For some Jewish women, ‘passing’ as Christian during the Holocaust could mean survival – but left scars all the same

Some women adopted non-Jewish identities to support the resistance. For most, though, it was simply a strategy for survival – one with constant risk of exposure and execution.

By: Hana Green, College of Charleston, The Conversation

Outlets: The Conversation

Published: January 14, 2026

Words: 1,270

Last Updated: 2 months ago

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By Hana Green, College of Charleston

Travel case in hand, dressed in fashionable clothing and wearing a practiced, coquettish smile, Hela Schüpper Rufeisen sat aboard the train to Warsaw, Poland. No one on board would have suspected that beneath the coat of the young woman were strapped assorted handguns and several cartridge clips.

Schüpper Rufeisen, who was Jewish, relied on this dissonance between appearance and reality to ferry items into, out of and between the …

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