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Sandra Samuel delivers Moshe to safety
Sandra Samuel, an Indian woman of quiet strength and uncommon valor, never had a passport till the other day. Without fanfare and lacking any agent or public relations specialist, she did more for human life that dreadful morning in Mumbai last week than Britney Spears or Paris Hilton or Lucy Liu have accomplished in their lifetimes. Britney may have trimmed down for her birthday and gotten great photo-ops, but Sandra Samuel saved an infant’s life literally in the face of blazing machine guns and grim killers. She did not seek a photo.
Sandra Samuel now continues to help care for the heartbreakingly famous baby Moshe Holtzberg in Israel, after rescuing him from the terrorists who murdered his young parents, and other Jews, at the Chabad House. Her emigration from India was expedited when the Israeli government declared her one of the “Righteous Persons” and issued her immigration papers. Recipients of this honor, awarded by a special Supreme Court commission in Israel, include Oskar and Emilie Schindler, Raoul Wallenberg, and Corrie ten Boom. People and groups that receive this title have risked their lives to save others, many during the Holocaust. Sandra Samuel is evidently the first citizen of India to receive this honor.
Her emigration from India was expedited when Israel declared her a 'Righteous Person'
[Wednesday afternoon: A meaningful and deeply appreciated statement has been released by one of the most prominent Islamic leaders in North America, as reported by the Jerusalem Post:
From Imam Shabir Ali of Toronto--
“Such terrorist attacks are not justifiable on any grounds. Islam cannot condone such murder of innocent civilians. From what you have described, Rabbi and Mrs. Holtzberg are of great service to humanity. Our knowledge of their service adds to our sense of loss and grief that such bad things can happen to such good people. Islam is built on the monotheist foundations which the Jewish people struggled for many centuries to maintain in the face of much severe opposition.”]
Baby Moshe’s parents, Rabbi Gavriel and Rivka Holtzberg, neither of them even 30 years old,were buried yesterday in Jerusalem’s Mt. of Olives Cemetery. Under a reign of fire and having actually faced down their killers, Sandra Samuel lifted the baby from the bloody corpses of his parents and fled to safety and then a “homecoming” in Israel. Nobody who was ever a human being failed to be moved by this singular act of bravery, maternal instincts, and disarming courage.
There are other cemeteries in Israel where a vast host of Christians, agnostics, and Eastern believers, and others are buried—or who are honored in special tree groves planted in their memory on the stony hills of Jerusalem. Their names are inscribed on tombstones or on garden plaques, often with a brief narrative of their noble audacity.
The Nazis routinely offered a bounty for those who turned in Jews who were hiding. The bounty consisted of a quart of liquor, four pounds of sugar, a carton of cigarettes, or, at times, small cash payments. For many civilians, these commodities were unobtainable through normal channels, and so they were provided with a powerful enticement to cooperate with the Gestapo—the bestial central agency whose mission was to find Jews and kill them. Any person or family righteously hiding or rescuing Jews were exterminated outright.
It seems as though no incentive, other than blind human compassion and utter decency, compelled this daring Indian woman to stare down hate and save a baby. The Talmud states: “If you save a single life, you save the whole world.”
This is one of oldest Jewish credos ever, and for this we plant trees in the Holy Land.
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