An overlooked hero

[Rdaug27]

Irena Sendler. I first heard of this women with all the Nobel Peace Prize coverage this year. Yes the prize went to Al Gore, and yeah I believe he has done well getting the awareness out for the environment, even though I don't agree with some of the science behind the facts, and how he goes about saying he is "carbon neutral" but he justifies that by giving donations to different environmental organizations. This lady was overshadowed by Gore, and I think it important to put her story out to as many people as possible. The more I read about her from the following site, just amazed me even more. So read up everyone, and enjoy. This is truly a remarkable story.

March 1994 issue of News and World Report, which said, 'Irena Sendler saved 2,500 children from the Warsaw Ghetto in 1942-43'.

WEBSITE HERE Irena Sendler

[Cancer]

I think I did a report on her for English or social studies or something last year... I remember watching a video about her. Really an amazing woman.

[tro81]

No disrespect but you talk about forgoten heros think about all the boys that stormed the beaches and gave there country they're life. now those boys are hero's. everyone remembers the high ranked officers but CAN YOU NAME ANY SOLDIER THAT HAS DIED. without them we are nothing... they are the real heros

[AndyPants]

Word to that.

Granted though, this is a different kind of hero. She started in the 40's (yeah the 1940's more than half a century ago) and is well past recognition.

But still, we need to not just honor the heroes that have lived in the shadows but those that stepped into the blazing sun and known danger to defend what they believed in. All due respect to your little bro tro81.

[tro81]

well spoken Andy...I guess i was just looking at one side which was wrong of me. They both was putting there lives up for someone else so they could live a free life. I apoligize for what i said but it still makes me kinda angry that noone talks about our fallen soldiers....

and thank you Andy for the condolences :)

[Rdaug27]

Yes, too many go without recognition. I chose the title, Overlooked Hero, more of because she was nominated, or at least there was a drive to get her nominated, for the Nobel Peace Prize, but it was given to Al Gore instead. (I also wanted to give it a title that people would look at, but couldn't come up with anything too clever ) I feel people like Irena Sendler deserve awards such as the Peace Prize. Like I said before, Gore is doing good raising awareness and stuff about the environment, and we all need to be aware and try and do things different and cleaner, but is it the Peace Prize he deserves for that? If you ask me, someone who puts their life on the line to save others is far more deserving of this award. I mean I don't know the criteria for such an award, but it seems too politicized to me.

I hold everyone who has ever served with the utmost respect and honor. I thank them all for their sacrifices, and owe them more than I ever will be able to repay.

[TriPP]

i personally don't think anyone that's doing a job they volunteer for is a hero. however, some people go beyond the call of duty their job calls for and do heroic things.

[Zabka]

Just to add some levity....

http://www.nbc.com/Saturday_Night_Live/video/index.shtml#mea=161982

This is relevant in the middle where Kanye West is upset he didn't win the Nobel Peace Prize of Physics.

[Rdaug27]

Sendler passes

Sendler passes. Story from Yahoo

WARSAW (Reuters) - Irena Sendler, a Polish woman who saved thousands of Jewish children during World War Two by smuggling them out of the Warsaw Ghetto, died in the Polish capital on Monday after a long illness, local media said.
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Israel's Holocaust remembrance authority, Yad Vashem, said in a statement that it mourned her death.

The web portal of Poland's leading daily, Gazeta Wyborcza, said Sendler, 98, died in Plocka Street hospital early on Monday. The hospital declined to comment on the report.

Yad Vashem chairman Avner Shalev said: "Irena Sendler's courageous activities rescuing Jews during the Holocaust serve as a beacon of light to the world, inspiring hope and restoring faith in the innate goodness of mankind."

Using her position as a social worker, Sendler regularly entered the ghetto, smuggling around 2,500 children out in boxes, suitcases or hidden in trolleys.

The children were then placed with Polish families outside the ghetto, created by Nazi Germany in 1940 for the city's half a million strong Jewish population, and given new identities.

But in 1943 Sendler, who led the children' section of the Zegota organization which helped Jews during the war, was arrested and tortured by the Gestapo.

She only escaped execution when Zegota managed to bribe some Nazi officials, who left her unconscious but alive with broken legs and arms in the woods.

"People who stand up for others, for the weak, are very rare. The world would have been a better place if there were more of them," Marek Edelman, the last surviving commander of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, said on national television.

His sentiments were echoed by former Polish President Lech Walesa as well as religious leaders.

Sendler was honored with Israeli Yad Vashem Righteous Among the Nations medal in 1965 for her actions, and later made an honorary Israeli citizen.

She was also nominated for the Nobel Peace Price last year but, despite her bravery, she denied she was a hero.

"The term 'hero' irritates me greatly. The opposite is true. I continue to have pangs of conscience that I did so little," Sendler said in one of her last interviews.