His
name is known to millions as a household word for
courage in a world of brutality: Oscar
Schindler - the flawed hero who
saved more than 1,200 Jews from Hitler's gas chambers.
No one will ever know exactly what made Oscar Schindler do what no
German had the courage to do. A large part of the fascination of
Schindler is that not even those who admire him most can figure out his
motives.
Samaritan actions, brotherly love ...? Oscar Schindler
does not exactly fit the description of guardian angel
very well! We think we know what goodness looks like. It
looks like Gandhi, skinny in his loincloth, or Mother
Teresa, unostentatious in her nun's habit. Goodness does
not drink, womanize, wear big Nazi-badges ...
He came to Krakow in the wake of Hitler's SS troops with
the intention of making profit on the war by exploiting
cheap Jewish labor, he hung out with a crowd of Nazi
officers, he was quick with a bribe, he dealt in the
black market, he was an alcoholic playboy and a
shameless womanizer of the worst sort.
But Oscar Schindler rose to the highest level of humanity and gave his
Jews a second chance at life. He continually risked his life and spent
millions to protect and save the Schindler Jews, everything he
possessed. He died penniless.
In those years, millions of Jews died in the Nazi death
camps, but Schindler's Jews miraculously survived. He earned their everlasting gratitude.
No matter why - what matters to
his Jews is that he surfaced from the chaos of madness and risked
everything for them.
To more than 1,200 Jews Schindler was all that stood between them and
death at the hands of the Nazis. But he remained true to the Jews, the
workers he referred to as my children. In the shadow of Auschwitz
he kept the SS out and
everyone alive.
Holocaust Photos
Today there are more than 7,000 descendants of Schindler's Jews living in US and
Europe, many in Israel. Before the Second World War, the Jewish
population of Poland was 3.5 million. Today there are between 3,000 and
4,000 left.
This site shows Schindler Jews sharing memories of their unlikely savior -
stories to bear witness to goodness, love and compassion. To serve as
eulogy to the millions with a yellow star who lived and died during the
dark years of the Nazi genocide.
Generations will remember Oscar Schindler for what he did ..
- Louis Bülow
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