商品簡介
During the late 1930s, a small group of American and Filipino diplomats played cards regularly. While their poker matches started as an excuse to smoke cigars and discuss political events of the day, it resulted in so much more.
This small band of men in the Philippines--Lt. Colonel Dwight D. Eisenhower, Philippine president Manuel L. Quezon, US High Commissioner Paul V. McNutt, and the brothers Alex and Philip Frieder--eventually sought to rescue a handful of Jewish families seeking to escape the clutches of Hitler's Gestapo by bringing them to a remote Pacific haven on the other side of the world. Through their shared sense of humor, their mutual respect for the customs and people of the islands, and their innate desire to help a persecuted people, they hatched an audacious rescue program to bring as many victims as possible to the safe shores of the Philippine Commonwealth.
Drawing upon recently released archives and original interviews with some of the last remaining Holocaust survivors, journalist Mark Sy shines a hard light on the obscure humanitarian partnership between the Filipino and American freedom fighters desperate to rescue Europe's Jews to the shores of this unlikely haven as tensions between the world's greatest superpower and Axis Japan reached a crescendo.
Unearthing the trials, setbacks, and achievements of key players embroiled in this daring rescue plot, The Manila Poker Club is an inspiring, immersive tale of courage, compassion, and resilience that has been seldom told.
