Newsletter Yad Vashem

The Scattered Life I Lead – The Diary of Lucien Dreyfus: a Yad Vashem Podcast

Holocaust-era diary writing offers a rare glimpse into real-time events and personal reflections that, had they not been written, may well have been swept away in the rapid unfolding of events. The diary of a French Jewish intellectual, Lucien Dreyfus, helps us shed light on one person’s grappling with the calamity. This episode of « On the Holocaust », will talk about Dreyfus’s life, reflections and fate during the Holocaust as expressed in his wartime diary: “’The Holocaust Diary of Lucien Dreyfus.” Featured guest: Alexandra Garbarini, Professor of History and Jewish Studies at Williams College in Massachusetts. Click here to listen.

Online Exhibition: The Fate of Jewish Artist Felix Nussbaum

Felix Nussbaum was born in Osnabrueck, Germany, and studied in Hamburg, Berlin and Rome. He and his companion, Felka Platek, settled in Belgium in 1935. In 1940, he was arrested and sent to the camp of Saint Cyprien in southern France. Nussbaum managed to escape, and lived in hiding in Brussels until he was caught in 1944 and sent to Auschwitz, where he met his death. Click here to visit an online exhibition featuring Nussbaum’s work.

New From our Publications – One Step Ahead: David J. Azrieli (Azrylewicz): Memoirs

Danna J. Azrieli

David J. Azrieli was born in 1922 in Maków Mazowiecki, Poland. Written by his daughter Danna, this gripping account of survival during World War II describes David’s extraordinary travels, always just one step ahead of life threatening danger, which took him to the Soviet-occupied zones of Poland and later to Ukraine, Tashkent, and Buchara. He subsequently served in the Anders’ Army, before making his way from Baghdad to the frontiers of British-occupied Palestine. The memoir chronicles David J. Azrieli’s arrival in Palestine, his studies at the Technion in Haifa, his experiences as a soldier in the War of Independence, and his realization that most of his immediate family had perished in the Holocaust. Azrieli finally settled in Canada in 1954. This story of survival is all the more remarkable given Azrieli’s later achievements as a successful real estate developer and philanthropist. One of the economic giants of the Jewish world, his many developments changed the face of Israel and stand as a striking testament to the strength and courage of a boy whom Hitler could not defeat. Click here to purchase.