Testimony of Yoel Ben-Porat

I, Yoel Ben-Porat, whose name before the war was Julek Weinraub, am the son of Joseph and Malka Weinraub (nee' Bauer) and the grandson of Yechiel Weinraub. I come from the town of Skalat where my family lived for many years.

Our house was located at number 10, May the 3rd Street and we lived there until the fall of 1942 when the Skalat Ghetto was established. Then we were forced to leave our house and to move into an apartment beyond the synagogue. It was an area of some old, dilapidated houses in a poor Jewish section known in our town by the Yiddish phrase “inter da bud” (below the public bath house). We shared the tiny crowded apartment with two more families. The name of one was Kiwetz and the name of the other, I do not recall.

I spent the Nazi occupation in the town of Skalat, where the lives of the Jews were in danger at all times and I wish to relate here one of my experiences during this period. It was October 21, 1942, the first day of the “Wild Action” in Skalat. I remember that on that day, at dawn, someone had knocked on our window and tried to awaken my father. A man's voice said in Ukrainian, “Yosio, vstavaity!” (Joseph, wake up). When I heard the message, I was the first to jump to my feet and to run outside in order to see who was there. I looked around, but I saw no one. Till today I do not know, for sure, who came to warn us. My family thought that it probably was a Ukrainian peasant, named Masnej, who was very fond of my father and in whose Mantiawa orchards, on the outskirts of town, we kept our bee hives.

Not being sure that the knock on the window was a warning, my father told me to walk over to the Judenrat area of our town, only a few minutes walk from our house, to see what was happening. Under the Nazi occupation I used to accompany my father during his deliveries of newspapers to German and Ukrainian institutions such as the Schupo and Kripo, and I was acutely aware of our dangerous situation. Therefore, though I was only eleven years old, my father considered me reliable to bring back some news of what was going on. Arriving at the Judenrat I saw nothing unusual, and since everything was quiet, I decided to go back home.

When I reached the street near the synagogue, suddenly the town exploded with noise. The shooting and shouting was of such intensity that it exerted the intended shock effect on the Jews. The Germans and the Ukrainian police, who were all around, fell upon us and I was among the very first twenty or thirty Jews caught. We were immediately led to the synagogue. There we were stopped in front of the large, iron door which was shut tight. I remember a German soldier with a grenade in his hand, walking up to the heavy door and hanging the grenade on the door handle. Then he moved to the side of the building, detonated the grenade by pulling a string and thus blew the door open. By then, more people had joined us in front of the synagogue and we were the first group of about forty or fifty Jews to be chased inside.

The sanctuary was huge and empty when we were driven in. But every few minutes more people were brought in and within an hour, hundreds of victims filled the synagogue. Since I was caught alone, I decided to stand near the front entrance in order to see whether my parents would be brought in. Even at that young age I realized that it would be better for them not to be caught. Yet, I thought, just in case they were brought in, at least I would be with them and not alone. I remained standing at the entrance all the time, seeing tens of people being chased in every couple of minutes. Some of them were wounded and all were in a state of panic. We didn't know exactly what was going to happen to us, but we knew that from here we would be brought to some terrible place. Inside, the atmosphere was one of shock and terror. The air was permeated with moans and screams of the wounded, and the cries and prayers of the trapped victims. After a few hours when the sanctuary was half filled, Obersturmbannfuhrer Muller appeared. I recognized him from his frequent visits to the Skalat Schupo. He came inside, took his pistol and shot at random into the crowd. This caused the people to retreat deeper into the sanctuary, enabling Muller to see how much space was left for additional victims to be brought in.

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I stood a few more hours at the entrance. Suddenly I saw my Aunt Esther Zimmer, my mother's sister, her sixteen year old daughter, Betka, and ten year old son, Yitzchak, the family of Shaye Zimmer, being brought into the synagogue. Shaye Zimmer was the second in command of the Skalat Judenrat, therefore, I realized that his family was caught by mistake and would probably be released. I was right. I decided to attach myself to them and not let go. I don't remember how long we waited, perhaps a half an hour or an hour, when an SS officer came in with a list and started to call the names of families of the Jewish police and the Judenrat members who were caught. Among them he called the names of my aunt and two cousins.

By that time the synagogue was almost full and everybody was pushing. We too pushed, trying to get out when the Zimmer names were called. When we came outside and my uncle spotted me together with his wife and children, he became pale. An SS officer approached him and asked my uncle “Is this your family?”

He answered “Yes.”

“All of them, the wife and three children?”

Again, my uncle said “Yes.”

“But you told me that you have a wife and two children,” the SS-man hissed.

“No, my Sturmfuhrer, I said a wife and three children.”

“Don't you lie, you dog you! You said a wife and two children.”

I looked at my uncle and our eyes met. My life was hanging on the thread of his next answer. He would either panic and say it was a mistake and deny that I was his son, or at the risk of the lives of his wife and children, claim me as his son and thus save me. My uncle repeated almost in a shouting voice, “I said a wife and three children.” An exchange of shouting between my uncle and the SS-man took another turn, but finally I, together with my aunt and two cousins, were motioned to be released. We were taken to the Judenrat where we were kept for the duration of the 'action' - two nights and one and a half days.

After the 'action,' I found out that my father was also caught and was killed near the well of the Skalat marketplace, from where he tried to escape. My mother and her three brothers, Israel, Chaim, and Yoel Bauer; were all caught. My mother jumped from the train, but was shot and killed near Borki-Wielkie. All three brothers also jumped from the train; two of them were killed after they jumped and only one, Israel, survived.

I survived the “Wild Action” alone. This 'action' claimed the greatest number of victims from Skalat, as well as Jews from the towns of Grzymalow and Podwoloczyska, who were brought to our town. With this slaughter, the systematic mass murder of the Jews in Skalat was begun.

Taped testimony as given to Lusia Milch
by Yoel Ben-Porat, November 1995

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