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The '''Tehran Children''' were a group of about one thousand Jewish children who had fled eastward from Poland with their families at the outbreak of World War II. Many of them had lost their parents during their flight. These orphans were allowed to emigrate from the USSR along with 23,000 Polish soldiers and refugees, under an agreement signed by the Polish Government-in-exile and the Soviet government allowing for the enlistment of Polish refugees in the Soviet Union in the (Polish) Anders Army. In the spring and summer of 1942, the children were taken to Tehran along with the other refugees and soldiers. After immigration permits were obtained from the British, the children were brought to Palestine via Karachi and Suez on February 18, 1943.
[[File:1994 Grynberg.jpg|thumb|250px]]
[[File:2019 Dekel.jpg|thumb|250px]]
[[File:2020 Grigsby.jpg|thumb|250px]]
 
'''Tehran Children''' (see [[Holocaust Children Studies]])
 
== History ==
 
The '''Tehran Children''' were a group of about one thousand [[Holocaust Refugee Children]] who had fled eastward from Poland with their families at the outbreak of World War II. Many of them had lost their parents during their flight. These orphans were allowed to emigrate from the USSR along with 23,000 Polish soldiers and refugees, under an agreement signed by the Polish Government-in-exile and the Soviet government allowing for the enlistment of Polish refugees in the Soviet Union in the (Polish) Anders Army. In the spring and summer of 1942, the children were taken to Tehran along with the other refugees and soldiers. After immigration permits were obtained from the British, the children were brought to Palestine via Karachi and Suez on February 18, 1943.
 
The "Tehran Children" escaped from Poland to Russia after Germany conquered it in September 1939, or lived in regions annexed to the Soviet Union following the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939 (see Appendix I on the JewishGen Yizkor book site), which divided Poland between the two powers.  Some of the children's original Polish towns moved from German hands to Russian and via versa (see Appendix II on the JewishGen Yizkor book site) during the period in which the Jews ran away, fleeing eastward from certain death, as history proved later.  There were around 300,000 such refugees, according to some estimates. (See Note 2).
 
In the beginning of 1940 the Soviet authorities, through the NKWD, began mass expulsion of Polish citizens to gulags in Siberia.  Many hundreds of thousands of Polish citizens, many Jews among them, were expelled to the depth of Russian Siberia.  After weeks of a horrible journey in cattle cars, the deportees were settled in Siberia and lived under harsh and difficult conditions.  The mortality rate was very high; many of the children died or became orphans in this period.
 
On June 22nd, 1941, Nazi Germany attacked the U.S.S.R. despite the non-aggression pact between them, and a new era started for the Polish refugees, Jews among them.  An amnesty was declared; as a result all the Polish citizens were set free from the gulags (see Appendix III on the JewishGen Yizkor book site).  A mass emigration started, towards the Asian territories, mainly Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan.
 
A wave of hungry and sick refugees, wearing torn rags, flooded the towns of Tashkent, Samarqand, and others.  Many of the children lost their parents in this period, and many of the children themselves died of hunger and epidemics.
 
At the same time, Lt-General Wladyslaw Anders was freed from prison in Moscow and founded the Polish Armies in Exile, which would attack Germany in Italy, passing through the Middle East.  The Soviet authorities agreed to the emigration of about 24,000 Polish citizens with the Anders army, including around 1,000 Jewish children, most of them orphans, and 800 Jewish adults.
 
By the end of 1941, Sikorski, the prime minister of the Polish Government-in-exile, managed to convince Stalin to send around 25,000 Polish soldiers of the Anders Armies to Iran, to arm themelves and to strengthen the British armies in the Middle East.  Thirty-three thousand soldiers left, 11,000 citizens with them, including 3,000 children, of which about 1,000 were orphaned Jewish children.  (See Note 3).  The "Tehran Children" left in trains from Samarqand to Krasnovodsk, and from there, through the Caspian Sea to Pahlevi, an Iranian port town on the Caspian southern shores.  From there they moved to Tehran.
 
In Pahlevi, refugee tent camps were immediately erected.  The Jewish children suffered from heat, starvation, sicknesses, and also the abuses by their fellow Poles.  The situation changed once the Jewish Agency learned about the refugees' camps and opened its Eretz Israel Office in Tehran.  Messengers and instructors were sent to the camp; as a result, living conditions improved significantly.  It is worth mentioning that Tzipora Sharet, a leader from the Yishuv in Eretz Israel, contributed to the children's welfare.  David Lauberg (Laor), one of the adult refugees, was appointed to be the head of the camp.  In 1995, David Laor submitted many documents, photographs and items to Yad Vashem.  This material was the basis for another book about the "Tehran Children" published by Yad Vashem (Hebrew) "I Did not Have Time to be Sad", 1996 (the story of Kaner Majloch from Pruchnik, a symbol of the children's odyssey).
 
In January 1943, the evacuation of the tent-city began.  The children moved to Afhaz and then to the Iranian port of Bender Shapur, where they embarked on the S.S. Dunera, headed to Karachi.  This route was chosen since the Iraqis refused to grant them transit visas through Iraq.  From Karachi they embarked on another ship, the Neurolia, which sailed to Suez, Egypt.  Then they crossed the Sinai Desert by train, they were quarantined in El Arish for another two days, and finally after an odyssey of four years of agony, they arrived home and disembarked the train in Atlit in Eretz Israel ("Palestine" at that time), on February 18th, 1943.
 
The second group (of around 110 children) arrived via Iraq after the British suppressed the Rashid Ali's revolt that year.
 
The small Yishuv (the name of the Jewish settlement in Eretz Israel prior to the foundation of the State of Israel) rejoiced and welcomed the little children as if a miracle had happened.  The children were distributed among Kibbutzim, Moshavim, and various educational institutions.  Natan N. Alterman, the famous Hebrew poet, wrote a poem which is well known about the Tehran Children, "who also after they will grow old, will always remain "the Tehran Children"...
 
..." yes, the war of the elders of Tehran, ten years old,
and the war of the elders of Kazakhstan, six years old,
all the elders of the battles between Siberia and Polesie
the little elders, persecuted by fire..."
 
The "Tehran Children" were quickly absorbed in Israel and overcame the gap in their education, the loss of four significant years, during which instead of studying, they struggled for their life.  They did grow up, raised new families, and overcame the bereavement, the sad memories, and the hardship.  They completed their studies and slowly their faith in humanity was restored.  They all became very positive and contributing citizens of Israel, active in all realms of the Israeli society, economy, and army.
 
But 35 did not grow old.  Thirty-five of the children fell in battles during the wars of Israel, mainly the Independence War in 1948, sacrificing their lives for the freedom of the new State of Israel.  Those 35 young brave boys and girls were commemorated in the book by Meir Ohad, Yizkor the Tehran Children, published by the Public Commission to Commemorate the "Tehran Children", Tel Aviv, 1979.  Details (in Hebrew) about each combatant, his biography, the date and place of his death, and his burial place are in the Israeli Ministry of Defense website: http://www.izkor.gov.il.
 
== Book : ''Children of Zion'' (1994; ET 1998), by Henryk Grynberg ==
 
* Henryk Grynberg, ''Dzieci Syjonu'' <Polish> (Warszawa: Karta, 1994). Hebrew ed. ''Dzieci Syjonu, The Children of Zion, The Path of Agony of the "Tehran Children"'' (Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1995). English ed. ''Children of Zion'' (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1998).
 
The book is based on 73 testimonies – "Protocols" – taken and registered from the children immediately after their arrival to the Promised Land.  The protocols of the children's testimonies are in the archives of the Hoover Institution, Documentation Box 197, Folders 1-4, Polish Information Center - Jerusalem, at Stanford University, in the collection "Poland - Ministry of Information and reports of Jewish Deportees."  They were the basis of Grynberg's book, which enfolds the historical events of this less explored chapter of the Holocaust through the eyes of the little Jewish refugees from Poland and their struggle for survival in the Soviet Union ... The escape of the children from Poland saved them from the clutches of the Nazi extermination machine, yet exposed them to the cruel fate of helpless refugees, fighting all sorts of hardship: diseases of many kinds, incomprehensible hunger, cold, forced labor and confinement to an orphanage.  These events are less documented in history books, and in this respect the "Children of Zion" contributes, through the testimonies of the individual child, to the general review of history.
 
"In Children of Zion, Henryk Grynberg takes an extraordinary collection of interviews conducted by representatives of the Polish government-in-exile in Palestine in 1943 and arranges them in such a way that their voices become unforgettable. The interviewees--all Polish children--tell of their wartime experiences. Rather than using traditional form, Grynberg has turned their voices into a large "choral" group. The children recall their lives before the war (most were well off), their memories of the war's outbreak and the arrival of the Germans and Russians, and their experiences after leaving work camps and the ways many coped with their lives as orphans."--Publisher description.
 
====List of children====
 
* (31) ?? Eliezer Haltman (15) from Izbica
 
* (36) ?? [[Cywia Elsan]] (15, 1927?) + Nisan (12, 1931)
 
* (37) [[Ida, Bela, Abram & Hersz Potasz (FFMM / Poland, 1928 1930, 1932, 1935), Holocaust survisors]]
 
Ida Potasz / Judyta Patasz]] (15) with sister and 2 brothers
 
Born in Goworowo, Poland. Children of Fiszel and Chaja. Arrived in Israel on February 18, 1943.
 
* (40) ??  Chaim Dawid Cwibel (16)
 
* (50) Josef Hurwicz () with brother Mojsze
 
[[Josef & Moniek Horowicz (MM / Poland, 1928, 1932), Holocaust
 
Born in Wieliczka (near Krakow), Poland. Children of Ozjasz (Jehoszua) and Sara.
 
* (53) Mordechaj Szmulewicz
 
[[Motek Szmulewicz (M / Poland, 1928), Holocaust survivor]]
 
Born in Lodz, Poland. Son of Israel and Adela. Arrived in Israel on February 18, 1943.
 
* (65) Josef Rozenberg (15)
 
[[Hersz, Jozef, Lea & Mosze Rosenberg (MMFM / Poland, 1928, 1929, 1930, 1932), Holocaust survivors]]
 
Born in Krzeszow (near Lublin), Poland. Children of Nachemi and Rachel. Arrived in Israel on February 18, 1943.
 
* (74) Nachum Teper = Manes 1926? (15)
 
[[Fajga, Jozef, Markus & Bajla Teper (FMMF / Poland, 1928, 1930, 1932, 1937), Holocaust survivors]]
 
Born in Narol (near Lwow?), Poland. Children of Samuel and Regina. Arrived in Israel on February 18, 1943.
 
* (79) Boruch Flamenbaum
 
[[Boruch Flamenbaum (M / Poland, 1929), Holocaust survivor]]
 
Born in Bilgoraj, Poland. Son of Abram (Abraham) and Sara. Arrived in Israel on February 18, 1943.
 
* (83) Szymon Turner (13)
 
[[Szymon Turner (M / Poland, 1929),
 
Born in Mszana Dolna (Osiany Dolne), Poland. Son of Izak (Icchak) and lea. Arrived in Israel on February 18, 1943.
 
* (102) David Auschibel ? (14) or Berta Anzubel (b.1927) ?
 
* (107) Jeschoszua Frydman (16)
 
* (108) Josef Barten (14)
 
[[Josef Barten (M / Poland, 1929)
 
Born in Majdan Klobuszewski, Poland. Son of Wolf and Rywka (Rebeka).
 
* (109) Izreal Ferster (15) Arrived with two sisters ?
 
Or Fenster?
 
* (110) Dina Stahl (Sztark) (11) Dina Rabka
 
[[Dina Stahl (F / Poland, 1932)
 
Born in Rabka, Poland. Daughter of Josef and Ester.
 
* (111) Lunia Akerman (13) with brother (8)
 
[[Leonia & Jankiel Akerman (FM / Poland, 1930, 1935), Holocaust survivors]]
 
* 112. Sima Siebcesser (13)
 
[[Syma Zybcener (M / Poland, 1930), Holocaust survivor]]
Born in Tarnowka (near Lancut), Poland. Son of Mendel and Rajzel.
 
* 113. Eliezer Hochmeister (15)
 
[[Eliezer Hochmeister (M / Poland, 1928), Holocaust survivor]]
Born in Warsaw, Poland. Son of Dawid and Noami (Noemi). Arrived in Israel in 1943.
 
* 114. Eliezer Kreitner (13)
 
* 115. Luba Milgram (12)
 
[[Minia, Luba, Chaja & Szajndla Milgrom (Poland, 1929, 1931, 1936, 1938), Holocaust survivors]]
 
Born in Kaluszyn, Poland. Children of Jozef and Estera. Arrived in Palestine on February 18, 1943.
 
Luba was interviewed in Palestine in 1943.
 
* 116. Mojsze Lipowicz (11)
 
[[Felicja, Maria & Monek Lipowicz (FFM / Poland, 1929, 1931, 1933), Holocaust survivors]]
 
Born in Pultusk, Poland. Children of Selik and Roza (Rojza). Arrived in Palestine on February 18, 1943.
 
Maria (#136) and Monek (Mojsze, #116)) were interviewed in Palestine in 1943.
 
* 117. Chaim Cymerman (13) with his sister
 
[[Chaim & Malka Cymerman (MF / Poland, 1930, 1932), Holocaust survivors]]
 
Born in Hrubieszow, Poland. Children of Michal (Nacha) and Perla (Ita). Arrived in Palestine on February 18, 1943.
 
Chaim (#117)) was interviewed in Palestine in 1943.
 
* 118. Sara Mlawer (12) with her brother.
 
[[Zelek & Sara Mlawer (M / Poland, 1930, 1932), Holocaust survivors]]
 
Born in Przasnysz, Poland. Children of Michal (Michel) and Rywka (Frejda). Arrived in Palestine on February 18, 1943.
 
Sara (#118)) was interviewed in Palestine in 1943.
 
* (196) [[Mozes Szrajber (M / Poland, 1930), Holocaust survivor]]
 
* (200) [[Moszko Sznajder (M / Poland, 1932), Holocaust survivor]] 
 
* (204) [[Abraham Rajf (M / Poland, 1930), Holocaust survivor]] + Jankel 1928 sons of Szyja. From Krasnobrod (august 1943.
 
* ??? (210) [[Sara Bruder (F / Poland, 1930), Holocaust survivor]] From Pultusk no sibling (Broder)
 
* ??? (214) [[Jakub Kalman (M / Poland, 19??), Holocaust survivor]] + sibling 1936  (age 17) ???
 
* (240) [[Mojsze Grajcer (M / Poland, 19??), Holocaust survivor]]
 
* (254) [[Miriam Koldra (F / Poland, 1928), Holocaust survivor]]
 
== Book : ''Tehran Children'' (2019), by Mikhal Dekel ==
 
* Mikhal Dekel. Tehran Children: A Holocaust Refugee Odyssey (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2019).
 
"Fleeing East from Nazi terror, over a million Polish Jews traversed the Soviet Union, many finding refuge in Muslim lands. Their story―the extraordinary saga of two-thirds of Polish Jewish survivors―has never been fully told ... Author Mikhal Dekel’s father, Hannan Teitel, and her aunt Regina were two of these refugees. After they fled the town in eastern Poland where their family had been successful brewers for centuries, they endured extreme suffering in the Soviet forced labor camps known as “special settlements.” Then came a journey during which tens of thousands died of starvation and disease en route to the Soviet Central Asian Republics of Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. While American organizations negotiated to deliver aid to the hundreds of thousands of Polish Jews who remained there, Dekel’s father and aunt were two of nearly one thousand refugee children who were evacuated to Iran, where they were embraced by an ancient Persian-Jewish community. Months later, their Zionist caregivers escorted them via India to Mandatory Palestine, where, at the endpoint of their thirteen-thousand-mile journey, they joined hundreds of thousands of refugees (including over one hundred thousand Polish Catholics). The arrival of the “Tehran Children” was far from straightforward, as religious and secular parties vied over their futures in what would soon be Israel ... Beginning with the death of the inscrutable Tehran Child who was her father, Dekel fuses memoir with extensive archival research to recover this astonishing story, with the help of travel companions and interlocutors including an Iranian colleague, a Polish PiS politician, a Russian oligarch, and an Uzbek descendent of Korean deportees. The history she uncovers is one of the worst and the best of humanity. The experiences her father and aunt endured, along with so many others, ultimately reshaped and redefined their lives and identities and those of other refugees and rescuers, profoundly and permanently, during and after the war ... With literary grace, Tehran Children presents a unique narrative of the Holocaust, whose focus is not the concentration camp, but the refugee, and whose center is not Europe, but Central Asia and the Middle East. 10 illustrations"--Publisher description.
 
== Book : ''A Train to Palestine'' (2020), by Randy Grigsby ==
 
* Randy Grigsby, ''A Train to Palestine: The Tehran Children, Anders' Army and their Escape from Stalin's Siberia, 1939–1943''
 
"In October 1938, eight-year-old Josef Rosenbaum, his mother, and his younger sister set out from Germany on a cruel odyssey, fleeing into eastern Europe along with thousands of other refugees. Sent to Siberian slave labor camps in the wildernesses, they suffered brutal cold, famine, and disease. When Germany invaded Russia many refugees were forced out of Siberia to primitive tent camps in Uzbekistan, accompanied by the Polish army-in-exile previously imprisoned by the Soviets. Within weeks the commander of the army, General Wladyslaw Anders, received orders to relocate his army to Iran to train to fight alongside the British in North Africa. Instructed to leave without the civilians, Anders instead ordered all evacuees, including Jews, to head southward with his troops. Joe and the refugees were again loaded on trains, accompanied by the Polish soldiers, and sent to the port of Pahlavi on the Caspian Sea. Then, transported by trucks over treacherous mountain roads, they finally arrived in Tehran, where they struggled to survive in horrifying conditions. In October 1942, the Jewish Agency in Jerusalem accepted responsibility for the nine hundred orphaned Jewish children in the camp, and by January 1943, the agency secured travel certificates for the Tehran Children to evacuate to Palestine. Joe and the other children, after five terrible years, finally reached safety at the Athlit Detention Camp, north of Haifa, on 18 February 1943. Readers will find the story is one of the swift brutalities of war, and the suffering of civilians swept up in the maelstrom of fierce conflict. A Train to Palestine recreates a remarkable, and little-known story of escape and survival during the Second World War."--Publisher description.


== Names of Tehran Children ==
== Names of Tehran Children ==


Eli Melech, Batya Shahar (Karola Felsen, name before the war), Hadassah Montag, Chibi (Tzvi Achtenberg), [[Hadassah Lampel]], [[Gabrila Knoebel]] (Gavriella Knoebel), Miriam Goldstein, Unidentified boy, and Michal Galina.
* 1. Aleksander Abend (Krakow, 1926)
 
* 2. Hersz Achtenberg (Warsaw, 1929)
 
* 3. Karol Ajchner (1926)
 
* 4. Jankiel Akerman (Warsaw, 1935)
* 5. [[Leonia Akerman (F / Poland, 1930), Holocaust survivor]] (111)


[[Hadassah Lampel]], the daughter of Moshe and Rosa, was born in a little Polish town called Nowy Sacz, in the foothills of the Beskid Mountains, on February 12, 1929. The family found temporary refuge in the Soviet Union. They were sent to Siberia to forced labor. She arrived in Israel among the Tehran children. She lived in the Kibbutz Givat Brenner. She died in 1948 in the Independence War.
* 6. Doris Akselrod (1930)
* 7. Piotr Akselrod  (1927)


[[Hannan Teitel / Hannan Dekel]] (1927-1993), bother of [[Rivka Teitel]] (1931) Rikva Dekel]]  and Noemi (1932)
* 8. Chaim Alter (1926)  


Mikhal Dekel, daughter of Hannah wrote a book.
* 9. Hana Alter (1927)
 
* 10. Jankiel Altman (1928)
 
* 11. Edmund Amada (1929)
* 12. Regina Amada (1929)
 
* 13. Berta Anzubel (1927)


---


[[Yehuda Zerzy Singer]] (M / Poland, 1928)
* 26. [[Ida Bauminger (F / Poland, 1931), Holocaust survivor]] (163)


Biography
Born in Krakow, Poland. Daughter of Chaskiel and Bronia.


Yehuda Zerzy Singer was born in Kraków, Poland in 1928 and immigrated to Palestine in February 1943 with the "Tehran Children," a group of children and Holocaust survivors brought to the country by the Jewish Agency after staying in a camp arranged for them in Tehran, Iran. After arriving in Palestine, Yehuda was sent with a group of children to Kibbutz Ein Harod.
* 79-80-81. [[Tola, Fryda & Marta Celniker (FFF / Poland, 1930, 1932, 1933), Holocaust survivors]] (122)


The Yehuda Zerzy Singer papers contain a handwritten diary, photographs, and documents relating to Yehuda Zerzy Singer’s experiences in Poland and Russia during World War II and his life in Palestine after his arrival with the "Teheran Children." The collection includes school certificates, a postcard, identification cards, and photographs of Yehuda in Kibbutz Ein Harod.
Born in Warszawa, Poland. Children of Mosze and Nomi.


The diary was written, in Polish, by Yehuda from September 1, 1939, the day of the invasion of Nazi Germany into Poland, until the beginning of 1942, about one year prior to his arrival in Palestine. The diary documents the occupation of Poland; the plans of the family to escape to the east and the trip of the family to Lviv; the recruitment of his father to the army; the occupation of Lviv by the Russians; receipt of a letter announcing that his father was taken prisoner; his mother's work in sawing trees and his brother's work as a guard; and a trip by train and meeting new friends on his way to Tehran.
* 89-90. [[Chaim & Malka Cymerman (MF / Poland. 1930, 1932), Holocaust survivors]] (117)


-----
Born in Hrubieszow, Poland. Children of Michael and Perla.


[[Salomon Wagner]] / Shlomo Vagner (1929-1948), born in Nisko, Poland, one of the Tehran Children (a group of Polish Jewish children, mainly orphans, who escaped the Nazi German occupation of Poland, found temporary refuge in the Soviet Union, and was later evacuated to Tehran, Iran, before finally reaching Eretz Israel in 1943), was killed during Israel War of Independence.
* 145-146-147. [[Israel, Bajla & Roza Fenster (MFF / Poland, 1928, 1930, 1935), Holocaust survivors]] (Ferster, 108).  


---
Born in Majdan Klobuszewski, Poland. Children of Symcha and Gitla. Arrived in Israel in August 1943.


[[Norbert Kurzmann]] / Natan Rom (M / Poland, 1929)
-----


Norbert-Natan was born in 1929 in Katowice, Poland.  His parents, Karol Kurzmann and Ethel née Aron, were bourgeois and traditional, with no Zionist tendencies at all.  Karol was a salesman, and the family lived comfortably.  Their eldest daughter Szuzana-Ziva was born in 1926. The family spent the summer of 1939 in Szczyrk, a holiday resort in the Beskid mountains in south-west Poland, as they did every year.  Two weeks before the outbreak of the war, due to the tensions between Germany and Poland, they moved to Jaroslaw, to the home of Karol’s parents.  They never returned to Katowice.
Eli Melech, Batya Shahar (Karola Felsen, name before the war), [[Halina Montag]] (Hadassah Montag), Chibi (Tzvi Achtenberg), [[Hadassah Lampel]], [[Gabrila Knoebel]] (Gavriella Knoebel), Miriam Goldstein, Unidentified boy, and Michal Galina.


After the war broke out, the Kurzmanns fled eastward together with other relatives from Jaroslaw.  Deciding that the men were in the most danger, the family split up.  Karol Kurzmann and his brothers, Max and Zigmund fled to Romania.  The women and children, including Ethel, Ziva and Natan returned to Jaroslaw.
* [[Halina Montag (F / Poland, 1928),  


When Jaroslaw was occupied by the Germans, the city’s Jews were robbed and abused, and enlisted for forced labor. On the eve of the Jewish holiday of Sukkot, 29 September 1939, the Jews were gathered and ordered to leave the city immediately.  They had to cross over the River San to the east bank, which was controlled by the Soviets.  The eviction was carried out while robbing, beating and shooting the Jews. Ethel and her children were amongst those who crossed the river. They found refuge for the night in the barn of a local farmer.  They continued on to Lwów, where they were reunited with Karol.
Born in Jaroslaw, Poland. Daughter of Chaim and Hania.


After about a year, Karol, Ethel and their two children were exiled to a Soviet camp in Yoshkar-Ola, on the Siberian border.  Their son Stefan-Uzi was born there.  Carrying their 2-week-old baby, the family continued its wanderings, reaching Samarkand via Novosibirsk. The money ran out and the Kurzmann’s situation deteriorated to the point of starvation. Natan and Ziva were placed in a Jewish orphanage.  From his sick-bed, Karol told his children, “I will never see you again.” Their mother told them to stay together always, and gave them her only possession:  the address of her brothers in the USA.
* 422. [[Hadassah Lampel]], the daughter of Moshe and Rosa, was born in a little Polish town called Nowy Sacz, in the foothills of the Beskid Mountains, on February 12, 1929. The family found temporary refuge in the Soviet Union. They were sent to Siberia to forced labor. She arrived in Israel among the Tehran children. She lived in the Kibbutz Givat Brenner. She died in 1948 in the Independence War.


Ziva and Natan were evacuated together with the other children in the orphanage and reached Tehran in August 1942.  There, emissaries from Eretz Israel gathered some 1000 Jewish children that had fled eastward with their families and lived a nomadic existence until reaching Tehran in various ways.  In February 1943, these children – the Tehran Children – reached Eretz Israel.
* [[Abram & Miriam Goldsztein (MF / Poland, 1927, 1930)


We arrived as “elderly children”, relates Natan.  They had no idea what had happened to their parents, Karol and Ethel, and their baby brother Uzi. After a year, they managed to make contact with their mother, and discovered that their father had perished in Samarkand. Ethel and Uzi returned to Katowice, lived in DP camps, travelled to Belgium to visit Ethel’s brother who had survived, and in 1948, the family was reunited in Israel.
Born in Zbaraz and Luck, Poland. Children of Lipa and Estera. Arrive in Israel in February 1943.


Recalling the reunion with his mother, Natan relates:
-----


“I had forgotten my German… I only spoke Hebrew…I was grown up, a soldier, and I came to meet my mother and this boy [Uzi], and we had no language in common…  I could only stutter in German.  We had not seen Mother and Uzi for five years…. and all I could do was stutter…  There was communication, but not connection.”
[[Chanania & Regina Teitel (MF / Poland, 1927, 1931), Holocaust survivors]]
Ziva settled in Kibbutz Hatzerim, Natan in Kibbutz Afikim, and they both started families.  They kept in contact with their mother and brother, and the three siblings – Natan, Ziva and Uzi – changed the family name to Rom.


---
Chanania Teitel / Hannan Dekel (M / Poland, 1927-1993)


[[Zeev Schuss]] (M / Poland, 1937-2018),
Regina Teitel / Rivka Dekel (F / Poland, 1931) ]] 


graduated in composition, conducting, and
Noemi Perelgric (F / Poland, 1932)
theory from the Academy of Music in Tel Aviv 1963, at the same time he graduated
in mathematics 1965 and got his PhD in mathematics from Northwestern 1970. He became professor at TAU and served the chairman of applied mathematics 1993-1995.


Schuss, Zeev was born on August 31, 1937 in Krakow, Poland. Son of Moshe and ajga Eugenia (Teitelbaum).
Mikhal Dekel, daughter of Hannah wrote a book.


---
-----


[[Joe Rosenbaum]] (M / Germany, 1931), Holocaust survivor
[[Yehuda Zerzy Singer]] (M / Poland, 1928)


"Holocaust Remembrance Day: The Tehran children'', by Tom Arceneaux (Shreveport Times, Apr 22, 2016)
Biography


Joe Rosenbaum was one of the Tehran Children.
Yehuda Zerzy Singer was born in Kraków, Poland in 1928 and immigrated to Palestine in February 1943 with the "Tehran Children," a group of children and Holocaust survivors brought to the country by the Jewish Agency after staying in a camp arranged for them in Tehran, Iran. After arriving in Palestine, Yehuda was sent with a group of children to Kibbutz Ein Harod.


I had never heard of the Tehran Children until Shreveporter Randy Grigsby told me about Joe. You’ll be able to hear Joe’s amazing story in a week. He is the guest speaker for the 33rd annual Holocaust Remembrance Service of Northwest Louisiana at 3 p.m. at St. Mary of the Pines Catholic Church May 1.
The Yehuda Zerzy Singer papers contain a handwritten diary, photographs, and documents relating to Yehuda Zerzy Singer’s experiences in Poland and Russia during World War II and his life in Palestine after his arrival with the "Teheran Children." The collection includes school certificates, a postcard, identification cards, and photographs of Yehuda in Kibbutz Ein Harod.


When Germany invaded Poland on Sept. 1, 1939, hundreds of thousands of the country’s Jewsfled to Soviet Russia. Any feeling of safety was short lived. When Germany invaded the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, the Soviet Union moved them further into the country.
The diary was written, in Polish, by Yehuda from September 1, 1939, the day of the invasion of Nazi Germany into Poland, until the beginning of 1942, about one year prior to his arrival in Palestine. The diary documents the occupation of Poland; the plans of the family to escape to the east and the trip of the family to Lviv; the recruitment of his father to the army; the occupation of Lviv by the Russians; receipt of a letter announcing that his father was taken prisoner; his mother's work in sawing trees and his brother's work as a guard; and a trip by train and meeting new friends on his way to Tehran.


Also in 1941, British and Soviet troops jointly occupied Iran. Efforts of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, as the area now comprising the nation of Israel was known prior to May 1948, paved the way for Polish refugees, both Christian and Jewish, to resettle in Palestine from Iran. That is how a group of Jewish children came to be known as the “Tehran Children.” Rosenbaum was one of them.
-----


Of course, the story of any group is an amalgamation of the stories of each member of the group, and Joe’s story varies some from the “typical” story of the Tehran Children. For a start, Joe is German not Polish.
[[Salomon Wagner]] / Shlomo Vagner (1929-1948), born in Nisko, Poland, one of the Tehran Children (a group of Polish Jewish children, mainly orphans, who escaped the Nazi German occupation of Poland, found temporary refuge in the Soviet Union, and was later evacuated to Tehran, Iran, before finally reaching Eretz Israel in 1943), was killed during Israel War of Independence.


He was born in Cologne, Germany on March 25, 1931, to Simon and Minna Rosenbaum. As the climate for Jews in Germany deteriorated after Hitler rose to power, Simon began making arrangements to immigrate to the United States. He hoped to move the entire family but his contacts in the U.S. could only make arrangements for Simon at that time. Simon planned to save enough to demonstrate that he could support his wife and three children so they could come to live with him in the U.S. Simon left for America in April 1938. Events in Europe moved too quickly for him to execute his plan.
---


Joe was the middle child. The family managed to get daughter Ines, the oldest (born in 1926), to Belgium, from where she ultimately escaped to America. Minna, Joe, and his younger sister Nelly, born in 1936, stayed behind in Germany.
[[Ben Zion Rabinowitz]] - The Rabinowicz family has one of the most outstanding Hasidic lineages and is the source of several dynasties. The founder of the Biala dynasty was Yaakov Yitzchok Rabinowicz (1766–1813). Among the Tehran Children were also the children of Yechiel Yehoshua Rabinowicz, Biala Rebbe of Jerusalem (1900–1981). He survived the Nazis by fleeing to Siberia; then in 1947 he settled in Israel. He was known as a miracle worker, and he established a yeshiva (a school for Talmudic study) at B’nai Brak.  


In the spring of 1939, Germany sought to relocate thousands of German Jews to Poland. The Polish government initially refused them entry, but eventually accepted them. When Germany invaded Poland, the refugees fled to the part of Poland occupied by Russia but they did not receive a warm welcome there either.
My parents had five children, the eldest daughter, the late Gitl Dreizl (we called her Gitl’a, and after immigrating to Israel has changed her name to Gila, and her surname after her marriage was Gotthelf); The second son, the late Herschel-Zvi (which we called Hersheleh), third son is I, Isaac Yaacov (called Yankale), the fourth son the late David Matitiahu (whom we called Dobtz’e); And youngest son Ben Zion (which we call Bentzal’e, Now lives in the city of Lugano in Switzerland).


The Russians relocated 400,000 refugees, including the remaining Rosenbaums, to Siberia in early 1940. They used freight cars on trains, then trucks, to move them like cattle. The refugees performed manual labor in an undeveloped area of the huge region. So isolated were they that there was no need for guards. Where would they go if they escaped?
(1) Gitla Rabinowicz(1921?)


While in Siberia, Minna became weaker and weaker. She was giving Joe and Nelly part of her meager food ration. She literally starved herself to save her children.
(2) Grand Rabbi Yerachmiel Tzvi Yehudah Rabinowicz was known as the Biala-Peshischa Rebbe (1923–2003).


Joe, his sister, and some members of his extended family eventually found themselves on a collective farm in Turkestan. Food again was scarce. One morning, Joe’s sister complained of being hungry when she woke up. Joe comforted her by telling her that he would bring her food later in the day. When he finally did, it was too late. She was dead.
(3) Rabbi [[Yaakov Rabinowicz]] (1926-1930), son of Rabbi Yechiel Yehoshua Rabinowicz, was the Biala Rebbe of the Ramat Aharon section of Bnei Brak, Israel. He died in 2010 (Born 1926


In time, Joe made his way to Iran, where he stayed and attended some school. From there, Jewish agencies assisted in bringing him and others on a roundabout journey to Palestine, then part of the British Mandate in the Middle East. He arrived on Feb. 18, 1943.
(4) Rabbi [[David Rabinowicz]] (1927-1997) was Biala Rebbe in Bnei Brak, Israel. He authored Lehavas Dovid. Died in 1997.


Hadassah and the Youth Aliyah, two Jewish organizations, helped him recuperate from his weakness and malnutrition after he arrived in Palestine, and he began to work on a kibbutz. He loved the family who took him in.
(5) Rabbi [[Ben-Zion Rabinowicz]] (1935-) of Biala was born in Poland on January 30, 1935. He is the youngest son of Rabbi Yechiel Yehoshua of Biala.


Joe’s father began to write to him, urging Joe to join him in America. Joe did not want to leave his adopted family, but eventually he joined his father in New York in 1946.
From Rabbi Yechiel Yehoshua, the lineage passed to Grand Rabbi Dovid Matisyahu (Reb “Duv’tche”) Rabinowicz (1928–1997) and then to Grand Rabbi Betzalel Simchah Menachem [[Ben-Zion Rabinowicz]], the Biala rebbe of Jerusalem.


Joe Rosenbaum’s story illustrates vividly the ravages and tragedies of dislocation due to war and genocide. It has deep lessons for all of us. Let us learn well.


----
----
Line 115: Line 316:


Rifka Glatz (née Muscovitz), born on October 26, 1937 in Debrecen, Hungary, describes moving to Cluj when she was in kindergarten; her father’s transport to a work camp in the early 1940s; being rounded-up with her mother and her brother in early spring of 1944; being taken to Budapest, Hungary, where they were kept in a synagogue; contracting the chicken pox but keeping it a secret; her and her family’s transport to Bergen-Belsen, of which she remembers little because of her young age; staying at Bergen-Belsen for eight months; being part of a group that was given their freedom by Rudolf Kasztner, who gave money and jewels to Eichmann; and recovering in Switzerland until her immigration to Palestine as part of the first legal Aliyah.
Rifka Glatz (née Muscovitz), born on October 26, 1937 in Debrecen, Hungary, describes moving to Cluj when she was in kindergarten; her father’s transport to a work camp in the early 1940s; being rounded-up with her mother and her brother in early spring of 1944; being taken to Budapest, Hungary, where they were kept in a synagogue; contracting the chicken pox but keeping it a secret; her and her family’s transport to Bergen-Belsen, of which she remembers little because of her young age; staying at Bergen-Belsen for eight months; being part of a group that was given their freedom by Rudolf Kasztner, who gave money and jewels to Eichmann; and recovering in Switzerland until her immigration to Palestine as part of the first legal Aliyah.
== Book : ''Children of Zion'' (1994; ET 1998).
* Henryk Grynberg, ''Dzieci Syjonu'' <Polish> (Warszawa: Karta, 1994). Hebrew ed. ''Dzieci Syjonu, The Children of Zion, The Path of Agony of the "Tehran Children"'' (Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1995). English ed. ''Children of Zion'' (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1998).
The book is based on 73 testimonies – "Protocols" – taken and registered from the children immediately after their arrival to the Promised Land.  The protocols of the children's testimonies are in the archives of the Hoover Institution, Documentation Box 197, Folders 1-4, Polish Information Center - Jerusalem, at Stanford University, in the collection "Poland - Ministry of Information and reports of Jewish Deportees."  They were the basis of Grynberg's book, which enfolds the historical events of this less explored chapter of the Holocaust through the eyes of the little Jewish refugees from Poland and their struggle for survival in the Soviet Union.


== External links ==
== External links ==


* [https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/tehran-children USHMM Encyclopedia]]
* [https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/tehran-children USHMM Encyclopedia]]
* [https://www.jewishgen.org/yizkor/Tehran/Teh001.html List of the Children]

Latest revision as of 14:29, 10 July 2021

1994 Grynberg.jpg
2019 Dekel.jpg
2020 Grigsby.jpg

Tehran Children (see Holocaust Children Studies)

History

The Tehran Children were a group of about one thousand Holocaust Refugee Children who had fled eastward from Poland with their families at the outbreak of World War II. Many of them had lost their parents during their flight. These orphans were allowed to emigrate from the USSR along with 23,000 Polish soldiers and refugees, under an agreement signed by the Polish Government-in-exile and the Soviet government allowing for the enlistment of Polish refugees in the Soviet Union in the (Polish) Anders Army. In the spring and summer of 1942, the children were taken to Tehran along with the other refugees and soldiers. After immigration permits were obtained from the British, the children were brought to Palestine via Karachi and Suez on February 18, 1943.

The "Tehran Children" escaped from Poland to Russia after Germany conquered it in September 1939, or lived in regions annexed to the Soviet Union following the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939 (see Appendix I on the JewishGen Yizkor book site), which divided Poland between the two powers. Some of the children's original Polish towns moved from German hands to Russian and via versa (see Appendix II on the JewishGen Yizkor book site) during the period in which the Jews ran away, fleeing eastward from certain death, as history proved later. There were around 300,000 such refugees, according to some estimates. (See Note 2).

In the beginning of 1940 the Soviet authorities, through the NKWD, began mass expulsion of Polish citizens to gulags in Siberia. Many hundreds of thousands of Polish citizens, many Jews among them, were expelled to the depth of Russian Siberia. After weeks of a horrible journey in cattle cars, the deportees were settled in Siberia and lived under harsh and difficult conditions. The mortality rate was very high; many of the children died or became orphans in this period.

On June 22nd, 1941, Nazi Germany attacked the U.S.S.R. despite the non-aggression pact between them, and a new era started for the Polish refugees, Jews among them. An amnesty was declared; as a result all the Polish citizens were set free from the gulags (see Appendix III on the JewishGen Yizkor book site). A mass emigration started, towards the Asian territories, mainly Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan.

A wave of hungry and sick refugees, wearing torn rags, flooded the towns of Tashkent, Samarqand, and others. Many of the children lost their parents in this period, and many of the children themselves died of hunger and epidemics.

At the same time, Lt-General Wladyslaw Anders was freed from prison in Moscow and founded the Polish Armies in Exile, which would attack Germany in Italy, passing through the Middle East. The Soviet authorities agreed to the emigration of about 24,000 Polish citizens with the Anders army, including around 1,000 Jewish children, most of them orphans, and 800 Jewish adults.

By the end of 1941, Sikorski, the prime minister of the Polish Government-in-exile, managed to convince Stalin to send around 25,000 Polish soldiers of the Anders Armies to Iran, to arm themelves and to strengthen the British armies in the Middle East. Thirty-three thousand soldiers left, 11,000 citizens with them, including 3,000 children, of which about 1,000 were orphaned Jewish children. (See Note 3). The "Tehran Children" left in trains from Samarqand to Krasnovodsk, and from there, through the Caspian Sea to Pahlevi, an Iranian port town on the Caspian southern shores. From there they moved to Tehran.

In Pahlevi, refugee tent camps were immediately erected. The Jewish children suffered from heat, starvation, sicknesses, and also the abuses by their fellow Poles. The situation changed once the Jewish Agency learned about the refugees' camps and opened its Eretz Israel Office in Tehran. Messengers and instructors were sent to the camp; as a result, living conditions improved significantly. It is worth mentioning that Tzipora Sharet, a leader from the Yishuv in Eretz Israel, contributed to the children's welfare. David Lauberg (Laor), one of the adult refugees, was appointed to be the head of the camp. In 1995, David Laor submitted many documents, photographs and items to Yad Vashem. This material was the basis for another book about the "Tehran Children" published by Yad Vashem (Hebrew) "I Did not Have Time to be Sad", 1996 (the story of Kaner Majloch from Pruchnik, a symbol of the children's odyssey).

In January 1943, the evacuation of the tent-city began. The children moved to Afhaz and then to the Iranian port of Bender Shapur, where they embarked on the S.S. Dunera, headed to Karachi. This route was chosen since the Iraqis refused to grant them transit visas through Iraq. From Karachi they embarked on another ship, the Neurolia, which sailed to Suez, Egypt. Then they crossed the Sinai Desert by train, they were quarantined in El Arish for another two days, and finally after an odyssey of four years of agony, they arrived home and disembarked the train in Atlit in Eretz Israel ("Palestine" at that time), on February 18th, 1943.

The second group (of around 110 children) arrived via Iraq after the British suppressed the Rashid Ali's revolt that year.

The small Yishuv (the name of the Jewish settlement in Eretz Israel prior to the foundation of the State of Israel) rejoiced and welcomed the little children as if a miracle had happened. The children were distributed among Kibbutzim, Moshavim, and various educational institutions. Natan N. Alterman, the famous Hebrew poet, wrote a poem which is well known about the Tehran Children, "who also after they will grow old, will always remain "the Tehran Children"...

..." yes, the war of the elders of Tehran, ten years old, and the war of the elders of Kazakhstan, six years old, all the elders of the battles between Siberia and Polesie the little elders, persecuted by fire..."

The "Tehran Children" were quickly absorbed in Israel and overcame the gap in their education, the loss of four significant years, during which instead of studying, they struggled for their life. They did grow up, raised new families, and overcame the bereavement, the sad memories, and the hardship. They completed their studies and slowly their faith in humanity was restored. They all became very positive and contributing citizens of Israel, active in all realms of the Israeli society, economy, and army.

But 35 did not grow old. Thirty-five of the children fell in battles during the wars of Israel, mainly the Independence War in 1948, sacrificing their lives for the freedom of the new State of Israel. Those 35 young brave boys and girls were commemorated in the book by Meir Ohad, Yizkor the Tehran Children, published by the Public Commission to Commemorate the "Tehran Children", Tel Aviv, 1979. Details (in Hebrew) about each combatant, his biography, the date and place of his death, and his burial place are in the Israeli Ministry of Defense website: http://www.izkor.gov.il.

Book : Children of Zion (1994; ET 1998), by Henryk Grynberg

  • Henryk Grynberg, Dzieci Syjonu <Polish> (Warszawa: Karta, 1994). Hebrew ed. Dzieci Syjonu, The Children of Zion, The Path of Agony of the "Tehran Children" (Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1995). English ed. Children of Zion (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1998).

The book is based on 73 testimonies – "Protocols" – taken and registered from the children immediately after their arrival to the Promised Land. The protocols of the children's testimonies are in the archives of the Hoover Institution, Documentation Box 197, Folders 1-4, Polish Information Center - Jerusalem, at Stanford University, in the collection "Poland - Ministry of Information and reports of Jewish Deportees." They were the basis of Grynberg's book, which enfolds the historical events of this less explored chapter of the Holocaust through the eyes of the little Jewish refugees from Poland and their struggle for survival in the Soviet Union ... The escape of the children from Poland saved them from the clutches of the Nazi extermination machine, yet exposed them to the cruel fate of helpless refugees, fighting all sorts of hardship: diseases of many kinds, incomprehensible hunger, cold, forced labor and confinement to an orphanage. These events are less documented in history books, and in this respect the "Children of Zion" contributes, through the testimonies of the individual child, to the general review of history.

"In Children of Zion, Henryk Grynberg takes an extraordinary collection of interviews conducted by representatives of the Polish government-in-exile in Palestine in 1943 and arranges them in such a way that their voices become unforgettable. The interviewees--all Polish children--tell of their wartime experiences. Rather than using traditional form, Grynberg has turned their voices into a large "choral" group. The children recall their lives before the war (most were well off), their memories of the war's outbreak and the arrival of the Germans and Russians, and their experiences after leaving work camps and the ways many coped with their lives as orphans."--Publisher description.

List of children

  • (31) ?? Eliezer Haltman (15) from Izbica

Ida Potasz / Judyta Patasz]] (15) with sister and 2 brothers

Born in Goworowo, Poland. Children of Fiszel and Chaja. Arrived in Israel on February 18, 1943.

  • (40) ?? Chaim Dawid Cwibel (16)
  • (50) Josef Hurwicz () with brother Mojsze

[[Josef & Moniek Horowicz (MM / Poland, 1928, 1932), Holocaust

Born in Wieliczka (near Krakow), Poland. Children of Ozjasz (Jehoszua) and Sara.

  • (53) Mordechaj Szmulewicz

Motek Szmulewicz (M / Poland, 1928), Holocaust survivor

Born in Lodz, Poland. Son of Israel and Adela. Arrived in Israel on February 18, 1943.

  • (65) Josef Rozenberg (15)

Hersz, Jozef, Lea & Mosze Rosenberg (MMFM / Poland, 1928, 1929, 1930, 1932), Holocaust survivors

Born in Krzeszow (near Lublin), Poland. Children of Nachemi and Rachel. Arrived in Israel on February 18, 1943.

  • (74) Nachum Teper = Manes 1926? (15)

Fajga, Jozef, Markus & Bajla Teper (FMMF / Poland, 1928, 1930, 1932, 1937), Holocaust survivors

Born in Narol (near Lwow?), Poland. Children of Samuel and Regina. Arrived in Israel on February 18, 1943.

  • (79) Boruch Flamenbaum

Boruch Flamenbaum (M / Poland, 1929), Holocaust survivor

Born in Bilgoraj, Poland. Son of Abram (Abraham) and Sara. Arrived in Israel on February 18, 1943.

  • (83) Szymon Turner (13)

[[Szymon Turner (M / Poland, 1929),

Born in Mszana Dolna (Osiany Dolne), Poland. Son of Izak (Icchak) and lea. Arrived in Israel on February 18, 1943.

  • (102) David Auschibel ? (14) or Berta Anzubel (b.1927) ?
  • (107) Jeschoszua Frydman (16)
  • (108) Josef Barten (14)

[[Josef Barten (M / Poland, 1929)

Born in Majdan Klobuszewski, Poland. Son of Wolf and Rywka (Rebeka).

  • (109) Izreal Ferster (15) Arrived with two sisters ?

Or Fenster?

  • (110) Dina Stahl (Sztark) (11) Dina Rabka

[[Dina Stahl (F / Poland, 1932)

Born in Rabka, Poland. Daughter of Josef and Ester.

  • (111) Lunia Akerman (13) with brother (8)

Leonia & Jankiel Akerman (FM / Poland, 1930, 1935), Holocaust survivors

  • 112. Sima Siebcesser (13)

Syma Zybcener (M / Poland, 1930), Holocaust survivor

Born in Tarnowka (near Lancut), Poland. Son of Mendel and Rajzel.

  • 113. Eliezer Hochmeister (15)

Eliezer Hochmeister (M / Poland, 1928), Holocaust survivor

Born in Warsaw, Poland. Son of Dawid and Noami (Noemi). Arrived in Israel in 1943.

  • 114. Eliezer Kreitner (13)
  • 115. Luba Milgram (12)

Minia, Luba, Chaja & Szajndla Milgrom (Poland, 1929, 1931, 1936, 1938), Holocaust survivors

Born in Kaluszyn, Poland. Children of Jozef and Estera. Arrived in Palestine on February 18, 1943.

Luba was interviewed in Palestine in 1943.

  • 116. Mojsze Lipowicz (11)

Felicja, Maria & Monek Lipowicz (FFM / Poland, 1929, 1931, 1933), Holocaust survivors

Born in Pultusk, Poland. Children of Selik and Roza (Rojza). Arrived in Palestine on February 18, 1943.

Maria (#136) and Monek (Mojsze, #116)) were interviewed in Palestine in 1943.

  • 117. Chaim Cymerman (13) with his sister

Chaim & Malka Cymerman (MF / Poland, 1930, 1932), Holocaust survivors

Born in Hrubieszow, Poland. Children of Michal (Nacha) and Perla (Ita). Arrived in Palestine on February 18, 1943.

Chaim (#117)) was interviewed in Palestine in 1943.

  • 118. Sara Mlawer (12) with her brother.

Zelek & Sara Mlawer (M / Poland, 1930, 1932), Holocaust survivors

Born in Przasnysz, Poland. Children of Michal (Michel) and Rywka (Frejda). Arrived in Palestine on February 18, 1943.

Sara (#118)) was interviewed in Palestine in 1943.

Book : Tehran Children (2019), by Mikhal Dekel

  • Mikhal Dekel. Tehran Children: A Holocaust Refugee Odyssey (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2019).

"Fleeing East from Nazi terror, over a million Polish Jews traversed the Soviet Union, many finding refuge in Muslim lands. Their story―the extraordinary saga of two-thirds of Polish Jewish survivors―has never been fully told ... Author Mikhal Dekel’s father, Hannan Teitel, and her aunt Regina were two of these refugees. After they fled the town in eastern Poland where their family had been successful brewers for centuries, they endured extreme suffering in the Soviet forced labor camps known as “special settlements.” Then came a journey during which tens of thousands died of starvation and disease en route to the Soviet Central Asian Republics of Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. While American organizations negotiated to deliver aid to the hundreds of thousands of Polish Jews who remained there, Dekel’s father and aunt were two of nearly one thousand refugee children who were evacuated to Iran, where they were embraced by an ancient Persian-Jewish community. Months later, their Zionist caregivers escorted them via India to Mandatory Palestine, where, at the endpoint of their thirteen-thousand-mile journey, they joined hundreds of thousands of refugees (including over one hundred thousand Polish Catholics). The arrival of the “Tehran Children” was far from straightforward, as religious and secular parties vied over their futures in what would soon be Israel ... Beginning with the death of the inscrutable Tehran Child who was her father, Dekel fuses memoir with extensive archival research to recover this astonishing story, with the help of travel companions and interlocutors including an Iranian colleague, a Polish PiS politician, a Russian oligarch, and an Uzbek descendent of Korean deportees. The history she uncovers is one of the worst and the best of humanity. The experiences her father and aunt endured, along with so many others, ultimately reshaped and redefined their lives and identities and those of other refugees and rescuers, profoundly and permanently, during and after the war ... With literary grace, Tehran Children presents a unique narrative of the Holocaust, whose focus is not the concentration camp, but the refugee, and whose center is not Europe, but Central Asia and the Middle East. 10 illustrations"--Publisher description.

Book : A Train to Palestine (2020), by Randy Grigsby

  • Randy Grigsby, A Train to Palestine: The Tehran Children, Anders' Army and their Escape from Stalin's Siberia, 1939–1943

"In October 1938, eight-year-old Josef Rosenbaum, his mother, and his younger sister set out from Germany on a cruel odyssey, fleeing into eastern Europe along with thousands of other refugees. Sent to Siberian slave labor camps in the wildernesses, they suffered brutal cold, famine, and disease. When Germany invaded Russia many refugees were forced out of Siberia to primitive tent camps in Uzbekistan, accompanied by the Polish army-in-exile previously imprisoned by the Soviets. Within weeks the commander of the army, General Wladyslaw Anders, received orders to relocate his army to Iran to train to fight alongside the British in North Africa. Instructed to leave without the civilians, Anders instead ordered all evacuees, including Jews, to head southward with his troops. Joe and the refugees were again loaded on trains, accompanied by the Polish soldiers, and sent to the port of Pahlavi on the Caspian Sea. Then, transported by trucks over treacherous mountain roads, they finally arrived in Tehran, where they struggled to survive in horrifying conditions. In October 1942, the Jewish Agency in Jerusalem accepted responsibility for the nine hundred orphaned Jewish children in the camp, and by January 1943, the agency secured travel certificates for the Tehran Children to evacuate to Palestine. Joe and the other children, after five terrible years, finally reached safety at the Athlit Detention Camp, north of Haifa, on 18 February 1943. Readers will find the story is one of the swift brutalities of war, and the suffering of civilians swept up in the maelstrom of fierce conflict. A Train to Palestine recreates a remarkable, and little-known story of escape and survival during the Second World War."--Publisher description.

Names of Tehran Children

  • 1. Aleksander Abend (Krakow, 1926)
  • 2. Hersz Achtenberg (Warsaw, 1929)
  • 3. Karol Ajchner (1926)
  • 6. Doris Akselrod (1930)
  • 7. Piotr Akselrod (1927)
  • 8. Chaim Alter (1926)
  • 9. Hana Alter (1927)
  • 10. Jankiel Altman (1928)
  • 11. Edmund Amada (1929)
  • 12. Regina Amada (1929)
  • 13. Berta Anzubel (1927)


Born in Krakow, Poland. Daughter of Chaskiel and Bronia.

Born in Warszawa, Poland. Children of Mosze and Nomi.

Born in Hrubieszow, Poland. Children of Michael and Perla.

Born in Majdan Klobuszewski, Poland. Children of Symcha and Gitla. Arrived in Israel in August 1943.

Eli Melech, Batya Shahar (Karola Felsen, name before the war), Halina Montag (Hadassah Montag), Chibi (Tzvi Achtenberg), Hadassah Lampel, Gabrila Knoebel (Gavriella Knoebel), Miriam Goldstein, Unidentified boy, and Michal Galina.

  • [[Halina Montag (F / Poland, 1928),

Born in Jaroslaw, Poland. Daughter of Chaim and Hania.

  • 422. Hadassah Lampel, the daughter of Moshe and Rosa, was born in a little Polish town called Nowy Sacz, in the foothills of the Beskid Mountains, on February 12, 1929. The family found temporary refuge in the Soviet Union. They were sent to Siberia to forced labor. She arrived in Israel among the Tehran children. She lived in the Kibbutz Givat Brenner. She died in 1948 in the Independence War.
  • [[Abram & Miriam Goldsztein (MF / Poland, 1927, 1930)

Born in Zbaraz and Luck, Poland. Children of Lipa and Estera. Arrive in Israel in February 1943.

Chanania & Regina Teitel (MF / Poland, 1927, 1931), Holocaust survivors

Chanania Teitel / Hannan Dekel (M / Poland, 1927-1993)

Regina Teitel / Rivka Dekel (F / Poland, 1931) ]]

Noemi Perelgric (F / Poland, 1932)

Mikhal Dekel, daughter of Hannah wrote a book.

Yehuda Zerzy Singer (M / Poland, 1928)

Biography

Yehuda Zerzy Singer was born in Kraków, Poland in 1928 and immigrated to Palestine in February 1943 with the "Tehran Children," a group of children and Holocaust survivors brought to the country by the Jewish Agency after staying in a camp arranged for them in Tehran, Iran. After arriving in Palestine, Yehuda was sent with a group of children to Kibbutz Ein Harod.

The Yehuda Zerzy Singer papers contain a handwritten diary, photographs, and documents relating to Yehuda Zerzy Singer’s experiences in Poland and Russia during World War II and his life in Palestine after his arrival with the "Teheran Children." The collection includes school certificates, a postcard, identification cards, and photographs of Yehuda in Kibbutz Ein Harod.

The diary was written, in Polish, by Yehuda from September 1, 1939, the day of the invasion of Nazi Germany into Poland, until the beginning of 1942, about one year prior to his arrival in Palestine. The diary documents the occupation of Poland; the plans of the family to escape to the east and the trip of the family to Lviv; the recruitment of his father to the army; the occupation of Lviv by the Russians; receipt of a letter announcing that his father was taken prisoner; his mother's work in sawing trees and his brother's work as a guard; and a trip by train and meeting new friends on his way to Tehran.

Salomon Wagner / Shlomo Vagner (1929-1948), born in Nisko, Poland, one of the Tehran Children (a group of Polish Jewish children, mainly orphans, who escaped the Nazi German occupation of Poland, found temporary refuge in the Soviet Union, and was later evacuated to Tehran, Iran, before finally reaching Eretz Israel in 1943), was killed during Israel War of Independence.

---

Ben Zion Rabinowitz - The Rabinowicz family has one of the most outstanding Hasidic lineages and is the source of several dynasties. The founder of the Biala dynasty was Yaakov Yitzchok Rabinowicz (1766–1813). Among the Tehran Children were also the children of Yechiel Yehoshua Rabinowicz, Biala Rebbe of Jerusalem (1900–1981). He survived the Nazis by fleeing to Siberia; then in 1947 he settled in Israel. He was known as a miracle worker, and he established a yeshiva (a school for Talmudic study) at B’nai Brak.

My parents had five children, the eldest daughter, the late Gitl Dreizl (we called her Gitl’a, and after immigrating to Israel has changed her name to Gila, and her surname after her marriage was Gotthelf); The second son, the late Herschel-Zvi (which we called Hersheleh), third son is I, Isaac Yaacov (called Yankale), the fourth son the late David Matitiahu (whom we called Dobtz’e); And youngest son Ben Zion (which we call Bentzal’e, Now lives in the city of Lugano in Switzerland).

(1) Gitla Rabinowicz(1921?)

(2) Grand Rabbi Yerachmiel Tzvi Yehudah Rabinowicz was known as the Biala-Peshischa Rebbe (1923–2003).

(3) Rabbi Yaakov Rabinowicz (1926-1930), son of Rabbi Yechiel Yehoshua Rabinowicz, was the Biala Rebbe of the Ramat Aharon section of Bnei Brak, Israel. He died in 2010 (Born 1926

(4) Rabbi David Rabinowicz (1927-1997) was Biala Rebbe in Bnei Brak, Israel. He authored Lehavas Dovid. Died in 1997.

(5) Rabbi Ben-Zion Rabinowicz (1935-) of Biala was born in Poland on January 30, 1935. He is the youngest son of Rabbi Yechiel Yehoshua of Biala.

From Rabbi Yechiel Yehoshua, the lineage passed to Grand Rabbi Dovid Matisyahu (Reb “Duv’tche”) Rabinowicz (1928–1997) and then to Grand Rabbi Betzalel Simchah Menachem Ben-Zion Rabinowicz, the Biala rebbe of Jerusalem.


Not part of the group but with a similar experience:

Eliahu Eilam Kimel, born on July 30, 1934 in Galicia, Poland, discusses his childhood; his parents Avraham and Regina (Rivka), who were both in the photography business; their non-Jewish neighbors; his father being a Zionist while his mother did not want to go to Palestine; having a large extended family of 100 members, of whom six survived; the Germans occupying his town; his father being beaten by a German, after which his family fled east to Lvov (L’viv, Ukraine) to relatives; his father making money by taking photographs for IDs; traveling east by train for three weeks without getting off and arriving in Ozero, Siberia; living there from 1939 until June 1941; his father working in the forest; being liberated in June 1941 but ordered to stay in the Soviet Union; going to Tashkent, Uzbekistan, then to Seragana, where they stayed for one year; having little food since fields were used to grow cotton for uniforms; not attending school and being taught how to read by a cousin; his father joining General Anders’ Polish Army in 1941; moving with his mother and aunt to a town near the army base; his mother getting ill, being pronounced dead in a hospital, and then revived by a doctor; his father being sent with the army to the Battle of Monte Cassino in Italy, for which King George gave Avraham a medal; going with his mother and aunt to a port on the Caspian Sea; fainting on the pier as he tried to get on a boat after stepping on a dead child; sitting on wooden benches on the tanker without getting up for 36 hours; arriving on the shore of Pahlavi, Iran, and then going to Teheran; his mother being taken to a hospital while he stayed with his aunt in a barrack for Jews; not being a part of the “Teheran Children” who stayed in an orphanage but being saved by them when he was being pushed into a waste ditch; staying for 18 months; attending school; leaving with his mother by boat to Suez; crossing the desert by train and going to Atlit in Palestine then to Jerusalem; attending high school; being in the Israeli Army from 1954 to 1957; studying engineering in the Technion in Haifa; getting married and having three sons; and still suffering from the trauma of his childhood.

Not part of the group:

Serge Klarsfeld (born 17 September 1935) is a French activist and Nazi hunter known for documenting the Holocaust in order to establish the records to enable the prosecution of war criminals. Serge Klarsfeld was born in Bucharest to a family of Romanian Jews. They migrated to France before the Second World War began. In 1943, his father was arrested by the SS in Nice during a roundup ordered by Alois Brunner. Deported to the Auschwitz concentration camp, Klarsfeld's father died there. Young Serge was cared for in a home for Jewish children operated by the OSE (Œuvre de secours aux enfants) organization; his mother and sister also survived the war in Vichy France, helped by the underground French Resistance beginning in late 1943. Since the 1960s, he has made notable efforts to commemorate the Jewish victims of German-occupied France and has been a supporter of Israel. He helped found and have led the Sons and Daughters of Jewish Deportees from France (Association des fils et filles des déportés juifs de France) or FFDJF. It is one of the groups that has documented cases and located former German and French officials for prosecution such as Klaus Barbie, René Bousquet, Jean Leguay, Maurice Papon and Paul Touvier, who have been implicated in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of French and foreign Jews during the Second World War. The Klarsfelds were among organized groups who filed cases decades after the war, sometimes as late as the 1990s, against such officials for their crimes against humanity. In the years before 1989 and the break-up of the Soviet Union, the Klarsfelds (Serge Klarsfeld and his wife Beate) frequently protested against the Eastern Bloc's support for the PLO and anti-Zionism. Recognition for their work has included France's Legion of Honor in 1984. In 1986, their story was adapted as an American television film starring Tom Conti, Farrah Fawcett and Geraldine Page. In 2008, a French television movie was made about them. On 1 January 2014, the Klarsfelds' Legion of Honor ranks were upgraded: Serge became Grand officer. On 26 October 2015, the UNESCO designate the Klarsfelds as "Honorary Ambassadors and Special Envoys for Education about the Holocaust and the Prevention of Genocide." Source: Online-Wikipedia

Not part of the group:

Rifka Glatz (née Muscovitz), born on October 26, 1937 in Debrecen, Hungary, describes moving to Cluj when she was in kindergarten; her father’s transport to a work camp in the early 1940s; being rounded-up with her mother and her brother in early spring of 1944; being taken to Budapest, Hungary, where they were kept in a synagogue; contracting the chicken pox but keeping it a secret; her and her family’s transport to Bergen-Belsen, of which she remembers little because of her young age; staying at Bergen-Belsen for eight months; being part of a group that was given their freedom by Rudolf Kasztner, who gave money and jewels to Eichmann; and recovering in Switzerland until her immigration to Palestine as part of the first legal Aliyah.

External links

Pages in category "Tehran Children (subject)"

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