Irena Sendler — Deserving Candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize

During the early years of WWII, Irena Sendler saved about 2500 children from being killed by the Nazis in Poland. She risked her life, she suffered imprisonment, and then after the war she worked tirelessly to help reunite the children with parents or relatives who might have survived. She has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, and I cannot think of a more deserving person. But I’ll bet she doesn’t receive it: the children were Jewish. To read an excellent story of her history and her work, please see this [h/t to Judith].

Mrs. Sendler, code name “Jolanta,” smuggled 2,500 children out of the Warsaw Ghetto during the last three months before its liquidation. She found a home for each child. Each was given a new name and a new identity as a Christian. Others were saving Jewish children, too, but many of those children were saved only in body; tragically, they disappeared from the Jewish people. Irena did all she could to ensure that “her children” would have a future as part of their own people.



Mrs. Sendler listed the name and new identity of every rescued child on thin cigarette papers or tissue paper. She hid the list in glass jars and buried them under an apple tree in her friend’s backyard. Her hope was to reunite the children with their families after the war. Indeed, though most of their parents perished in the Warsaw Ghetto or in Treblinka, those children who had surviving relatives were returned to them after the war.

What a selfless heroine! Please take a few minutes to read the entire story.