Obstacles to Jewish and non-Jewish Resistance
It is important to remember all the factors that made resistance to the Nazis both difficult and extremely dangerous. Some of the most formidable obstacles were:

Jewish Partisans humg in Minsk, October 1941.
The girl is 17-year-old Masha Bruskina

• The superior, armed power of the Germans: If nations such as Poland, France and others were unable to withstand attack by the German military machine, imagine the impossiblility of the task for unarmed civilians.
• The German tactic of collective responsibility: The Nazis had a policy of holding whole communities responsible for individual actions of defiance or rebellion. For example, the entire population of the Dolhyhnov ghetto in Lithuania was killed because two small boys escaped from it. At the camp of Treblinka guards shot 26 prisoners after 4 others escaped in the winter of 1942; also at Treblinka 160 Jews were executed after one man managed to kill a Nazi officer there.
• The isolation of Jews and their lack of weapons: Even when Jews had the will to resist, they faced tremendous practical obstacles to doing so. They had little or no access to weapons, food or hiding places and almost everywhere in Europe it was impossible for them to ‘blend in’ with the local non-Jewish population. Because of the deportations, they were usually foreigners in the places where they were, spoke different languages and looked different, including having shaved heads and/or wearing rags or camp uniforms. Apart from this, most local populations were unwilling to help Jews because they were antisemitic themselves, or too terrified of being shot by the Nazis for doing so.
• The secrecy and speed of deportations and other actions against the Jews: The Nazis deliberately used deception, secrecy and great speed to carry out actions against the Jews, in order to prevent or impede resistance. Deportees were told to pack suitcases for their “resettlement” (directly into the extermination camps) and given blocks of “soap” (made of stones) when they were herded into the “showers” (gas chambers). Millions of victims had no idea where they were being sent or they would not have ‘agreed’ to go there without a major struggle. As late as summer 1944 almost 500 000 Hungarian Jews were deported to a place they had never heard of. Its name was Auschwitz.