Dzyatlava Ghetto
The Dzyatlava Ghetto, Zdzięcioł Ghetto, or Zhetel Ghetto (in Yiddish) was a Nazi ghetto in the town of Dzyatlava, Western Belarus during World War II. After several months of Nazi ad-hoc persecution that began after the launch of Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the Soviet Union, the new German authorities officially created a ghetto for all local Jews on 22 February 1942. Prior to 1939, the town (Zdzięcioł) was part of Nowogródek Voivodeship of the Second Polish Republic.
| Dzyatlava Ghetto | |
|---|---|
The Synagogue of Dzyatlava (Zhetel) at the onset of World War II | |
Zdzięcioł
Location of Dzyatlava (Zdzięcioł) during the Holocaust in Eastern Europe | |
| Location | Dzyatlava, Western Belarus |
| Incident type | Imprisonment, slave labor, starvation, mass killings |
| Organizations | SS, Einsatzgruppe C, Belarusian Auxiliary Police, Wehrmacht |
| Executions | Kurpyash Forest |
| Victims | Over 4,500 Jews. |
Some Jews formed a resistance and underground police force, but their efforts were discovered by the Germans. Most of those involved fled to the forest outside the ghetto, while at least one leader was executed.
The majority of the residents were murdered in two separate instances of mass killing in April and August of 1942. Their bodies were disposed of in mass grave dug by the Nazis. A few hundred skilled workers were transferred to another ghetto. After the first round of killings, survivors prepared hiding places in case of another massacre. Due to their efforts, several hundred residents were able to escape the final liquidation of the ghetto and form a camp in the forest until the end of the Nazi regime. Out of the 4,500 Jews who were made to live in the ghetto, between 3,200-4,200 were killed in these massacres.