Gideon corner house

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Gideon Eckhaus ( July 3, 1923 in Vienna - June 29, 2020 in Tel Aviv ) was an Austrian Zionist who fled to Palestine in 1938 and took part in the establishment of the state of Israel . He was the long-time president of the Central Committee of Jews from Austria in Israel and made himself available as a contemporary witness .

Life

Gideon Eckhaus was the son of the businessman Karl Eckhaus, who came from Bukowina , and his wife Sabine, nee Vogel. He had a brother two years his junior. His mother died in 1934 of complications from pneumonia. The father was away on business a lot, the brothers lived with their grandmother. In 1935 he joined the Zionist Youth Association and became a committed Zionist. In 1938 he was in the synagogue when Hitler's troops marched into Austria . The prayer was interrupted. When he and his brother came out onto the street, all houses were already flagged with the swastika flag and the guards were wearing armbands with the swastika . His father's company and his shop at Hollandstrasse 13 were Aryanized, and when he had to experience how books and Torah scrolls were burned in Schiffgasse as part of the November pogroms of 1938 and Jews' beards were cut off, it was for him that 15-year-olds, of course: he had to leave Austria immediately. The emigration planned for later, carefully prepared by the youth alijah, turned into a hasty escape. He came to Trieste and from there by ship to Palestine . He could only take two books with him, the prayer book and the family book. There is a teacher's entry:

"If you are anvil, be patient, if
you are a hammer, then be strong"

Eckhaus participated in the development of the state of Israel . He was a member of the Jewish Settlement Police , a subdivision of Notrim , and then joined the Jewish underground army , the Hagana , which eventually became the armed forces of Israel . After his military service he devoted himself to working with young immigrants. A special concern, also on a voluntary basis, was taking care of the Jews who came from Austria. He became president of the Central Committee of Jews from Austria. From 1994 Eckhaus played a major role in restitution negotiations with the Austrian federal government. He was also chairman of the Israeli-Austrian Society Tel Aviv. The Central Committee ran a club in Tel Aviv for senior citizens from Austria and organized meals on wheels for bedridden members. This institution was also supported by the National Fund of the Republic of Austria for Victims of National Socialism .

memory

The Austrian Federal President Alexander Van der Bellen wrote in 2020: “With Gideon Eckhaus, a great Austrian has died. He was one of the many Jewish Austrians who were expelled from their homes, their belongings and, above all, relatives and friends who were stolen by the Nazis and fellow travelers. ”Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg expressed his concern. Eckhaus will be “very missing as a warning and contemporary witness. It is now more and more up to us to preserve the memories and the lessons we have to learn from the past. ”National Council President Wolfgang Sobotka expressed his condolences to the relatives. Second President of the National Council, Doris Bures, described Eckhaus as a strong and self-determined person. In their eyes he was a "fighter who has always stood up for justice."

family

His father was deported to the Auschwitz extermination camp by the Nazi regime and murdered there. His brother emigrated in time and survived in the USA.

His wife was named Sara. The couple had two sons, Shimon and Doron, as well as six grandsons and fifteen great-grandchildren.

Conversations with contemporary witnesses

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c ORF (Vienna): Eckhaus, President of the Jews from Austria, is dead , June 30, 2020
personal data
SURNAME Corner house, Gideon
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Israeli youth worker and contemporary witness
DATE OF BIRTH July 3, 1923
PLACE OF BIRTH Vienna
DATE OF DEATH June 29, 2020
Place of death Tel Aviv