Permanent tributes unveiled at the National Library of Israel
A dedication was also held at the library for the Robert and Ruth Magid Hall in honour of Dr Herbert V Evatt.
The Hugo and Ilona Lowy Main Reading Halls and Special Collections Reading Room at the National Library of Israel were officially dedicated last week, with Sir Frank Lowy, members of the Lowy family, and Israeli President Issac Herzog and first lady Michal Herzog in attendance.
A dedication of sorts was also held at the library for the Robert and Ruth Magid Hall in honour of Dr Herbert V Evatt.
The private ceremony in honour of Hugo and Ilona Lowy also included the unveiling of a new statue, Hugo, by artist Sigalit Landau. Frank Lowy commissioned the statue in memory of his father, who was clubbed to death on the Auschwitz concentration camp railway platform by an SS soldier for refusing to leave his tallit and tefillin behind.
Herzog gave a speech in which he spoke about the new library – an architecturally stunning structure in itself that also incorporates groundbreaking technology – as well as Lowy’s contribution and recognising Hugo and Ilona Lowy.
Lowy spoke movingly off the cuff with no notes – and entirely in Hebrew – about how his father had gone in March 1944 to buy train tickets to get his family out of Budapest and to a town where Ilona’s family was staying, but was taken by the Nazis to Auschwitz and not seen again. That has deeply impacted Lowy for his entire life.
The irony is that had the family, successfully made it to the town, all would have lost their lives when the Nazis slaughtered every Jew living there.
Lowy then told of how in 1994, his son Peter, attending a Pesach seder at a hotel in Palm Springs, California, randomly met an old Jewish man who had been at Auschwitz with Hugo that day and had witnessed him being beaten to death, finally giving the Lowy family closure on what had happened.
Photo: Yoni Kelberman
Also at the ceremony, cantor Shimon Farkas sang a famous old Hungarian song that was sung in the war.
The inauguration was meant to be held last October, but was delayed due to the Hamas atrocities of October 7 and the ongoing subsequent war in Gaza.
Similarly, Robert and Ruth Magid – publishers of The AJN – were to have seen the opening of the hall in Doc Evatt’s honour at the library last October. They have long advocated for recognition within Israel of the role Evatt, as Australia’s foreign minister at the time, played in its creation by facilitating the passing of UN Resolution 181, also known as “the Partition Plan”.
In remarks written for a ceremony last October that never happened, Ruth Magid told members of a UIA mission visiting Israel, “Doc Evatt lobbied for Israel’s membership in the face of a concerted campaign by powerful forces to prevent this outcome.
“When the General Assembly ratified the decision of the Security Council to admit Israel as a member state, Doc Evatt said, ‘Australia’s decision to fully recognise Israel was as inevitable as it was just.’”
She continued, “We could well ask why this non-Jewish Aussie from the rural town of Maitland, would be found on the world stage at this pivotal moment in history, playing a crucial role in the millennial dream of the Jewish people.
“The answer lies in Doc Evatt’s personal passion for justice, his deep concern for human rights, his belief in protecting and supporting small nations and minority peoples, his commitment to social justice and to achieving equitable treatment and opportunity through the Labor movement, often in the face of powerful opposition.”
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