Event Title
"With God Against Man” (Documentary and Discussion)
Location
Multicultural Center, Hardge Forum (Rm. 101)
Start Date
1-10-2014 7:00 PM
Description
Dan Subotnik, Professor, Law, Touro Law Center, Central Islip, NY. In the wake of the relentless Nazi invasion of 1940, thousands of refugees fled to the south of France, seeking Portuguese transit visas to leave France and enter Spain. Prohibited by his government from issuing transit visas to Jews and other refugees, Aristades De Sousa Mendes, the Portuguese consul general in Bordeaux defied his government’s orders, with the rationale, “I’d rather be with God against man than with man against God.” With a few members of his staff, he worked long hours to issue visas to 30,000 refugees, including 10,000 Jews, fleeing the Nazis. Among the refugees were the surrealist painter Salvador Dali, and Hans Augusto Rey, co‐author of the Curious George children’s books. For his heroism, De Sosa Mendes was recalled to Lisbon, fired, dishonored, and denied a pension by the dictator Antonio Salazar. Forces to sell his family estate, he spent the remainder of his life in poverty and obscurity, dying in 1954. He is honored at the Yad Vashem in Israel, the museum dedicated to the victims of the Holocaust.
"With God Against Man” (Documentary and Discussion)
Multicultural Center, Hardge Forum (Rm. 101)
Dan Subotnik, Professor, Law, Touro Law Center, Central Islip, NY. In the wake of the relentless Nazi invasion of 1940, thousands of refugees fled to the south of France, seeking Portuguese transit visas to leave France and enter Spain. Prohibited by his government from issuing transit visas to Jews and other refugees, Aristades De Sousa Mendes, the Portuguese consul general in Bordeaux defied his government’s orders, with the rationale, “I’d rather be with God against man than with man against God.” With a few members of his staff, he worked long hours to issue visas to 30,000 refugees, including 10,000 Jews, fleeing the Nazis. Among the refugees were the surrealist painter Salvador Dali, and Hans Augusto Rey, co‐author of the Curious George children’s books. For his heroism, De Sosa Mendes was recalled to Lisbon, fired, dishonored, and denied a pension by the dictator Antonio Salazar. Forces to sell his family estate, he spent the remainder of his life in poverty and obscurity, dying in 1954. He is honored at the Yad Vashem in Israel, the museum dedicated to the victims of the Holocaust.