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Authors: Lucette Lagnado
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drown his sorrows over the news of her birth.
CHAPTER 3
The Lost Uncle
I n the mid-1940s, Salomone was enlisted to make a reunion possible between the man whose name he shared and Zarifa. My uncle Salomon, the priest, who had left home as a teenager in 1914, was now pleading to be allowed to visit Malaka Nazli and be reunited with his mother.
My grandmother wasnât well; the news from Italy, the possibility that she had lost another daughter, was almost more than she could bear. Alone in her kitchen, Zarifa was inconsolable.
Could he see her one last time, her son, the apostate, asked?
Père Jean-Marie, as my uncle now called himself, was living in a Benedictine monastery in Jerusalem. He had been in the Holy City since coming to Palestine in 1925, and had enjoyed little contact with the family since leaving home as a teenager, abandoning Zarifa and his nine brothers and sisters to embrace a very different set of Brothers and Sisters.
He knew, of course, that he was considered a pariah. But he still felt that he would be granted a final audience with his mother, especiallyafter the family had reached out to him, seeking help tracking the whereabouts of Salomoneâs parents and sister. He had received a letter from his namesake asking if the Vatican could find out what became of them after they boarded the cattle train from Milan to Auschwitz. My father himself had urged that the lines of communication be reopened, believing that his brother could use his Vatican connections to solve the mystery. âIl faut faire des enquêtes,â my dad would say over and overâOne must make inquiries.
In the years since my uncle had left Cairo, a number of myths had proliferated around him and his career within the church. He was said to be high up in the Catholic hierarchy, a monsignor perhaps, even a cardinalâor on the road to becoming one. He was whispered to have close ties to the pope. There were even stories about his heroism during the war, rumors he had helped smuggle dozens of Jewish children who had fled Nazi-occupied Europe into Palestine.
The same family members who professed horror at my uncleâs embrace of Christianity were the ones who felt compelled to build up his accomplishments within the church, as if to say, If he had to be a priest, let him at least be a great priest.
In truth, Père Jean-Marieâs standing within the Catholic Church was vastly exaggerated. My uncle enjoyed a perfectly respectable career, but he was hardly an intimate of popes and cardinals. He was at most a competent, respected, andâexcept for his background as a devout Jewârather ordinary member of his Benedictine order.
But he had spent two years in Rome, so he certainly knew whom to ask about the fate of his own sister.
Was there any chance they had survived? Père Jean-Marie asked his friends and associates in Rome to trace the whereabouts of Bahia, his sister, her husband, Lelio, and their twenty-year-old daughter, Violetta.
The winter of 1945 was a season of wrenching questions and vague, desultory answers. Alas, the Vatican could only confirm what the Red Cross had already gleaned: that the family had been arrested and jailed, then placed on a transport to Auschwitz. After that, all traces of them had vanished. There were no records showing they had been exterminatedâand no signs indicating they had survived.
Salomone(standing, right) next to his sister, Violetta, and his parents, his two brothers in the foreground; Italian Riviera, 1937. Violetta, along with his mother and his father, perished at Auschwitz.
Perhaps that was the true horror: there could never be a resolution, a definitive word on their fate, never a death certificate or a burial site.
But Père Jean-Marie had done what he could. Would the family now honor his request?
My father refused to budge. He wouldnât allow the priest to step foot in Malaka Nazli.
In his mind, his older brother had brought nothing
CHAPTER 3
The Lost Uncle
I n the mid-1940s, Salomone was enlisted to make a reunion possible between the man whose name he shared and Zarifa. My uncle Salomon, the priest, who had left home as a teenager in 1914, was now pleading to be allowed to visit Malaka Nazli and be reunited with his mother.
My grandmother wasnât well; the news from Italy, the possibility that she had lost another daughter, was almost more than she could bear. Alone in her kitchen, Zarifa was inconsolable.
Could he see her one last time, her son, the apostate, asked?
Père Jean-Marie, as my uncle now called himself, was living in a Benedictine monastery in Jerusalem. He had been in the Holy City since coming to Palestine in 1925, and had enjoyed little contact with the family since leaving home as a teenager, abandoning Zarifa and his nine brothers and sisters to embrace a very different set of Brothers and Sisters.
He knew, of course, that he was considered a pariah. But he still felt that he would be granted a final audience with his mother, especiallyafter the family had reached out to him, seeking help tracking the whereabouts of Salomoneâs parents and sister. He had received a letter from his namesake asking if the Vatican could find out what became of them after they boarded the cattle train from Milan to Auschwitz. My father himself had urged that the lines of communication be reopened, believing that his brother could use his Vatican connections to solve the mystery. âIl faut faire des enquêtes,â my dad would say over and overâOne must make inquiries.
In the years since my uncle had left Cairo, a number of myths had proliferated around him and his career within the church. He was said to be high up in the Catholic hierarchy, a monsignor perhaps, even a cardinalâor on the road to becoming one. He was whispered to have close ties to the pope. There were even stories about his heroism during the war, rumors he had helped smuggle dozens of Jewish children who had fled Nazi-occupied Europe into Palestine.
The same family members who professed horror at my uncleâs embrace of Christianity were the ones who felt compelled to build up his accomplishments within the church, as if to say, If he had to be a priest, let him at least be a great priest.
In truth, Père Jean-Marieâs standing within the Catholic Church was vastly exaggerated. My uncle enjoyed a perfectly respectable career, but he was hardly an intimate of popes and cardinals. He was at most a competent, respected, andâexcept for his background as a devout Jewârather ordinary member of his Benedictine order.
But he had spent two years in Rome, so he certainly knew whom to ask about the fate of his own sister.
Was there any chance they had survived? Père Jean-Marie asked his friends and associates in Rome to trace the whereabouts of Bahia, his sister, her husband, Lelio, and their twenty-year-old daughter, Violetta.
The winter of 1945 was a season of wrenching questions and vague, desultory answers. Alas, the Vatican could only confirm what the Red Cross had already gleaned: that the family had been arrested and jailed, then placed on a transport to Auschwitz. After that, all traces of them had vanished. There were no records showing they had been exterminatedâand no signs indicating they had survived.
Salomone(standing, right) next to his sister, Violetta, and his parents, his two brothers in the foreground; Italian Riviera, 1937. Violetta, along with his mother and his father, perished at Auschwitz.
Perhaps that was the true horror: there could never be a resolution, a definitive word on their fate, never a death certificate or a burial site.
But Père Jean-Marie had done what he could. Would the family now honor his request?
My father refused to budge. He wouldnât allow the priest to step foot in Malaka Nazli.
In his mind, his older brother had brought nothing
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