Ucieczka, strach, upokorzenie, ośmieszanie, poniżanie. Żydowska odyseja w ikonografii niemieckich żołnierzy lat 1939–1941

Abstract

The basis of the following article will be the subject’s iconography, which is a visual odyssey of the Jewish community in Poland from 1939–1941. In it, we will notice fear, horror, humiliation, humiliation, ridicule and even murder. The photographs selected by the author introduce the reader to an overview of the events taking place in the first days and weeks of the German-led World War II, followed by military operations against the Soviets. Many of these shots, encapsulated in photographic frames, were taken by young (born 1920–1925) German soldiers seeing East-Polish Jews for the first time. In keeping with their National Socialist education and indoctrination, they sought them out for the photographs they took, which they then sent to their families in Germany. The frames depict: what such a war looked like and what it was. In these shots, young Germans identified with the speech of propagandist (Third Reich Minister) Joseph Goebbels (1897–1945), who on the subject of the photographs taken reported as follows: Here will be our modern artificial eye, the camera, for the swearing in of the testimony of the new time [...] Thus photography in the event of the day becomes a mission in which every German who has a camera takes part. Also, the vocabulary created for this, indoctrinated with the National Socialist worldview of young soldiers, was an essential part of the Jewish odyssey. The iconography presented below-which the author purchased from private individuals and online auctions in Germany, Belgium, France and the US-and is now part of his archive-has become an exceptional, uniquely and uniquely silent historical source.