She saved 25 Jews in Hungary; now she wants peace.
Matthew Kalman, Chronicle Foreign Service
SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
Wednesday, July 19, 2006
Page A – 10
Photo by David Blumenfeld, special to the Chronicle
Nahariya, Israel — Orna Shorani took it in stride when a Hezbollah rocket scored a direct hit on her house in this northern Israeli town.
The 76-year-old got her first taste of war as a teenager in Hungary, when she helped her family save 25 Jews from the Nazis. For that, Israel named her a “Righteous Among the Nations” for her bravery.
Shorani was fast asleep in bed at 7 a.m. Thursday when a Katyusha rocket fired by Hezbollah from Lebanon hit her house. It crashed through the roof of her grandson’s apartment upstairs and sent her bedroom door flying across the room to hit her on the head.
She refused to go to the hospital and, after she and her daughter stayed one night in nearby Acre, she was back at home while workers patched up the damage. All the windows in the front of her house were shattered and the doors were blown off their hinges. Houses and cars in the street outside had broken windows and were pockmarked with thousands of holes caused by shrapnel.
On Tuesday afternoon, contractors worked on the top floor of Shorani’s house, repairing the gaping hole in the roof and the damage to the floors below.
“There was a huge boom, and I got a crack on the head,” said Shorani, who sees and hears with difficulty and walks slowly with the aid of a cane. “My grandson came running down to see I was OK, but I told him to go away and let me go back to sleep.”
“I’m still shaking, and my head is still throbbing,” she said.
Nahariya, a few miles from the Lebanese border, has been the target of daily attacks by Hezbollah in the past few days. On Tuesday, two hours after she spoke to The Chronicle, the town was hit again, and one resident was killed as he ran for an underground shelter.
Half the town’s residents have left for safer areas out of range of the rockets, but Shorani said she was staying put.
“I’m not going to leave, even though I hear the boom of the rockets all night. Like they say, there’s no place like home,” she said.
“I’ve been through a lot. I lived through the Second World War in Hungary and all of Israel’s wars. I think I’ll survive this one, too.”
During World War II, the Germans who occupied Hungary established a labor camp next to her family’s home. With her mother and sisters, she helped 25 Jews escape from the camp, hid them from the Nazis and smuggled them to safety. One of the escapees, Ladislav Shorani, jumped over the fence into her garden, kissed her and declared: “You will be my wife!”
“He went off to fight with the Russian army,” Shorani said. “Three years later, he came back and married me. After the war, we moved to Israel.”
Now a widow, Shorani lives surrounded by her family. Her grandson has the apartment upstairs, her daughter is in the house next door and her son lives in a house built behind her own.
Shorani had a simple explanation for what she did back then: “God said, ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ We couldn’t stand by and let the Nazis kill these innocent Jews.”
And despite her experiences with war in her adopted home, she says she still believes the same. She said she did not agree with the fighting and loss of life swirling around her home.
“We are doing things wrong, and they are doing things wrong,” she said. “We need peace in all the world. Every person, wherever they live, is entitled to live in peace and good health. This is what I wish for our side, for the other side, and for all the countries of this region.”
BOSTON GLOBE
Amid barrage, a Holocaust heroine shakes off fear
By Matthew Kalman, Globe Correspondent | July 19, 2006
NAHARIYA, Israel — Orna Shorani, 76, was named a “Righteous Among the Nations” for her bravery in rescuing Jews from the Nazi Holocaust. This week her character was on display once again when she brushed off a direct hit by a Hezbollah rocket on her house in this town in northern Israel.
Orna was fast asleep last Thursday morning when a Katyusha rocket fired by militants from Lebanon struck her home, crashing through the roof of her grandson’s apartment upstairs and sending her bedroom door flying across the room, where it hit her on the head.
But she refused to go to the hospital, and yesterday she was back at home while workers patched up the damage. All the windows in the front of her house were smashed, the doors were blown off their hinges, and the roof had a gaping hole.
“There was a huge boom, and I got a crack on the head,” said Orna, who sees and hears with difficulty and walks with a cane.
“My grandson came running down to see I was OK, but I told him to go away and let me go back to sleep,” she said.
Orna lives in Nahariya, a few miles from the border with Lebanon, and the target of attacks by Hezbollah in the past few days. Half the town’s residents have left, but Orna said she had no intention of leaving.
“I lived through the Second World War and all of Israel’s wars,” she said. “I think I’ll survive this one, too.”
Orna did more than survive World War II. With her mother and sisters, she hid 25 Jews from a Nazi labor camp next to their home in Hungary and smuggled them to safety. One of them, Ladislav Shorani, jumped over the fence into her garden, kissed her, and declared:
“You will be my wife!”
“He went off to fight with the Russian Army,” Orna recalled. “Three years later, he came back and married me. After the war, we moved to Israel.”
Orna had a simple explanation for why she saved Jews from the Nazis back then.
“God said `Thou shalt not kill.’ We couldn’t stand by and let the Nazis kill these innocent Jews,” she said.
And, said Orna, she still believes the same today.
“We need peace in all the world,” she said. “Every person, wherever they live, is entitled to live in peace and good health. This is what I wish for our side, for the other side, and for all the countries of this region.”
© Copyright 2006 Globe Newspaper Company.
