Holocaust by Bullets is a non-fiction account of the search for the mass grave sites of the Jewish population who were executed in the Ukraine during World War Two, by mobile units of Nazi operatives. The book's author, Father Patrick Desbois, is Secretary to the French Conference of Bishops for Relations with Judaism, adviser to the Cardinal-Archbishop of Lyon, and adviser to the Vatican on the Jewish religion; he is a much respected figure within both the Christian and Jewish churches and is known for bridging the two churches with peace and calm. He is also an honoree of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum for the work that he documents in this book, that of honoring the memory of the Holocaust victims in the Ukraine.
Father Desbois first became interested in the story of the Ukrainian Jews when he listened to his Grandfather reminiscing about what he had witnessed when held as a prisoner of war in the Rawa-Ruska forced labor camp in the Ukraine. His Grandfather told of seeing the Nazis commit mass shootings and the burial of murdered Jewish Ukrainians in unmarked mass graves. Desbois determined to investigate and uncover much of this unknown atrocity and ultimately shed light on the murder of over 1.5 million Ukrainian Jews that occurred in four short years between 1941 and 1944. This extermination was largely forgotten partly because there was no "liberation" that provided allied witnesses, as there had been in the liberation of the German and Polish camps, but was witnessed primarily by local Ukranians who were complicit in enabling this holocaust to continue unremarked upon.
Father Desbois utilized the most modern forensics, documented eyewitness testimony and went through village archives with a fine-toothed comb in order to write the first full documented account of what really happened to the Jewish population of the Ukraine in the years of Nazi abuse of power. For this, he was recognized with the B'Nai B'rith International Award for Outstanding Contribution to Relations with the Jewish People.
