

were found, totally naked, their skin burst and torn in many

places. A grate was found in another room, made of wire and set

above the ground about 1m in height, traces of ashes were found

underneath. A Ukrainian engineer, who was also to be murdered but

saved his life by smearing the blood of a dead victim over his

face, reports that one could also hear screams of pain from women

and girls. (Operational Situation Report USSR No. 28, July 20,

1941, in Yitzhak Arad, Shmuel Krakowski, and Shmuel Spector, The

Einsatzgruppen Reports: Selections from the Dispatches of the Nazi

Death Squads' Campaign Against the Jews July 1941-January 1943,

Holocaust Library, New York, 1989, p.38-40)

(14) Had their noses, ears, tongues and even genitals cut away.