www射-国产免费一级-欧美福利-亚洲成人福利-成人一区在线观看-亚州成人

USEUROPEAFRICAASIA 中文雙語Fran?ais
China
Home / China / World

Movie reveals how zoo couple hid Jews

China Daily | Updated: 2017-03-25 06:50

WARSAW - The director of Warsaw zoo and his wife always carried cyanide during World War II. Danger was ever-present but they were ready to take their secret to the grave.

The couple hid nearly 300 Jews and resistance fighters on zoo grounds during most of the war, under the noses of the German Nazis occupying Poland.

It sounds like a Hollywood movie, and now it is. But The Zookeeper's Wife, which opens in Polish cinemas this week before rolling out internationally, is based on actual events.

Inside the zookeeper's villa, whose windowless cellar had a secret tunnel leading to the garden, Jan Zabinski and his wife Antonina gave refuge to the mostly Jews smuggled out of the city's ghetto.

"I remember squatting under this concrete shelf in the basement and keeping my hand over my sister's mouth to muffle her cries because she was constantly crying, day and night," said Moshe Tirosh, aged 5 at the time.

"When someone slammed the door upstairs, fear would pass through me, lest they find us," the 80-year-old told AFP in a telephone interview.

The retired businessman and grandfather-of-seven, who has lived in Israel since 1957, still cannot believe what he lived through.

"I saw children's dead bodies on the street. Terrible things ... I remember wondering why everyone wanted to kill us. I couldn't understand it," he said.

All but two of the zoo's hidden guests survived the war and Nazi troops stationed on the bombed-out zoo grounds never unearthed the subterfuge.

"My parents figured that it's always darkest under a lamppost," the zoo couple's daughter Teresa Zabinska said, citing a Polish saying according to which it is best to hide in plain sight.

"My father knew that it wouldn't occur to the Germans that so many people could be hiding in a place like this with open windows and no curtains," the 73-year-old said.

Most hid in empty animal enclosures or the villa's basement. Others were able to stay with the family upstairs by taking on fake identities as Antonina's tailor or their son Ryszard's tutor.

Between 1940 and 1944, nearly 300 people found refuge, some for just a few hours or days, but others remained months or even years.

"Around 30 people would stay here at once," said Olga Zbonikowska, 38, who works for the Panda Foundation that takes care of the villa now.

The stakes were high. In occupied Poland, even offering Jews a glass of water was punishable by death.

Whenever a Nazi soldier got too close for comfort, Antonina would warn everyone by playing an operetta on the piano.

The hidden guests would escape through the tunnel or hide in a wardrobe upstairs that opened on both sides like a magician's trunk.

The couple also hid the Jews from their housekeeper out of fear she could give them away.

Aptly, her mother's memoirs - to be republished this month - were entitled People and Animals.

American author Diane Ackerman relied heavily on the memoirs when writing her own 2007 nonfiction book The Zookeeper's Wife, which inspired the movie. Directed by Niki Caro, it stars Golden Globe winner Jessica Chastain.

The Zabinskis died in the early 1970s. The villa is now a museum where visitors can make an appointment to see the life-saving secret tunnel and basement.

Israel's Yad Vashem Holocaust remembrance centre later recognised the Zabinskis as Righteous Among the Nations, a title bestowed upon non-Jews who helped Jews during the Holocaust.

"They believed it was the right thing to do," Teresa said, of her parents' wartime actions. "My father always said that's what a decent person should do."

Agence France-Presse

Editor's picks
Copyright 1995 - . All rights reserved. The content (including but not limited to text, photo, multimedia information, etc) published in this site belongs to China Daily Information Co (CDIC). Without written authorization from CDIC, such content shall not be republished or used in any form. Note: Browsers with 1024*768 or higher resolution are suggested for this site.
License for publishing multimedia online 0108263

Registration Number: 130349
FOLLOW US
主站蜘蛛池模板: 寡妇一级a毛片免费播放 | 国产精品亚洲一区二区三区在线观看 | 男人的天堂视频在线观看 | 国产精品爽爽va在线观看无码 | 国产高清精品自在久久 | 婷婷尹人香蕉久久天堂 | 欧美老头老太做爰xxxx | 伊人色综合久久天天网蜜月 | 欧美国产综合日韩一区二区 | 色综合a怡红院怡红院首页 色综合精品久久久久久久 色综合九九 | 日本免费一区二区三区视频 | 国产日产欧产精品精品推荐在线 | 一区在线免费观看 | 亚洲资源在线播放 | 久久一区二区三区免费 | 中文字幕在线看视频一区二区三区 | 日本 欧美 国产 | 亚洲天码中文字幕第一页 | 色综合美国色农夫网 | 欧美一级日韩在线观看 | 亚洲一级毛片视频 | 国产在线欧美日韩精品一区二区 | 特级一级毛片免费看 | 国产精品中文字幕在线观看 | 最近中文字幕在线 | 中文 | 精品九九久久国内精品 | 黄色福利站| 一本高清 | 日韩美女在线视频 | 91免费看片 | 大尺度福利视频奶水在线 | 91亚洲综合 | 国产一区二区在线免费观看 | 99re在线视频精品 | 欧美成人se01短视频在线看 | 国产中文字幕在线免费观看 | 亚洲国产高清人在线 | 在线a网站| 久草福利资源在线观看 | 国产精品白浆流出视频 | 另类毛片 |