At 10 years old in 1944, Deshire Kumi-Veseli was not so young that she was unable to see the good she could do in a world consumed by evil.
Growing up in Albania at the height of World War II, Kumi-Veseli was not only witness to the indomitable spirit of humanity in the midst of unimaginable crisis, she was party to it.
“My grandmother has always been a sweet, caring, helpful person,” said Olta Gjoca, a 2006 Ralston High School graduate and Kumi-Veseli’s granddaughter. “It doesn’t surprise me that she has a story like this, that she did such a great thing, even as a very young girl.”
Last month, Kumi-Veseli was honored by the Anti-Defamation League and the Institute for Holocaust Education with the Courage to Care Award, an honor presented to individuals who aided persecuted peoples during the Holocaust.
Kumi-Veseli’s story is one of daring and heart, honor and compassion, for even at 10 years of age, her actions and that of her family, helped save the lives of two Jewish families in German-occupied Albania.
“It’s so wonderful,” said Hillary Fletcher of the Institute for Holocaust Education. “Deshire’s story has so much to teach us about how even the youngest people were involved in the work to save lives.”
And as a Muslim, Kumi-Veseli’s story resonates even more powerfully in today’s era when tensions between Jews and Muslims mount throughout the world.
“The story is telling in that regard, too,” Fletcher said. “It shows that we all have the ability to get along with our brothers and sisters, no matter what our differences may be.”
War started in Albania in the spring of 1939 when Italian forces marched into Albania and declared the small Balkan country a protectorate of Benito Mussolini’s dictatorship. For the next four years, the Albanians lived under the pall of fascism as fighting fanned out across Europe and the world.
Amidst it all, from Kumi-Veseli’s small hometown of Kruja in central Albania, her older brothers, Refiku and Hamit, left for Albania’s capital city of Tirana to find work.
In Tirana, Refiku began working in a camera shop and Hamit found work as a clerk in a store. At the camera shop, Refiku befriended a man named Mosha Mandil, a Yugoslavian who had come to Albania with his wife and two children. At the store, Hamit worked with a man named Ben Joseph, also a Yugoslavian who had immigrated to Albania with a wife and a sister.
Mandil and Joseph, both Jewish, had fled Yugoslavia in the wake of the Italian pullout from that country in 1943, fearing the Nazi German occupation that was to come and the likelihood of their deportation as enemies of the Third Reich.
The Mandil and Joseph families moved east to Albania, hoping to evade the Nazis, but when the Italians again pulled out of Albania, the doors were left wide for another invader, the same that had marched across Yugoslavia in the aftermath of the Italian retreat: the Germans. Now, with Nazi forces bearing down on Tirana and searching out Jews at every turn, Refiku and Hamit made a fateful decision.
“They talked to the family and asked if they might be able to bring Mosha and Ben Joseph to Kruja and hide them,” said Gjoca. “And my grandmother’s family said ‘Yes.’ There wasn’t a question about it.”
“It was ‘besa,’” Fletcher said. “It was about honor. It was about saving lives.”
“Besa” — roughly translated in English as “faith” — is the word Albanians use to describe a creed by which all peoples are bound in saving a life, any life. As the Germans inched closer to Tirana in March 1944, Refiku and Hamit — with the help of another brother, Xhemali — spirited the Mandils and the Josephs out of Tirana and back to their hometown of Kruja.
Kruja, Gjoca said, is one of the most beautiful and historic cities in the Balkans and perhaps in all of Europe. The city is perched atop rocky outcroppings in the foothills of Mount Kruja and in those rocks are a network of caves, and in those caves, the Mandil and Joseph families would find their salvation.
Dressed in ethnic Albanian garb, the Mandils and the Josephs made the 25-mile trek from Tirana to Kruja and, for the next year, Mosha and Ben spent their time hiding in the caves while the Mandil and Joseph women and children stayed out of sight in the cellar of Deshire Kumi-Veseli’s parents.
Kumi-Veseli became friends with the Mandils’ seven-year-old son, Gavra. In 1996, Gavra Mandil returned to Kruja for a much anticipated reunion with Kumi-Veseli and her family.
“It’s really incredible,” Gjoca said. “I’m so proud of my family. I’m so proud to be able to represent my grandmother with this award.”
By the time Albania was liberated by Allied forces, many Albanian families had acted in the same way Kumi-Veseli’s had. Albanian Muslims and Christians alike combined to save more than 2,000 Jews from the Holocaust.
“It’s kismet that we can talk about this story on Yom HaShoah,” Fletcher said, referencing the annual day of Holocaust remembrance which this year fell on Monday. “We are so honored to be able to recognize Deshire.”
Kumi-Veseli and one of her brothers are still living in Kruja and Gjoca said the news of the award was heartwarming for her grandmother and the entire family.
“She’s very happy about the award,” Gjoca said. “But more than that, my grandmother just wanted to help.”
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