THE SECRET ALLIANCE: The Extraordinary Story of the Rescue of the Jews Since World War II

A well-researched, well-written account of the extensive covert activities that allowed two million Jews to steal home. Szulc (Then and Now, 1990; Fidel, 1986, etc.) provides ample atonement for an American Jewish community that stands self-accused of not doing enough for their European brethren during WW II. Between 1943 and 1991, American Jews and the relief organizations they formed helped rescue nearly two million Jews from Eastern and Western Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. This narrowly focused study spotlights obscure heroes like Joe Schwartz of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee and Shaul Avigur of Mandate Palestine's Mossad. While Jews flooded allied displaced-person camps after the war to loudly press their humanitarian case before the world, agents of rescue performed the improbable in clandestine operations in Hungary, Egypt, and, most recently, Albania and Ethiopia. It is shocking to discover that thousands of dollars a head had to go from the Israeli secret service to the likes of Ceausescu and Saddam Hussein before Jews were allowed to be smuggled out to freedom. Only a reading of all 40 books in the bibliography could determine whether the reporter who broke the Bay of Pigs story has broken much new ground here, but Szulc has certainly succeeded in assembling the most readable book on the topic.