Righteous Among the Nations

Discussions on the Holocaust and 20th Century War Crimes. Note that Holocaust denial is not allowed. Hosted by David Thompson.
User avatar
Annelie
Member
Posts: 5053
Joined: 12 Mar 2002, 03:45
Location: North America

Righteous Among the Nations

#1

Post by Annelie » 14 May 2013, 21:13

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Righteous_ ... he_Nations

I have heard of this but never really looked into it.
There were 24,365 awards given out but it doesn't mention exactly how many lives
were saved? Does anyone know how or where to find this out?

Thankyou

User avatar
wm
Member
Posts: 8753
Joined: 29 Dec 2006, 21:11
Location: Poland

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#2

Post by wm » 14 May 2013, 22:33

It can't be done because awards are not given for saving lives but for "active involvement of the rescuer in saving one or several Jews from the threat of death". So the awards are given for unsuccessful rescue attempts too.
And many people like the members of the Żegota organization, Raoul Wallenberg or Henryk Sławik didn't know precisely how many they saved. Maybe 5000 or 6000 (Sławik). And what happened to "their" Jews later, how many of them did survived the war.


User avatar
Annelie
Member
Posts: 5053
Joined: 12 Mar 2002, 03:45
Location: North America

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#3

Post by Annelie » 14 May 2013, 23:31

Ok, thankyou.

history1
Banned
Posts: 4095
Joined: 31 Oct 2005, 10:12
Location: Austria

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#4

Post by history1 » 15 May 2013, 13:45

wm wrote:[...] awards are not given for saving lives but for "active involvement of the rescuer in saving one or several Jews from the threat of death". So the awards are given for unsuccessful rescue attempts too. [...]
What´s the source for your claims?

I guess here you´ll find a more correct answer, Annelie:
http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/righteous/faq.asp

User avatar
wm
Member
Posts: 8753
Joined: 29 Dec 2006, 21:11
Location: Poland

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#5

Post by wm » 15 May 2013, 14:21

That sentence is from Yad Vashem's FAQ...

There are many examples:
- Mieczysław Wolski, Janusz Wysocki and 30 Jews hidden in the underground hideout "Krysia" (among them Emanuel Ringelblum) - all executed in 1944, awarded posthumously,
- Andrzej Garbuliński and his son, killed for sheltering Alfenbeins family,
- Józef Adamowicz, delivered food for dr Julian Aleksandrowicz in Kraków ghetto, caught and killed by the Jewish Ghetto Police. Aleksandrowicz was eventually rescued by the AK.
- Józef Ulma, Wiktoria Ulma, and 8 Jews - executed.

And there are people who personally didn't save anyone: Stefan Korboński, Eryk Lipiński, Tadeusz Pankiewicz, Jan Karski.

ladycplum
Member
Posts: 337
Joined: 31 Jan 2008, 01:43
Location: Louisiana

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#6

Post by ladycplum » 17 May 2013, 16:59

wm wrote:That sentence is from Yad Vashem's FAQ...

There are many examples:
- Mieczysław Wolski, Janusz Wysocki and 30 Jews hidden in the underground hideout "Krysia" (among them Emanuel Ringelblum) - all executed in 1944, awarded posthumously,
- Andrzej Garbuliński and his son, killed for sheltering Alfenbeins family,
- Józef Adamowicz, delivered food for dr Julian Aleksandrowicz in Kraków ghetto, caught and killed by the Jewish Ghetto Police. Aleksandrowicz was eventually rescued by the AK.
- Józef Ulma, Wiktoria Ulma, and 8 Jews - executed.

And there are people who personally didn't save anyone: Stefan Korboński, Eryk Lipiński, Tadeusz Pankiewicz, Jan Karski.
Jan Karski is a good example. It can't truly be said that his actions saved any Jews, but his actions helped bring to light the inhuman conditions of the ghettos and camps. And the extraordinary courage he showed in passing into danger by posing as a Jew and going into the ghettos to inform a rather blase world about what was really going on in the occupied countries cannot be denied.
"The more I see, the more I know. The more I know, the less I understand"-Paul Weller

ladycplum
Member
Posts: 337
Joined: 31 Jan 2008, 01:43
Location: Louisiana

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#7

Post by ladycplum » 28 May 2013, 06:40

I wonder if Joe Brown should be included in the Righteous....he was one of the few people to testify that Hitler was a danger, plus he adopted two Jewish boys from the East.
"The more I see, the more I know. The more I know, the less I understand"-Paul Weller

User avatar
henryk
Member
Posts: 2559
Joined: 27 Jan 2004, 02:11
Location: London, Ontario

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#8

Post by henryk » 16 Jul 2014, 19:16

wm wrote:It can't be done because awards are not given for saving lives but for "active involvement of the rescuer in saving one or several Jews from the threat of death". So the awards are given for unsuccessful rescue attempts too.
And many people like the members of the Żegota organization, Raoul Wallenberg or Henryk Sławik didn't know precisely how many they saved. Maybe 5000 or 6000 (Sławik). And what happened to "their" Jews later, how many of them did survived the war.
http://www.thenews.pl/1/9/Artykul/17640 ... in-Silesia
'Polish Wallenburg' honoured in Silesia
PR dla Zagranicy Peter Gentle 16.07.2014 13:27
Ceremonies are being held in Jastrzębie-Zdrój, Silesian region, in honour of Henryk Sławik, a Polish politician and diplomat who helped save over 30, 000 Polish refugees, including 5,000 Polish Jews, in Hungary during World War Two.
Monument dedicated to the 'Polish Wallenburg' in Katowice, southern Poland: photo - Katowicach, foto: Michał Bulsa/Wikipedia

Henryk Sławik was born in what is now a part of Jastrzębie-Zdrój 120 years ago. A mass was celebrated in his memory in the local church and a commemorative plaque was unveiled in tribute to a man who is described by historians as the hero of three nations – Polish, Jewish and Hungarian and the 'Polish Wallenberg’, a reference to Raoul Wallenberg, the Swedish diplomat who saved tens of thousand of Jews while serving as Sweden’s special envoy in Budapest in 1944. During World War Two, Sławik created the Citizens’ Committee for Help to Polish Refugees in Hungary and became a delegate of the Polish Government-in-exile. He worked closely with Jozsef Antall, senior (the father of the future Hungarian Prime Minister).
After Polish refugees of Jewish descent were separated from their colleagues pending racial decrees issued by the Hungarian government, Sławik provided them with false documents confirming their Polish roots and Roman Catholic faith. Following the Nazi take-over of Hungary, he went underground and arranged for Polish Jews to leave Hungary and survive the Holocaust.
He was arrested by the Germans in March 1944. Although brutally tortured he did not betray Antall and his Hungarian friends. He was hanged in the Mauthause concentration camp.
In 1977 he was posthumously given the title of Righteous Among the Nations and in 2010 he received the Order of the White Eagle, the highest Polish state distinction. \A wide range of events in tribute to Henryk Sławik to be held later this year has been outlined at a press conference in Jastrzębie-Zdrój. They include a mass celebrated by the Primate of Hungary, a run from Jastrzębie-Zdrój to Mauthausen, a premiere of a para-documentary film about Sławik and Antall, as well as exhibitions, lectures, school competitions and city games. (mk/pg)

User avatar
wenty
Member
Posts: 1601
Joined: 02 Dec 2002, 00:41
Location: Australia
Contact:

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#9

Post by wenty » 17 Jul 2014, 10:51

Oskar Schindler would probably be the most notable amongst the Righteous Among The Nations, though clearly there are plenty of them.

Henry highlighted the example of Henryk Slawik, so bearing his posthumous award in mind, I wonder if they are still awarding people today or have they all been accounted for?

Cheers,
Adam.

Sid Guttridge
Member
Posts: 10158
Joined: 12 Jun 2008, 12:19

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#10

Post by Sid Guttridge » 17 Jul 2014, 12:23

The award is still available but, necessarily, less new worthy individuals will be discovered over time.

User avatar
wm
Member
Posts: 8753
Joined: 29 Dec 2006, 21:11
Location: Poland

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#11

Post by wm » 18 Jul 2014, 10:31

Many people simply didn't care much for the award especially in the Warsaw Pact countries, where Israel was regarded as an aggressor, and one of the main enemies of the communist block, so any connections with that country were at least frown upon.

Some members of my family supported a Jew who was hiding in the local elementary, their neighbour was sheltering several Jews in an underground hideout he made himself. As the saved Jews didn't care to nominate them to the award (only a Jew can) they received nothing. And really nothing wrong with that - the award has become well known only lately, earlier it was little known even among the Jews. And that happened frequently. People didn't care, there were so many other things happening around - today for many there are Jews and nothing else, it didn't look this way then. The Jews were an insignificant part of the whole story.

Another problem is those people mentioned - Wallenberg, Schindler really risked nothing. Wallenberg had diplomatic immunity, Schindler was a member of the Nazi elite, he didn't even risk his wealth as he had none ("his" factory was stolen from the rightful owners). One might say in those circumstances both had an unquestionable moral duty to help other people in danger.
Even Sławik, an envoy of the Polish government - it was his job to save people and risk his life.

In this regard a humblest Polish, Ukrainian, Belorussian peasant saving a Jewish family did more and risked more than those people - for them and their families the danger was real and ever-present, not only from the Germans but criminals, sometimes from the so called partisans too, and even from their neighbours.
A peasant didn't have any obligation, even moral one, to save anyone in those circumstances - he should have looked the other way or gave some food and nothing more. Two/three years of sheltering required a lot of courage - or stupidity (in fact some rescued Jews said exactly that - thanks God our hosts were of limited intelligence and weren't able to comprehend the dangers, the consequences of their decisions).

User avatar
Annelie
Member
Posts: 5053
Joined: 12 Mar 2002, 03:45
Location: North America

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#12

Post by Annelie » 18 Jul 2014, 14:18

wm,

Thanks or sharing. Sad to hear those that helped never were acknowledged but I hope the Jews saved remembered them
after the war? There are of course rotten people as Jews as any other nationality because they were the victim doesn't
mean they (speaking only of some) are any more the better of a person.

User avatar
wm
Member
Posts: 8753
Joined: 29 Dec 2006, 21:11
Location: Poland

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#13

Post by wm » 21 Jul 2014, 00:18

The "cemetery" Jew disappeared some day, some of the neighbor's Jews survived, maybe even all. One of them (or it was a family) was sending him parcels from the US after the war. Thanks to the communist rulers total economic ineptitude they were much more valuable here than in the West.
Some other people must have helped them later anyway, in 1943 everyone was forced to flee from there, and the Jews had to manage on their own.

But what I was trying to say nobody really cared about this righteous status. They had their own holocausts there, stories, heroes. Someone who kept a few Jews in a hole in the ground wasn't a hero. They were his friends/colleagues so he kept them. In the killing fields of Volhynia it was small stuff, nothing to boast about.

Sid Guttridge
Member
Posts: 10158
Joined: 12 Jun 2008, 12:19

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#14

Post by Sid Guttridge » 25 Jul 2014, 11:02

Hi wm,

A most peculiar post.

Why on earth would Israel be regarded as an aggressor in the Warsaw Pact? It received Czech weponry during its independence war in 1948 and had no claims on any Warsaw Pact country at all. It was not a member of NATO and so not in direct opposition to the pact. And, given that most of the population of Warsaw Pact members didn't want to be in it anyway, why would it matter to most that Israel was outside it?

Only the high profile winners you mention had diplomatic immunity. Tens of thousands of others didn't. Besides, what does it matter if some receivers of the award didn't take high personal risks? The award is for being instrumental in saving Jews from an awful death. That seems good reason enough to me.

Most of the tens of thousands of awardees are in exactly the category of humbler people you appear to be unaware of.

Finally, you are going to need to justify the following: "...stupidity (in fact some rescued Jews said exactly that - thanks God our hosts were of limited intelligence and weren't able to comprehend the dangers, the consequences of their decisions)."

This appears to be the sort of unattributed slur that lies at the root of racial bigotry. What is your source, who said it, when and where?

This looks very much like a job for the administrators here if you cannot either justify it or withdraw it.

Over to you.

A very disappointed Sid

User avatar
Skyderick
Member
Posts: 165
Joined: 11 Apr 2014, 13:59

Re: Righteous Among the Nations

#15

Post by Skyderick » 25 Jul 2014, 17:35

wm wrote: As the saved Jews didn't care to nominate them to the award (only a Jew can) they received nothing.
How do you know that they survived? And that they didn't die before Yad VaShem started the project in 1963? And that they were treated well? The title is not granted to people who took money in return for their help. Your neighbors may not have been qualified? I don't see how someone wouldn't care about his saviors. Is this why you're sore about Jews? Please, fill this form http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/righteou ... polish.pdf
wm wrote: Another problem is those people mentioned - Wallenberg, Schindler really risked nothing... One might say in those circumstances both had an unquestionable moral duty to help other people in danger... A peasant didn't have any obligation, even moral one, to save anyone in those circumstances
I strongly disagree. The same moral principles apply to all human beings, as far as I'm concerned, and it is my sincere belief that any conscious, adult human being has the moral duty to help his persecuted fellow human beings, then as today. The vast majority of the Righteous Among the Nations were neither diplomats nor public figures.
wm wrote: In this regard a humblest Polish, Ukrainian, Belorussian peasant saving a Jewish family did more and risked more than those people - for them and their families the danger was real and ever-present, not only from the Germans but criminals, sometimes from the so called partisans too, and even from their neighbours.
And the townsfolk lived under a risk of air raids, burglars and informers among their neighbors. And their food was sometimes rationed.
wm wrote: ...in fact some rescued Jews said exactly that - thanks God our hosts were of limited intelligence and weren't able to comprehend the dangers, the consequences of their decisions.
I would like to know who those Jews were and how many they were, since you seem to believe they reflect upon the whole of rescued Jewry - many tens of thousands of people. Those I've met maintained life long contact with their rescuers, including my grandmother.

Annelie, Yad Vashem has a searchable database here: http://db.yadvashem.org/righteous/searc ... anguage=en Upon clicking on any name, you are offered a list of names of people they helped. Most saved a few individuals, sometimes only a single person.

Post Reply

Return to “Holocaust & 20th Century War Crimes”