Béla Csejtey, commander of the home defense section of the VIII Anti-Aircraft Artillery Battalion, headquartered in Kassa, was out doing inspections at midday on June 26, 1941. As he drove up to the barracks, he noticed the sentry looking at the sky through field glasses. He turned his eyes to the sky and “suddenly saw, at a height of about 1000 meters, three dark … colored planes marked with red star insignias, flying in a triangle shaped position.” Minutes later, two bombs exploded nearby, one hitting the barrack’s shoe repair shop, the other a gate post. “Bomb fragments, pebbles and stones were whizzing past me, so I could do nothing but throw myself to the ground.” Elsewhere in the city, Magda Elefánt was riding her bicycle when she heard air raid sirens. She headed to her grandparents’ house, which was nearby, to seek shelter. When she arrived, it was smashed to pieces.

The aerial bombing of Kassa killed dozens of residents, destroyed the municipal post office building, and temporarily knocked out the city’s communication system. The culprits of the unprovoked attack were unknown and no country claimed responsibility. Csejtey thought the planes looked like they were a German make, but the red star insignia led him to believe they belonged to the Soviet Red Army. Kassa’s geographic position near the Soviet border and the flight path of the bombers also suggested the planes originated from the Soviet Union. Though there was some skepticism among government officials, including the newly appointed prime minister, László Bárdossy, the Hungarian government ultimately blamed the USSR for the attack and declared war on the Soviet Union in retaliation for the invasion. At the time, locals were skeptical. “We [were] told the Russians [were] responsible for the rubble and death,” Edith Eva Eger, who grew up in Kassa, remembered. “No one believe[d] it, and yet no one c[ould] refute it.” Magda Spira, another Kassa resident, also recalled that nobody believed the official story. Instead, they thought it was a conspiracy perpetrated by the Germans to drag Hungary into the war.

Four days earlier, on June 22, 1941, Germany began its campaign against the Soviet Union, codenamed Operation Barbarossa.