From 1934, ministered as an expositor of the Rosochowaciec parish in Beneva, then in the Polish Pidhaitsi county of the Ternopil Voivodeship. The village of Beneva, c. 25 km south of Ternopil and c. 20 km east of Pidhaitsi, had an estimated population of c. 1,250 in 1939, of which Roman Catholic Poles constituted c. 68% and Greek Catholic Ukrainians c. 31%. In addition, several Jews lived in the village. Under his care in 1938 were 1,322 faithful.

After the German and Russian invasion of Poland in 09.1939 and the start of World War II — as a result of the genocidal German–Russian agreement of 23.08.1939, known as the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, confirmed on 28.09.1939 by the so‐called „Treaty on the Borders and Friendship between Germany and Russia”, also known as the Second Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact — the area was occupied by the Russians. Left for his hometown then, c. 70 km to the north, near Zolchiv. According to a source, „Was reprimanded in the Lviv curia. Was accused of having escaped and abandoned his parishioners”. So returned after a few months, but prob. could not move back to the rectory building, which had been occupied by the genocidal Russian NKVD. So moved in with a Ukrainian family, but after some time they — intimidated by their Ukrainian neighbors — had to refuse to let him stay overnight. From then on, prob. until the end of the Russian occupation, resided in the homes of the Polish inhabitants of Beneva.

The Russians subjected Poles in particular to repression, arresting Polish intelligentsia, teachers, doctors, landowners, government officials, foresters, policemen, and families of Polish military personnel. Many other Poles became victims of four large waves of deportations „to Siberia”. Accounts often mention that „they came at night, without warning, and took away entire families, from infants to the elderly”. „When we went out into the yard, they allowed my mother to look into the chest — unfortunately, it was empty, because our neighbors had already emptied it. We took practically nothing, because they did not allow us to move around the house […] There were large snowdrifts and heavy frost”. In the first large deportation alone, on c. 10.02.1940, c. 140,000 Poles were deported „to Siberia”, including 15 Polish families from his Beneva. In addition, 150,000–200,000 men were conscripted into the Russian army, and c. 100,000 were forced to work for Russian industry, mainly in the mines of the Donets Basin, in heavy industry plants in the Urals and in Siberia. Then, the surveillance of priests and monks began. High taxes were imposed on the clergy, and religious education was removed from schools.

After the German attack on their erstwhile ally, the Russians, on 22.06.1941, and the beginning of the German occupation, Bilokrynytsya parish curacy found itself in the Germ. Kreishauptmannschaft Berezhany (Eng. Berezhany County), within the Germ. Distrikt Galizien (Eng District of Galicia), part of the German‐occupied and run quasi‐state called the Germ. Generalgouvernement (Eng. General Governorate), i.e. GG, expanded by East Galicia.

Prob. resumed then the construction of a brick church, replacing the wooden, temporary chapel erected by the Poles in 1921.

Became also a chaplain of the Polish resistance Home Army AK, founded on 14.01.1942 (part of the Polish Clandestine State) — perhaps even earlier, had been a chaplain of the Union of Armed Struggle ZWZ, on the basis of which the AK was founded — the largest resistance movement in occupied Europe. Beneva belonged to the ZWZ‐AK Pidhaitsi Sub‐district, which was part of the Berezhany AK Inspectorate in the Ternopil AK District.

The period 1941‐1943 was, however, marked in particular by the extermination of Jews. From the beginning of 1942, the Germans implemented the genocidal plan Germ. «Endlösung der Judenfrage» (Eng. Final Solution of the Jewish Question), which in the GG was codenamed «Aktion Reinhardt» (Eng. Operation Reinhardt). The local center of the Jewish community was the county town of Pidhaitsi, where in 1939 c. 3,400 Jews may have lived, i.e. c. 55% of the inhabitants. Already in 07.1941, the Germans established — in accordance with the German regulations in force in the GG — the Germ. Judenrat (Eng. Jewish Council), responsible for the Jewish community, assisted by the Germ. Jüdischer Ordnungsdienst (Eng. Jewish Order Service). Later, they de facto forbade Jews to leave the town without permission, because from 25.10.1941, a decree issued by the Germ. Generalgouverneur (Eng. General Governor) of the GG, Hans Frank, came into force, according to which „Jews who leave their assigned district without authorization are subject to the death penalty. The same punishment applies to persons who knowingly provide such Jews with a hiding place”, and „Instigators and accomplices are subject to the same punishment as the perpetrator; an attempted act will be punished as a completed act. In less serious cases, hard labor or imprisonment may be imposed”. On 21.09.1942 Germans, with the support of the Ukrainian, collaborationist Germ. Ukrainische Hilfspolizei (Eng. Ukrainian Auxiliary Police), also operating as Germ. Schutzmannschaft (Eng. Security Battalions), i.e. Schuma — which was to take part in all such Germ. Aktion (Eng. operation) — as well as the Germ. Jüdischer Ordnungsdienst, herded c. 1,000 Jews to the railway station, from where they were deported to their deaths, to the Germ. Vernichtungslager (Eng. extermination camp) VL Belzec. Incidentally, c. 50 Jews were murdered in the Jewish cemetery. Immediately afterwards, a ghetto was formally established in Pidhaitsi, initially of an „open” nature, without a boundary fence. On 30.10.1942, the second Germ. Aktion took place. Over 1,200 Jews were deported to VL Belzec, and several dozen were murdered during the roundup. At about the same time, Jews from the surrounding villages were brought to the ghetto, including prob. from Beneva, and in 12.1942 the ghetto — c. 2,500 people — was „closed”, i.e. surrounded by a wooden fence topped with barbed wire. On 12.04.1943, c. 40‐50 sick Jews were murdered in the Jewish cemetery. The liquidation of the ghetto took place on 06.06.1943. The Germans and the Germ. Ukrainische Hilfspolizei murdered c. 1,070 Jews in two ditches dug in the part of Pidhaitsi called the Old Town. On 08.08.1943, c. 750 Jews were lured out of hiding, under promise of transfer to Ternopil. All were taken out of the town and near the village of Zahaytsi, c. 2 km away, the Germans and Ukrainians murdered them. Over the next few months, the Germans and the Germ. Ukrainische Hilfspolizei systematically searched the ghetto hunting for Jews. C. 300 were captured and murdered in the Jewish cemetery. The Germans could declare that Pidhaitsi and the surrounding area were Germ. „Judenfrei” (Eng. „free of Jews”).

In the small village of Beneva, where on 01.03.1943, only 1,126 people lived, of whom — after the deportations „to Siberia” — probably c. 50% were Poles, and everyone knew each other well and knew exactly what their neighbors were doing, Anne Urban and her son John, Polish residents, hid Jews. In 1983, the Yad Vashem Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Institute in Jerusalem honored them for this with the titles of „Righteous Among the Nations”.

At the same time, i.e. in 02.1943, in Volyn, c. 150 km to the north, Roman Shukhevych, nom de guerre „Taras Chuprynka”, the chief commander of the Ukrainian, genocidal OUN/UPA organisation, who in 1941 was a member of the Ukrainian Germ. Sondergruppe Nachtigall (Eng. Special Group Nightingale) — a unit of the Germ. Wehrmacht (Eng. Armed Forces) that took part in the German attack on Russians in 1941, accused of participating in the Jewish pogrom in Lviv in 1941 — and later a member of the Germ. Schutzmannschaftsbataillon 201 (Eng. 201st Protection team Battalion) — responsible for the murder of Jews and civilians in the territory of Belarus — issued an order: „The extermination operation should be carried out according to the following principles: Polish villages are to be burned, and their populations massacred. Attacks on towns will take place in broad daylight, not at night. In mixed villages, the Polish population alone should be liquidated, and farmsteads should be burned only if they are 15 meters away and when there is no risk of the fire spreading to neighboring Ukrainian buildings. The Ukrainian population will receive instructions as to where to gather during the attack […] For every Ukrainian murdered, whether by Poles or Germans, 100 (one hundred) Poles will be executed”.

It was the de facto signal for the commencement of the «Genocidium Atrox» — i.e. the genocide perpetrated by Ukrainians, known as „Volyn genocide”.

Immediately thereafter, in 03.1943, the UPA issued an appeal to members of the Germ. Ukrainische Hilfspolizei to desert and join the UPA ranks. Perhaps as many as 10,000 Ukrainians did so.

Volyn was drenched in Polish blood. Tens of thousands of Poles were murdered by the Ukrainians — with German passivity — in an extremely barbaric manner. Hundreds of villages were burned.

Although Shukhevych's order was not formally addressed to units of the Germ. Ukrainische Hilfspolizei in the Germ. Distrikt Galizien — there, in 1943, the genocidal OUN did not establish an armed wing under the name UPA, but formed armed units under a euphemistic name, to „confuse” the Germans, of Ukr. Українська Народна Самооборона (Eng. Ukrainian National Self‐Defense), i.e. UNS — but de facto also there the Ukrainian génocidaires, „unemployed” after the end of the Germ. «Aktion Reinhardt», deserted and joined the UNS. But in 12.1943 — when it became clear that the Germans were losing the war in the East, i.e. on 24.12.1943, the great Russian offensive called the Dnieper–Carpathian Operation began — the UNS was formally transformed into a „UPA‐West” unit of the genocidal OUN/UPA. In 01.1944, its commander was another of the Ukrainian „trainees” of the Germ. Sondergruppe Nachtigall and the Germ. Schutzmannschaftsbataillon 201, the degenerate Vasyl Sydor, nom de guerre „Shelest”, who almost immediately ordered „to strike continuously at the Poles until they are completely destroyed from these lands”. The «Genocidium Atrox» began in Germ. Distrikt Galizien.

The UNS/UPA had nothing else to do at the time, because — as even the Ukrainian Wikipedia confirms — „during the last months of 1943, UNS units did not conduct military operations in connection with the introduction on 02.10.1943, by the Germans in Galicia of the system [of collective responsibility] of executing 10 hostages for the murder of every German soldier or official”. The Poles remained though a target for were not among these „officials”. And the Germans behaved passively towards the genocidal acts of the UNS/UPA, essentially not undertaking any major operations against Ukrainians.

In the vicinity of Pidhaitsi, the orders of the génocidaire Sydor were carried out by another degenerate, the commander of the UPA Military District WO‐3 „Lysonya”, Emilian (Omelian) Polowy, nom de guerre „Ostap”, whose „career path” was identical to that of his superiors — i.e. through the Germ. Sondergruppe Nachtigall and the Germ. Schutzmannschaftsbataillon 201, where they gained experience in the extermination of Jews. One of the Ukrainian inhabitants of the village of Bilokrynytsya, c. 15 km from Beneva, recalled years later — after escaping to emigration in Canada — that „in mid‐1943, UPA [i.e. UNS] units began to be formed. From them, a sotnia was formed solely from the inhabitants of the Pidhaitsi county […] In November–December 1943 and January 1944 [they underwent] military training in Volyn in the village of Derman”, in the same village where the OUN/UPA murdered c. 190 of its Polish inhabitants in 1943.

The murders of Poles began in the last quarter of 1943 and intensified at the beginning of 1944. Some sources say that already in 1943 „a death sentence in absentia was issued against him”. At the same time, in the same year, was ordered by the Germans to leave the rectory. „He first lived in a mixed house. The landlady was Polish and her husband Ukrainian. After a few weeks, he had to leave. The woman was afraid of other Ukrainians. [Prob. in 01.1944] he ended up in the house of Anne and Vaclav Szpulak.

The priest spent the day in church or at home. At night, together with Vaclav Szpulak, they went to the attic”. It was similar in other Polish households. A contemporary source describes the atmosphere in the village in the following literary terms: „Young boys from several nearby villages, led by older men, organized themselves into an armed unit. The Poles called it a gang. At night, the unit haunted Polish houses, mainly to steal their belongings. The phrase "The day is yours, but the night and the forest are ours. Be careful" was repeatedly uttered. That's why the Poles spent their days at home, often going to attics, barns, and sheds to rest. Nobody knew how a visit after dark might end”.

Undoubtedly the information was reaching them that Ukrainian attacks might not end with just „the haunting of Polish houses”. On 15.01.1944, they prob. received news that in the village of Markova, c. 35 km to the southwest, Ukrainian génocidaires had murdered c. 57 Poles, including the local parish priest, Fr Ignatius Nicholas Ferenc. And closer to home, in Kupchyntsi on Strypa river, c. 9 km to the north, on 11.11.1944, i.e. Polish National Independence Day of Remembrance, Ukrainians murdered at least 11 people, including „a nine‐person Polish family: 53‐year‐old Casimir Poprowski, his 47‐year‐old wife Pelagia, sons: 5‐year‐old David, 8‐year‐old Volodimir, 10‐year‐old John and 16‐year‐old Nicholas, daughters: 1‐year‐old Marie, 6‐year‐old Anastasia and 14‐year‐old Olga”.

Attacks on Poles in villages located on the Strypa River, on which Beneva is also located, intensified at the beginning of 02.1944. The end of the Ukr. Мясопуст (Eng. carnival) was approaching, which in the Greek Catholic Church fell on 28.02.1944, i.e. on Ukr. Чистий понеділо (Eng. Clean Monday), and in the Roman Catholic church on Ash Wednesday, 23.02.1944. And so, on the night of 09‐10.02.1944, in Sosniv, c. 4 km south of Beneva, „Ukrainians murdered 10 Poles (including a married couple and a family of four), and in the Studynka estate, they burned alive the Sychodulski family of four and two children in a building, and also murdered two more people; a total of 16 Poles were killed”.

On 13.02.1944, a Sunday, was Beneva's turn. One account describes the event as follows: „It was bitterly cold outside. The front was approaching the village from the east. The Germans had been in Podolya for three years. They hadn't shown up in Beneva. The Ukrainians ruled here. Everything was according to the rule: "night and forest…".

The priest returned from church and said he wouldn't sleep in the attic anymore because he was tired, frozen, and couldn't even sing during mass. He decided he would stay home that night.Vaclav Szpulak said: "If you can, Father, I can too"”.

The Polish Welfare Committee PolKO from Berezhany — an agency of the only Polish charity organization, i.e. Central Welfare Council RGO, which the Germans allowed to operate in the GG — wrote in a report dated 25.02.1944, to the RGO Delegate in Lviv: „On Monday, February 14, 1944, a dozen or so Ukrainian terrorists invaded the village of Beneva in the Pidhaitsi district. They were dressed in German uniforms and armed with firearms. They spoke poor Polish […] Several of them surrounded the house of Szpulak Vaclav, c. 40 years old, with whom the local parish priest, Father Vladislav Żygiel, 38 years old from Zolochiv, had been staying for a month”.

A witness of the events from the Szpulak family recalled: „Around 10 p.m. we heard a knock on the door. My father was surprised that someone had come for the horses so early. After a while, there was another louder knock. They shone a lamp so brightly into the window that you could pick up the needles on the floor. I looked out. There were a lot of people outside.

My mother went to answer the door, but they were already inside. They broke down the door. Most stayed outside, but a few people, speaking Polish and wearing Polish pre‐war uniforms, went straight to the priest's room. They stood at the sheet‐metal door and started banging on it with their rifle butts.

He didn't open it […] Mother was talking to them, sisters Anne and Janine were terrified, and the five‐year‐old boy, who had been sleeping with the father, was sitting on the bed. Vaclav Szpulak had buried himself in the duvet. The youngest of the siblings, a few–month‐old Zbyszek, was the only one unaware of what was happening”.

The PolKO report continues: „They fired a shot in the hallway to scare us, so Father Żygiel opened the door.

The Ukrainians then burst into the room and shot Father Żygiel’s housekeeper, Marie, whose surname is unknown, and then tried to kidnap the priest and take him to the fields.

Father Żygiel began to beg them to spare his life, giving them money, clothes, shoes, and all the household appliances. However, the attackers, in response to his pleas and tears, replied, "We want nothing but your soul", and then began to drag him out of the room by force”.

The aforementioned witness remembered it this way: „He was standing in his officer's boots, tights [i.e., soldier's trousers tapered to fit into his boots], and a shirt. They told him to get dressed. They said he was under arrest and they were taking him to Pidhaitsi. They tried to put a coat on him.

He was stubborn. They couldn't help him because they were mostly boys, and he, a tall, strong, 42‐year‐old man, was leaning against the doorframe.

They told my mother to turn off the light. The priest suddenly started screaming. So terribly — like an inhuman being. A moment later we heard a shot.

He fell to the ground, and the strangers opened all the doors and left.

They left with everyone standing in the yard. My mother told me to go and lock the door, but I was afraid. The priest was where he fell — on the doorstep. Next to him lay a housewife, whose neck had been pierced with a bayonet by one of the strangers (probably that was why the priest was screaming)”.

A contemporary columnist describes the last moments of his life as follows: „They were young men, mostly teenagers. They tried to kidnap their victim, but they lacked the physical strength to move the tall man who was leaning against the doorframe. Father Vladislav stood in the doorway in shiny officer's boots, breeches, and a white shirt, adopting a soldier's stance. At that moment, the desperate murderer fired three shots at his victim from a distance of one meter — one shot to the head and two to the chest, fatally. The victim fell to the ground with a thud and ended his life”.

The PolKO report concludes: „After a triumphant tour of the entire village, [the Banderites] departed towards Bahatkivtsi”. That day in Beneva, Ukrainian génocidaires murdered c. 25‐28 Poles.

Another witness adds: „They lay there for three days because their parents had gone to Pidhaitsi and learned that a commission was coming to investigate. It didn't come. There was a blood stain on the floor that couldn't be washed off. The funeral was on Thursday”.

According to many sources, the priest's murderer was a certain Paul Pasiecznik. One witness concludes his account: „When he killed the priest, he was no more than 18 years old. Afterward, he lived [in Beneva] with the knowledge of what he had done. A few years ago [i.e. in 1973], he hanged himself, leaving a suicide note in which he confessed that he couldn't bear the pangs of conscience”.

After this attack, the Ukrainian génocidaires still had a few days left before Lent. So, in Bahatkivtsi, c. 5 km east of Beneva, „they murdered 21 Poles, including the eight‐person Rogalski family and the seven‐person Stachurski family”. In Malovody, c. 6 km west, „they murdered 4 Poles, including a three‐person family: a mother named Hawiak and a small child were burned, her brother Vladislav's head was cut off with an axe and left in the yard, and his body was thrown into a well”. In Sokoliv, c. 6 km south, „they murdered 15 Poles”. In Zolotnyky, c. 9 km south, on 22.02.1944, the last day of the Roman Catholic carnival, „they murdered 72 Poles. Father Ignatius Tokarczuk, later the Archbishop of Przemyśl, miraculously survived”. Finally, on 23.02.1944, on Roman Catholic Ash Wednesday — Greek Catholics were still then celebrating Ukr. Мясопуст — „they cruelly murdered 15 Poles; they gouged out their eyes, cut off their genitals; the victims were left dying for several hours”.

The brick church he built in Beneva today serves the Greek Catholic Church. It has not been returned to the Poles and the Roman Catholic Church. The Greek Catholic Church existing in Beneva in 1944 was destroyed when Russian troops entered the village. According to one source, „one of the shells hit the church roof, and the "UPA" weapons warehouse located under the church exploded, completely destroying the entire building”. Moreover, no Roman Catholic church, built thanks to the efforts of generations of Poles in the part of the Lviv Archdiocese today located in Ukraine, who were then deported to the western lands of the Russian Polish Republic, called „prl” — unless murdered by the genocidal OUN/UPA — was not returned to the Catholic Church. All were taken over by other Churches, including the Greek Catholic Church. None returned.

On 12.10.2007, the génocidaire Roman Shukhevych was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of Ukraine. On 10.12.2017, on behalf of the „Coordination Council for the Commemoration of Decorated Knights of the OUN and UPA”, génocidaire Vasyl Sydor was posthumously awarded in Lviv the Silver Cross of Military Merit of the UPA, 1st Class (No. 009). The degenerate Emilian Polowy was also supposed to receive, on 14.01.1945, the Bronze Cross of Military Merit UPA. In several locations, monuments and commemorative plaques have been erected, books written in memory of these Lat. „hostis humani generis”.

Lat. „O Tempora! O mores!”