Righteous Among the Nations

Nobuki Sugihara, second from right, with Chaim Chesler, in blue shirt, and guests of Limmud FSU Minsk at the village of Mir, Belarus, during an unveiling of a plaque for Chiune Sugihara, May 2, 2019. (Boris Brumin/via JTA)

May 23, 2019, 6:08 pm

Holocaust hero Chiune Sugihara’s son sets record straight on his father’s story

Nobuki Sugihara says he’s not out to glorify his father — and proves it by debunking myths and showing that human kindness, not ideology, prompted him to save thousands of lives

By Cnaan Liphshiz

Abdol Hossein Sardari, the 'Iranian Schindler' (photo credit: Fariborz Mokhtari)

May 1, 2019, 11:25 pm

Unrecognized ‘Iranian Schindler’ said to have saved countless Paris Jews in WWII

New film ‘Sardari’s Enigma’ portrays how Abdol Hossein Sardari issued passports with an archaic — and false — Persian-Aryan ethnicity. So why isn’t he honored by Israel?

By Rich Tenorio

In this still from the new historical dramatic film 'The Light of Hope,' Swiss nurse Elisabeth Eidenbenz speaks with Pat, one of the children at her maternity hospital that she ran for refugees from 1939 to 1944 in Elne, France. (Courtesy)

March 12, 2019, 5:08 am

How one Swiss nurse hid hundreds of pregnant women and their kids from the Nazis

‘The Light of Hope’ shares the little-known story of Elisabeth Eidenbenz, who saved young refugees during the Spanish Civil War and WWII through her French maternity clinic

By Rich Tenorio

Illustrative: Housing construction in Beit Shemesh in May 2012. (Nati Shohat/Flash90)

February 14, 2019, 10:16 am

Israel’s memorial forest to ‘Japanese Schindler’ was razed to build apartments

Son of Chiune Sugihara disappointed to find no trace of the grove in Beit Shemesh dedicated to his father; KKL-JNF apologizes and vows to replant

By TOI staff

President Reuven Rivlin speaks at the opening of a museum exhibition dedicated to diplomats who saved Jews during the Holocaust in Paris, France, January 24, 2019. (Haim Zach/GPO)

January 24, 2019, 3:53 pm

Rivlin opens Paris exhibition honoring diplomats who saved Jews in Holocaust

Ahead of Sunday’s International Holocaust Remembrance Day, museum displays stories of 200,000 people rescued through diplomatic efforts in WWII

By TOI staff

Totko Teklak, gesturing, shows a visitor from Israel where his father hid her mother during the Holocaust in eastern Poland, June 2017. (Courtesy of Lea Hirsch)

December 22, 2018, 8:56 am

Israeli whose uncle was killed by Poles honors her mother’s rescuer

Relatives of Antek Teklak receive a certificate from Yad Vashem recognizing him as a Righteous Among the Nations for hiding Jewish woman

By Cnaan Liphshiz

A nun prays beside the casket and photo of 110-year-old Roman Catholic Sister Cecylia Roszak, believed to be the world's oldest nun, and a rescuer of Jews during the Holocaust, during her funeral ceremonies at Church of Our Lady of the Snows the Dominican in Krakow, Poland, November 22, 2018. (AP Photo/Beata Zawrzel)

November 23, 2018, 12:38 am

Polish nun who rescued Jews during Holocaust laid to rest

Cecylia Roszak was thought to be the oldest nun in the world; poet Abba Kovner was one those she and her sisters saved at a local convent

By AP and TOI staff

Cecylia Maria Roszak, right, who was awarded the 'Righteous Among Nations' honor for helping to save Jews during the Holocaust, seen here in Krakow, Poland, May 2018. (Piotr Jantos/Archdiocese of Krakow)

November 21, 2018, 8:58 pm

Polish nun who helped hide Vilna ghetto rebels during Holocaust dies at 110

Cecylia Roszak was thought to be the oldest nun in the world; poet Abba Kovner was one those she and her sisters saved at a local convent

By Stuart Winer

Illustrative: A black cab drives past London's Westminster Bridge, March 23, 2017 (AP Photo/Tim Ireland)

November 15, 2018, 6:49 am

London Jewish cab owners donate taxis to Holocaust rescuers in Poland

Iconic black vehicles will be used in initiative to help chauffeur elderly Poles who risked their lives to save Jews

By JTA

Ecuadorian Foreign Minister Jose Valencia speaks at en event in the capital of Quito on November 9, 2018, to restore Manuel Antonio Munoz Borrero as a member of the country's diplomatic service. (Screen capture: YouTube)

November 14, 2018, 7:16 pm

Ecuador restores credentials of late diplomat who saved Jews from Nazis

Ecuadorian FM leads ceremony honoring Manuel Antonio Munoz Borrero, who was removed as consul in Stockholm for issuing passports to fleeing Jews

By JTA

Lithuania's President Dalia Grybauskaite (2nd-R), King of the Netherlands Willem-Alexander (C), Rob Zwartendijk (5th-R) and his wife Edith (4th-R) and the Mayor of Kaunas Visvaldas Matijosaitis (R) attend a ceremony to unveil an installation to honor Dutch diplomat Jan Zwartendijk, credited with saving over 2,000 Jews from the Holocaust during WWII, on June 15, 2018, in Kaunas, Lithuania. (AFP Photo/Petras Malukas)

October 18, 2018, 6:22 pm

Dutch government apologizes over diplomat punished for saving Jews in WWII

King of Netherlands, minister speak to family of Jan Zwartendijk, who was reprimanded after issuing unauthorized visas to more than 2,000 Jews

By TOI staff and JTA

Bent Lewinsky waits to celebrate Danish Jewry’s 1943 rescue outside the Great Synagogue of Copenhagen, Oct. 11, 2018. (Cnaan Liphshiz/JTA)

October 16, 2018, 3:44 am

In Denmark, the world’s only happy Holocaust commemoration event

Danish Jews commemorate being saved 75 years ago, when 7,200 Jews from the Nazi-occupied Scandinavian land were ferried aboard small ships to neutral Sweden

By Cnaan Liphshiz

The endorsements of Chiune Sugihara and Jan Zwartendijk, the Japanese and Dutch consuls, respectively, in Kovno, Lithuania, appear on the Leidimas, or travel document, that allowed Isaac Lewin and his family to escape Lithuania in 1940. (Courtesy of Alyza D. Lewin)

October 10, 2018, 6:18 am

Dutch diplomat was punished for saving Jews in the Holocaust, new book reveals

Jan Zwartendijk, honorary consul of the Netherlands in Lithuania, rescued more than 2,000 Jews, together with Japanese envoy Chiune Sugihara

By JTA

Ana Dudas (R) and two of her daughters are seen in an interview with the Kan public broadcaster aired on September 26, 2018. (Screen capture: YouTube)

September 29, 2018, 5:24 am

Descendants of Serbian woman who rescued Jews told to leave Israel

Ana Dudas, whose grandparents are recognized as Righteous Among the Nations, informed she can remain in country if her husband, 2 youngest daughters leave

By JTA

Britain’s Prince William unveils a statue of Frank Foley, a British spy who helped save thousands of Jews from the Nazis during the Holocaust, September 18, 2018 (YouTube screenshot)

September 23, 2018, 9:26 pm

Prince William unveils statue for spy who saved Jews from Holocaust

MI6 agent Frank Foley used his cover job as a passport officer in Berlin to freely issue British visas to German Jews in the 1930s

By JTA