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Polish Diplomat Who Saved Hundreds of Jews during the Holocaust Named Righteous Among the Nations
(Ha'aretz) Ofer Aderet - Konstanty Rokicki, the Polish vice consul in Switzerland during World War II, supplied false passports of South American countries to hundreds of Jews who were about to be deported. Yad Vashem on Tuesday declared the Polish diplomat a member of the Righteous Among the Nations. The rescue operation became fully known through extensive archival research in recent months, including by Poland's ambassador to Switzerland. A key figure was Abraham Silberschein, the representative of the World Jewish Congress in Switzerland, who collected the personal information of Jews who were in danger and sent it to the Polish Consulate in Bern. In his own hand, Rokicki filled in the names of the Jews on empty passport forms that he had received from the honorary consul of Paraguay in Bern, Rudolf Hugli, in 1942 and 1943. It later came to the attention of German officials, including Adolf Eichmann, who ordered an investigation into the affair.