The most important section in the newspaper during election season is the obituary section. That’s where I run whenever I’ve had enough of the current public commotion. Here’s what I found there on Tuesday:
Simjon Rosenfeld, 96 years old, was the last survivor of the Sobibor death camp. In a camp in which 150,000 Jews were murdered, he and his friend managed to kill 11 SS people and escape.
Most of the rebels were caught and murdered. Simjon survived, until yesterday.
The head of the Nahal Sorek regional council, Eli Askozido, told me that every morning he used to visit the local nursing home because after being greeted with a “good morning” by Simjon, everything was taken in the right proportions for the rest of his day.
Now the last Sobibor survivor has passed away.
Zipporah Friedman Ish Shalom, who passed away last night at the age of 93, was the daughter of the previous Vizhnitzer Rebbe, the “Imrei Chaim.”
She and her husband made aliyah to Israel and built Kibbutz Reshafim in the Bet She’an Valley in the framework of the HaShomer HaTza’ir movement. Both of them also assumed the position of kibbutz secretary.
After years of not being in touch with her father, she returned to nurse him when he grew ill, and their relationship resumed. Her family moved to the religious Kibbutz Sa’ad. Delicate threads were woven between the kibbutz and chassidic movements.
Thousands were privileged to learn from teacher Zipporah stories of Shai Agnon throughout the years, with a special blend of old and new, between the Jewish shtetl and the Israeli yishuv.
After almost 100 tumultuous years, both of them were buried in the land of Eretz Israel.
In their memory.