BYSTANDERS, PERPETRATORS, AND RESCUERS
TEACHING LESSON 8

Handout 8A:   Portraits of Rescuers

Handout 8B:   Shelly in Hiding

Handout 8C:   Honoring a Rescuer

Optional Video:   The Courage to Care or They Risked Their Lives

Vocabulary: Righteous Among the Nations, underground, collective responsi-bility

Read Overview 6 with students. Then tell the class that although many ignored the persecution of Jews and other minorities, a small number of brave men and women did not. These people, most of whom were Christians, have been given a special title and place of honor in Israel. In 1953 the Israeli Parliament, the Knesset, passed a law giving the Holocaust Remembrance Authority the power to recognize and honor those who risked their lives for the rescue of Jews.” A commission headed by an Israeli Supreme Court Justice was set up to hear testimony concerning the heroic actions of each nominee. Among the questions the committee asks about each nominee are the following:

1. How was the original contact made between the rescuer and the rescued?
2. How did the rescuer help the rescued?
3. Was the rescuer paid and if so, what amount?
4. What were the risks faced by the rescuer?
5. What were the rescuer’s motivations?
6. What is the evidence provided by the rescued person or his or her representative?

A person accorded this honor is given a specially minted medal bearing his or her name, a certificate of honor, and the privilege of having his or her name added to those on the “Righteous Among the Nations Wall of Honor” at Yad Vashem. Tree plantings have been discontinued due to lack of space.

In this lesson, students will look in Handout 8A at short biographical sketches for some of the people honored at the Righteous Among the Nations. Handout 8B describes the experiences of a North Carolina survivor who was hidden by Polish farmers during the war. Then Handout 8C asks students to view the film TheCourage to Care or They Risked Their Lives or to research one of the well-known rescuers listed on the handout and write a speech nominating one of them for official recognition as a Righteous Among the Nations.

Before distributing Handout 8A, emphasize the great risks that those who helped Jews were taking. Quite often people caught aiding Jews were shot or hanged on the spot by German or their accomplices. Other family members were killed or severely punished as well. In many places the Gestapo offered a reward to anyone turning in Jews. A typical reward paid by the Gestapo to an informer was one quart of brandy, two pounds of sugar, a carton of cigarettes, and a small amount of money. A Dutch police investigation in 1948 indicated that an unnamed informant had been paid 7½ gulden or about $1.40 per person for turning in Anne Frank and her family to the Nazis.

Even without a reward, a neighbor or relative might decide to inform on a family hiding fugitives to settle a grudge or quarrel. In addition to fearing the Germans, those who helped had to be careful of local anti-Semites. After the war ended, it was not unusual in some eastern European countries for those who had helped to ask their Jewish friends not to tell anyone for fear of reprisals by their neighbors. In addition, those willing to help had to have a place where fugitives could be hidden. Annexes, cellars, stoves, garbage bins, and cemeteries served as hiding places. In rural areas, pigsties, cow barns, stables, and haystacks harbored those hunted by the Nazis.

Divide the class into groups. Give the members of all groups copies of Handout 8A. Tell the class that each of the people described in A, B, and C have been awarded the title “Righteous Among the Nations” and have had a tree planted in their memory on the Avenue of the Righteous. Ask each group to answer the questions at the bottom of the handout.

Discuss student answers to the questions on Handout 8A. Focus discussion on the reasons why some people showed a willingness to help others despite the extreme risk. Social scientists have identified several factors that motivated rescuers to risk their lives for others.  

On pages 150-193 of her book When Light Pierced the Darkness: Christian rescue of Jews in Nazi-Occupied Poland, sociologist Nechama Tec identifies six characteristics that the rescuers she studied shared. These characteristics were

1. individuality or separateness. These people did not blend into their social environment;
2. independence or self-reliance. The rescuers were willing to act in accord-ance with their personal beliefs, regardless of how these convictions were viewed by others;
3. a long history of doing good deeds which reflected their enduring commitment to standing up for the helpless and needy;
4. a tendency to see aid to Jews in a matter-of-fact, unassuming way, as neither heroic nor extraordinary;
5. an unplanned, unpremeditated beginning of Jewish rescue that happened gradually or suddenly, even impulsively; and
6. a way of looking at Jews that defined them, not as Jews, but as helpless people, totally dependent on the protection of others.

Psychologists who have studied the traits of rescuers have identified one or more of these factors as contributing to the willingness of the rescuer to risk his or her life for another—a strong sense of morality, a personal relationship with the rescued person, altruism, political or religious beliefs or the belief that he or she is capable of succeeding with the rescue. Every rescuer who was studied exhibited one or more of these traits.

After reading the handout, have students focus on Question 3:
Why were people willing to help others despite the risks? (The Ukrainian farmer described in Part C had known the man whose family he helped as a friend before the war began. This did not make the risks to him and his family any less great, but it may explain why he had no prejudices to overcome. Joop Westerweel, on the other hand, had shown evidence earlier in his life of being willing to take a stand against injustice while in the East Indies. He exhibits Nechama Tec’s long history of standing up for the helpless and the needy. Students might also suggest that all of these people acted out of their political or religious beliefs, particularly the conviction that Hitler’s persecution of Jews and other minorities was wrong.)

Conclude this activity by discussing the question of what makes a person a hero. Today the term is used to describe a wide variety of people in public life from sports personalities and Olympic gold medal winners to civil rights leaders such as Martin Luther King, Jr. Ask students: What qualities or characteristics make the people in these stories “heroic”? (courage, commitment to beliefs or principles, persistence, compassion or concern for others)

Next distribute Handout 8B. After reading and discussing the questions on the handout, ask: Do you think Shelly would want to nominate them as ”Righteous Among the Nations”? What other questions would you want to ask Shelly before answering this question?

Distribute Handout 8C. Tell the class that each group will be nominating a person to receive the honor of being called a “Righteous Among the Nations.” If a copy of the film The Courage to Care or They Risked Their Lives is available, students might select a candidate from the people profiled in these films. (Information on both films is found in the Bibliography.) As an alternative, each group can choose one of the well-known rescuers listed on Handout 8C. After each group has completed its research, have members choose a representative to deliver the speech to the class. To make the presentation more interesting, select three students to act as Israeli Supreme Court Justices asking questions of the speakers after they have made their speeches. All of the people listed in the handout have been honored at Yad Vashem as “Righteous Among the Nations.”

Additional information on Raoul Wallenberg, the Swedish diplomat who helped save thousands of Hungarian Jews, can be found in With Raoul Wallenberg in Budapest by Per Anger and Wallenberg: Lost Hero by Danny Smith. Both books are suitable for middle and high school students. Students can also consult the Internet for recent information on Wallenberg. Rescue by Milton Meltzer gives the stories of many others who helped save Holocaust victims. (Information on these books can be found in the Bibliography.)

Most students will be familiar with Oskar Schindler, made famous by the Steven Spielberg movie Schindler’s List. Schindler was a Czech businessman who saved thousands of Jews by employing them in his factory. Less well known is Sempo Sugihara. Sugihara was the Japanese deputy consul general in Lithuania from the fall of 1939 to August 1940. Disobeying his government’s orders, he issued transit visas to thousands of Jews who had fled into Lithuania from German-occupied Poland to escape Nazi death camps. When Sugihara returned to Japan in 1947, he was asked to resign from the diplomatic corps because of his refusal to obey orders on 1940.

Connect to Language Arts : As a follow-up activity, have students write a letter to the person who has received their Righteous Among the Nations award, informing him or her of the award and explaining how the writer feels about what the recipient has done.

Connect to American/North Carolina History: Students can compare and contrast the “rescuers” of slaves during the pre-Civil War period in American history and the rescuers of the Holocaust victims. What risks did Southerners who provided waystations on the Underground Railroad take? How might they have been treated by their neighbors of discovered? What motivated participants in the Underground Railroad to help the slaves escape to freedom? In North Carolina, many of the participants in the Underground Railroad were Quakers.

All that is necessary for the forces of evil to win
is for good men
to do nothing.

Edmund Burke
British Statesman

Published in cooperation with the North Carolina Council on the Holocaust
Copyright © 2002 by the North Carolina Council on the Holocaust. Updated 2005.
North Carolina Department of Public Instruction
http://www.ncpublicschools.org/holocaust_council/