Resistance

Content Warning: This section mentions wartime violence, death, antisemitism, and the Holocaust.

Chaya Lindner is a 16-year-old Jewish girl working for the Jewish resistance during World War II, in Nazi-occupied Poland. Chaya’s blonde hair and fair skin, as well as the fact that she speaks both Polish and German, allow Chaya to pass as a gentile, facilitating her work as a courier. Chaya is from Krakow and has two younger siblings, Yitzchak and Sara. She is separated from her family in 1940, when she is almost 14, after the German occupation of Poland leads to her family’s relocation to a ghetto and her deportation from the city. Chaya ends up at the Draengers’ farm, where she eventually joins the resistance movement.

Chaya is unquestionably brave, spirited, and determined. She is called upon to join Akiva shortly after she receives news that her sister has been sent to Belzec, an extermination camp, and that her brother has disappeared. Rather than give up hope, Chaya chooses to avenge her siblings and so many others before them. Even after Akiva seemingly disbands, Chaya does not give up, looking for ways to keep contributing to the resistance. When Esther is captured by the Gestapo, Chaya does not hesitate to risk her own life to break Esther out; similarly, when faced with almost-sure death in Warsaw, Chaya says that she has no regrets about coming to the ghetto.