Knowra Irena Sendler Irena Sendler Irena Sendler was a Polish social worker and resistance activist who helped rescue about 2,500 Jewish children from the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II.
Warsaw Ghetto : A German Nazi-established Jewish ghetto in occupied Warsaw, where residents faced forced labor, starvation, deportation, and mass death. Sendler entered the ghetto to assist children facing deportation and lethal conditions.
Aryan side : The German occupation-era term for Warsaw areas outside the Jewish ghetto, where Jews faced capture if discovered. Children who escaped the ghetto often needed concealment and support in this part of the city.
Janina Grabowska : A Polish social worker who collaborated with Irena Sendler in helping Jewish children during the German occupation. She was among the colleagues associated with Sendler's child-rescue work.
German occupation of Poland : The German Nazi regime's military and administrative control of Poland from 1939 to 1945. The occupation created the conditions for the Warsaw Ghetto and Sendler's clandestine activity.
Żegota : The Polish Council to Aid Jews, an underground organization that provided Jewish people with money, shelter, false documents, and other aid. Sendler worked with Żegota, which supported rescue efforts and helped fund assistance.
False documents in occupied Poland : Forged or falsified papers used under German occupation to conceal Jewish identity or evade persecution. False identities could help children pass as non-Jewish after leaving the ghetto.
Julian Grobelny : A Polish socialist activist who led Żegota and helped organize aid to Jews under German occupation. His leadership connected Sendler's work to Żegota's broader relief operation.
Holocaust : The systematic persecution and murder of six million European Jews by Nazi Germany and its collaborators. The genocide explains the danger Sendler's rescue efforts sought to confront.
Warsaw Uprising : The 1944 armed revolt by the Polish resistance against German occupation forces in Warsaw. Sendler was imprisoned and tortured by the Gestapo before the uprising, during the occupation's resistance struggle.
Rescue of Jews during the Holocaust : Efforts by individuals and organizations to protect Jews from persecution and murder during the Holocaust. Sendler's work was one operation within a wider, dangerous range of rescue efforts.
Show all 20