When we reflect on the heroes of the Holocaust, names like Oskar Schindler, the German businessman who rescued over 1,200 Jews, often come to mind. However, another remarkable figure emerged during this dark chapter in history: Abdol Hossein Sardari, an Iranian diplomat who risked everything to save Jews from Nazi persecution. His story is one of courage, deception, and unwavering moral conviction in the face of overwhelming odds.

Iranian diplomat Abdol Hossein Sardari saved thousands of French Jews during the Holocaust. In 1979, the mullahs destroyed all of his possessions. pic.twitter.com/Wnz5yxa99T

— Avi Kaner ابراهيم אבי (@AviKaner) May 5, 2024

 Sardari was not your typical hero. Born into a prominent Iranian family, he enjoyed the privileges of Persian royalty, including an education abroad and influential political connections. He began his diplomatic career in Paris in 1937, serving as a junior diplomat. As France fell to the Nazis in 1940, he was promoted to head of Consular Affairs, tasked with overseeing the well-being of Iranians in Paris.

Within this community were a couple of hundred Iranian Jews, many of whom had fled Iran during the Iranian Bolshevik Revolution or had moved to Paris seeking economic opportunities. They lived relatively well, owning homes and celebrating holidays with grand festivities, until the Nazis imposed their brutal regime.

The situation for Jews in France took a drastic turn on September 27, 1940, when the Nazis mandated that all Jews register with the police. Sardari observed the escalating harassment and discrimination against non-Aryans, realizing the gravity of the situation. Jews began losing their jobs, being barred from public life, and facing arrest. The French government required Jews to carry ID cards marked with the word "Juif" in bold red letters.

While the Nazis classified Iranians as related to the original Aryans, which offered some protection, Sardari felt a moral obligation to protect all Iranians, including Jewish ones. He could not stand idly by as his fellow citizens faced persecution.

Sardari's clever deception

To save the Iranian Jews, Sardari employed a bold and cunning strategy. He hosted lavish parties at the Iranian embassy, inviting German officials and winning their trust. This approach allowed him to build connections that would prove invaluable in his efforts to protect the Iranian Jews.

Using his legal education, Sardari crafted an elaborate deception. He wrote to the Vichy government, claiming that the Iranian Jews were not actually racially Jewish, but rather "Jugutis," a group of purebred Iranians who had adopted certain Jewish practices. He argued that they should be considered Aryan because of their blood and cultural heritage. This audacious claim was a fabrication, yet it was designed to exploit the Nazis' twisted racial logic.

Sardari's arguments gained traction within the Nazi bureaucracy, prompting further investigation into his claims. Meanwhile, he took advantage of his position to issue blank passports and visas from the embassy's vault, granting hundreds of Iranian Jews the means to escape persecution without revealing their Jewish identity.

As the war progressed and the situation worsened for Jews in France, Sardari's efforts intensified. In 1941, as British and Russian forces invaded Iran, the Iranian government recalled Sardari. Undeterred, he continued his mission, even after losing his salary and enduring hardships. He went without food and heat, yet his resolve remained unshaken. His appeals eventually reached Adolf Eichmann, the infamous SS officer responsible for organizing the Final Solution. Although Eichmann dismissed Sardari's claims as "Jewish tricks," Sardari's unwavering commitment led to a remarkable outcome.

Despite Eichmann's rejection, Sardari's efforts bore fruit. German officials began to accept his pleas, and soon, the Vichy authorities exempted the so-called Jugutis from anti-Jewish legislation. Sardari's work initially focused on Iranian Jews, but as word spread, he found himself helping French and non-Iranian Jews as well.

The aftermath and legacy

His actions saved countless lives, and he became a hero among the Iranian Jewish community in Paris. However, upon returning to Iran, he faced legal charges for his actions. He spent ten days in jail for issuing visas to non-Iranians before being released through intervention.

After the Iranian Revolution in 1979, Sardari's life took a tragic turn. The new Islamist government seized his property, stripped him of his ambassador's pension, and executed his nephew, who was the previous prime minister. Fearing for his life, Sardari fled to England, where he lived in poverty until his death in 1981.

Years later, Yad Vashem reached out to him for details about his life-saving work. In his response, Sardari humbly stated, "As you may know, I had the pleasure of being the Iranian Consul in Paris during the German occupation of France, and as such, it was my duty to save all Iranians, including Iranian Jews."

Abdol Hossein Sardari's story is a testament to the power of individual conviction and moral courage. He faced immense pressure and danger yet chose to act righteously, saving lives at great personal risk. His legacy serves as a reminder of the impact one person can have in the fight against injustice, and it challenges us to consider what we would do in similar circumstances.

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Ex-Lebanese Justice Minister Ashraf Rifi told Lebanon's MTV in recent days that the Iranian-backed Hezbollah is like the Vichy regime of France during World War II, and that Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah should stand trial for betraying Lebanon, according to the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI).

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"I won't be tagged [as an enemy] by an Iranian agent. I don't need an integrity certificate from him. He needs to stand trial for his crimes against Lebanon," said Rifi, in an interview recorded and translated by MEMRI.

"We need people who are 100% Lebanese, and not agents of Iran. Who receive weapons from Iran, training from Iran, and who work for the Iranian project," he said.

"These are historical delusions that the Iranian regime lives in. It wants to restore the great Persian empire. This is a historical illusion that ended 1,400 years ago and will not ever return," he added.

"Take for example France during the Second Lebanon War. There were people who cooperated with the Nazi regime with the excuse that they were being realists. And there were other people, free people with principles, who refused to cooperate with the Nazi occupation. They extended a hand to the Allies and freed their country. I want to go in this process, more or less," said the former minister.

"We as Lebanese cannot do this by ourselves, but we cannot in any way give legitimacy to Hezbollah and its illegal weapons. Until the right moment comes from a regional and global perspective in which we can liberate the homeland as France did in the Second World War.

"I want to remind all Lebanese that those who collaborated with the Nazi occupation, the Vichy Regime of General Petain, they were all tried for betraying the homeland and here too the same will happen," he said.

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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As the world prepares to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day on Thursday, the Holocaust Survivors' Rights Authority in the Social Justice Ministry published on Wednesday data about the number of survivors living in Israel.

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This past year, the authority and the ministry took steps to adapt the services they provide to survivors, given their advanced age and the effect of the COVID pandemic.

Currently, 165,800 Holocaust survivors and victims of antisemitic attacks during the Holocaust live in Israel, 90% of whom are 80 or older. The average age of survivors is 85. Some 31,000, or 19%, are over 90, and over 950 are over 100. This past year, 15,324 survivors died.

The figures from the Holocaust Survivors' Rights Authority indicate that 60% of the survivors known to the authority are women, whose average age stands at 85.4. Nearly two-thirds (64%) of known survivors were born in Europe. The largest group – 36%, or 59,900 were born in the former Soviet Union, followed by 19,100 born in Romania, 8,900 who were born in Poland, 4,500 who were born in Bulgaria, 2,400 who were born in Hungary, and 2,300 German-born survivors.

Another 36% of the known survivors in Israel were born in Asia and North Africa, including 30,600 Moroccan and Algerian-born citizens who suffered under antisemitism and antisemitic restrictions under the Vichy government. These include 18,000 Baghdad natives who were victimized by antisemitic rioting in Iraq in June 1941. Another 11,000 were born in Tunisia and Libya and were subjected to race laws and sent to labor camps.

Only 5% of known survivors in Israel made aliyah before the state of Israel was founded, while another 11% arrived by the end of 1948. Some 80,500 (48%) made aliyah by the end of the 1950s and over one-third made aliyah starting in 1989 in the big wave from the former Soviet Union. In 2021, an additional 98 survivors made aliyah.

Which cities in Israel are home to the most survivors? Haifa is number one, with 11,300 survivor residents, followed by Jerusalem (10,300), Tel Aviv (8,900), Ashdod (8,200), Netanya (8,000), Beersheba (7,050), Petah Tikva (6,700) and Rishon Lezion (6,500).

In 2021, the authority transferred some 4.1 billion shekels ($1.29 billion) in stipends and grants directly to survivors. A total of 50,800 survivors who lived through the camps and the ghettoes, lived under assumed identities or in hiding, worked in labor camps or were with their parents who worked as forced laborers, receive monthly stipends ranging from 2,554-6,412 shekels ($803-$2,017), based on their level of disability. Of these 15,500 low-income survivors receive monthly stipends of up to 11,729 shekels ($3,690). An additional 111,600 receive annual grants up 6,500 shekels ($2,044). A total of 3,400 survivors in Israel receive stipends from abroad have the amount topped up by the authority to the amount of 2,538 shekels ($798).

The Holocaust Survivors' Rights Authority also provides monthly stipends to some 18,000 widows and widowers of survivors.

Social Justice Minister Meirav Cohen said, "Our watch is the last watch, and it comes with great responsibility. The average age of Holocaust survivors is 85. These are the last years we have to serve them, allow them to age in dignity and also document as many of their stories as possible, because not long from now, there won't be anyone to tell them."

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On July 16, 1942, thousands of French policemen under the Vichy regime arrested more than 13,000 Jews, including more than 4,000 children, and ceded them to the Nazis, who put them in internment camps. Fewer than 100 survivors would come back to France after the deportation.

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France had denied responsibility for the roundup until 1995, when former President Jacques Chirac recognized the country's wrongdoing.

Parly's voice crackled and eyes welled with tears as she said France "has betrayed its own children."

"The Vel d'Hiv roundup [named for the Vélodrome d'Hiver, a bicycle velodrome where most of the victims were temporarily held] has left a wound in France's soul, a deep scar that will not heal and that we should never heal since this gaping hole in our soul reminds us that our values are not infallible," she said. "At any moment, what we consider our accomplishments could be threatened, baffled, destroyed."

Parly said the National Memory Day should encourage the country to "never again … turn a blind eye," especially amid a resurgence of hateful acts against the Jewish community.

Parly's comments come after a series of Jewish graves in France were desecrated with swastikas earlier this year, prompting crowds to protest anti-Semitism in Paris.

The number of anti-Semitic acts in the country has surged by 74% in 2018, according to Interior Ministry figures.

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