Page 46 - Issue4-November2017_online_opt
P. 46
Irena Sendler
Perhaps Irena’s desire to help Jews survive the Nazis had
something to do with this kiddush Hashem that occurred long
before in Otwock. Skipping ahead, Irena decided to go for a
graduate certificate in social welfare at the University of War-
saw. She also signed up for a community internship across
town sponsored by the Polish Free University. That is where
Irena met and became a lifelong follower of Professor Helena
Radlinska, a Jewish-born woman in her early sixties, who had
long since converted to Catholicism. She was a pioneer in the
Irena Sendler
field of social work in Poland. Irena devoted all of her energies
to her new career and her new job providing help for the city’s
unwed mothers.
The Bench Ghetto
In 1935, in Polish universities, Jews were made to sit separately
from “Aryan” Poles. Anti-Semitism was open and normal. Po-
land was an openly anti-Semitic country, whose government
and people did not like Jews and sought to limit their influence
on the economy. The far-right ultra-nationalists had violent tac-
tics and racist rhetoric. These anti-Semites proudly wore green
ribbons to show their affiliation. Irena once said, “The years at
the university were very hard and very sad. A rule was estab-
lished segregating the Catholics from the Jewish students. The
Catholics were to sit on the chairs on the right and the Jews on
the chairs to the left. I always sat with Jews and therefore I was
beaten by anti-Semites together with Jewish students.”
At the University of Warsaw, the majority of the students
tacitly supported this discrimination against Jewish students.
Across town, at the Polish Free University, however, things were
different. When the ultra-nationalist thugs came to assault the
Jewish students, the entire campus rallied and drove them off
with fire hoses. Irena’s new friends from Dr. Radlinska’s circle
included many Jews, although as left-wing activists, religion
didn’t much interest any of them.
In 1939, World War II broke out. Warsaw was a city of one
million inhabitants, and one third of the populace was Jewish.
The Poles considered Warsaw to be dynamic and modern. The
Germans, however, considered the Poles, part of the Slavic race,
to be inferior to Aryans and ominously classified Poles along
with their Jewish neighbors as “untermenschen” or sub-hu-
38 u www.wherewhatwhen.com u
Perhaps Irena’s desire to help Jews survive the Nazis had
something to do with this kiddush Hashem that occurred long
before in Otwock. Skipping ahead, Irena decided to go for a
graduate certificate in social welfare at the University of War-
saw. She also signed up for a community internship across
town sponsored by the Polish Free University. That is where
Irena met and became a lifelong follower of Professor Helena
Radlinska, a Jewish-born woman in her early sixties, who had
long since converted to Catholicism. She was a pioneer in the
Irena Sendler
field of social work in Poland. Irena devoted all of her energies
to her new career and her new job providing help for the city’s
unwed mothers.
The Bench Ghetto
In 1935, in Polish universities, Jews were made to sit separately
from “Aryan” Poles. Anti-Semitism was open and normal. Po-
land was an openly anti-Semitic country, whose government
and people did not like Jews and sought to limit their influence
on the economy. The far-right ultra-nationalists had violent tac-
tics and racist rhetoric. These anti-Semites proudly wore green
ribbons to show their affiliation. Irena once said, “The years at
the university were very hard and very sad. A rule was estab-
lished segregating the Catholics from the Jewish students. The
Catholics were to sit on the chairs on the right and the Jews on
the chairs to the left. I always sat with Jews and therefore I was
beaten by anti-Semites together with Jewish students.”
At the University of Warsaw, the majority of the students
tacitly supported this discrimination against Jewish students.
Across town, at the Polish Free University, however, things were
different. When the ultra-nationalist thugs came to assault the
Jewish students, the entire campus rallied and drove them off
with fire hoses. Irena’s new friends from Dr. Radlinska’s circle
included many Jews, although as left-wing activists, religion
didn’t much interest any of them.
In 1939, World War II broke out. Warsaw was a city of one
million inhabitants, and one third of the populace was Jewish.
The Poles considered Warsaw to be dynamic and modern. The
Germans, however, considered the Poles, part of the Slavic race,
to be inferior to Aryans and ominously classified Poles along
with their Jewish neighbors as “untermenschen” or sub-hu-
38 u www.wherewhatwhen.com u
