Passage out of hell:

[superbeets]

[h=1]Passage out of hell: Tunnel dug using spoons and hands by Jewish prisoners to escape Nazi death squads is rediscovered at site of mass execution[/h]

• 100,000 Jews, Polish prisoners and Soviet POWs were murdered at Ponary
• Small group of 80 Jewish prisoners were forced to dig up and burn bodies
• But the prisoners dug a 114 feet long tunnel from the pit they were held in
• New scanning technology has for first time revealed the tunnel they used

By RICHARD GRAY FOR MAILONLINE
PUBLISHED: 12:32, 29 June 2016 | UPDATED: 13:55, 29 June 2016

 

[superbeets]

It was one of the most horrific acts of World War Two – the massacre of 100,000 Jews, Polish intellectuals and Russian prisoners of war in the woods around a popular rural holiday resort.
Yet a small group of prisoners were able to escape the Nazi death squads in Ponary, just six miles to the south of the city of the Vilnius, now the capital of Lithuania, by digging their way to freedom.
For the first time since 40 emaciated and traumatised prisoners alluded their Nazi captors, the tunnel they used to escape has been rediscovered.

Archaeologists have used new scanning techniques to reveal the location of a tunnel dug by a group of Jewish prisoners to escape a pit they were imprisoned in at the site of a notorious massacre by the Nazis. The scans reveal the narrow passage (pictured above), dug using spoons and their hands, for the first time since the war

New scanning techniques have allowed archaeologists to find the escape tunnel – more than 114 feet (35m) in length – that enabled the prisoners to break out of the pit they were held in.

 

[superbeets]

The Jewish prisoners were part of a so-called 'Burning Brigade' formed of prisoners from the Stutthof concentration camp, close to Sztutowo, in Poland.


They were forced to dig up the bodies of those that had been shot and piled into mass graves since the Nazi occupation began in July 1941 in a desperate attempt by the Nazis to cover up their crimes.

Around 70,000 Jews from Vilnius and the surrounding area had been marched into the woods, stripped, shot and dumped in giant pits there.

Later Polish academics, priests and resistance fighters were also massacred there while around 7,500 Soviet POWs were also killed there.


The Burning Brigade were tasked with digging up and burning their remains in 1943 as Soviet troops advanced on the area.
After months of this horrific work and as they neared the end of their task, the prisoners feared they too would be killed.

They were imprisoned in one of the giant pits that had been dug for oil storage by the Soviets before the Nazis overran the area.
Using spoons and finger nails they worked for three months to scrape out a narrow tunnel leading out of the pit.

On 15 April 1944 they cut their leg shackles with a nail file and 40 of them crawled through the tunnel but many were discovered before they reached the fence.

 

[superbeets]

[h=3]THE PONARY MASSACRE[/h]The tranquil woods of Ponary on the outskirts of Vilnius in Lithuania were the site of one of the most horrific episodes during World War Two.


The Nazi SS units formed death squads that rounded up Jews from the Vilnius ghetto and marched them into the woods where they were shot.


Many were stripped and made to stand looking down into the pits onto the bodies already in pits.


The death squads, aided by Lithuanian volunteers, also murdered around 7,500 Soviet POWs, who were among the first victims at Ponary in 1941.


Later Polish academics, teachers, artists and priests were also murdered at the site.


As Soviet troops advanced on the site towards the end of the war, prisoners from the Stuffhof concentration camp were formed into units to dig up the bodies and burn them.


The ashes were ground up, mixed with sand and buried.


Eleven of the 80 prisoners tasked with this managed to escape and their testimony was crucial to revealing what had haoppeend at the site.

 

[superbeets]

• SHARE PICTURE

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Jewish prisoners were lined up in killing pits in the forest at Ponary (pictured) before being shot and buried. Later prisoners were forced to dig up the bodies and burn them in an attempt to hide the crimes

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The Jewish prisoners were held in a pit (pictured) while they spent months digging up and burning the bodies of those who had been murdered by Nazi death squads in the forest outside Vilnius

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The archaeologists used a technique known as electric resistivity tomography (pictured) where the electrical resistance of the earth on a site is measured to reveal underground structures. They found the 114 feet long tunnel stretching from the pit towards where the perimeter fence had once been

 

[superbeets]

Just 15 managed to cut through the fence and escape into the forest and only 11 of them survived to reach partisan forces and live out the rest of the war.
Dr Jon Seligman, a researcher with the Israel Antiquities Authority who has been leading the work to search for the escape tunnel, said: 'As an Israeli whose family originated in Lithuania, I was reduced to tears on the discovery of the escape tunnel at Ponary.
'This discovery is a heartwarming witness to the victory of hope over desperation.
'The exposure of the tunnel enables us to present, not only the horrors of the Holocaust, but also the yearning for life.'

 

[superbeets]

 

[ScottL]

"You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to superbeets again."

 

[GasMan]

And fuck head Guesser compares Trump to these Nazis, and gives a lifetime pass to an idiot comparing Trump to the holocaust.

Epic fail by an epic failure.

 

[festeringZit]

And fuck head Guesser compares Trump to these Nazis, and gives a lifetime pass to an idiot comparing Trump to the holocaust.

Epic fail by an epic failure.

Nailed it