Kupil (Kupel) | Khmelnytskyi

A class picture from 3rd grade shown by Nina M. ©Nicolas Tkatchouk/Yahad – In Unum Rabbi Istak Meyer Gleizer was murdered in Kupil during the Holocaust. ©Facebook, Family archives Guilt, née Perlman, wife of Rabbi Istak Meyer Gleizer, were both murdered in Kupil during the Holocaust.  ©Facebook, Family archives Joseph and Polina, children of the Rabbi Istak Meyer Gleizer and Guilt, née Perlman, wife of Rabbi Istak Meyer Gleizer, were both murdered in Kupil during the Holocaust.  ©Facebook, Family archives / Nina M., born in 1918: “Straight after the Germans’ arrival, the Jews were persecuted. They were forbidden to keep their jobs and were forced to wear round yellow patches on their clothes.” ©Nicolas Tkatchouk/Yahad – In Unum Stanislav K., born in 1930: “One day, all the Jews were ordered to gather at the Klub. Those who didn’t show up were hunted down by the Schutzmann and taken there by force.” ©Nicolas Tkatchouk/Yahad – In Unum Vira M., born in 1926, was an eyewitness to the execution: “The Jews were stripped naked and searched, one by one before being shot.” ©Nicolas Tkatchouk/Yahad – In Unum Vira M., born in 1926, was an eyewitness to the execution. ©Nicolas Tkatchouk/Yahad – In Unum The Yahad team with a witness near one of the execution sites. ©Nicolas Tkatchouk/Yahad – In Unum The Jewish cemetery in Kupil. ©Nicolas Tkatchouk/Yahad – In Unum A surviving tombstone at the Jewish cemetery in Kupil. ©Nicolas Tkatchouk/Yahad – In Unum A surviving tombstone at the Jewish cemetery in Kupil. ©Nicolas Tkatchouk/Yahad – In Unum The guard’s hut located on the Jewish cemetery. ©Nicolas Tkatchouk/Yahad – In Unum The road to the Jewish cemetery that the Jews were led down. ©Nicolas Tkatchouk/Yahad – In Unum The memorial located on one of the mass graves dug for the execution. The mass graves are located on the Jewish cemetery. ©Nicolas Tkatchouk/Yahad – In Unum

Execution of Jews in Kupil

1 Sitio(s) de ejecución

Tipo de lugar antes:
Near Jewish cemetery (1); Cellar (2)
Memoriales:
Yes
Período de ocupación:
1941-1944
Número de víctimas:
Hundreds

Entrevista del testigo

Nina M., born in 1918 : “One week after the Germans’ arrival, they ordered about a hundred Jewish men to gather at the central square. Anyone who didn’t show up by themselves were taken there by force by the Schutzmanns. I remember one Jew was particularly humiliated. I don’t know what he did to deserve it. He was forced to climb over the Lenin statue. As it was quite difficult, he keep falling down, but they forced him to climb it over and over again. I don’t remember his name, but I remember that he worked as photographer before the war. Then, they all were locked up in a one-story building, it was either a shop or a library, -- I can’t tell you now. So, once everyone was inside, the door and windows were locked. There was even a disabled Jew who didn’t fit in but was thrown over the heads of others. He was the only survivor as he managed to breath through a hole while all other suffocated.” (Witness n°856U, interviewed in Kupil, on January 8, 2010)

Archivos soviéticos

“[…] in 1942, in July or August, the Germans, together with [Ukrainian auxiliary] policemen, carried out a roundup in the town of Kupel and caught about 600 Soviet civilians of Jewish nationality. Regardless of their sex or age, all of them were taken to Volochisk, but none returned.” [Deposition of a local villager Ivan Y**, given to the State Extraordinary Commission (ChGK), on August 30, 1944; GARF 7021-64-795]

Nota histórica

Kupil is a town located 45 km (28mi) northwest of Khmelnytskyi. The first record of the jewish community dates back to the 18th century. In 1897, the local Jewish population numbered 2,727 individuals, making up 63% of the total population. The majority of Jews lived off small scale commerce and handicraft. The community had a cemetery, four synagogues and a Yiddish school. In the 1920s, a Jewish kolkhoz [collective farm] Nay Lebn" ('New Life" in Yiddish), was founded. In 1926, 67% of the total Kupil population was Jewish, 1,828 individuals.

Holocausto por balas en cifras

Kupil was occupied by German forces on July 5, 1941. Shortly after the German occupation of the town, the Germans locked about 90 Jewish men into a small shop or library and placed guards outside. By the next morning most of the men had suffocated to death, only one disabled man managed to survive. The victims were buried near the location where a statue of Lenin had been in the center of town and, after a month, they were reburied at the Jewish cemetery. According to local villagers, the Jews continued to live in their houses, contrary to what it is written in the archives. We believe that the ghetto was opened and created in the same area as the Jews lived before without forcing other Jews to move in, which local villagers were unaware of the existence of a ghetto. In the spring or summer of 1942, a group of Jews fit to work was selected and taken to the Pavlykivtsi labor camp where they worked in a sand quarry before being exterminated in late autumn 1942. On September 21, 1942, about 600 Jews were rounded up and marched from the Kupil ghetto to the brick factory located north of Volochysk, where they were shot in a clay quarry. Some Jews who had managed to hide during this Aktion were shot afterwards at the Jewish cemetery over the course of several isolated shootings.

Pueblos cercanos

  • Pavlykivtsi
  • Volochysk
Para apoyar el trabajo de Yahad-in Unum por favor considere hacer una donación

¿Tiene información adicional con respecto a un pueblo que le gustaría compartir con Yahad?

Por favor contáctenos a contact@yahadinunum.org
o llamando a Yahad – In Unum at +33 (0) 1 53 20 13 17