Document Type
Article
Abstract
This article analyzes the elements of heroic behavior of Havka Folman-Raban during her experiences as a courier in the underground of the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II. Drawing on numerous missions she completed prior to being arrested in Kraków, Poland, and others made during her internment at Auschwitz-Birkenau and the Auschwitz subcamp Harmęże, this assessment considers!how Havka Folman-Raban’s wartime activities and convictions that continued throughout the rest of her life align with four commonalities of heroism identified in heroic behavioral sciences. We consider how Havka’s participation in the Socialist Zionist Pioneering Movement influenced her actions. To understand the breadth of the then-fifteen-year-old Jewish girl’s actions and coming of age during the!war in the framework of common heroic criteria, we look at Jewish youth movements of the interwar period, the ideology that became a way of life for their members, and the philosophical shift employed at the outbreak of Hitler’s war. This article suggests that the behaviors acknowledged in Havka’s undertakings were foundational both to her life in Israel after the war and to the humanistic endeavors she considered fundamental to society.
DOI
10.26736/hs.2026.01.07
Recommended Citation
Dotan, Beth S.
(2026)
"The Heroic Behaviors of Havka Folman-Raban, Courier in the Warsaw Ghetto,"
Heroism Science: Vol. 11:
Iss.
1, Article 7.
DOI: 10.26736/hs.2026.01.07
Available at:
https://scholarship.richmond.edu/heroism-science/vol11/iss1/7
Included in
European History Commons, Holocaust and Genocide Studies Commons, Leadership Studies Commons, Psychology Commons