Deliberations Over "Righteous Among The Nations" Status
Robert Satloff, who had been searching for records of Arabs who had saved Jews from the Holocaust, was first informed of Abdul-Wahab by Odette Boukhris' daughter, Annie Boukhris, who had also been hidden by Abdul-Wahab at the age of 11; shortly after recording her testimony, she died at age 71. Satloff then went to Mahdia and confirmed the story.
Although nominated, Abdul-Wahab still has to be approved by the Yad Vashem commission that grants the honor. Yad Vashem has conferred the honor on more than 70 Muslims, but thus far no Arab had ever been nominated. Most of the Muslims who received the award are Albanians. Abdul-Wahab's case has already been once studied by the Righteous Among the Nations Department of Yad Vashem but it was declined on the premise that saving Jews in Tunisia was not against the law at the time and the saviors did not risk their own lives and safety which is a necessary condition in proclaiming a person Righteous among the nations.
Facts: There are righteous who saved Jews, breaking no laws. In Nazi occupied Tunisia, there were also no laws. Poland was the only occupied country during World War II where the Nazis formally imposed the death penalty for anybody found sheltering and helping Jews. The following proclamation was issued by Dr. Ludwig Fischer, the German district governor of Warsaw, on November 10, 1941: "Anyone who deliberately offers refuge to such Jews or who aids them in any other manner (i.e., offering a night's lodging, food, or by taking them into vehicles of any kind, etc.) will be subject to the Death Penalty. Country people must, once and for all, sever all contacts with and disassociate themselves from all Jewry, they must break the seriously anti-social habit of aiding the Jews".
SS Colonel Walter Rauff posted in Tunisia, was before in Poland, and knew about the Death Penalty there. Rauff, also involved in killing Jews in gas vans in Poland and Russia, told the Jews of Tunisia that he would show them how he "had taken care of Jews in Poland". Some Jews were randomly shot in cold blood, sending a message of arbitrary reprisals, not connected to the breaking of any law. In the context of these prevalent brutal circumstances, Khaled deserves the nomination of righteous. Members of the commission, "experts in the history of the Holocaust in a certain region of Europe", didn't use primary sources of the period.
On one hand, Yad Vashem's spokeswoman agrees that an Arab, Khaled Abdul Wahab, performed "admirable" deeds in harboring and protecting 25 Jews in his farm, in Nazi-occupied Tunisia. However, on the other hand, she claimed that he didn't break any law. These statements reflect the historical realities of contradictions in Germany's policy during the Holocaust, confusing Jews and Arabs.
Read more about this topic: Khaled Abdul-Wahab
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