Were Ukrainians Nazis?
Simon Wiesenthal
What Happened in Lviv?
Nazi Propaganda Film
Collective Guilt
Paralysis of the Comparative
Function
60 Minutes' Cheap Shots
Ukrainian Anti-Semitism
Jewish Ukrainophobia
Mailbag
A Sense of Responsibility
What 60 Minutes Should Do
PostScript
Nazi Propaganda Film
Historical documentary footage was shown to 60 Minutes viewers and identified as Ukrainians
abusing Jews, and the impression was created that German cameramen happened to come across these
spontaneous outrages and filmed them as they were taking place. This too is a falsification.
The truth is that when the Germans entered Lviv, they made a propaganda film - they gathered up
a handful of street thugs and staged scenes in which mistresses of the recently-fled NKVD were
stripped and "wallowed in the gutter" and collaborators of the recently-fled Communist regime,
some of whom were probably Jewish, were humiliated and roughed up in the street. That several
of the victims are shown naked or half-naked suggests that this was just such a humiliation, and
not an arrest. Certainly, as German cameramen were present, the action must have taken place
after the arrival of the Germans, and as German soldiers are seen to be in attendance, the
action cannot be viewed as having been initiated by Ukrainians. And neither can the action be
interpreted as a pogrom, as the civilians are unarmed and no wounding or killing is recorded; in
fact, in footage 60 Minutes chose not to show, the women can be seen dressing themselves and
leaving the scene:
Several women suspected for collaborating with the NKVD were rounded up by
street gangs organized by the Nazis, stripped naked, then thrown into the
gutters in front of the prison. The event lasted for a few hours.
"While the public humiliation of any female is deplorable, the other photos
in the series show that these women left the scene intact" ... says Katelynksy.
"Moreover," he adds, "this staged outburst of revenge was mild compared
with the "bloody reprisals of the liberated French."
"In 1944 and 1945, countless women were publicly humiliated and over 15,000
of their compatriots were tortured, hanged, or shot for Nazi collaboration in
France. Yet the photographs of these bloody events are, for reasons of
sensitivity, not published by the Western press and the events are rarely
mentioned by historians." (Ukrainian News, Edmonton, March 1993, No. 3)
In short, some and possibly all of the historical footage broadcast by 60 Minutes was not the
Ukrainian populace spontaneously attacking Jews, but rather was street criminals directed by the
Germans to rough up Communist collaborators among whom were probably Jews. It is, therefore,
misleading to represent the scenes as either spontaneous in origin or initiated by Ukrainians or
motivated by Ukrainian anti-Semitism.
What must be kept in mind is that the Nazis had their reasons for making this film: (1) they
were trying to convince Germans back home that Nazi attitudes toward Bolsheviks and Jews were
not uniquely German, but rather were universal; (2) they were demonstrating to the intimidated
Ukrainian population that Bolsheviks and Jews need no longer be feared and that they could be
attacked with impunity; and (3) they were taking a first step toward dragging a handful of
Ukrainians into complicitous guilt.
Bodies on the Ground
One photograph inserted into the middle of these "remnants of a film" was of bodies lying in
rows on the ground. Of course Morley Safer does not identify the photograph - he does not
attribute it to a source, he mentions no date or place. As the photograph is being shown, Mr.
Safer is saying that Simon Wiesenthal "remembers that even before the Germans arrived, Ukrainian
police went on a three-day killing spree." The impression left in the viewer's mind, therefore,
is that these must be some of the 5,000 to 6,000 victims of that killing spree.
Three details of this photograph, however, suggest otherwise: (1) The bodies are shown lying in
snow, whereas the killing spree was supposed to have taken place in the three days before the
German occupation of Lviv on June 30, 1941. (2) The legs of one of the bodies are visible, and
these legs are skeletally thin, which suggests a famine victim and not the victim of a pogrom,
or else suggests that this is an exhumed corpse. If these are in reality famine victims, then
they are more likely to be Ukrainians than Jews. (3) Most of the shapes on the ground resemble
small heaps rather than bodies, which suggests that the photograph is one of exhumed remains
from some old mass grave - and we may reflect that in June 1941 (if that was when this
photograph was taken), the inhabitants of Ukraine's many mass graves were predominantly
Ukrainians and not Jews. Thus, there is a very real possibility that Morley Safer is using a
photograph of Ukrainians killed by Jews as evidence of Jews killed by Ukrainians.
The Wallowing Photograph
The last scene of this Nazi propaganda footage that was presented by Morley Safer has a
