In Our Own Hands: The Hidden Story of the Jewish Brigade in World War II [VHS]

Like the famed black Tuskegee Airmen and the much-decorated Japanese-American 442nd Infantry, the Jewish Brigade -- young volunteers from what was then Palestine -- had to overcome great prejudice just to be allowed to fight in the British army as Jews. At last receiving their chance, the men of the Brigade faced the Germans in fierce combat during the final Allied offensive in the north of Italy, and came away victorious. Though the war in Europe ended soon after, for these young volunteers from Palestine -- many of whom lost families in the Holocaust -- their war had just begun.

In the first year after the war, Brigade soldiers masterminded one clandestine operation after the next throughout Europe. They formed secret vengeance squads to assassinate Nazi officers in hiding, engineered the rescue and illegal movement of Holocaust survivors to Palestine, and engaged in widespread arms theft for Israel's future War of Independence -- all under the noses of the Allied Armies.

More than anything, "In Our Own Hands" is a story of courage and imagination, providing survivors the missing link between the ruined world that was Europe and hope for a new life in a country of their own.