Holocaust Survivor George Weidenfeld Bankrolls Rescue of 2,000 ISIS Victims
A British Jew who fled Nazi-ruled Austria as a child is funding the rescue of up to 2,000 Middle East Christians.
George Weidenfeld, a publisher who is also a member of Britain’s House of Lords, says he has “a debt to repay” to Christians fleeing ISIS, because the Quakers and the Plymouth Brethren fed and clothed him and helped him to reach Britain in 1938, The Independent reported Thursday.
Weidenfeld is spearheading Weidenfeld Safe Havens Fund, which last week supported the flight of 150 Syrian Christians to Poland on a privately chartered plane to allow them to seek refuge, making them the first beneficiaries of the resettlement project.
READ: 4 Mistakes To Avoid When Talking About Radical Islam
Having arrived in Britain on a train a year before the start of the World War II with just a few shillings to his name, Lord Weidenfeld went on to establish the Weidenfeld and Nicolson publishing business a decade later. He was made a life peer of Britain’s upper house in 1976.
The 95-year-old told The Times of London: “I had a debt to repay. It applies to so many young people who were on the Kinderstransports”– the German-language name for the organized shipment of Jewish children, often by their own parents with help from religious and secular non-Jewish helpers, to save them from the Holocaust.
The fund aims to offer 12-to-18 months of paid support to the refugees.
READ: Montreal’s ‘Jewish Schindler’ Rejects Claims He Does More Harm Than Good
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
