Польшаның Дэмбица қаласы: тарихы мен көлік торабы

Dębica (; Dembitz) is a town in southeastern Poland with 44,692 inhabitants as of December 2021. In result, the city has now a direct highway connection with the western Polish border and in consequence with all of Western Europe. A car journey to Kraków (approximately 120 km) takes around an hour, while Rzeszów, the capital of the Podkarpackie Voivodeship located to the East of Dębica, can be easily reached in less than 30 minutes. Dębica is also located by the 94 country road, which was formerly part of the European route E40. This two lane road has been renovated in recent years. However, with the completion of the A4 highway, it lost its former significance. Dębica is also connected with the cities of Mielec and Tarnobrzeg thanks to the local road number 985. Dębica is situated along a vital railway line that spans from the western to the eastern borders of Poland. This line supports train speeds of up to 160 km/h, enabling the fastest Express InterCity Premium trains to reach Krakow in just over an hour. Between 1988 and 1990 Dębica was connected with Straszęcin by a trolleybus line.

One of the oldest documented references to this area dates back to the year 1293. It records a settlement by the name of Dambicha, belonging to the noble Gryfita family. In 1305, the village was raided by the Tatars, who burned a wooden church. The church was rebuilt in 1318, and by 1325, Dębica was the seat of a deanery, located on the outskirts of the mighty Sandomierz Forest. The Dębica Deanery consisted of fourteen parishes, among them Przecław, Sędziszów Małopolski, and Strzyżów. In 1358 King Casimir III the Great gave a local nobleman Świętosław Gryfita permission to found a town, and Dębica received town rights, together with a privilege to organize weekly markets on Wednesdays. The Germans created a ghetto for the town's Jewish population, eventually killing most of them either on the spot or in the Auschwitz concentration camp. In the forested hills south of the town, strong Polish underground forces operated, with numerous units of the Home Army (AK). It was too dangerous for AK officers to stay in Dębica, thus the headquarters of a local underground district (known as Deser) were located at a nearby village of Gumniska, located in the hilly area south of the town. Resistance fighters were very active here, often attacking the main Kraków Lwów rail line, used by German troops. In early 1944, units of the local Armia Krajowa district unsuccessfully tried to blow up a train with Hans Frank, which was passing through the village station at Czarna Tarnowska, some west of Dębica. As a reprisal, on February 2, 1944, the Germans murdered 50 Poles by the rail track in Dębica (also see Otto Schimek). On the outskirts of Dębica, near the villages of Pustków and Blizna and several neighboring ones, the Germans established a massive military base called Heidelager in the fall of 1941, which included the Blizna V 2 missile launch site for weapons testing, and the training of new Ukrainian collaborationist military formations including the SS Galizien Division. It is estimated that over the duration of the SS Heidelager training base operation, some 15,000 slave labour prisoners perished there, including 7,500 Jews, 5,000 Soviet POWs, and 2,500 Poles, on top of an estimated 1,000 Soviet soldiers who died in the area during the Nazi Soviet war. Their remains are buried in the cemetery along the road to Pustków Drips. Originally, the cemetery was located inside the ring IV (Dąbrówki). Later, the graves of soldiers were exhumed and moved. A Russian colonel killed in the fighting is buried in one of the tombs. Implicated in war crimes was SS man Alois Kurz (ID 382378) who, from 1940 to 21 April 1941, served in the SS Regiment Westland, then was assigned to a construction battalion for the SS training ground and labor camp serving the SS Truppenubungsplatz Heidelager in Pustków. Also implicated in war crimes was Wilhelm Schitli, commander of the "Jewish camp" at the SS training area HL Heidelager from October 1942 to September 1943. Polish priest Jan Nagórzański, who joined the Polish resistance and rescued Jews during the occupation, was arrested by the Germans, but was soon liberated by the Home Army in 1944. In 1945, he was beaten by Russian troops, and then fell ill with typhus and died in Dębica. War destruction again stopped the town's development, but recovery this time was fast and based on pre war factories. In 1975, after administrative reform, counties in Poland ceased to exist and were replaced by numerous and small Voivodeships. Dębica again was moved this time from Rzeszów to the newly created Tarnów Voivodeship. In the late 1970s, Dębica gained importance as a centre of food and agricultural production. This was due to the creation of Kombinat Rolno Spozywczy Igloopol, which, under an influential Communist dignitary Edward Brzostowski, developed very fast. Igloopol built a huge factory and a completely new district, with numerous condominiums, located on the northern side of the rail line. The company achieved its peak in the late 1980s. After the collapse of the Communist regime, the company was divided into several smaller firms, controlled by former Communist activists.

There are two major sports clubs in Dębica. Klub Sportowy (Sports Club) Wisłoka Dębica, founded in 1908, is one of the oldest sports organizations in the country. Wisłoka is famous for its wrestlers, who have won numerous medals in the Olympic Games, World and European Championships. Other fields in which Wisłoka's athletes achieved significant achievements are: soccer, boxing, cycling and karate. The club was sponsored by Tire Company Dębica and it had its heyday in the 1970s. Another team, Igloopol Dębica, was founded in 1978 and is the brainchild of a prominent activist of Polish communist party, Edward Brzostowski. Igloopol enjoyed strong support from the local government. Brzostowski was for some time Minister of Agriculture and director of Polish Football Association, so his favorite team prospered in soccer as well as in boxing, achieving significant successes. Igloopol's best years, the late 1980s, are closely associated with the peak of its sponsor. Lately, both teams played in regional lower divisions, hoping to win promotion. Both clubs contest the Dębica derby, one of the fiercest derbies in south eastern Poland.