Madeleine Albright, of Jewish Ancestry, Stands With Muslim Immigrants

I was raised Catholic, became Episcopalian & found out later my family was
Jewish. I stand ready to register as Muslim
By Miranda Cooper
President Trump is expected to announce plans to issue an extensive antiimmigrant executive order, which would include an indefinite ban on Syrian
refugees entering the U.S. and a 120-day ban on all immigration. After those 120
days have passed, immigration from several majority-Muslim countries, including
Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen, will still be suspended.
These policies are perceived by many as Islamophobic; the president has said
there will be no Muslim registry.
The anti-immigration measures are cause for concern for former Secretary of
State Madeleine Albright, who took to Twitter to reference her Jewish
heritage and show solidarity with Muslims:
Follow
Madeleine Albright
@madeleine
I was raised Catholic, became Episcopalian & found out later my family was
Jewish. I stand ready to register as Muslim in #solidarity.
Albright, who almost exactly twenty years ago became the first woman ever to
serve as Secretary of State, discovered shortly thereafter that her family was
Jewish and that three of her grandparents had been killed in the Holocaust.

Albright was born in Prague in 1937 and immigrated with her parents to the
United States at age 2, immediately after the Nazis invaded Czechoslovakia.
Her parents, Josef and Mandula Korbel, had both converted to Catholicism and
did not tell their daughter of either their Jewish past or the tragic fate of
their families. From The Washington Post, in 1997:
Like many other assimilated Czech Jews, Albrights father, Josef Korbel,
considered himself a Czechoslovak patriot first and rarely referred to his
religious background. Under the racial laws introduced by the Nazis following
the takeover of Czechoslovakia, however, a family like the Korbels would have
been considered 100 percent Jewish.
I have always thought of myself as a Czechoslovak Catholic, Albright said. My
parents were of the generation who thought they were the children of a free
Czechoslovakia, the only democracy in central Europe. This was their pride [and]
that is what I grew up with.
Albright, whose daughter married a Jewish man and is raising her children
Jewish, has spoken and written about learning of her Jewish heritage as a
practicing Christian. She attends an Episcopalian church.
As the grandchild of Holocaust victims and as an immigrant whose familys ability
to come to the United States likely saved their lives, Albrights vocal support of
a marginalized group in the face of the Presidents anti-refugee policies is very
meaningful. One can only hope that the president will take the story and words
of this inspiring woman shaper of American political history into account.
On a conference call, Sec. @madeleine Albright reiterates her promise to add
her name to any Muslim registry.