Partisans

A young rabbi escapes a nazi ghetto to join partisan fighters in the forest and take revenge. Instead, he is made religious leader of the brigade in this historically accurate portrayal of the Bielski Partisans and the largest armed rescue of Jews by other Jews during The Holocaust.

GENRE: War. Holocaust. True Events. Historical Fiction.

Jacob Stein studies to become a rabbi as the Nazis invade Poland. Soon he is a slave, making saddles and cleaning corpses from the streets. When Jake escapes the ghetto to the safety of the surrounding forest, he joins the Bielski Partisans, determined to avenge his loved ones and fight back.

But Tuvia Bielski, military leader of the all-Jewish fighting unit under Soviet command, does not see another soldier when Jake arrives. Instead, he makes Jake a religious leader.

Tuvia, via a combination of brilliant military tactics, political savvy, marksmanship, language skills, sheer guts, and just plain luck — or is it divine intervention? — eludes massive Nazi manhunts, assassinates collaborating politicians and quislings, raids Nazi supply trains, destroys enemy food supplies, builds a hidden village in the forest and in the process rescues over 1400 Jews from certain death in Nazi ghettos.

Bielski arms those who escape the ghetto, trains them to fight, and helps the children, sick and elderly among them survive the harsh winters in the dense forests of Eastern Poland.

Woven into these historical events is the story of Jake and his fiancé, Helen both of whom escape Nazi ghettos and death camps, then find refuge in Bielksi’s military unit where the culture is Jewish, but also distinctly partisan: Women are treated as property; rank confers privilege; and violence is the first tool employed by those in power.

The story forces the reader to confront a question that pervades all tales of human suffering: when, if ever, do the ends justify the means?

Scriptapalooza. Semi-Finalist – 2007