Kraus - An Unwilling Hero

Moshe (Miklos) Kraus was one of the greatest Jewish rescuers during the Holocaust. Besides disseminating the Auschwitz Report beyond Hungary's borders, which led to the halt of the mass extermination of Hungarian Jewry in July 1944, Kraus was the initiator and manager of the large-scale rescue operation at the "Glass House" and other protected houses throughout Budapest, where tens of thousands of Jews were saved by being equipped with protective documents known as "Schutzpasses".

However, Miklos Kraus's story was pushed out of historical memory and omitted from the textbooks on which Israeli children were raised. Kraus was sidelined by powerful forces that shaped national memory in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s of the twentieth century. The fortified wall that concealed him was first breached by Dr. Ayala Nadivi, who uncovered countless historical testimonies and documents supporting the facts. This story is presented to us for the first time in prose through a series of meetings taking place in 1972 between Kraus and Uri, a teenage boy from Tel Aviv visiting his grandmother in Jerusalem during summer vacation, where he meets Kraus, who was his grandmother's neighbor. A fascinating and moving connection forms between the two, delicately portraying Miklos Kraus's unique and tragic character and his tremendous enterprise.

Lior Reitblatt, born in 1958, an Israeli businessman and investor, was exposed to Miklos Kraus's heroic rescue efforts while studying the story of Vrba and Wetzler's escape from Auschwitz and the concealment of their report by the leadership of Hungarian Jewry.

"Kraus - An Unwilling Hero" is his debut book and the first stone he lays in his personal project to commemorate Kraus's legacy.

Lior will be joined in conversation with:

• Michele Gold, Honorary Director at Holocaust Museum LA

• Susanne Reyto, Holocaust survivor

  • Susanne was born just six days before the Nazi occupation of Hungary in March 1944 and survived the first year of her life living with her mother in so-called “protected houses,” with protective papers (Schutzpass) from the Swedish and Swiss legations. Her childhood experiences and her ultimate and difficult escape from Communist Hungary in the late 1950s left Susanne with an unwavering spirit of optimism and perseverance.

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