Babi Yar
Babi Yar refers to the site of a tragic and significant massacre of Ukrainian Jews by the Nazis during World War II. In September 1941, following the Nazi invasion of Kiev, approximately 33,771 Jewish people were systematically shot over two days at a ravine known as Babi Yar. This massacre was part of the broader Nazi campaign to exterminate Jews, which resulted in the deaths of over a million Jews in the territory of modern-day Ukraine. The involvement of some local Ukrainians in the murders raises complex issues about collaboration during this dark period.
For decades after the war, the Soviet government suppressed acknowledgment of the Babi Yar atrocities, and it was not until Ukraine's independence in 1991 that efforts to memorialize the victims gained momentum. The establishment of monuments and the Babi Yar Holocaust Memorial Center aims to educate future generations about the events that took place, the broader context of the Holocaust, and the roles played by different groups in these horrific acts. This history remains a critical part of understanding the impact of the Holocaust and the need for remembrance and reconciliation.
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Babi Yar
Babi Yar is the name given to the massacre of Ukrainian Jews by the Nazis in 1941. Part of their plan to murder all Jews, the Nazis shot and killed 33,771 people in a two-day mass killing. Although the mass killing was orchestrated by German Nazis, many Ukrainians were involved in the murders. After World War II, the Soviet government did not want to acknowledge the Babi Yar atrocity. However, after Ukraine gained its independence in 1991, the Ukrainian government took steps to honor the victims and acknowledged Ukrainians' role in the murders.
Background
The Nazis were a political party in Germany led by Adolf Hitler, who wanted to take control of all of Europe. Hitler and the Nazis were guided by racist and authoritarian beliefs and wanted to rid Europe of people who they thought were inferior. The Nazis most often targeted Jewish people. Hitler and the Nazis wanted to kill as many Jews as possible. In Germany and other parts of Europe, the Nazis opened concentration camps where they took Jews to be killed, sometimes using poison gas. The Nazis also killed at least two million Jews in the Soviet Union. There, they often killed people in large groups using guns.
Before World War II, Kiev, the capital of what is today the Ukraine, was home to roughly one hundred and sixty thousand Jews. Jews made up about 20 percent of the city's population. As the Nazis began invading countries around Europe and rounding up Jews to be taken to concentration camps, Jews fled from cities that seemed as though they might be overtaken by the Nazis. The Nazis were closing in on Kiev in 1941, and roughly one hundred thousand Jews fled before they took power there. The Nazis seized control of the city on September 19, 1941.
Overview
After the Nazis took power, they quickly began rounding up Jews. On September 29, only ten days after the Nazis invaded the city, many of the Jews remaining in Kiev—mostly women, children, the elderly, and the disabled—were marched out of the city to a ravine. The victims, who were unaware of their fate, were forced to strip and put all their possessions in piles. The Nazis and some Ukrainians then made them line up in front of the ravine and opened fire on them. The Nazis used machine guns to kill thousands of people in a short time. As the Germans and Ukrainians fired their guns, the dead or dying victims fell into the ravine. The ravine was chosen so that the Nazis would not have to dig a mass grave for the victims. Soldiers then went into the ravine to shoot and kill any survivors. Then the soldiers raided the victims' possessions to steal what they wanted.
Only twenty-nine people managed to escape being executed at Babi Yar. Some of them did so by falling into the ravine before they were shot and lying with the dead bodies for hours. Others wore crosses to hide their true identities. Some of those who escaped tried to warn others, but people did not believe that the Jews were being murdered so violently.
In the months following Babi Yar, the Nazis and the Ukrainians killed more than sixty thousand people. Although the September 1941 massacre at Babi Yar is the most famous, other massacres happened at the site as well. Historians estimate that more than one hundred thousand people—including Soviet prisoners of war, Roma, and Ukrainian nationalists—were killed at the ravine during the course of World War II. On November 6, 1943, the Soviet army took control of Kiev from the Nazis.
Historians estimate that roughly one million Jews were killed in the area that is now the Ukraine during World War II. They believe that mass killings took place in other parts of Kiev and in other cities around the area. For many years after the war, Ukrainians grappled with their country's role in the Holocaust. Many historians believe that local Ukrainians helped the Nazis identify and round up the Ukrainian Jews who were murdered. Furthermore, local Ukrainians took part in the mass murder of Jews at Babi Yar.
After the war, the Soviet government would not acknowledge what happened at Babi Yar and in other parts of the Ukraine. In 1961, the Russian poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko wrote a poem called "Babi Yar" in which he criticized the government for ignoring the massacre and other atrocities. The poem was important as it taught many Soviet citizens about the massacre, which had not been discussed often before that time. Until the 1970s, no memorial had been installed at Babi Yar, and the area had been turned into a public park, despite tens of thousands of people losing their lives there. In 1976, the Soviet government installed a monument that recognized the "Soviet citizens" who lost their lives, but no specific mention of Ukrainian Jews was made. The targeting of Jews was better recognized in 1991, after the fall of the Soviet Union, when a menorah (an important symbol of the Jewish faith) was erected at the site. The Ukrainian government announced that a memorial would be built to teach about Babi Yar and the Holocaust. The Babi Yar Holocaust Memorial Center was set to open in 2021 to commemorate the eightieth anniversary of the massacre. The center would confront the history of Babi Yar, the treatment of Ukrainian Jews, and the involvement of Ukrainians in Nazi massacres.
Bibliography
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Dawidowicz, Lucy S. "Babi Yar's Legacy." The New York Times, 27 Sept. 1981, www.nytimes.com/1981/09/27/magazine/babi-yar-s-legacy.html. Accessed 14 Sept. 2017.
Hjelmgaard, Kim. "75 Years Ago: 33,771 Jews Slaughtered at Babi Yar." USA Today, 29 Sept., 2016, www.usatoday.com/staff/2543/kim-hjelmgaard/. Accessed 14 Sept. 2017.
"Holocaust in Kiev and the Tragedy of Babi Yar." Yad Vashem, www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/education/learning‗environments/babi‗yar/historical‗background3.asp. Accessed 14 Sept. 2017.
Kinstler, Linda. "No Monument Stands Over Babi Yar." The Atlantic, 30 Sept. 2016, www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/09/ukraine-jewish-babi-yar-russia-holocaust-germany-poroshenko/502517/. Accessed 14 Sept. 2017.
Pileggi, Tamar. "75 Years after Babi Yar Massacre, Ukraine Reexamines Its Dark History." Times of Israel, 3 Oct. 2016,
www.timesofisrael.com/75-years-after-babi-yar-massacre-ukraine-reexamines-its-dark-history/. Accessed 14 Sept. 2017.
Schmidt, William E. "Today at Babi Yar the Spirits Will Rest." The New York Times, 5 Oct. 1991, www.nytimes.com/1991/10/05/world/today-at-babi-yar-the-spirits-will-rest.html. Accessed 14 Sept. 2017.
Tabarovsky, Izabella. "Babi Yar: The Holocaust as Final Solution Began Here." Newsweek, 29 Sept. 2016, www.newsweek.com/babi-yar-holocaust-final-solution-began-here-503523. Accessed 14 Sept. 2017.