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| Reb Yoel Teitelbaum z"l |
The Rebbi never ever acknowledged or gave basic "Hakoras Hatoiv" to Rudolph Kasztner, who saved him!
The Rebbe survived imprisonment in Bergen-Belsen because he and his entourage were passengers on Kasztner's train, the Zionist-organized rescue of almost 1800 Hungarian Jews negotiated by Hungarian Zionist leader Rudolph Kasztner with Adolph Eichmann, the Nazi in charge of the Nazi's Final Solution.
Kasztner's train was diverted to Bergen-Belsen by Eichmann and its passengers were held there as Eichmann waited to see if the Jewish Agency would pay him additional ransom to save other Jews.
The Kasztner hostages – who had marginally better conditions than other prisoners – were released on Eichmann's orders, 318 after about one month and the remainder after close to five months. All were taken to safety in Switzerland.
After the War, when Kaszter was libeled and the government of Israel sued in support of Kasztner, The Rebbe was asked to testify on Kaszter's behalf. The Rebbe refused to acknowledge the Zionists role in his rescue and reportedly replied, "I was saved by God, not by Zionists." (Satmar would later develop a mythology to cover for the lies that credited anti-Zionist haredi Jews for the rebbe's rescue, but that mythology has been clearly proved false. Kasztner saved him.)
The Rebbe had ordered his hasidim to stay in Hungary. He blocked Zionist organizations from operating in his region and steadfastly refused to believe the Nazis would ever harm Hungary's anti-Zionist Jews. The Nazis eventually threw everyone, Zionists and Anti-Zionists in the same ovens!
