Michael Smuss, a survivor of the Warsaw Ghetto in Poland who resisted the Nazis, has died aged 99 in Israel.
He joined the ghetto uprising as a teenager in 1943, helping to make petrol bombs. Taken prisoner, he survived concentration camps and a death march before the end of World War II.
After the war, he became an artist and Holocaust educator. The embassies of Germany and Poland in Israel paid tribute to him on social media.
He repeatedly risked his life during the Holocaust, fighting for survival and helping other prisoners in the Warsaw Ghetto – even after he was captured by the Nazis and deported to concentration camps, the German embassy stated on X.
The Polish embassy said Smuss lectured youth on the history of Polish Jews and expressed his memories through art. His legacy endures.
The Polish embassy and the Holocaust Educational Trust described Smuss as the last surviving fighter of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. However, conflicting reports in 2018 identified Simcha Rotem as the last surviving fighter of the uprising.
Last month, Germany's ambassador to Israel awarded Smuss with the German Federal Cross of Merit, recognizing his contributions to Holocaust education and promoting dialogue between the two countries.
Smuss was born in 1926 in the Free City of Danzig, a city-state now known as Gdansk, Poland. He later moved to Lodz before being deported to the Warsaw Ghetto with his father. Hundreds of thousands of Jews faced poverty, starvation, and disease in the ghetto.
Having been taken outside to work in a factory repairing and repainting helmets, he joined the Jewish Resistance and began making petrol bombs to resist the Nazis when they moved to empty the camp on April 19, 1943.
Smuss described the uprising as the greatest uprising in this war against Germany, which lasted for 28 days. He was captured on April 29.
During his harrowing journey, he witnessed many atrocities, including deaths on a train intended for the Treblinka extermination camp. Eventually, he offered himself for labor to survive the journey.
Smuss eventually returned to Poland, moved to the US, and later relocated to Israel in 1979 to seek help for trauma symptoms. He took up art and spent his life educating others about the Holocaust.
He is survived by his wife.
