Grapevine: Father of Haifa resident honored for saving Jews

Haifa resident Tova Teitelbaum said that it gave her great satisfaction to know that people whom her father had saved during the Holocause had come to Israel and had brought children, grandchildren and even great-grandchildren into the world.

By GREER FAY CASHMAN
Model Katia Marshvin has her locks cut by Eli Ben-Zikri to use as a wig while she undergoes treatment. (photo credit: Courtesy)
Model Katia Marshvin has her locks cut by Eli Ben-Zikri to use as a wig while she undergoes treatment.
(photo credit: Courtesy)
■ HAIFA RESIDENT Tova Teitelbaum, who had long struggled to have her late father Jonas Eckstein officially recognized as a Jew who risked his life to save fellow Jews during the Holocaust, was more than gratified this week when her father’s memory was honored by the B’nai B’rith World Center and the Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael-Jewish National Fund at a ceremony in the Scrolls of Fire Plaza of the Martyrs’s Forest.
Not only was the event the closing of a circle for her, but it also led to a series of reunions. Some of the people whose lives her father had saved were in attendance as well as relatives whom she had never met before even though she has been living in Israel for decades. In fact, she introduced two lots of relatives to each other. Were it not for the B’nai B’rith ceremony, it is unlikely that she would have ever met these relatives or that they would have met each other.
Teitelbaum, who is herself a child Holocaust survivor, said afterwards that it gave her great satisfaction to know that people whom her father had saved had come to Israel and had brought children, grandchildren and even great-grandchildren into the world. Aside from honoring Jews who saved Jews, B’nai B’rith each year brings survivors to the commemoration site and sets up corners of testimony. There the survivors meet with groups of schoolchildren and members of the Border Police to share with them firsthand information of the situation that prevailed in the ghettos, the forests and the camps during the Holocaust.
■ BEING DIAGNOSED with cancer is bad news for anyone, but more so for people whose careers are based on their appearance. When 21-year-old model Katia Marshvin of Ashdod was told that she had cancer and that she would have to undergo a course of chemotherapy, she did not wait for her natural hair to fall out, but had her head shaved and was fitted with a real hair wig that was almost identical in style and color to her own natural hair.
The wig was a multiple gift. Hairdresser Eli Ben-Zikri is in a better position than some of his colleagues, who also specialize in making wigs free of charge for cancer patients, in that he himself is a recovering cancer patient. He understands the anxieties that accompany the disease, the fears that one’s appearance may be radically altered and that hair may not grow back. Hairdressers like Ben-Zikri cannot make the wigs without donations. They’re not asking for money. They’re asking for hair. Any girl or woman with a head of long, healthy hair can donate, knowing that within a few months to a year the length of the hair she has donated will have been naturally replaced.
Women who have donated hair to enable others to maintain their self-confidence and self-esteem feel a far greater sense of satisfaction than those who may give money to a cause and not know where it is going. Too often, monetary donations end up in salaries instead of improving the welfare service for which they were intended. But hair donations, when accepted by a hairdresser working with cancer patients, are fashioned into attractive wigs which are then donated to patients. Marshvin, who is being treated at Kaplan Medical Center in Rehovot, said that after wearing the wig a few times, she completely forgot that it was a wig because every time she is photographed or looks in the mirror, there seems to be no difference between it and her real hair.
Ben-Zikri, who maintains a wig salon on a voluntary basis at Kaplan Medical Center, has taken a personal interest in the young model who immigrated from Russia when she was five years old. Most of the women for whom he makes wigs are somewhat older than Marshvin, who between treatments is keeping up with her career. Cancer patients in need of a wig can contact Ben-Zikri at 050-679-8798. Women who want to donate hair can also make an appointment with him to come into the Kaplan salon. Donations must be at least 30 cm. in length.
■ DIMONA WAS not only one of the focal points of this year’s Mimouna festivities, but also the location for the grand finale of this year’s Perlman Music Program which brings 12- to 18-year-old exceptionally talented young string instrumentalists from around the world to Israel to participate in a little over two weeks of master classes given by world renowned violinist Itzhak Perlman and some carefully hand-picked colleagues.
The concept for training the world’s future leaders of classical music was that of Perlman’s wife, Toby. The program is conducted in Tel Aviv, where Perlman was born, and is recognized as one of the best intensive training programs that any young musician can receive.
The program culminated this year with a gala performance in Dimona to a fullhouse attendance. Young Dimona musicians were so entranced by the musical abilities of members of their peer generation that Dimona Mayor Benny Biton pledged that any Dimona youngster who wants to study classical music on a string instrument and doesn’t have the funds to pay for tuition will be granted a scholarship. The PMP performance was enlivened by the participation of the famed singers from Dimona’s Black Hebrews community.
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