VIDEO: Warsaw Ghetto Uprising commemoration highlights women ghetto fighters
Speakers at the event described in gripping detail the heroic acts by women, including young girls, in the resistance
Courtesy of the Congress for Jewish Culture
By Rukhl Schaechter April 24, 2025
In Riverside Park in Manhattan, a simple slab of stone (called der shteyn in Yiddish) commemorates the Jewish fighters of the historic Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in 1943.
On Friday, April 18, close to 300 people gathered by der shteyn to honor the memory of the uprising, and the six million Jews who perished in the Holocaust. The annual event is hosted by the Congress for Jewish Culture and several other Jewish organizations.
This year’s program highlighted the heroic acts by women, including young girls, in the resistance. Historian Lori Weintrob described in gripping detail some of these events, while Anita Gallers, a great-granddaughter of the Yiddish writer Jacob Pat, read an excerpt of his book Khanke about his niece who fought the Nazis.
Feygele Jacobs read a letter from the head of the Ghetto Fighters’ House Museum in Israel, expressing the dire importance of sharing with the world the self-sacrificing heroism of these fighters.
Barnard student Judith Goldstein and CJC director Shane Baker read a Yiddish poem by Chaim Leib Fuks and its English translation by his son, Michael (Menachem) Fox, about a postcard Fuks received from his sister in the Lodz Ghetto and the emotions it awakens in him.
Kyla Kupferstein Torres shared moving memories of her grandparents, Holocaust survivors Hershl and Fela, who lived with many other survivors in the Amalgamated Building complex in the Bronx, and singers Joanne Borts, Shiffee Lovitt Loccasio and Sarah Gordon performed several beautiful Yiddish Holocaust songs.
Koved zeyer ondenk. Honor their memory.
Did you know that only 2% of Forward readers donate to support our nonprofit newsroom? That 2% make it possible for millions to read the Forward without a paywall or subscription — removing any barriers to the full and fair Jewish story.
But while the Forward is free to read, it isn’t free to produce. Big stories — like deep dives into the antisemitism data, political scoops or reporting trips to college campuses — take months of research and fact-checking. All while we keep you informed of what you need to know each day.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Forward Publisher & CEO
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
