Szmalcownik
Szmalcownik (); in English, also sometimes spelled shmaltsovnik) is a pejorative Polish slang expression that originated during the Holocaust in Poland in World War II and refers to a person who blackmailed Jews who were in hiding, or who blackmailed Poles who aided Jews, during the German occupation. By stripping Jews of their financial resources, blackmailers added substantially to the danger that Jews and their rescuers faced and increased their chances of being caught and killed. In the capital of Poland, Warsaw, some 3,000–4,000 people acted as blackmailers and informants. In the summer of 1942, Żegota, a Polish underground organization dedicated to aiding the Jews, requested that the Polish Underground State intensify its efforts to stop the "blackmailer plague". In the summer of 1943, the Home Army began carrying out death sentences for szmalcowniks in occupied Poland, executing more than a dozen by the end of the war. The number and effect of these executions is disputed. A number of szmalcowniks were also tried in Poland after the war. The phenomenon of blackmailing Jews during the Holocaust was not unique to Poland, and occurred throughout occupied Europe. Etymology The term comes from the German word Schmalz (Polish phonetic spelling: szmalc, literally meaning "lard") and indicated the blackmailer's financial motive, i.e. the bribe to be paid by the victim. It originated in criminal jargon. Literally, therefore, szmalcownik can be translated as a greasy-palmer. In English, the term is often used as a synonym of blackmailer, but in Polish works, based on the wartime parlance, a distinction is sometimes made between szmalcowniks, who acted more like one-time muggers, accosting their victims on the street and demanding a bribe, and the more dangerous blackmailers, who tracked their victims to their hiding places and demanded everything they had. The term is also sometimes described in English as a bounty hunter, as the Germans offered financial rewards, described as bounties, for turning in the Jews. Demographics Szmalcowniks came from diverse backgrounds. About three-quarters were ethnic Poles, but members of the German, Ukrainian and Lithuanian minorities – and in some cases even Jews – were also engaged in blackmailing. Most known szmalcowniks were men aged 25–40. Some were collaborating with the Gestapo or other German officials, or with the Polish Blue Police, in addition to blackmailing. Recent research suggests that contrary to popular belief, szmalcowniks were not necessarily habitual criminals before the war; out of 200 individuals tried by German courts in Warsaw between 1940 and 1943, only 11 involved pre-war criminals. According to Jan Grabowski, "there are mentions of szmalcowniki in all of the accounts by Jews hiding on the 'Aryan side' of Warsaw. The sheer number of mentions is a direct (though difficult to quantify) evidence of the prevalence of this practice." Gunnar S. Paulsson estimates the total number of szmalcowniks in Warsaw at "as high as 3–4 thousand", targeting the Jewish community (in hiding on the "Aryan" side, outside the Warsaw Ghetto) of about 28,000 and their gentile helpers, who numbered about 70,000–90,000,