Stefania, her sister, the Diamants, and the other Jews are in a life-or-death situation due to the Nazis. Nazi stands for National Socialist German Workers’ Party, yet the Nazis weren’t socialist as we define it today. The ideology of the Nazi Party shifted over time based on current conditions. In The Rise of the Third Reich (Penguin 2005), the historian Richard J. Evans says the Nazis’ all-powerful leader, Adolf Hitler, achieved success “by telling his audiences what they wanted to hear” (171). Evans argues Hitler “reduced Germany’s complex social, political, and economic problems to a simple common denominator: the evil machinations of the Jews” (172). Nazis made Jews like the Diamants scapegoats for the world’s ills.

After taking over territories with begrudging acceptance from the international community, Hitler invaded Stefania’s country Poland in 1939. He made a pragmatic deal with communist Russia—led by the all-powerful Joseph Stalin—so Russia took over Stefania’s side of Przemyśl. The invasion of Poland launched World War II, and Hitler quickly occupied other countries, like France. In 1941, Hitler declared war on Russia and took over Stefania’s side of the city. This takeover led to the creation of a ghetto to segregate the Jews within a walled-up or fenced section of the city.