French Holocaust survivor and pro-abortion campaigner Simone Veil dies at 89

PARIS—French politician Simone Veil, who survived the Holocaust and led campaigns for the legalization of abortion in France in the 1970s, died at her home in Paris on Friday, her family said. She was 89 years old.

A Jewish survivor of the Nazi death camps at Auschwitz-Birkenau and Bergen-Belsen with the prisoner number 78651 tattooed on her arm, she was a fervent European and fighter for civil liberties, becoming the first elected president of the European Parliament in 1979. Although out of the national limelight since 2007 when she quit her seat at France's top constitutional court, she commanded wide respect across the political spectrum and remained among the most popular politicians in opinion polls.

Veil marking the 60th anniversary of Auschwitz's liberation in 2005 with then-President Chirac (Photo: AFP)

Tributes honoring her courage and determination to advance women's rights were paid from within France and beyond.

"May her example inspire our fellow countrymen, who will find in her the best of France," French President Emmanuel Macron said in a message to the family. Veil's concentration camp experience turned her into a passionate advocate of European unification but she was best known in France for legalizing abortion when she was health minister in 1974 under then President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing.

(Photo: AFP)

Virtually unknown when she joined the cabinet, she fought doggedly against a hostile parliament and divided public opinion to push through a bill that became known as "the Veil Law", making France the first mainly Roman Catholic country to legalize abortion. "Great debates that have for a time divided the French people appear with the passing of time as a necessary step to forming a new social consensus that is part of the tradition of tolerance in our country," Veil said in a speech defending the abortion law in 1974.

(Photo: AFP)

Veil was born Simone Jacob in Nice, on the French Riviera, on July 13, 1927, and from a young age experienced the spread of anti-Semitism in Europe. "Your mother is a Jew, you will burn in hell," a classmate once told her. In spring 1944, aged 16 and living under a false identity, she was arrested together with her family by the Germans. Her father, mother and brother died in concentration camps, though a sister who was active in the French Resistance survived imprisonment in the Ravensbruck camp.

(Photo: MCT)

After the war, she studied law at the Institute of Political Studies in Paris and became a magistrate, winning honorary degrees from the US Princeton University and Israel's Weizman Institute. She was married to Antoine Veil, a prominent businessman who led several leading companies and died in 2013. They had three sons. "She embodied for an entire generation the struggle of women for the freedom to decide on motherhood," said Jean Louis Debré, former president of the Constitutional Court. "More profoundly, she represented for men and women seeking a new future a European desire for peace and prosperity."

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Tillerson urged to appoint special envoy on anti-Semitism

Religious leaders in the US along with lawmakers and former federal officials have urged Secretary of State Rex Tillerson asking him to fill the position of Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat anti-Semitism at the State Department.

"As faith leaders who care deeply about combating anti-Semitism, we know how critically important this Special Envoy role has been in representing our government abroad on a range of issues affecting the safety and welfare of Jewish communities," read an open letter written by the ADL and signed by nearly two dozen representatives of the Catholic, Protestant, Evangelical, Muslim, Sikh, Hindu and Jewish faiths.

"We urge you to clarify your position and commit to filling this statutorily mandated appointment as soon as possible."

US Secretary of State Tillerson (Photo: Reuters)

The Special Envoy position, which was created in 2004 under the Global Anti-Semitism Review Act, helped define the State Department's working definition of anti-Semitism, in addition to monitoring, reporting on and combating acts of anti-Semitism and anti-Semitic incitement abroad. The position has been vacant since US President Donald Trump took office in January.

Bloomberg reported in February the White House was considering eliminating the position, along with other special envoy positions dedicated to climate change and Muslim communities among others.

Plans to elimite the position as part of the Trump administration's efforts to make drastic cuts in government spending were also crticized by the American Jewish Committee, the Simon Wiesenthal Center, more than a 100 Holocaust organizations, educators and scholars.

US Rep. Chris Smith, R-NJ, who authored the Global Anti-Semitism Review Act under George W. Bush's administration, also came out against plans to defund the office, noting recent bomb threats made to Jewish centers across the US as well as recent acts of vandalism at Jewish cemeteries.

"It is vital that one senior law enforcement official has the mandate to lead efforts across the government to anticipate, prevent and respond to threats and attacks—especially violent ones—against the American Jewish community," Smith said in a statement.

Hannah Rosenthal, who served as the special envoy from 2009 to 2012, asserted that "If someone is not tasked with this responsibility, it will not be done."

She went on to say the working definition of anti-Semitism formulated by the office has been helping American diplomats around the world "push back" against offensive activities and speech.

Her successor, Ira Forman, who served as the special envoy from 2013 to January 20, 2017, echoed those sentiments, saying US leadership around the world "will vastly diminish if the office of the special envoy is not supported by senior leadership at the State Department."

A State Department official quoted by NBC News said the Department wants to ensure it was "addressing anti-Semitism in the most effective and efficient method possible and are exploring the best means to continue to do so."

The State Department, he said, "remains concerned by high levels of anti-Semitism in many other countries."

Tillerson was asked about the vacant position when testifying in front of the US House of Representatives' State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Subcommittee on June 14.

Rep. Grace Meng, D-NY, said during the hearing, "We have written a bipartisan letter and made repeated calls from Congress for you to fill this seat. By what date do you know if you will have appointed a new special envoy to monitor and combat anti-Semitism?"

 

Tillerson said the State Department was trying to ascertain whether the special envoys "weakened our attention to those issues," arguing that other diplomats avoid dealing with the issue because there is a special envoy in place.

"One of the questions I’ve asked is, 'If we’re really going to affect these areas, these special areas, don’t we have to affect it through the delivery on mission at every level at every country?'... And by having a special person, an envoy out here, one of my experiences is, mission then says, 'Oh, we’ve got somebody else that does that,' and then they stop doing it. And so it was not the intent."

The ADL rejected Tillerson's assertions, saying, "We appreciate the sentiment you expressed that all diplomats should feel responsible for combating anti-Semitism. However, concerns about anti-Semitism do not always make it on to the agenda of diplomatic meetings, especially when many other legitimate and pressing issues require attention. By contrast, when the Special Envoy meets with foreign officials, anti-Semitism is the agenda."

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Police make arrest in vandalism at Boston Holocaust memorial

Police say they have arrested a man who used a rock to smash a glass panel at the New England Holocaust Memorial in Boston.

James Isaac faces arraignment Wednesday on charges of malicious destruction of personal property and destruction of a place of memorial. It could not be determined if he has a lawyer.

New England Holocaust Memorial in Boston (Photo: AP)

 

Police were called by a witness to the memorial early Wednesday to find a glass panel on one of the memorial's 54-foot-high towers shattered.

The memorial that opened in 1995 is on the Freedom Trail near Faneuil Hall and City Hall and is open at all times.

The six glass towers are lit internally and etched with millions of numbers that represent tattoos on the arms of many Jews sent to Nazi death camps.

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Rabbi, several others arrested in public benefits fraud case

Rabbi, several others arrested in public benefits fraud case

Prominent New Jersey rabbi and his wife suspected of illegally soliciting more than $1 million from federal public assistance programs by underreporting incomes; three other couples suspected of of the same fraudulent scheme.

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The neo-Nazi who converted to Judaism

For most people only faith in reincarnation can explain such a story. But Yonatan Langer, a kippa wearing Jew from West Berlin, is quite capable of recounting his previous incarnation: it ended only a few years ago. Yonatan, 33, or Lotz if you go by his original name, was a neo-Nazi. In the neighborhood where he lived in Berlin, he spent time in Neo-Nazi clubs, used the Nazi salute, and admired the SS.

"Hitler, Himmler, Hess—they were heroes to me, war heroes," said Langer in his interview for the newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung.

Yonatan Langer

Just a few years ago he used to celebrate Hitler's birthday, but today he celebrates the Jewish holidays and puts on tefillin every morning. This week, in New York, he is set to complete his conversion to Judaism, after undergoing the traditional circumcision of a bris. Langer managed to get out of the very depths of the violent and racist scene. He attributes his change mainly to the conversations he had with the director of the group Exit. which helps neo-Nazis "get out of the extreme right and start a new life." "It's actually quite simple to convert extreme right-wingers, or radical Islamists," Langer said. "You just need to allow them to take part in life, and extremism is solved by itself."

Langer recalled having a dream, during a time in his life when he was starting to distance himself from his friends. In it, he was standing in a warm cave, when the word "Kabbalah" appeared on the wall. Langer awoke from the dream, jumped out of bed and ran to his computer. From there he went to an introductory course for Kabbalah. These days, he studies Hebrew, works at the Kabbalah Studies Center in Berlin and tries to work through the vicissitudes he underwent.

(Translated & edited by Lior Mor)

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Ynet reporter to receive B’nai B’rith journalism award

Ynet reporter Yaniv Pohoryles will receive on Wednesday the 2017 B’nai B’rith World Center Award for Journalism Recognizing Excellence in Diaspora Reportage.

  Pohoryles, home page editor and writer for the Jewish World section of Ynet, was chosen for a series of nine articles published over the course of 2016 that covered Jewish communities in the US and France, Jewish demography, Israel-Diaspora relations, Jewish sportsmen, fundraising, aliyah and kosher food in the Diaspora, among other topics. "I'm very happy that the issue of Diaspora Jewry and new olim is getting broader coverage in the Israeli media," Pohoryles told Ynetnews. "I feel that for many years, the issue has been under-reported or put into the niche of folklore, without any mind given to its wider aspects."

Ynet reporter Yaniv Pohoryles

Pohoryles went on to say the B’nai B’rith award "is yet more proof there are many who find interest in such topics and that their impact is wide-reaching." "I want to thank Ynet for giving me this stage and hope to write many more articles and stories on these fascinating issues," he concluded. US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman will deliver the keynote address at the awards ceremony, which will be held at the Konrad Adenauer Conference Center in Jerusalem's Mishkenot Sha’ananim neighborhood. Also recognized will be Israeli singer/songwriter David Broza, who will receive a special special citation for fostering Israel-Diaspora relations through the arts. The citation has previously been conferred upon Israeli musicians Nurit Hirsh (2014), David D'Or (2015) and Idan Raichel (2016).

David Broza at the Ynet studio (Photo: Yaron Brener)

"Broza has appeared before countless Diaspora communities, groups and organizations during a career that has spanned more than 40 years," the B’nai B’rith World Center-Jerusalem said in a statement. "His original songs and passionate performances are cherished throughout Israel and the Diaspora, offering a common language and point of reference for Jews of diverse backgrounds. A powerful musician, dedicated peace advocate and music industry innovator, Broza awes and inspires audiences with his sincere message and musical allure."

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Polish human rights official under fire for Holocaust remark

A leading Polish human rights official has come under fire for saying the "Polish nation" took part in the implementation of the Holocaust—a controversial statement in a country whose official view is that Poland never collaborated with Nazi Germany during World War II.

The statement was made by Adam Bodnar, the country's human rights commissioner, who spoke Wednesday on the state-run TVP Info broadcaster.

 

The sign to Auschwitz extermination camp, located in Poland (Photo: EPA)

"There is no doubt that the Germans were responsible for the Holocaust, but many nations took part in its implementation. Among them—and I say this with regret—the Polish nation," said Bodnar during his interview. Bodnar later apologized for the comment, but members of Poland's conservative government nevertheless said he should resign. The flap threatens to weaken Bodnar, who heads one of the last state institutions still independent from the ruling conservative Law and Justice party. After taking power in 2015, the party moved quickly to consolidate its hold over the Constitutional Tribunal, public media and other state bodies in a way that has eroded checks and balances, sparking criticism by the European Union. Bodnar's office has criticized the government for its steps against the constitutional court and over other human rights issues. Deputy Foreign Minister Jan Dziedziczak called Bodnar's comment "scandalous," untrue and added it "disqualifies him from public life."

Bodnar

Bodnar quickly apologized for his choice of words and clarified that he did not mean to say that the entire nation took part in the Holocaust, only that some Poles had committed crimes against Jews. The behavior of Poles toward Jews during Germany's wartime occupation of Poland remains an extremely sensitive subject. Poland was subjected to a cruel occupation during the war and was the site of many death camps where the Germans murdered Jews, Roma and other minority groups. Poles today are hugely offended at suggestions that they took part in the Holocaust. There is a state campaign to fight the term "Polish death camps," which non-Poles have sometimes used. After referring to a "Polish death camp" in a '12 speech of his, then US president Barack Obama raised the ire of the Polish population, until his administration had to issue an apology. There also have been greater efforts in recent years to face the difficult issue of the Poles who did collaborate in violence against Jews for profit or other motives. However, the subject is anathema to the government, which prefers to speak only of the Poles who risked their lives to save Jews, sparking some criticisms of historical whitewashing.

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