O earth, cover not thou my blood, and let my cry have no place…

(The Book of Job, 16:18)

Bełżec (Gem. Sonderkommando Belzec der Waffen-SS, Pol. Bełżec) is a Nazi concentration camp near the village of the same name in Poland, about 70 kilometers northwest of Lviv and immediately after crossing the modern Ukrainian-Polish border. Initially, in 1939, the Nazis founded a working concentration camp in Bełżec. As of August 1940, the number of prisoners was 11 000: Roma, Jews and other nationalities from Radom, Lublin, Warsaw and their environs. Since November 1941, the construction of the death camp, including gas chambers, was begun. On March 17, 1942, three gas chambers began to operate in the framework of the beginning of the Operation Reinhardt, a component of the so-called “final solution of the Jewish question”. Jews deported from Lublin and Lviv were the first victims of the death camp. In the first four weeks, almost 80 000 people were killed in Bełżec. Deportations with further extermination continued until November 1942. A significant proportion of the camp victims were Jews from Lviv and other Ukrainian cities of Galicia. So, only during August 1942, more than 50 000 Lviv Jews were sent to the camp.

According to researchers’ estimates, between 450 000 and 600 000 Jews and nearly 2000 Roma were killed in Bełżec. In 2000, the British intelligence service declassified the content of a number of Nazi documents related to the death camp activities. In particular, the number of 434 508 Jews killed in the camp was indicated in a telegram from the commander of the SS and Lublin police Hermann (Julius) Höfle to Adolf Eichmann about the progress of the Operation Reinhardt until 31.12.1942. However, there is reason to believe that this number was underestimated, because it is not clear whether Jews who died on the way to the camp were counted here, as well as from what period the victim registration was carried out.

The area of the death camp in Bełżec was several hectares, and it was one of the largest Nazi “death factories” during World War II. In early 1943, the killers thoroughly destroyed the bodies of the victims, as well as any traces of the camp functioning.

Since 2004, the symbolic Place of Remembrance, which includes a museum exhibition, has been located at the crime scene.