by Gjoka Sami /

 In this picture, – Kleit Whittman Gjoka, (my son) and Kara Dioguardi, taken yesterday in the US. Senate, (Rusell Building) where Joe Dioguardi and Shirley Cloyes DioGuardi, organized an unforgettable event with the Albanian-American and American Jewish Community, with congressmen and senators, with  Rabbis and Holocaust survivors, saved by the Albanians from the  bloodthirsty Nazis and, among many others, ambassadors of different countries, here in Washington DC.

 (KARA DIOGUARDI  – You most likely recognize her from her days as a judge on American Idol, but in addition to being a hit songwriter and TV personality, DioGuardi is a WB music executive, music producer and author. She is also a co-owner of Arthouse Entertainment, which publishes some of today’s biggest hits, such as tracks from Bruno Mars, Cee-Lo and Eminem).

 All who know Kara DioGuardi, know her as the American star and the jury of the America’s Idol; as an astonishing song writer; and a wonderful person as she truly is but for us Albanians she is the daughter of one the most honored activist and leader of the ethnic Albanians, Joseph J. DioGuardi, Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from New York’s 20th district, who together with Shirley, never stopped their hard work and invaluable activities to bring Albania to the platform of the proud nations, to shed light on the history of our people and bring to light our noble deeds throughout history, since the times of the Illyrians, our ancestors who gave birth to Popes and Emperors, including Konstantin the Great, The Roman Emperor who spread all over the empire the Christianity, Skenderb our national Hero who with only few thousand Albanian fighters defeated an Empire and defended the Christian Europe, decades after decades, not simply in one or 2 or 3 battles or in one or 2 or 3 years alone but battle after battle, year after year, never loosing and never retreating becoming stronger and victories every time, becoming the wonder of the whole world, for whom famous people, including our American poet, Longfellow would write century after centuries.

 Joe and Shirley Cloyes DioGuardi have been the two brightest bacons in this distant times to bring back to our shores the respect that the Albanians deserve, shedding light to our great history up to our greatest deeds of all, which is – saving every single Albanian Jew during the Second World War and further more saving even every single Jewish Guest (every one of them with no exception), who had managed to escape from other Balkan nations to come and find save heaven in Albania, a unique and the best country, even for this reason alone, the best in the entire world, the best because Albanians did that then and will do it again and again for any one who is in dangerous, even at the risk of sacrificing their own entire families.

 Shirley Cloyes DioGuardi a member of the National Honor Society is the   Balkan Affairs Adviser, her contribution to recognize the Albanian heroism in saving every single Albanian Jew in Albania during the second war II is next to no one else’s such contribution, both in and outside Albania and this has made her remarkable woman and a pride of our people.

 Joe DioGuardi is, with no doubt, the best choice the Albanians ever could have had to raise their voice and address their concerns both inside and outside of the US Senate and U.S. Congress, the man who made it possible to reveal to the entire world the true values of our people and who contributed so much in shaping the future of our nation. 

 Was it not for his work, the recognition of the Albanian aspirations in Kosova for independence and freedom, would have been much more slower to be embraced by the world community.

Joe helped and rose to a higher level then our Gandhi style, leader, Ibrahim Rugova, to be recognized by the democratic world as the Balkan leader to reason with and it.  Joe’s contribution played a crucial role in promoting ideas of democracy and freedom among the suppressed nation of Kosovar Albanians. 

 Joe Dioguardi played an irreplaceable role to gain the long waited support from the U.S. government in our war against the Serbian medieval aggression.

 It was Joe Dioguardi who successfully asked to establish diplomatic relations between The US and Albania, immediately after the fall of Communism in Albania- through and with the invaluable contribute of late Congressman Tom Lantos, who like all his Jewish bothers and sisters of Albania, survived the Holocaust, and was at the time  the human rights commission in the US Congress, and of course, a beloved friend of the Albanian people.

 Mrs. Annette Lantos, wife of the late Mr. Tom Lantos spoke in this historical gathering, sobbing not only for her beloved Lantos but also touched by the sacrifices and heroism  of the Albanians in saving not so many but every single Jew in that bloody war of Nazis occupation.

Joe continues to work for the wellbeing of all the Albanian people, still scattered and spread in different small Balkan states.Kara the, wonderful girl of this great Dioguardi family has become the pride of our fellow citizens, and we are proud of her American-Italian roots with arbereshi (Albanians of Italy and Greece- Arvanitas) blood in her veins, proud that she came to celebrate with us the 100th anniversary of the independence of Albania and the commemoration of our most noble deed of all – saving all of our Jewish people of Albania, 100% of them.

 Yes we are the only nation in the entire world that saved every single Jew, Jews that war our people before the war and every Jewish guest, who came to find save heaven in Albania.

 All the speakers, Rabbis, Jewish survivors, Albanian families who saved them, congressmen and senators, all spoke  about this unprecedented act of the Albanian Nation that is not an achievement of the Albanians alone but should be considered the achievement of the human kind, against evil,  something others fail to deliver or would ever come close to what Albanians did not even Denmark, who was a safe heaven for Jews as was Albania, not even our great country where we live, America did what Albanians did for the Jews when they desperately needed more people like the Albanians and the world has so much to learn from the Albanians, to learn how we can resist and challenge and win against the forces of evil, like Albanians did, and the Albanians did such a deed for no other reason, but because they could not do anything different, no matter how ruthless the evils were and no matter what consequences it could have had.

 The room in the Rusell Senate Building was full of common and very important people and among them, was our Kara, whose Albanian blood still after 500 of separation, runs in her veins, after 500 years of forceful separation, when her people, left Ottoman prosecution and found refugee in Kalabria (Italy).

 Joe, pleasantly so, spoke to the public, that both Italians and the Albanians together should not forget that it was the Albanians those  who not only defeated Turks battle after battle, in their homeland, while Europe had lost the courage to fight against such a powerful empire,  but further, even when Albanians were in the midst of their war against the Ottoman invasion, not only did not Albanians receive any substantial help from the rest of the Europe, but again it was the Albanians who would turn to help and rescue them.

When the Italians, were at the same time under the threat of foreign invasion, Skanderbe took his best of the best fighters, 4000 of them, crossed over the Adriatic Sea, after leaving  the protection of his country to his best generals, and not only came to the aid of Italians but defeated its enemies as he did in every battle with Turks in Albania.

 “Was it not for Skenderbe and the Albanians”, Joe addressed, smiling the Italians and their Ambassador in this event, you and all Italy would be speaking French today instead of Italian.Joe then recounted how Albanians, called in those times as Arbaria (arberesh) built one of the major strongholds in Calibria to resist the Turkish threat. The region called Calibria, Joe explained the Etymology of this name, is not an Italian name but an Albanian name made by two albanian words- Kala = castle and Abria- arberia- Albania.  (Calabria = the castle of the Albanians).An emotioanla, Jewish grandmother, of Siver Spring MD, Joana NEwman, told the gathering  that she nos has grandchildren who have their children, and was it not for the Albanians who saved her life as a child, living with them as a member of their families, like all the other Jews in Albania,  none of her children and grand children would have ever come to be, and this is what makes the great saying a unchallenging realty, that;  saving a single life is as if saving an entire nation, and the Albanians have done it time and again.

 She told the gathering that she had seen with her eyes, in Albania as a Jewish child, being blended as a child of the family of her Albanian rescuers, how the Nazis in that town killed an entire family, for sheltering a “Partisan” yet nothing she says deterred the Albanians, to keep the Jews in their families and consider them members of their families, and not only in one house or in one town but wherever the Albanians lived.

 Rabbis after rabbis,  congressman after congressman had nothing but praise for such a nation, whose history is so little known, and whose contribution not yet fully recognized, partly because during the half a centaury of communissem,  the government of Albania, did not allow any contact of the Albanians inside with the outsiders, and many of the letters of the survivors were never delivered to the gentiles, but kept in secret government files, that Joe took from the Albanian archives after the fall of the communism in Albania.

 On the other hand in Yugoslavia where most of the Albanian lived, in order not to create any sympathy for the Albanian the Serbian government tried to hide all the documents, the reviled the great deed of the Albanians in saving Jews, something that no other nation has ever done.

 William Whittman(Sami Gjoka)- The Author of “Shadows Speak in Riddles”,  “If I Go To Hell”.  and “Life Has Frozen in Albania”.