I've read dozens of auto-biographies of survivors, and very few mentioned having any help from non-Jews. In Eastern Europe-- and in Poland especially, most non-Jews helped the Nazis find Jews trying to 'pass' as gentiles and survive the war.
However, there were some unique, wonderful, saintly people who risked their lives to save Jews. This lady was one of them. She would have been wonderful if she had only saved one life, but she saved 2,500 lives.
Here is the beginning of the article from the print ready page and I'll put the link in afterwards. This is from the Jerusalem Post, which is a good newspaper to read if you want to know about Israel. I recommend Arutz 7 and the Debkafile if you want know more of what is really going on behind the official news :
Irena Sendler, a Polish social worker who organized the rescue of some 2,500 Jewish children from the Nazis and was later honored by Yad Vashem memorial, has died.
Sendler's daughter, Janina Zgrzembska, told The Associated Press her mother died at a Warsaw hospital Monday morning. She was 98.
Sendler had lived at a Warsaw nursing home run by the Catholic Brothers of St. John of God since 2003, but had been in the hospital since last month with pneumonia.
Sendler was born Irena Krzyzanowska in Warsaw on 15 Feb. 1910. As a social worker with Warsaw's welfare department, Sendler masterminded risky rescue operations of Jewish children from the Warsaw Ghetto during Nazi Germany's brutal World War II occupation.
Records show Sendler's team of some 20 people saved almost 2,500 children from the Warsaw Ghetto between October 1940 and April 1943, when the Nazis burned the ghetto, shooting the residents or sending them to death camps
The link:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1209627064522&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FPrinter
Trinov posted on May 12, 2008
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Comments
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dailyachesandpains said on May 12, 2008....
Amazing! So sad to hear the one that saved so many lives lost hers. You know, I bet that's what kept her living for so long...knowing how many kids she gave life to by saving them.Daily -
Trinov said on May 12, 2008....
Hi, I wouldn't be surprised. And I am sure that her reward from Heaven is so great that this world cannot hold it.
It's about three generations, so if all of them had just two children, then she is the 'mother' of 2,500 times two, 5,000, times two, 10,000, times 2, 20,000 souls who will go on G-d willing to make more souls. All their good deeds and any inventions, etc that they produce throughout the ages will be partly hers as well. -
dailyachesandpains said on May 12, 2008....
You said that SO well! They are part of her...All of them and their deeds! -
silverwhisper said on May 13, 2008....
RIP, irena. with the history the jews have had in europe--and really, everywhere in the world--it must be particularly rewarding to see a gentile like mrs. sendler.
ed -
Trinov said on May 13, 2008....
Hi, Isreal has honored many of these rare Righteous Gentiles and some have come to live here.
When the whole world went crazy, and when people were in fear for their lives and the lives of their families--for the Nazis took brutal revenge on anyone caught helping Jews in any way--a few wonderful people risked everything to save Jews.
New stories come out every year, when these people are very old and sometimes when they are dying--for people who do these type of actions are usually very modest and don't always understand how incredibly wonderful they were and are!
Someone did a research project on these people and found that the common denominator was that all were raised with both love and respect by their own parents. This was the factor, not education or religion or wealth etc.
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Trinov said on May 14, 2008....
Hi, here is a link to another article in the Jerusalem Post-this lady was really somebody incredibly special :
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1210668626978&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
It seems that she went to amazing odds to personally save the childrena and was caught and tortured by the Nazis who sentenced her to a firing squad. Fortunately or I should say, G-d was watching over her, the underground was able to bribe the Nazi executioner who listed her as executed. She was released and continued her work with the underground until the end of the war!
As the article mentions, she did not see herself as a heroine! and what she said about her upbringing is very telling--she was raised to respect human beings and not just people like herself. -
skald said on May 22, 2008....
I just saw this now. What a wonderful lady. If people in general were like her, there would not be much trouble in the world. She was not fearing for her own life. If she was she risked it anyway. -
Trinov said on May 22, 2008....
If people in general were like this lady, we would be living in a Paradise on earth.
From what she said, and this was quoted in the second article, her parents taught here to respect all human beings. So they have some of the credit for raising this sainted woman.
After being tortured by the Nazis, and escaping a firing squad, she went back to work for the underground. You would think that she would have needed some time to just calm down and take care of herself! There just are not enough words or ways to praise someone who acted in this way, especially in those times.
The people in her town would be wise to honor her and keep up her grave. She must have had some incredible welcome in Heaven! -
skald said on May 22, 2008....
Trinov. Yes, she must have been welcomed there very warmly. Her parents raised her right but then this was in herself too. What a wonderful woman and I guess she could not stop she just went straight to the underground again. That is the kind of person she was. Thanks for telling us about her. -
Trinov said on May 24, 2008....
Hi, Irene Sendler was just so so special. -
Trinov said on Aug 06, 2008....
Someone sent me this link, and there are a few videos on Irene Sendler, and they are worth watching. What an incredible woman, and I'm sure, as one newscaster said, that she is now receiving her true reward--upstairs! (just seeing her beautiful face is worth it, very few old people can look so beautiful).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVw1PANUcdg