Pictures from Kosovo during World War II

A German military officer converses with Kosta Pecanac (the pre-war president of the Chetniks) and Dazafer Deva (a collaborator from Kosovo) in Podvjevo.
Group portrait of Yugoslavian Jewish refugees who are living in a prison in Italian-occupied Pristina.

A Jewish family living in a prison cell in Italian-occupied Pristina. Pictured are Majer and Mimi Altarac with their son Jasa.

A few belongings of the Mandil family hang on hooks in the prison cell where they were detained for eight months by the Italians.

Mosa Mandil, a Jewish refugee from Serbia, poses with his son Gavra in the prison cell in which they are living in Italian-occupied Pristina.
After the German invasion in April 1941, the family fled south to the Italian-controlled province of Kosovo. The Mandils were imprisoned along with several other Jewish families in the city of Pristina, where they remained for ten months.

Majer Altarac poses with his son, Jasa, in the courtyard of the prison where they are living in Italian-occupied Pristina.

A document issued by the IV Carbinieri Battalion “Lazio” listing the names of 18 Jewish refugees imprisoned in Pristina who have been authorized to leave by truck for Albania. Among those listed are the three members of the Altarac family and the four members of the Mandil family.


Group portrait of four Jewish and Albanian friends who have come together to attend a wedding. Pictured from left to right are: Neshed Ismail (the groom), Refik Veseli, Mosa Mandil and “Shishko”.

Refik Veseli (right) plays with Irena and Gavra Mandil in the snow during the period in which he hid them at his parents' home in Kruja. The four are on their way to the wedding of Neshed Ismail in the Kosovo Mountains.


Two Jewish refugee children in their cell in the Pristina prison, where they were detained with their families by the Italians for eight months. Pictured are Gavra Mandil (right) and Michael Konforti (left).


Germans set fire to a Serbian village near Kosovska Mitrovica, circa 1941.
Source: USHMM