This week, the last remaining participant in the doomed uprising in the Warsaw ghetto died. Marek Edelman was believed to be 90 years old, although the exact date of his birth (perhaps January 1, 1919) is unknown.
Edelman was born in what is now Belarus and as a toddler, his parents, members of a Jewish socialist, anti-Zionist party called the Bund, moved from Belarus to Warsaw, Poland. According to Edelman, "Warsaw is my city. It is here that I learned Polish, Yiddish and German. It is here that at school, I learned one must always take care of others. It is also here that I was slapped in the face just because I was a Jew."
In 1943 as the Jewish population in Warsaw was loaded into cattle cars and taken to Treblinka for extermination, 220 young men led by Mordechaj Anielewicz and Marek Edelman staged an uprising that kept the Nazis at bay for three weeks. In the end, the systematic burning of the ghetto rather than Nazi guns defeated the insurgents. Anielewicz was killed, but Edelman and several others escaped through the sewers.
After his escape, Edelman joined the Polish Home Army, the official name of the Polish resistance, and fought the Germans, including in the 1944 Warsaw uprising, which saw 200,000 killed and the city leveled by German bombs.
Following the war, Edelman went on to become a noted cardiologist. And while many of his friends left Poland for Israel and the United States, Edelman stayed. "Someone had to stay to watch over all those who died here," he said.
Edelman’s activism did not end with the war. In the 1970’s, he became an active member of the Solidarity movement and was arrested with Lech Walesa and others when Jaruzelski imposed marshal law. After he was freed, he was elected to the Polish Senate and oversaw the dismantling of Communism in Poland.
Edelman’s was a hard life, but a life well lived. He dedicated it to ending prejudice of all kinds. Requiscat in Pace.
Link to story from France 24 and New York Times obituary.
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read more blogs!
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Berrysplash
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Oct 3 @ 12:46PM
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Thanks for the moving blog!
Never again means just that--Never Again! But unforunatley we don't heed the horrors of the past but we let them live again somewhere else.
RIP Marek Edelman!
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bardnsage
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Oct 3 @ 12:54PM
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A true life story,,, of overcoming adversity.
His was the greatest generation. Every day we loose more and more of the people who lived through this time.
It's very hard to understand how not getting your flu shot on your schedule, not being able to park your car, not being able to afford your cell phone and your cable at the same time, that someone calling another a bad name is a racist incident that requires special laws, hours of media, and counseling for the "Mental Anquish",,,,,,,
even comes close to the adversity, sacrafice, and tribulations of this generation,,,,,,
and no where near the level of courage to overcome it.
CHEERS,,,, to the greatest generation. We are not worthy. 
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ttomtarr
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Oct 3 @ 5:11PM
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I have often wondered why that group fought rather than allow themselves to be led off like cows to slaughter, as did so many others..
I guess the chose to ignore the Judenrat, who chose and sent the people to be eliminated.
I have often wondered if so many Jews were involved in early communism because of their betrayal in the war by their upper class, and as a result embraced the class conflict theories of Communism.
Enielewicz and Edelman were fearless visionaries. If other ghettos had followed their example, the course of the war would have been different, and many of the Jews who died might have lived.
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RightWingRepublican
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Oct 4 @ 7:41PM
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Great story. Thanks for sharing it.
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thenewguy295
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Oct 9 @ 9:33AM
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One of the amazing things about it was that they only had a handful of weapons yet kept thousands of German troops busy for weeks at a time when they were sorely needed at the battle front.
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