Paris, 9 November 2017
Simon Wiesenthal Centre Director for International Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels was invited to join an Honorary Committee of six diplomats from El Salvador, Hungary, Israel and Switzerland and representatives of CRIF (Council of French Jewish Institutions), the Memorial to the Shoah, Yad Vashem, Yahad in Unum, the Elie Wiesel Institute and the Women’s Co-operation Council, In Memory of Righteous Gentile, Carl Lutz.
Left to right: Frederic Hayat, Shimon Samuels and Xavier Cornut.
Recognized as a "Righteous Gentile", this Swiss diplomat as Vice-Consul in Budapest, provided Hungarian Jews with protection certificates. After a confrontation with Adolf Eichmann, the architect of the Holocaust, Lutz conceived of an elaborate stratagem to place 76 residential buildings in Budapest under diplomatic extraterritoriality, in which he housed thousands of families. Protecting these quarters from the SS, he is credited with saving 62,000 men, women and children from deportation to Auschwitz.
Nominated on three occasions for the Nobel Peace Prize, Carl Lutz has been honoured in Israel, Hungary, the United States, Germany and now in his own country Switzerland.
Samuels joined the other members of the Honorary Committee (see below) in the call for a plaque in Lutz's memory outside the Swiss Foreign Ministry in Berne.
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M. Bernardino Regazzoni |
Ambassadeur de Suisse en France |
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M. Takács, Szabolcs |
Ambassadeur de Hongrie auprès de l'IRHA |
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Mme Carmen Maria Gallardo Hernandez |
Ambassadeur d'El Salvador |
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M. Georges Karoly |
Ambassadeur de Hongrie en France |
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M. Marc Attali |
Ministre plénipotentiaire Israel en France |
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M. Francis Kalifat |
Président du CRIF |
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M. Olivier Cadic |
Sénateur représentant les français de l'étranger |
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Mme Agnès Hirschi |
Fille adoptive de Carl Lutz |
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M. Jacques Fredj |
Mémorial de la Shoah |
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Yad Vachem |
Yad Vashem |
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M. Shimon Samuels |
Centre Simon Wiesenthal |
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M. Patrick Desbois |
Yahad in Unum |
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Mme Rebekka Benesch |
Conseillère de l’Ambassade de Suisse |
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M. Xavier Cornut |
Fondation Carl Lutz |
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M. Raphy Marciano |
Institut Elie Wiesel |
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Mme Evelyne Berdugo |
Présidente Coopération féminine |
In his thanks to the organisers: Frederic Hayat and Xavier Cornut of the Carl Lutz Foundation and Lutz's adoptive daughter Agnes Hirschi, Samuels noted,
"having worked alongside the late Simon Wiesenthal for almost twenty years until his passing, I am certain that the plaque acknowledging the vital role of Carl Lutz for the Jewish people and as a universal example, would have brought great satisfaction to Simon.
It will also be applauded by his family and the 400,000 worldwide membership of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre".
Simon Wiesenthal had written the Preface to Theo Tschuy's biography of Carl Lutz, "Dangerous Diplomacy" which was distributed at the ceremony at the Rue Copernic Synagogue in Paris.