Of the approximately 30,000 Jews who escaped ghettos and work camps and mounted armed resistance against the Nazis during World War II, about one in 10 were women. They weren’t always welcomed by partisan units – women weren’t deemed suitable for fighting – but nonetheless proved crucial to the cause, their work ranging from cooking and nursing to reconnaissance, weapons transport and, yes, combat. 

Sheri Rosenblum, the director of development and outreach for the San Francisco-based Jewish Partisan Educational Foundation, recounts their courage and contributions in an online presentation coinciding with the exhibit Pictures of Resistance: The Wartime Photography of Jewish Partisan Faye Schulman at the Central Library. Schulman was one of the best-known women of the Jewish Resistance, serving as a nurse and providing an extraordinary glimpse into the partisans’ imperiled lives as a photographer. 

Rosenblum holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Judaic Studies from UCLA and Brandeis University, respectively. She studied for two years under renowned Jewish and medieval history scholar Amos Funkenstein, winner of the coveted Israel Prize for History.