The old brick wall on Okopowa Street catches the eye, and the discreet entrance opposite the corner of Anielewicza tells you you've arrived. The black door metal at number 49 is rarely wide open, and few know what they can find beyond the wall.

The Jewish cemetery on Okopowa Street in Warsaw established in 1806 (known as the cemetery on Gęsia before World War II), the largest Jewish cemetery in the capital city of Poland, and one of the largest Jewish cemeteries in the world, was closed during World War II. After the war it was reopened and a small part of it remained active, serving Warsaw's existing Jewish population.

The Jewish cemetery beyond the brick wall covers 33 hectares and contains more than 250,000 marked graves, as well as mass graves of Warsaw ghetto victims, so the map at the entrance is welcome.

As soon as you enter you notice the original gate, renovated in 1998, then, as you walk along the nearby alleys, you enter the atmosphere of a Jewish necropolis: a series of tombs, shrines and mausoleums, marble, and sandstone gravestones, simply marked or carved, decorated with symbols and ornaments.

From the establishment of the Warsaw Ghetto until July 1942, some 92,000 people died or were killed there. Many of them were buried in an unmarked grave in the cemetery on Okopowa Street.

A commemorative complex marks Warsaw Ghetto mass graves at the Jewish cemetery. The complex, consisting of two fields of broken stones, symbolizes the thousands of murdered Jews and the symbol of lives cut short is represented by an openwork monument with stones suspended in the air, arranged in the form of a broken column.

As you move away from the main alley and into the forest, the landscape changes, and the long-abandoned, moss-covered gravestones and tombstones share the place with nature, for here is one of the largest wild forests in the city. Somewhere, deep in the forest, nature becomes the master of the place again.

As you walk along the alleys, you have the feeling that you have been there before, that the next alley is a replica of the one before: the remaining tombstones, gnawed by tears and time, are lost among the tall trees, among the ferns that hide from the sun or are covered with vines climbing up to the sky. But each stone is part of history, part of the archive, and has something to reveal.

It's quiet, only nature is undulating, with the rustle of leaves carried by the wind, and the cry of birds in flight. It's their territory now. For no one knows anyone here anymore...

Towards the exit of the cemetery, a monument catches the eye. The white rose calls to silence.

The monument depicts Janusz Korczak with the children from the ghetto orphanage. Nicknamed the "King of Children", Janusz Korczak, Polish pediatrician, and teacher, Jewish national, children's rights advocate, writer, and radio broadcaster in pre-war Poland, forcibly removed to the Warsaw ghetto, is known today for bravely moving (despite being offered amnesty) with 200 orphans to Umschlagplatz, the site in the Warsaw ghetto where most Jews were rounded up for deportation to the Treblinka extermination camp.

At the exit, near the outer wall, there is the Monument to the Memory of Children - Victims of the Holocaust, founded by Jacek Eisner (Holocaust survivor from the Warsaw ghetto).

The view from beyond the wall on Okopowa Street with the block of flats seemingly rising out of nowhere and the noise of the cars, wakes you up to reality. It's life on the other side…

In many other places in Poland, during World War II, Jewish cemeteries were destroyed, and the stones were used as road-building material. Although the cemetery on Okopowa Street survived this, the cemetery was partially demolished as it was used for mass executions and burials of victims of the Warsaw Ghetto, and the Warsaw Uprising of 1944, and all Jewish archives in Warsaw were destroyed.

The Warsaw Jewish cemetery was recognized as a historical monument in 1973 and today, in addition to being actively used for burials, the cemetery is an important source of heritage for the local Jewish community. Here is the final resting place of many prominent clergymen, politicians, spiritual leaders, soldiers, scientists, industrialists, writers, social activists, and many others. Alongside its historical value, the necropolis on Okopowa Street also has great artistic value as a place where many sculptures, artworks, and craftsmanship of many famous artists can be found.

In recent years, restoration work has been carried out on the retaining wall opposite the entrance to the cemetery, some of the tombstones have been subjected to conservation, and areas of the cemetery have undergone archaeological work, the purpose of which was to remove the layer of humus created by leaves that had not been touched for decades.

The information on the gravestones is often used in genealogical research, the cemetery is considered the last remaining archive.

The photos were taken in August 2023 in the Jewish cemetery on Okopowa Street in Warsaw, Poland.