News 2015
Two articles by VICTOR KUPERMINC
December 16, 2015
For the past few weeks, our friend Victor Kuperminc, the association’s treasurer, has been publishing articles in Tribune Juive and Information Juive. We are pleased to present two of these articles today.
The first is Victor’s translation of an article published in the New York Jewish newspaper “The Jewish Forward”: When Obama speaks to the Jews.
The second, from the same source, was published in “Information Juive”: What the “FORWARD” thinks: a new edition of “Mein Kampf” – is it really a bad idea?
Marie GATARD: D’où venir ?
December 10, 2015
In May, Marie Gatard, a friend of Odette’s, published her eighth book, a collection of poetry, “D’où venir ?” (Where to come from?), with Le Nouvel Athanor. Today we must make up for our oversight in not mentioning it.
Marie Gatard is the author of several books (some of which are mentioned in the Other books section of our website) and of plays performed in Paris, London and Lisbon and also broadcast on France Culture. A journalist, publisher, writer and prizewinner of the Académie de Médecine, she worked for various Paris newspapers and magazines, including Paris-Match (1954–1963), Le Point, Le Monde de l’Éducation, France-Soir, Marie-Claire, Synthèses. She was also editor-in-chief of two scientific journals: the weekly medical news magazine La Semaine des hôpitaux-Informations and Biofutur, the first European biotechnology journal.
After this brief glimpse of Marie Gatard’s very discreet personality, our oversight is partly made up for. And if you read her books, perhaps she will forgive us!
Diocèse de Nice: Histoire et identités d’une terre de contrastes
November 2015
Published in November 2015 under the direction of Gilles Bouis, diocesan archivist, the book required the collaboration of 14 authors, as well as the skills of a cartographer and a professional photographer, over more than two years. This 300-page book covers the seventeen centuries of history that separate the first Christian communities of late Antiquity from the diocesan synod of 2009.
The Marcel network appears on page 227.
Jeannette Wolgust’s testimony at Beit Haverim
November 18, 2015
Jeannette Wolgust was the guest of Beit Haverim, a Jewish LGBT association, at its premises in rue Fénelon in Paris, only a few days after the attacks in Paris and Saint-Denis.
20th Writers’ Fair
November 8, 2015
Sunday, November 8, 2015, from 2 to 7 p.m.
Les Enfants et Amis Abadi will be at the 20th Writers’ Fair. Victor Kuperminc will present his books. Andrée Poch-Karsenti will present Odette Abadi’s “Terre de détresse” and her own book “Les 527 Enfants d’Odette et Moussa”. Fred Coleman will present “Le Réseau Marcel”.
The fair will be held in the reception rooms of the town hall of the 16th arrondissement (71 avenue Henri Martin, 75116 Paris – Métro Pompe).
Free admission
Unveiling of the names of the Righteous recognised between 2011 and 2014
October 11, 2015
Sunday, October 11, 2015 at 11 a.m.
In the presence of H.E. Aliza Bin-Noun, Ambassador of Israel to France
Allée des Justes
75004 Paris
Métro Saint-Paul or Pont Marie
Free booking required: reservation@memorialdelashoah.org
2015 commemoration for Odette and Moussa Abadi
September 8, 2015
Our annual gathering with Odette and Moussa.
Montparnasse cemetery, September 8, 2015. About twenty people, a few more walking sticks marking the passing of time… but hearts still full of memories, of nostalgia, and also of the joy of being together again. The joy, too, of seeing the Friends – Robert Pouderou and Lucette, Marie Gatard, Victor Haïm… – and, unable to travel but present in their expressed thoughts, Jacqueline Denechère, Catherine Jourdan, Aude de Saint-Loup, Pierre-Emmanuel Dauzat, Françoise and Jean-Marc Gagnier… Fred Coleman was there too.
Odette and Moussa ABADI in LIBERTÉ DU JUDAÏSME
September 1st, 2015
The Marcel network
Telling the story of the Marcel network would almost be like beginning an oriental tale, were it not for the tragic events that led to its birth: on September 17, 1910, Moussa Abadi was born in Damascus into a religious Jewish family. He studied at the Alliance Israélite and then entered the Lazarist college.
After a competitive exam, he won a scholarship from the Syrian government. He wanted to enter the Sorbonne and obtain the qualification of “Teacher of French Abroad”. He went to Paris, where he stayed for eighteen months before his contract obliged him to return to Damascus. He came back in 1933. In Paris he discovered the theatre and Louis Jouvet, the Middle Ages with his master Gustave Cohen, and also politics through the meetings at the Mutualité…
The Marcel network in VATICAN INSIDER
August 27, 2015
La «Rete Marcel» e il salvataggio dei 527 bambini ebrei a Nizza
Giovanni Preziosi, an Italian historian, is currently researching the help given through hospitality in church circles during the Second World War. Called “The way of the convents”, this part of history traces the work of the religious institutions that opened their doors to help anyone in mortal danger.
A book in preparation, testimonies wanted
Beyond this article, Giovanni Preziosi plans to write a book on the subject. To do so, he is collecting testimonies from hidden children. You can take part in this work by answering the questionnaire provided.
Answers to the questionnaire are processed by the association “Les Enfants et Amis Abadi” before being passed on to Giovanni Preziosi.
Le TAPISSIER de JÉRUSALEM (The Upholsterer of Jerusalem) – Lucien Lazare
July 9, 2015
Lucien Lazare, born in Alsace in 1924 into a lower-middle-class Jewish family, soon saw his childhood turned upside down – by the death of his father in 1938, then by illness, successive moves and the Occupation. Part of the networks of the Éclaireurs Israélites de France (French Jewish Scouts), he tells simply of the path that led him to the Jewish maquis of Castres. Although a “happy” Frenchman, he moved to Jerusalem in 1968, where he founded the secular Lycée René-Cassin and became the historian of the Jewish resistance, then of the Righteous. He is an upright and loyal man who retraces his journey in Le Tapissier de Jérusalem.
Le Monde des livres devotes an article to his memoirs, “Le Tapissier de Jérusalem”.
Open seminar at the Mémorial de la Shoah
June 28, 2015
On Sunday, June 28, 2015, an open seminar will be held at the Mémorial de la Shoah.
Programme:
– Aktion Reinhardt and the destruction of the Jews of Poland
– A micro-history of the Jews in Lyon during the war.
– How to teach the Shoah to a difficult audience?
– Understanding the history of the Shoah through multidisciplinary teaching.
– Persecution and round-ups in the Italian occupation zone.
– The Jewish question in Marseille from 1939 to 1944.
– The Shoah in Greece: the particular case of Ioannina.
Fred Coleman at the Nice Book Festival
June 4, 2015
Fred Coleman, author of “The Marcel Network”, recently translated into French (“Le Réseau Marcel”), will present his book at the Nice Book Festival on Saturday, June 6 at 11.15 a.m. at the Authors’ Forum (Place Pierre Gautier).
He will sign his book from June 5 to 7 at the Librairie Masséna stand (stand G3).
On Monday, June 8 at 2.30 p.m., Fred Coleman will give a lecture at the Centre Elie Wiesel (55 rue Clément Roassal).
The WEBSITE GETS A MAKEOVER
May 29, 2015
Our website has been adapted to the different types of screen. You can now browse it with the same comfort on computers, tablets and smartphones.
AT THE COLLÈGE FERSEN, THEIR NAMES WERE DORINE, ÉLIANE, PAULETTE AND HÉLÈNE… (by AMEJDAM)
May 21, 2015
AMEJDAM’s mission: putting up plaques to honour the memory of children arrested in the Alpes-Maritimes, interned at Drancy and transported in inhuman conditions to be murdered in the Auschwitz extermination camp.
On Thursday, May 21, 2015, a plaque was unveiled at the Collège Fersen in Antibes. A moving ceremony, full of sometimes surprising discoveries. Four little girls brought out of the night of oblivion – their names were Dorine, Éliane, Paulette and Hélène.
Collecting testimonies for the Mémorial de la Shoah
May 20, 2015
Judith Lindenberg, a historian, is recording filmed interviews with survivors for the archives of the Mémorial de la Shoah. She wishes to gather the testimonies of survivors, whatever their experience during the war (deportees, hidden children or other), by conducting interviews outside Paris.
Until now the Mémorial’s testimony-collecting campaigns have been carried out only in Paris, and it is becoming urgent to record the words of survivors who have not yet been recorded and who would agree to testify.
If your testimony, or that of people around you, has not yet been recorded, you can contact Judith Lindenberg:
judlindenberg@gmail.com
Centre de Recherches Historiques, EHESS
Jewish Studies
http://cej.ehess.fr/index.php?823
CHARLES GOTTLIEB, THE WARRIOR OF MEMORY… (by AMEJDAM)
May 8, 2015
Charles’s last testimony for AMEJDAM.
That voice we all knew – the voice of a man who, in the last years of his life, made it his essential mission to pass on the unspeakable, to accompany pupils to Auschwitz and to tell them, explain to them, what the camp and deportation were… More than 30 times, he walked again in the footsteps of the murdered deportees – he, the surviving deportee.
On December 29, 2014, he had agreed to come and talk to us on the radio, and it is his voice that you will “hear again” today, thanks to this transcription, slightly simplified to make it easier to read.
Daniel Farhi, Officer of the Legion of Honour
May 6, 2015
On May 6, Rabbi Daniel Farhi was presented with the insignia of Officer of the Legion of Honour by Maître Serge Klarsfeld (Grand Officer of the Legion of Honour, President of the Sons and Daughters of Jewish Deportees from France). The ceremony took place at the Mémorial de la Shoah (17 rue Geoffroy-l’Asnier, 75004 Paris).
Daniel Farhi was made a Knight of the Legion of Honour in 1993. He was promoted to Officer of the Legion of Honour, from the President of the Republic’s special reserve, on January 1, 2012.
EXHIBITION “LUTETIA, 1945 – THE RETURN OF THE DEPORTEES”
April 30, 2015
To mark the 70th anniversary of the return of the deportees, the AFMD is organising an exhibition presenting testimonies and videos of deportees, families and the reception staff at the Hôtel Lutetia.
Discover the Lutetia on the website created for the occasion. You will find many video testimonies about the return of the deportees, as well as the dates of the exhibition.
Renée DUPRAZ, née PONS, is looking for Florelle and Jeannette Zysman
April 19, 2015
Renée DUPRAZ, née PONS, is looking for information about Florelle and Jeannette ZYSMAN, whom she knew in 1942–43 in GAP. If you have any leads or information, thank you for your help.
Many of you contact us in the hope that, through our association, we can help you find a relative. We are happy to help whenever we can. This also depends on your testimonies and what you share.
Simon EINE reads Victor HAÏM
May 19 and 20, 2015
On May 19 and 20, Simon Eine, honorary member of the Comédie-Française and an Abadi child, will give a reading of Victor Haïm’s “Délicieuse Cacophonie”.
Victor Haïm is a playwright, actor, screenwriter, director and drama teacher, and also a Friend of the Abadis.
The reading will take place at the Studio-Théâtre of the Comédie-Française.
Death of Jean Altman
April 17, 2015
Jean Altman, husband of Gisèle Altman, died suddenly on Thursday, April 16, 2015. His funeral took place on Friday, April 17 at Bagneux cemetery.
April 15: YOM HASHOAH LIVE – Reading of the names of the Jewish deportees from France
April 15, 2015
The Mémorial de la Shoah invites you to follow the Yom HaShoah ceremony live on its website on Wednesday, April 15 at 7 p.m.
Under the aegis of the Fondation pour la Mémoire de la Shoah. In partnership with the Mouvement Juif Libéral de France (MJLF), the Association of the Sons and Daughters of Jewish Deportees from France (FFDJF), which initiated this ceremony, and the Consistory of Paris.[…] You can follow the ceremony live from this page.
For Yom HaShoah, the date chosen by the State of Israel to commemorate the victims of the Shoah and the heroes of the Jewish Resistance during the Second World War, an uninterrupted 24-hour public reading takes place, day and night. Of the 76,000 names inscribed on the Wall of Names, the names of the people deported from France on convoys no. 44 to no. 84 are read out one by one. Some 200 people – former deportees, relatives, volunteers, children… – take turns reading, from the lists in Serge Klarsfeld’s Memorial of the Deportation (published by the FFDJF), the names of “those of whom only the name remains” (Simone Veil).
THE MARCEL NETWORK IN NICE-MATIN
March 29, 2015
On Sunday, March 29, Nice-Matin devoted two pages to the history of the Marcel network and the work of its founders, Odette and Moussa Abadi.
The MARCEL NETWORK in L’EXPRESS
March 26, 2015
This week, the magazine L’Express, through Charles Haquet, devotes three articles to the Marcel network.
History: the resistance network that saved 500 Jewish children
In Nice, in 1943, a couple set up a clandestine group, the Marcel network, which saved more than half a thousand young Jews from deportation. Witnesses look back on a little-known story of love and courage.
“The Marcel network, a message of hope”
The American journalist Fred Coleman investigated the Marcel network at length. Published four years ago in the United States, his book has at last been translated and is available in France.
Letter to my 527 children
Before taking her own life, Odette Abadi, the heroine of the Marcel network, wrote a very moving letter to all “her” children.
General meeting of the association: Tuesday, March 24, 2015
March 7, 2015
Our Ordinary General Meeting will be held on:
Tuesday 24 MARCH 2015 at 7 p.m.
at the CENTRE COMMUNAUTAIRE
119 rue La Fayette
75010 Paris
Agenda:
2014 activity report and 2015 projects
2014 financial report
Any other business
and… a friendly drink
“Enfance et Exil” (Childhood and exile) – Juan Freund’s play translated into French
February 26, 2015
Until now, the play written by Juan Freund was available only in its original Spanish version. Thanks to the work of Gladys Campos, the play is now available in full in French.