It all began in July 2018, when Maccabi Tel Aviv played against Ferencvárosi TC, the Hungarian football club known for its right-wing orientation and its unabashed fans who have repeatedly caused reputational damage to their team.
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I was part of the World Jewish Congress at the time and I proposed, along with the congress and the two clubs, holding an event in honor of István Tóth, who as a player on Ferencvárosi TC saved many Jews during the Holocaust and paid for this with his life. I was delighted to learn that the idea was accepted and that on top of that, the two teams – Maccabi and Ferencvárosi TC – both attended the event with their players wearing jerseys with the writing "Our Hero" on them.
The Jewish community in Budapest was happy that the local club found time to memorialize the player and the event was declared a success. The crowd was on its best behavior. The event showcased the club's determination to fight racism at any price, at its home base. This effort, which began three years ago, picked up steam as of late and was recently recognized by the European soccer authorities.
Tóth was born to a Catholic family in 1891 and started his soccer career in Ferencvárosi TC, becoming one of its first stars, well before it became the prestigious team it is today and long before anyone could see it being part of the Champions League.
Tóth logged more than 19 games in the Hungarian national team over the years, including in the 1912 Olympics. By 1926 he was no longer just a player but also a member of the club's management in the season that saw it win the championship title by overcoming the defending champion MTK Budapest FC, which had dominated local soccer for nine years straight.
He then became its head coach and led it through four straight championships. He founded the first soccer coaching school in Hungary, saying at the time that "there is no point in keeping what I know to myself, we have to spread this to others."
In the 1930s, like many others, he moved to Italy with other Hungarian coaches – Jews and non-Jews – where he spread the gospel of Hungarian soccer.
Soccer paid a heavy price
Tóth, who got the nickname Potya for Hungary during World War I, saw himself as a loyal soldier just as much as a soccer coach. Many of his friends were Jews, an obvious result of the fact that Jewish businessmen were running Hungarian soccer. Tóth led his club to win the Mitropa Cup, the equivalent title to today's European Champion Clubs' Cup, with the help of Jewish players of course. After his Italian adventure, he came back to coach in Hungary but in 1942, after 400 appearances as a player and 267 as a coach, he threw in the towel, not because he was tired of playing but because he had a more urgent matter to deal with: saving lives.
He took it as a personal affront when he saw soccer clubs become hotbeds for fascist theories and realized that he had to change his trajectory, especially because the love of his life – soccer – was being destroyed in front of his eyes.
After an acquaintance asked him to help a Jewish friend forge a document, the upcoming calamity dawned on him and he resolved to fight it. The fact that he was a soccer star was obviously a plus. Thus, he transformed his home into a small headquarters that would issue forged documents and he even hid Jewish friends there occasionally without any scruples. Having already been a known campaigner against fascist tendencies in Hungary, he became the liaison between the many partisans who had arrived in Hungary to fight fascism from around the world. He considered it important to save the athletes and artists who could use their clout to counter the rising tide of this ideology.
Two of the people who were saved because of his efforts went on to become famous in Hungary after the war. The first was Kálmán Latabár, the comedian and film actor who was considered the "Charlie Chaplin" of Hungary in his early days, but during one of his tours, he had to return to Hungary because his mother was Jewish and it had become clear what would happen to her.
Hilda Gobbi was the second one. After the war, she became the "first lady" of Hungarian theater and an icon of modern Hungarian culture.
Winds of change
Potya was captured in 1944 in what appears to be a result of someone tipping off the authorities. He was sent along with close friends to a prison in Budapest, in a castle on a hill overlooking part of the city. Today tourists go to the castle because it offers a panoramic view of the city, but on February 6, 1945, when there were rumors that German forces were losing ground, the prisoners started a riot and the guards went on to massacre all of them because they worried the riot would succeed. It was confirmed that Tóth had been buried only a year later.
Back to 2018. The Israeli and the Hungarian teams get rousing applause in the stadium, even though most of those in the audience are unaware that the event is in honor of one of the greatest stars of the Hungarian club, and one of the bravest people local soccer has ever produced. The match ends without any incident, and the Hungarian managers decide it is time to ratchet up the fight against hatred.
This past February, another event was held in memory of "Potya," this time at the Dohány Street Synagogue, known as the Great Synagogue of Budapest. His name was also etched in stone in a commemorative plaque. The event was attended by the Israeli Ambassador to Hungary Yacov Hadas-Handelsman, the president of the FTC Gábor Kubatov, and one of Prime Minister Viktor Orban's deputies, as well as Toth's great-grandchildren. "We could not ignore the great efforts expended by the club over the past several years in order to change its image," Hadas said. Hadas, who also attended some of the club's matches and has been in constant contact with it, added: "This is not easy, and there is pushback, but we see the change on the ground."
Just earlier this month, in a long-overdue move, the club started righting a historical wrong: It asked the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial to recognize Tóth as a righteous among the nations due to his efforts to save Jews during the war. This is a long a complicated process, and the chances of success are not great. Tóth, whose story until three years ago was known only to aficionados of soccer history, could become a household name if he gets this well-deserved recognition.
A soccer player, a Hungarian patriot, and maybe a righteous among the nations.
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