Tibor Timothy Vajda

In the Whirlwind of History: Struggle on and Keep the Faith Tibor Timothy Vajda

Tibor Vajda, a 20-year-old Jew escaped from a forced labor camp in October 1944 and joined a resistance group in Budapest. They fought the fascist Arrowcross bandits and freed Jewish men from the ghetto. Vajda's mother and younger brother Laszlo were hiding at a Christian business. They survived mass killings on the streets and on the banks of the Danube, but lost family members in the chaos. When Eva and Tibor got married, they felt they could not live among people who supported murdering Jews. They joined a Zionist group planning to follow them to Palestine. Tibor's father was seen alive but sick on the Austrian border. Before he could leave to find him, eye-witnesses arrived who saw German SS soldiers kill him. Eva got pregnant and Tibor's mother became sick. They got stuck in Hungary. After the war, public anti-Semitism became louder in Hungary. Remnants of the fascist German and Hungarian armies under the patronage of western armies planned to start third world war against the Soviets. Holocaust survivors feared a new fascist takeover. Some young Jewish men joined the political police. Tibor Vajda's decision proved to be fatal. Fugitive of the fascists soon became the victim of the communists.