Key Points
Location
Bełżec was located in southeastern Poland, near the village of the same name, approximately 70 kilometers (about 43 miles) from Lviv, Ukraine. In 1940, the Germans established a string of labor camps along the Bug (Buh) River. Until the German invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941, the Bug River formed the demarcation line between German- and Soviet-occupied Poland. The choice of location was dictated by good rail connections. Also, Belzec was relatively close to cities and towns with significant Jewish populations. Among these towns were Lublin and Lvov.
Establishment
The camp, the first killing center to implement Operation Reinhard (Aktion Reinhard), was established in March 1942 as part of Operation Reinhard. The Nazis initially deployed local Poles to build the camp’s barracks, but these workers were eventually replaced by Jewish forced laborers, many of them skilled carpenters. German officials then brought in the first transports of Jewish prisoners. These prisoners were gassed in a series of experimental gassings as a means to the efficiency and efficacy of the killing process. Victims of the last experimental gassings included the Jewish forced laborers engaged in the construction of the camp.
Mass Extermination
These initial gassings mirrored the killing centers of the T4 (“euthanasia”) program. The killings were conducted with bottled, chemically produced carbon monoxide gas. The first commandant of Bełżec, Christian Wirth, had experience as a T4 operative. Wirth had also viewed gassings conducted in gas vans at the Chełmno death camp. Based on his observations, he ordered a self-contained gassing installation that employed carbon monoxide gas generated from the exhaust of a large automotive engine. It was this gassing technique, used in stationary gas chambers, that would be replicated in the other Operation Reinhard camps. Bełżec operated from March 1942 until June 1943. It is estimated that around 434,500 people were murdered there, primarily Jews from Poland, but also Roma and other victims
Operation
All arriving Jews disembarked from the trains at a platform in the reception zone. They were informed by the SS that they had arrived at a transit camp. To ready them for the communal shower, the Sonderkommando separated women and children were from men. The disrobed new arrivals were forced to run along a fenced-off path to the gas chambers, leaving them no time to absorb where they were. The process was conducted as quickly as possible amid constant screaming by the SS. The bodies were then disposed of in mass graves.
Destruction of Evidence
As the war came to a close, the Nazis attempted to destroy evidence of their crimes. In 1943, they dismantled the camp and planted trees over the mass graves to hide the evidence of mass murder. By late spring 1943, Jewish forced laborers, guarded by the SS and police and their auxiliaries, had completed the task of exhuming and burning the bodies. They had also dismantled the camp. In June 1943, the camp was liquidated and the Jewish forced laborers were either shot in Belzec or deported to the Sobibor killing center to be gassed. The area of the camp was plowed over and turned into a farm with one of the Ukrainian guards was made the farmer.
