(Rosh Yeshiva Mir, New York 1887-1964). Autograph Letter Signed, written in Hebrew to the Va’ad HaYeshivoth and R. Zalman Sorotzkin (c/o Rabbi L. Olshwang, Rabbi Kalmanowitz’s brother-in-law) on three sides of an aerogramme.

KALMANOWITZ, AVRAHAM

11th February

Miami Beach, Florida

1957

Concerning the rescue of students from Cairo’s Yeshiva Ahaba Ve’Ahva to Israel and America. Mentions Dr. Chaim Shoshkes (and his failure to act discreetly), Chief Rabbi of Israel, Nahum Goldman and US State Department; all in regard to where these students should be enrolled for future Torah studies (Porat Yosef, Jerusalem and Mir, New York).

Rabbi Avraham Kalmanowitz escaped to the United States in 1940 following the German occupation of Poland and became a tireless rescue activist on behalf of Jews trapped in Nazi Europe and the Soviet Union. He is credited with the successful transfer of the entire Mir yeshiva from Lithuania to Shanghai, providing for its support for five years, and obtaining visas and travel fare to bring all 250 students and faculty to America after World War II. He established the U.S. branch of the Mir in 1946. In the 1950’s and 60’s he aided North African and Syrian Jewish youth suffering from persecution and pogroms, and successfully lobbied for the passage of a bill in Congress granting "endangered refugee status" to Jewish emigrants from Arab lands.