The USC Shoah Foundation mourns the passing of Dr. Abner Delman, a cardiologist and longtime supporter of the USC Shoah Foundation. He was 93.
Abner's wife, Ilse-Lore Delman, was a Holocaust survivor who fled her hometown to escape Nazi persecution at a young age. She spent three years in hiding. In 1998, Ilse recorded her testimony with the USC Shoah Foundation, and soon after, the couple became involved with the organization.
Paul Engel was born into a middle-class Jewish family on May 4, 1922 in Vienna, Austria. He had a younger brother, Robert. When World War I broke out in 1914, his father, Eduard, was drafted into the Austro-Hungarian army. Captured as a prisoner of war, he spent six years in Siberia working in a coal mine, finally reuniting with his family in 1920. In Vienna, Eduard owned a perfume wholesale business. Before the war, Paul attended a primary school and was accepted to a Gymnasium in the 14th district of Vienna.
Hela Goldstein’s testimony given to the British Film and Photographic Unit on April 24, 1945 is believed to be the first-ever audio-visual testimony given by a Holocaust survivor. As a 22-year old victim, she spoke from Bergen-Belsen, the Nazi concentration camp where she was imprisoned upon liberation. Standing at the foot of a mass grave with her killers before her, Hela recounted what she experienced. By telling her story in the face of death, she became a foremother of testimony.
The conference will be held November 4-7, 2018 at Doheny Library at USC and at Villa Aurora in Pacific Palisades.
Dr. Kiril Feferman is a former Senior Lecturer in the Department of Jewish Studies at the Russian State University for Humanities, Director of Education and Research at the Russian Research and Educational Holocaust Center in Moscow, and current head of the Holocaust History Center at Ariel University.