Lisa Magon — Association of Jews of Vilna and vicinity in Israel

Lisa (Lize) Magon January 01, 1920, Vilna - February 17, 1943 – Ponar

Lisa Magon was a member of the underground organization called the FPO - United Partisans Organization in the Vilna Ghetto. Her mission was to warn the Jews in the Ashmiani ghetto of the impending Aktion; she became a significant link in the relations between the Judenrat and the underground in the Vilna Ghetto. The FPO commemorated her memory by including her name in the slogan calling to fight, and the first weapon obtained by members of the underground in the Vilna Ghetto was named after her.

She was born on January 01, 1920 in Vilna. She was a member of the pioneering training kibbutz "Ha'bokeah" and a trainee in the "Mishmar HaEmek" battalion of Hashomer Hatzair. She managed the branch in Vilna and mentored young trainees of the movement. After Vilna's occupation on June 25, 1941, the Jews, including members of the Shomer ha-Tsa'ir youth movement, tried to escape to the east, but were captured; most of them were sent to labor camps. The rest were transferred to the city ghetto. Magon, a member of the FPO was equipped with forged documents due to her Aryan appearance and resided on the Aryan side. Although she had Polish acquaintances and a safe place, she decided to return to the ghetto to be with her friends and acquaintances. When the underground began to organize its armed revolt, she became a courier (kasharit) for the underground and conveyed the idea of ​​the revolt from city to city.

About 4,000 Jews from the city and the surrounding area were concentrated in the Ashmiani ghetto, most of them women, the elderly and children. At the order of the Germans, Yaakov Gens, chief of the Jewish police and head of the Judenrat in the Vilna Ghetto, sent the Jewish police from the Vilna ghetto to the Ashmiani ghetto to conduct a selection and hand over 1,500 children and women to the Germans. Since an underground organization did not exist in Ashmiani which could be updated on the matter, Magon was ordered by her headquarters to go there under her Aryan appearance and warn the Jews of the Aktion about to take place, make it clear to them that this meant death, and organize the youth to go to the forests and call for resistance. She managed to enter the ghetto and tried to organize the Jews there to escape, but they did not believe her. During the Aktion in Ashmiani, Magon met with youth groups and incited them to flee to the forest. Thanks to this, groups of young people fled to the forest; she herself returned to the Vilna Ghetto. Upon her return she became the main FPO courier. As a courier, she would go out without the yellow badge, with a Polish certificate in her pocket that could have resulted in her being detained by the Germans, but she did not hesitate to take on life-threatening tasks.

In her new role, and disguised as an Aryan, she applied to the German police to obtain a new certificate. It is possible that someone tipped them off and that day she was arrested by a Lithuanian policeman. She was taken to the Gestapo and imprisoned in the basements where she was constantly interrogated, but never revealed anything. After a week of torture, she was transferred to Lukiškės prison. The headquarters tried to free her by using their contacts and bribes, but all efforts were in vain. In a handwritten note smuggled out of the Gestapo prison, she wrote to Abba Kovner:

Dear Abba, my situation and my chances are now clear to me. But it's hard for me to come to terms with the idea that I'll be led to Ponar. I'm calm. I know for what I am giving up my soul. I know you are doing everything to obtain my release, but now everything is lost. I think about and worry about Adek (a code name for the Bialystok ghetto). Send my greetings to all my comrades. I shake your hands. Be strong and of good courage. Yours, Lisa.

She was shot dead in Ponar on February 17, 1943. She was 23 years old.

Upon her death, her name began to be used in a number of cases. First, the FPO's recruiting slogan was "Liza Ruft!" ("Lisa Calls"). At these words, every member of the organization had to reach his designated position. On the thirtieth day of her death, Baruch Goldstein pulled out a machine gun from a German bunker - the first weapon obtained by members of the underground - and managed to bring it into the Vilna Ghetto. The gun was nicknamed "Lisa." On March 17, 1944, Abba Kovner wrote the book A Missive to Hashomair Hazair Partisans, and at the end he mentioned her name in the "Yizkor" (In Memory) - a list in memory of his fallen friends. Lisa Magon is described in the book with admiration and pain, as a dedicated fighter who moved to the ghetto to dedicate herself to the idea of ​​defense and revenge. In his testimony at the Eichmann trial, Abba Kovner told her story - about her mission to warn the Jews of the Ashmiani ghetto of the Aktion, and her heroic death in Ponar.

From: Wikipedia