P.20 - Zorach Warhaftig Archive: Documentation of rescue and aid extended to refugees who escaped from Poland and Lithuania to Japan, 1939-1990

P.20 - Zorach Warhaftig Archive: Documentation of rescue and aid extended to refugees who escaped from Poland and Lithuania to Japan, 1939-1990
 
 Zorach Warhaftig was born in Wolkowisk, White Russia. While still a youth, he was an active member of the Hamizrachi movement. He acquired a traditional Jewish education and a general education, earning his Law degree at Warsaw University. From 1936-1939 he served as Chairman of the Eretz Israel office in Warsaw and a representative at the 17th through the 21st Zionist Congresses.
 
 When World War II broke out, he escaped to Lithuania, and there he aided in the escapes of thousands of Jewish refugees from Poland and Lithuania to Japan, as part of a fruitful collaboration with the Japanese Consul in Lithuania, Chiune Sugihara, later recognized as a Righteous Among the Nations, as well as with the Dutch Consuls. He specially helped the students of the Mir Yeshiva and the Slobodka Yeshiva in their escape from Europe and arrival in Eretz Israel and the United States via Japan.
 
 In 1941 he went to the United States and served as Vice President of Hapoel Hamizrachi in the United States, and a member of the Administrative Committee of the World Jewish Congress (WJC). As part of his duties, he also continued to try to help the Jewish refugees and survivors in various ways.
 
 At the end of the war, he went out to refugee camps in Germany on several occasions and concerned himself with locating Jewish children in monasteries, orphanages and Christian families and returning the children to Judaism.
 
 As a member of the Vaad Leumi in Eretz Israel in 1947-1948, Warhaftig played an important role in the founding and establishment of Yad Vashem.
 
 The Zorach Warhaftig Archive includes much documentation regarding the condition of the Jews of Poland and Lithuania at the outbreak of World War II, and especially documentation related to aid to refugees through the obtaining of visas to Japan, 1939-1941. The documentation includes letters, telegrams, reports and lists of those refugees and survivors who sought visas. The Record Group also includes documents, letters and other documentation regarding Warhaftig's activities in assisting the refugees and survivors after the Holocaust and his diverse activity in commemorating the Holocaust.