Jack Kemp

Part of this information was included in my article on the Exodus ship that was posted at the Birdnow Aviary years ago and at the online Baltimore Jewish Times.

Another person that few people know about is the late Reverend John Stanley Grauel, a Methodist minister. Rev. Grauel helped a Jew recover in his home town in New England from an antisemitic attack on his grocery store. He later got involved in 1940s Zionist politics and was one of the crew members of the ship "Exodus 1947" (the Hebrew name translates as "Exit Europe 1947") that was made famous in the somewhat distorted history of the movie "Exodus." Before the ship first sailed from Baltimore, Rev. Graul was sworn into the Haganah, the Jewish underground military's naval forces. The Jewish members accomodated him by, of their own volition, having him sworn in on a copy of the New Testament rather than a Jewish Hebrew Tanach (Bible). When the Exodus ship was docked in southern France, Rev. Graul, in his full minister's outfit with a big cross, acted as a secret courier up to Paris. He later rejoined the ship as it sailed towards what is now Israel.

Rev. Graul was somewhat of a utopian and later lived in a communal property in New Jersey where he died. His body was later exhumed and reburied about a half mile outside the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem. He was reburied there with full Israeli Navy military honors.

From Wikipedia: Grauel became very aware of the European Holocaust and the Zionist movement in 1942 through his close friendship with Judge Joseph Goldberg of Worcester. Also in 1942, he joined the America Palestine Committee, which was dedicated to the establishment of a Jewish state. In 1943 he gave up the local ministry to assume a position as a director of the committee's Philadelphia office. In 1944, attending his first Zionist meeting he met David Ben-Gurion, the Zionist leader and future prime minister of Israel. Grauel learned of the Haganah, the Jewish underground army in Palestine, and the longtime humanitarian efforts of the Haganah to save Jewish lives from the Holocaust by smuggling Jews into Palestine. Reverend Grauel enlisted in the effort immediately, leading a double life working for the America Palestine Committee and the Jewish underground.
SS Exodus

Grauel sailed aboard the famed illegal refugee running ship the Exodus on March 23, 1947. The Haganah placed him aboard as a secret operative, under the cover of a foreign correspondent for the Episcopal journal, The Churchman. Grauel's mission was to get the story of the Exodus '47 out to the world. In Europe he organized and transferred refugees from the DP Camps to the ship. Filling multiple roles, he acted as an administrative executive, quartermaster, cook, and a liaison for the crew and the refugees. The Exodus, heavily overburdened with 4,554 refugees, was intercepted and captured by British destroyers off the coast of Haifa, Palestine, in a brief violent assault that left two refugees and one crew member dead. Grauel was arrested by the British. With help from the Haganah, he escaped.

Testimony to the UN

Later he gave a direct testimony before the "United Nations Special Committee on Palestine". His firsthand testimony was extremely effective in eliciting sympathy and understanding for the cause of unrestricted Jewish refugee immigration to Palestine. Golda Meir, a later Prime Minister of Israel, observed that Reverend Grauel's testimony and advocacy for the creation of the Jewish State fundamentally and positively changed the United Nations to support the creation of Israel. Grauel said that his testimony before the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine was given more credence because he was a Christian, rather than a Jewish crew member.[1]
Later humanitarian efforts

Throughout his life he maintained close associations with Jewish concerns. In the 1950s and 1960s he led investigations into the terrible conditions of Jews living in Morocco and Algeria. In 1975 he led one of the first Jewish youth tours of the Nazi concentration camps in Europe. Reverend Grauel was drawn to numerous humanitarian efforts including the American Civil Rights and Native American struggles.

The State of Israel recognized Rev. Grauel through the Humanity Medal, the Fighter for Israel Medal and the Medal of Jerusalem.[2]

END OF QUOTE

More about Rev. Grauel's final resting place in Jerusalem

http://www.jewishmag.com/134mag/exodus_grauel/exodus_grauel.htm

QUOTE

"The American Christian Missionary Alliance Cemetery located in the Germany Colony in Jersalem was established after the American Colony sold its Mount Zion plot to the German Templars in 1906. Many unkempt graves were moved here, and today, this cemetery is unique, in that it accepts anybody for burial, regardless of religion or nationality. Here, one may find the tombstones of Armenians, Protestant Arabs, British nationals who married Israeli Jews, converts, Asians and more. At one end of the cemetery, lies Yakov Blum, a protestant missionary who had studied under the Rav Kook."7

The cemetery is crowded with stones, none very prominent, gray and low with the residents' plot outlined in gray concrete stone. In the middle row, straight back from the gate had a very unusual large vertical white gravestone. It is clear that this person's stone was different; this grave was more prominent than anything around it.

The gravestone had two large stars of David carved at the top with the symbol of the Israel Defense Forces in the middle of one stone and a Menorah in the middle of the other Star of David. At the bottom, on either side were to two naval anchors. The text at the top read in English and Hebrew the famous Talmudic dictum- He who saves a single life is as if he has saved the entire world. A large cross was carved in the middle below the dictum. The name read, Reverend John Stanley Grauel, in Hebrew below the name, a special designation – Yohanan the Priest, 1917-1986; further down in English, Exodus 47, in Hebrew Exodus and the words at the bottom in Memoriam.

END OF QUOTE

His autobiography is called "Grauel" and is coauthored with Eleanor Elfenbein. The forward was written by the former mayor of Jerusalem, Teddy Kollek.

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 02:50 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 1032 words, total size 7 kb.