The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has given a posthumous award to a Polish Catholic woman who risked her life to save 13 Jews during the Holocaust. Francisca Halamajowa, along with her daughter Helena, gave shelter to a group of Jewish men, women, and children, whom they hid under the noses of invading German troops.The Jews were hidden in the hayloft of a pigsty and in a hole under the kitchen floor while German soldiers camped on the Halamajowa family farm. Had the soldiers found the Jews, they would have murdered their Polish protectors as well as the Jews themselves.

Francisca remained in Sokal, Poland even when her Polish neighbors fled Ukrainian pogroms, in order to care for the Jews she was sheltering.

The Jews who benefited from her actions; three men, five women, and five children had managed to flee the Sokal ghetto shortly before it was liquidated. The Jewish population of Sokal before the Holocaust was 6,000; only 30 survived, among them all 13 of those who sought refuge on Francisca Halamajowa’s farm.

Francisca Halamajowa died in 1960. She never shared the story of her bravery, even with her family.

“After the war, there was still enough fear and hostility that Francisca never told her story about how she had cared for and saved these Jewish individuals from certain death at the hands of the Nazis,” stated Abraham Foxman, head of the ADL. “Francisca’s granddaughters only learned the truth in full after they had moved to the United States decades later. But the Jewish families that were saved and their descendants knew the truth.”

One survivor’s diary inspired a 2009 film about Francisca and Helena, titled No. 4 Street of Our Lady.

“Francisca was one who had the courage to care,” Foxman stated as he presented the ADL award to her granddaughters Grace Kucharzyk and Jolanta Steron. “She upheld the honor of the human race and the conscience of the world.”

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The Shavei Israel organization has released a new, first-of-its-kind Polish-language guide to the holiday of Chanukah – entitled “Lights for Polish Jewry”. which will be distributed to thousands of “hidden Jews” throughout Poland. The new book contains the history, laws and customs of Chanukah, including a sampling of traditional songs and recipes.

Shavei Israel works in nine countries to bring back to Judaism “hidden Jews,” who themselves or their parents or ancestors were forced to practice the religion secretly. Its founder Michael Freund stated that iIn recent years, an increasing number of Poles have rediscovered their Jewish ancestry, seeking to reclaim the precious heritage that was so brutally taken from them and their forebears. It is our hope that this book will…enable a new generation of Polish Jews to celebrate Chanukah with joy, as well as gain a better understanding of our eternal faith, its principles and beliefs.

Approximately 4,000 Jews are officially registered as living in Poland, but according to various estimates, there are tens of thousands of others who have concealed their true identity, or are simply unaware of it.

Many of the “hidden Jews” in Poland lost all contact with Judaism due to extreme anti-Semitism after the Holocaust, and some of them even converted. Others concealed their Jewishness from the Communist authorities and now feel free to resume their true identity.

Another phenomenon pertains to Jewish young people who were adopted by Catholic families and institutions during the Holocaust. They were told nothing of their Jewish identity, and only in recent years have they or their descendants gradually begun to rediscover it.

Shavei Israel also provides assistance to different communities, such as the Bnei Menashe of India, the Bnei Anousim in Spain, Portugal and South America, the Subbotnik Jews of Russia, the Jewish community of Kaifeng in China as well as the “hidden Jews” of Poland.

Its emissaries in Poland conduct seminars in Poland and provide assistance for the process of conversion to those who choose to immigrate to Israel.