Beyond Courage

Under the noses of the military, Georges Loinger smuggles thousands of children out of occupied France into Switzerland. In Belgium, three resisters ambush a train, allowing scores of Jews to flee from the cattle cars. In Poland, four brothers lead more than 1,200 ghetto refugees into the forest to build a guerilla force and self-sufficient village. And twelve-year-old Motele Shlayan entertains German officers with his violin moments before setting off a bomb. Through twenty-one meticulously researched accounts – some chronicled in book form for the first time – Doreen Rappaport illuminates the defiance of tens of thousands of Jews across eleven Nazi-occupied countries during World War II. In answer to the genocidal madness that was Hitler's Holocaust, the only response they could offer was resistance, and their greatest weapons were courage, ingenuity, the will to survive, and the resolve to save others or to die trying. There are maps integrated throughout the text and extensive end matter includes: timeline of important events, index, pronunciation guide and source notes.