Also, according to Ringelblum, there were in Warsaw ALONE some 600 illegal minyanim, groups of Jews praying together throughout the period when any public religious observance was forbidden. Political parties were of course proscribed, as were newspapers or printing of any description. But we now know of more than fifty titles of underground newspapers in Warsaw alone, and most of the political parties continued their clandestine existence. Lastly, the importance of cultural institutions, demonstrate further unarmed resistance. The most famous of these cultural institutions was the Oneg Shabbat group in Warsaw. Founded and headed by Dr. Emanuel Ringleblum, the historian and public figure, it methodically assembled reports and diaries an initiated research in order to preserve documentary evidence of the life of the Jews in the Warsaw ghetto. Despite these examples one must remember that this unarmed Jewish resistance did not occur everywhere. For example, in areas of Eastern Poland that had been annexed by the Soviet Union in 1939, the German murder groups killed off large numbers of young men and members of the intellegentsia immediately or shortly after they occupied these places. In addition, in many places Jewish Gestapo agents denounced others in hopes of saving themselves, this made any form of resistance more difficult.
Lastly, one poignant example of unarmed Jewish resistance is from Auschwitz where a group of inmates calculated when Hanukah would occur. They then lit Hanukah candles in the snow and sang, "Ma Oz Tsur Yeshuati.".
While considering the Nazi intentions, Abba Kovner, a poet and leader of the Zionist movement Hashomer Hatzair, wrote, "Is there a way out? Yes, there is a way out: rebellion and armed resistance." Large scale operations, which Kovner is alluding to in this letter, were mainly dependant on two ingredients: the availability of weapons, and the support of a civilian population capable of aiding underground fighters.
