Beginning in 1939, Disna was under the control of the Soviet Union. When the war began between Russia and Germany, on June 22, 1941, Disna was one of the first cities to be occupied by the Nazis. Part of the Jewish population, for the most part young, left their homes and went off into the world to seek a place of refuge.
Most of the Jews, over three thousand people, who were left in Disna, were concentrated in a ghetto by the Germans, which was located on Polotsk Street with the ajoining alleys, and half of Gluboke Street, in Zadisienka. There they lived over 40 people to a house.
At the same time the Nazis gave an order that all Jews should be driven into Disna who had lived in the neighboring villages, and those who had taken up a temporary shelter in the villages with peasants they knew.
When the ghetto was created, the Germans chose five men, headed by Nachum Rochlin (from Plon), as a Jewish Council (Judenrat), on which they placed the obligation to carry out all orders of the German command. In the time of the ghetto Jews had no right to leave the streets mentioned, even to cross the street and go to buy basic goods in the market.
As soon as the murderers had occupied Disna, they burned all the beit-midrashim that they found on the other side of the city, that is, outside the ghetto. All together, six beit-midrashim were burned.
The Jewish population of Disna lived in need and in suffering, and under unhygienic conditions.
The German killers would take men every day, via the Jewish Council, for forced labor, not paying a cent and beating them at their work. They would gather pretty, young girls and oblige them to clean the garbage with their hands. Very often the Germans would demand warm clothing for their army via the Jewish Council, or gold and jewelry. They constantly threatened that if their orders were not carried out, they would take Jewish to be shot.
In the time of the ghetto, the children did not study, as they were not allowed to go to school. In the time of the ghetto there were many who had no way of living. With the help of the Jewish Council the better off woulld get hold of products and divide them among those who had nothing at all. Of course, this was not enough for all the needy, and many of the poverty stricken were starving.
In the year 1942, on the Great Sabbath, the Germans gathered up 30 Jews and shot them, because the son of the regional commissar fell on the front. In the same way many Jews were shot in all the cities and towns which belonged to the Glubok province.
After the murder of the 30 Jews mentioned, rumors spread that in the neighboring towns, such as Prozoroki, Ziavki, and Luzhki, the ghettos had been liquidated. In the Disna ghetto the youth organized groups who stood watch to alert the population to any attack by the German "Sonderkommandos", who were specialized in the destruction of ghettos.
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On the 15th of June 1942, the first day in the month of Tammuz, at 3 AM, people noticed that German gendarmes and poice were surrounding the ghetto. The alarm was given quickly and a tumult began in the ghetto. Much of the population began to run away. Those who did not run away were gathered together by the German murderers on the sand (where there was a cemetery for soldiers who fell in the year 1812), they were obliged to dig two large ditches, into which they were led in groups, stretched out in rows and murdered. They were led out in their underwear, to make sure they had no gold or jewels with them.
Avraham Feikin started running, shooting a revolver at a policeman. But he was shot down as he ran. Tsile Yaktan spat on a German officer and told him that as they shot the Jews, so would they be shot.
And so the Jewish settlement in Disna was liquidated. The youth could not escape from the ghetto before the liquidation, as they were afraid that if they did run away their parents and the whole population would be shot.
