Irena Sendlerowa uhonorowana nagrodą „Odwaga Troski”

Maria Zawadzka, 16 November 2016
On May 23rd, 2010 in Warsaw Abraham H. Foxman, Director of the American Anti-Defamation League (ADL) posthumously honored Irena Sendler with the “Courage to Care” award. The distinction was presented to the daughter of the Righteous, Janina Zgrzembska. In the ceremony participated the U.S. Ambassador to Poland Lee Feinstein, the Ambassador of Israel to Poland Zvi Rav-Ner and Jerzy Halbersztadt, director of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews, cooperating with the Anti-Defamation League.

During the ceremony, the courage and devotion of Irena Sendler were emphasized numerous times. The children she helped rescue during the Second World War, while she was working in the Welfare Assistance Department of the Warsaw Administration, were brought out from the Warsaw ghetto onto the so-called Aryan Side. They received false papers and were placed in Polish orders, orphanages and families. That way 2,500 children were rescued. The Righteous Among the Nations risked her own life to save Jews. She was even arrested and tortured in the “Pawiak” prison, but the Council to Aid Jews “Żegota” managed to buy her out. Irena Sendler was awarded with the title of the Righteous Among the Nations in 1965. She passed away in May 2008, at the age of 98. 

The Anti-Defamation League is one of the oldest and most important organizations of this type in the world. Its main goal is to fight with all forms of anti-Semitism and to defend democratic ideals and civic rights. The seat of ADL is located in New York. The League was founded in 1913 under the patronage of B’nai Brith.

The “Courage to Care” award was created on April 23rd, 1987 and is granted to heroes who risked their own lives to save Jews during the Holocaust. In 1988 it was given to Jan Karski, the legendary courier of the Polish underground, emissary of the Polish Underground State and Righteous Among the Nations. In 1989 Anna and Jan Puchalski were honored with the award – during the Second World War they were living in the village Łosośna (currently in Belarus) and saved Jews who escaped from the ghetto in Grodno. The Righteous Stefania Burzmińska, who as a sixteen-year-old girl rescued 13 Jews in Przemyśl, received the “Courage to Care” award in 1991. Renia Koźmińska and her son Jerzy – honored in 1996 – helped the thirteen-person Glazer family escape from the Warsaw ghetto and hid them in the basement of their house on the outskirts of Warsaw. In 2009 the award was given to the Righteous Irena Gut-Opdyke, whose dramatic story was presented in the play “Irena’s Vow”, premiered in September 2008.