The Film

The story of Albania’s Muslims, and what they did during Word War II, is one of the great untold stories of the war. As Hitler’s troops marched across the Balkan States in the early 1940s, they sealed the fate of over a million Jews. But in the tiny Muslim country of Albania, the fate of the Jews looked entirely different. There, Muslims across the country, from the capital of Tirana to the remote mountain villages, took the Jewish refugees en masse into their homes. Jews were disguised as Muslims, taken to mosque, given headscarves to wear and called by Muslim names; they were hidden in closets and attics, and ferried to safety in inaccessible mountain hamlets; they were adopted, befriended, and they were never, ever, betrayed. Most remarkably, this was all done with the consent and support of the entire country. Thousands of Jews, hidden in plain sight – everyone knew – and no one told.

In this documentary, the incredible history of Albania's Muslims is woven throughout the journey of two men: Rexhap Hoxha – who is trying to return a set of Jewish prayer books to the survivor that his family sheltered over 60 years ago, and Norman Gershman - an American photographer determined to shed light on this long forgotten piece of history.  The film follows Mr. Hoxha on an epic journey  to fulfill a promise he made to his dying father, while interviews with survivors and rescuers from that time provide a gripping narrative of heroism and courage where you least expect it.

As far as we have been able to determine, not a single Albanian Jew – nor any of the thousands of other Jews who sought refuge in Albania – was given up to the Nazis by Albania’s Muslims during WWII. With the exception of Denmark, Albania is the only occupied country to be able to make this claim.  Indeed, Albania is the only country in occupied Europe to have more Jews at the end of the war than at the beginning.  Truly a story that needs to be told, now more than ever, God's House will be the first definitive documentary to illuminate this amazing history.