Parshat Yitro: Our Righteous Gentile

"Infamy, infamy, they've all got it in-for-me!"

Kenneth Williams' famous (or should it be infamous?) quote from ‘Carry on Cleo’ could equally be applied to Jewish history.

'The Longest Hatred' which was characterised by the cowardly and brutal attack of the Amalekites on the Israelite women and children at the tail end of last week's Parsha, was in evidence yet again last Shabbat in the Beth Israel Synagogue of Colleyville, Texas. Thank Gd this time, our brethren were not harmed. There seems to exist an unending chain that links both attacks across five millennia. The longest hatred does not appear to be in any rush to distance itself from our nation in the past, present or future.

It is easy to think that 'they', whoever the current flavour of antisemitism takes on the ancient mantle happens to be, do 'have it in-for-us'. The thought of which is understandably concerning and deeply troubling.

I don't think it is a coincidence that the final verse of last week's Parsha tells us that "The Lord will be at war with Amalek throughout the ages" and Parshat Yitro's first verse, relates how "Moshe's father-in-Law, Yitro, priest of Midyan heard about all that Gd had done for Moshe and for His people Israel when the Lord brought Israel out of Egypt."

Rashi adds that he had also heard about how Amalek had been vanquished (albeit temporarily) and this was included in his admiration for the nascent Israelites. The Torah refers to him as being Moshe's father-in-law to demonstrate how highly he was regarded by its Divine author.

I would even go so far as claiming Yitro to be one of the first Righteous Gentiles for his having recognised the significance of both Gd and the Israelites, despite not being of the faith himself.

The Torah juxtaposes two extreme ends of the human spectrum. Those who hate the Jews and want to commit genocide against them and those who love and admire the same nation. It is a theme that has been re-enacted again and again throughout the ages and particularly within living memory. It is not by accident that Yad Vashem recognizes the 'chasidei umot ha'olam' in the dedicated 'avenue and garden' memorials they have created within the heart of the museum.

In a few days' time, we will be commemorating Holocaust Memorial Day. It is a painful time for all the remaining survivors and their descendants. Perhaps the knowledge that despite the evil and sadistic machinations of the Amalekites we call the Nazis (yimach shemam – may their names be wiped out), there were also many Yitros who could have joined in the massacres, but instead chose to bravely risk and sometimes lose their lives to protect the descendants of the Israelites - our people.

Righteous Gentiles like Irene Sendler, a Polish Catholic social worker and nurse, who, with her compatriots, saved 2,500 children from the Warsaw Ghetto or Oskar Shindler whose list saved 1,100 Jews in Kraków-Płaszów.

How about Raoul Wallenberg, unseen and unheard of since 1945 and probably executed by the Russians in 1947? He saved around 100,000 Jews in Hungary.

They are but three of the 27,712 'Righteous Amongst the Nations' recognised by Yad Vashem (as of 1st January 2020) and they hail from a staggering 51 countries.

However, I would like to tell you about my own Righteous Gentile. She is not amongst that list of honourees although my mother ensured that she was recognised by Yad Vashem for her bravery. Her name was Michelle Debatty.

The following is taken from my mother’s memoirs that were collated a few years before her passing.

The family consisted of my mother and my uncle Romeo, my grandparents, two great-aunts and my great-grandfather after whom I am named. Due to my grandfather having been born in Sydney, my mother, uncle and their parents were protected from harm as they had British passports, despite the Nazis knowing that they were Jewish.

My great-aunts and great-grandfather were hidden as they were Polish and had no such protection.

The family lived in a villa in Spa, near the German border and engaged an 18-year-old Catholic girl, named Michelle who had the responsibility of looking after the children in case my grandparents were deported. The Jews of Belgium were sent to Auschwitz.

The family was told that if anything happened to my grandparents, Michelle would place my mother in a convent and Romeo in a monastery. Michelle was the eldest of a large family living in the town.

My grandfather joined the Resistance and that took him out a lot although he continued to keep Kosher. The Resistance was a clandestine organisation where mostly young old men from Spa and the rest of the region were fighting the Germans.

My grandfather had a wireless radio hidden under the staircase and would listen to it at certain times of the day. The signal was always the same. They would say, ‘Ici Londres’ (‘Here is London’) followed by the regular signal, which was the first few beats from Beethoven’s 5th Symphony. The sentences spoken made absolutely no sense. For instance, “The nightingale will sing tonight” or, “There are cows in the fields.” However, my grandfather understood these messages which were of crucial importance for the Resistance. From him they’d send their coded messages along the line to British pilots, secret agents, and resistance fighters.

He passed on the coded messages through Michelle to non-Jewish people all over the countryside and then they knew what was going on. My grandfather who obviously spoke English fluently, as it was his mother tongue, was able to decipher the bizarre messages sent through the BBC in London and he was the first one to know about D-Day. He then passed the translated news around all the farms via Michelle. She memorised his translations and delivered them to the Resistance by bicycle. For her to be caught would have been a death sentence.

There was a decree that all the Jews [in hiding] in Spa were ordered to leave the town to go to work in Germany. Michelle’s brother, Andre, was the postmaster in Spa. He too joined the Resistance and saved my great- grandfather and great-aunts by putting a cross next to the list of Jews living in Spa, pretending they had died. This saved their lives as all the other Jewish families were deported to the concentration camps. These were very difficult times and it is the way my mother and uncle grew up, amid the Nazis and some collaborators.

To my mother, Michelle was a third parent and happily, they were reunited through my uncle's efforts to locate her before my cousin Joshua's barmitzvah in 1987. They stayed in touch until Michelle's death only a few years ago when she was in her early nineties. I had the pleasure and privilege of meeting her numerous times and she accompanied my mother and me back to Spa nearly thirty years ago when we visited the town she had grown up in. The trip was also particularly memorable for an American friend who came along and whose father had been in one of the battalions that liberated Belgium and France after D-Day.

My uncle recalls how, on the morning of Sunday 10th September 1944, he and Michelle went to greet the American Army as they entered Spa to liberate the town. They ran down the hill towards the main road and saw a GI in a jeep using a Walkie-Talkie. When he spoke to him, my uncle couldn't understand his Southern drawl (after all, he was only nine-and-a-half). As a child who was always interested in becoming a doctor (and who became a world-renowned Cardiologist), he thought that the soldier had a jaw impediment until he realised that he was chewing some gum.

Michelle was there alongside him. She was so much part of the family that, after more than sixty years, she could still recite the Shema (with the proper cantillation) and knew the words and tune to the Benching. She was a very special lady. One of a kind and our own Righteous Gentile.

Had she been caught for what she did, she would no doubt have been killed and Gd knows what would have happened to the family. Would they have been hidden or would they have met the fate of so many other Jewish children?

Sometimes, it is easy to think that, as Bilaam stated, “We are a nation that dwells alone.” There are those around us who sadly do wish us harm and who sometimes tragically succeed in achieving their murderous plans. But we should not forget that there are many, many people who value our presence in the greater society and marvel at our extraordinary achievements and stubborn resilience!

On the Shabbat when we read firstly about Yitro and then recount the extraordinary events at Mount Sinai and the giving of the Torah, let us remember those who, in the darkest recesses of history remembered us and express our deepest gratitude and appreciation. Simply put, we owe them nothing less than our lives.

Shabbat Shalom.