Escape Via Siberia

"In Escape via Siberia: A Jewish Child's Odyssey of Survival, Dorit Bader Whiteman presents a compelling story of survival. Through the story of one boy - Eliott "Lonek" Jaroslawicz - she conveys the tale of the dramatic escape of thousands of Polish Jews from the encroaching Nazi menace." "With the crack of a Nazi whip on his father's head, the world that Lonek knows is gone forever. Lonek and his family are forced to join the tide of refugees fleeing eastward. In the course of their flight they are imprisoned as enemy aliens in a Siberian labor camp." "A short-lived treaty between the Polish Government-in-Exile and the Soviet Government allows for the miraculous release of approximately one hundred thousand Polish citizens, including Lonek's family. They make their way from Siberia to Tashkent, only to find that life there is harsh - hunger and sickness abound. When his father falls ill, Lonek's mother is driven to despair and leaves her ten-year-old son on the doorstep of an orphanage." "Lonek is then swept up in another miraculous rescue. He becomes one of the more than 900 Jewish children known as the "Teheran Children." After an arduous journey, the kinder-transport is stranded in Iran due to the the vagaries of war and failed diplomacy. Their plights is championed by Henrietta Szold while the leadership of Hadassah relentlessly pressures the American and British governments to assure the children's safe passage. Finally, eight months after they leave Tashkent and after a route that takes them through India and Egypt, Lonek and the other children safely reach Palestine."--BOOK JACKET.