Judy Batalion about women resistance in Hitler’s ghettos

Judy Batalion talked about her well-received book, which has already been translated into over 40 languages and has been published in a young readers’ edition . “The Light of Days” is already optioned as a motion picture by Steven Spielberg for whom Judy Batalion is co-writing the screenplay.

„The Light of Days” is the result of scientific research about heroic Jewish women conducted by the author in the British Library. During her research, Judy accidently came across a Yiddish book titled „Freuen in di Ghettos” (Women in Ghettos). This thriller about „the ghetto girls” became a direct inspiration for “The Light of Days”.

This non-fiction book brings to light the extraordinary accomplishments of brave Jewish women who became resistance fighters in Poland during WWII. Witnesses to the brutal murder of their families and neighbors and the violent destruction of their communities, a cadre of Jewish women in Poland—some still in their teens—helped transform the Jewish youth groups into resistance cells to fight the Nazis. With courage, guile, and nerves of steel, these “ghetto girls” paid off Gestapo guards, hid revolvers in loaves of bread and jars of marmalade, and helped build systems of underground bunkers. They flirted with German soldiers, bribed them with wine, whiskey, and home cooking, used their Aryan looks to seduce them, and shot and killed them. They bombed German train lines and blew up a town’s water supply. They also nursed the sick, taught children, and hid families. Many of them ended up in Gestapo torture rooms and concentration camps, only a few survived the hell of WWII.

“These women did what they could. They fought for dignity. Every little act can lead to change – and that’s what’s so inspiring,” said Judy Batalion when asked what message today’s readers can find in the story of Jewish women fighters.