Beatification for Polish Family Murdered By Nazis WW2 For Sheltering Jews, Also Murdered

Beatification for Polish family murdered for sheltering Jews, BBC News, Sept. 10, 2023.

A beatification Mass service has been held in Poland for a Catholic family murdered by Nazis for hiding Jews during World War Two. Poland's president and more than 30,000 pilgrims attended the outdoor service, led by Pope Francis' envoy. This was the first time an entire family has been beatified, a great honour and a step towards sainthood.

They were executed in 1944 with the Jews they sheltered in south-eastern Poland, after they were betrayed. In late 1942, motivated by their Christian values, farmers Jozef and Wiktoria Ulma and their six young children - Stanislawa, Barbara, Maria, Wladyslaw, Franciszek and Antoni - hid eight Jews in their farmhouse in the village of Markowa

Saul Goldman, 70, was hiding with his sons Baruch, Mechel, Joachim and Mojzesz. Also there was Golda Grunfeld and her sister Lea Didner with her daughter Reszla, according to Poland's state Institute of National Remembrance. Unlike in Nazi-occupied western Europe, the penalty for aiding Jews in occupied Poland was summary execution.

In 1944 a Polish police officer is thought to have betrayed the family by informing the Nazis of their secret.

German gendarmes shot the Jews hiding in the attic and then took the Ulma family outside, shooting Jozef and Wiktoria, who was seven months pregnant at the time, in front of their young children - the oldest was eight, the youngest 18 months. The children were then shot dead. Several months later, members of the Polish underground resistance executed the police officer who is believed to have denounced the family...

- More, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66768915