Now living in Israel, Bodner, 73, was four-and-a-half when he was left for dead at Auschwitz in the final days of World War II. At the time, his name was Elias Gottesman. His tattoo number was A-7733. He and his twin brother, Jeno Gottesman – affectionately known as Jolli – had been the subjects of experiments by the camp’s Angel of Death, Josef Mengele, before they became separated.

Just days before the liberation of Auschwitz, Bodner came across a man who was looking for his family and asked him if he would be his father. After getting Bodner to safety outside the camp, the man adopted him and later took him to live in Israel.

But what happened to Jeno, whose tattoo number was A-7734, remains a mystery to this day.

Bodner’s adoptive father searched tirelessly for Jeno until his death around 40 years ago. His adoptive mother took the mantle briefly, but with no real evidence Jeno had survived Auschwitz, the search stalled.

According to Israeli genealogist Ayana KimRon, Bodner, who enlisted her to help him revitalise the search, struggled with the trauma associated with the memory of his brother and had given up hope of seeing him alive. He didn’t even know his own real name, let alone that of his brother’s.

“He was at the point where he ­didn’t believe anymore that anyone from his family had survived,” KimRon told The AJN.

“He felt it was just him, the last ­survivor of his own family. He doesn’t remember his brother, he doesn’t remember anything really, just a few snapshots he’s carried with him his whole life.”

But then came a breakthrough that would change everything. KimRon uncovered evidence Jeno had survived Auschwitz.

After tracking down Bodner’s biological family, KimRon discovered that the twins’ mother had returned to her home town of Stroino, a Ukrainian village – then in Hungary – where she was murdered in 1946. Prior to this, however, she had received information that one of her sons had survived.

But the information couldn’t have been referring to Bodner. In 1945, the Nazis began marching prisoners from camps in Poland to camps inside Germany. The sick, incapacitated and children – Bodner among them – were left to die in the camps. During this brief period, Bodner’s adoptive father had helped him escape. It was just days before the liberation of Auschwitz, meaning there would have been no official record of his survival. Therefore, the surviving twin the mother learnt of had to be Jeno.

According to records, Jeno was last seen by Allied doctors and passed as healthy after liberation, but there the trail ends.

Now Bodner and KimRon are using the information they have gathered – the name Jeno “Jolli” Gottesman and the tattoo number

A-7734 – to track him down via a Facebook page, which has garnered more than 37,000 “likes” and has been viewed around a million times.

“We launched the Facebook site because if Jolli is alive, he must have family, or neighbours, or friends, and so the Facebook page was established to look for them. Check your neighbour, check homes for the elderly, whatever. Just look around and don’t be afraid to look at the [tattooed] numbers on the arm. This is the problem we have, not wanting to look at the tattoos. Do it, it’s important,” said KimRon.

For more information, visit the Facebook page: A 7734

ADAM KAMIEN

Menachem Bodner today.

The poll, posted last Thursday – but which has since been taken down – asked users if they “believe that Israel has a right to exist”, to which they could select either “No, I believe in the rights and sovereignty of Palestine” or “Yes, I support the creation and continuance of the state of Israel”.

Asked for comment, Senator Milne told The AJN that the Australian Greens resolution on Israel-Palestine contained the clause, “[The Australian Greens] support the legitimate rights and aspirations of the Israeli people to live in peace and security in their own independent, sovereign state.”

However, a posting by the page admin in the comments stream under the poll stated that “the Greens is also not an authoritarian party. We are free to disagree with our party leader because it fosters debate. Leaders aren’t always right”.

NSW Upper House Greens MP David Shoebridge, an outspoken critic of Israel, said he was “very pleased” to see that the question, which “raised a false dichotomy” between the rights of Israelis and Palestinians, had been removed.

“Greens policy is very clear that Israel has the right to exist, alongside Palestine, in safe and secure UN mandated borders,” he said.

But Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) executive director Peter Wertheim said although Greens policy accepts Israel’s right to exist, “they continue to be embarrassed by extremists in their own ranks, including some of their MPs, who are fixated on singling out Israel, among all the nations of the world, as a target of hatred and demonisation”.

“Regardless of their personal views, their activities and rhetoric have time and again been magnets for gross expressions of anti-Semitism, both online and in public forums,” he said. “The Greens as a party have a choice to make … They can speak and act as a party with mainstream voter appeal, or they can pander to the radical fringe of politics. With a federal election fast approaching, they can no longer do both.”

An admin comment on the Facebook page attempted to justify the poll: “The main purpose of facebook questions is to illicite (sic) reponses (sic), debate and hopefully growth towards different viewpoints. The question is loaded, we acknowledge that but let me reiterate once again. this isn’t about jewish (sic) people. it’s about Israel.”

NSW Young Greens convenor Evan Gray told The AJN: “We posted a poll not to advocate policy but to encourage discussion – unfortunately the discussion we expected did not occur and so we removed the poll.”

GARETH NARUNSKY

A screenshot of the poll, which was removed.

The ad, which slams new state government industrial relations legislation, features a large photo of Adolf Hitler with a quote from the Nazi dictator: “We must close union offices, confiscate their money and put their leaders in prison.”

ETU state secretary Peter Simpson said he understood the ad could be upsetting to Holocaust survivors, but denied it conflated Queensland Premier Campbell Newman with Hitler.

“If that’s how people took it, if that was the inference, then of course I apologise,” Simpson told The AJN.

“I visited the Holocaust centre and left in tears, so I know better than most what the bastard [Hitler] did … we never intended to cause offence.” Simpson said that while the ETU will continue its campaign, the organisation would not run the ad again.

B’nai B’rith Anti-Defamation Commission chairman Dvir Abramovich described the ad as “inappropriate, absurd and deeply offensive”.

“While I am aware that Holocaust analogies get the headlines and generate media attention, they do little in the service of truth, history or memory,” Abramovich said in a statement. “No matter how committed an organisation is to its members and to its mission, invoking the Holocaust and Hitler to make a political point … has no place in civil discourse,” he added.

Simpson said he had been in contact with Jason Steinberg of the Queensland Jewish Board of Deputies (QJBD) in the wake of the controversy and that the pair plans to meet to discuss the matter.

In a statement posted on the QJBD Facebook page, Steinberg condemned the ad, calling it “totally inappropriate and deplorable”.

“The ETU advertisement … tends to diminish the true horror of the Nazi regime and the Holocaust,” Steinberg wrote.

“We hope that every Queenslander will see that analogies between Australian politics and Nazism … have no place in a mainstream newspaper.”

ADAM KAMIEN

B’nai B’rith Anti-Defamation Commission chairman Dvir Abramovich.

Under the current government, the community has received several rounds of funding under the Secure Schools Program to beef up security at Jewish day schools. The Coalition plan will allow security upgrades to be extended to other facilities, including community centres and synagogues.

In a letter to the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) received at the end of May, Abbott said the Liberal and National parties “are acutely aware of the particular risks of violence and other criminal acts faced by your community”.

“The Coalition is sympathetic to your request for further assistance to enhance security at Jewish community schools, synagogues and other facilities. Last year, I announced a ‘Safer Streets, Safer Suburbs’ plan that could be used to assist the Jewish community in this regard,” he said.

“If elected to government, the Coalition would seek advice from relevant government agencies on the appropriate level of assistance we could offer to the Jewish community from this program. I would expect the allocation to assist the Jewish community with security would be significant.”

ECAJ executive director Peter Wertheim welcomed Abbott’s letter.

“We are very appreciative of what government has already done to help us to meet the security costs for Jewish communal buildings and facilities and communal security in general, through the Secure Schools funding program and tax deductibility for donations for communal security,” he said.

“But even with the benefit of that assistance, we are unable to bear the burden of securing our communal institutions on our own. The prospect of further government funding assistance for this vital work is therefore very necessary and most welcome.”

The ECAJ wrote to Abbott in April outlining the security challenges faced by the community, the government’s contribution so far, and what was needed going forward to fund capital and ongoing operational costs Australia-wide.

GARETH NARUNSKY

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott.

A YouTube video shot on June 1 and uploaded by Justice for Palestine Brisbane shows  Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) activists pulling Eskal pickled cucumbers off the shelves as one protester comments: “I have all their apartheid biscuits as well.”

The clip then cuts to a scene at the front of the store where another protester states: “This economy prioritises pickles above human lives”, and calls on the supermarket chain to “remove all Eskal products from its shelves”. An employee is seen asking the protesters to leave the store before police move in.

The group also protested outside the Myer centre, which houses a Seacret cosmetics store, and outside David Jones, which stocks the product Soda Stream – the maker of which is headquartered in Israel.

Queensland Jewish Board of Deputies president Jason Steinberg said while everyone was entitled to express their views, “going into a business and trying to prevent them from selling their goods which they have a right to do, that’s crossing the line”.

“There were some very obviously vehement messages against Israel which are totally unfounded and not showing both sides of the story,” he said. He added that the average Queenslander wasn’t interested in the BDS message and just wanted to go about their shopping.

A spokesperson for Queensland Police said there was no official record of the incident from either the duty supervisor or the Major Events Planning Unit.

The AJN understands the police moved on without any further incident.

Woolworths spokesperson Benedict Brook said: “We are aware of an incident in Woolworths Macarthur Chambers on June 1. Local police were in the store at the time and the protesters moved on relatively quickly. Our priority is always the safety of our customers and we ensured this was the case at the time.”

GARETH NARUNSKY

A YouTube screen grab of the protestors.

NSW Police say they are closing in on three suspects, and are hopeful new information will lead to an arrest.

Detective Chief Superintendent Wayne Gordon said now is the time to come forward with ­information.

“We are very confident that people within the community know the identities of people involved or connected to these bombing incidents in 1982,” Gordon said.

“We have applied new technologies to forensic evidence from the original investigation and those examinations are continuing.”

At 2pm on December 23 in 1982, two people were injured when a bomb exploded in the stairwell of the Israeli Consulate in Sydney.

Four hours later a second bomb was found in the car park of the Hakoah Club in Bondi that had failed to properly detonate.

The investigation into the bombings was reopened by NSW Police, the Australian Federal Police, the NSW Crime Commission and the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) in August last year.

NSW Police Minister Michael Gallacher announced on Thursday that the NSW government is offering $100,000 to anyone who has information that leads to an arrest and conviction of people involved.

“The police have never lost sight of that fact that this was an act of terror,” Gallacher said.

“This type of crime threatens our way of life and is simply not tolerated in society.

“This happened many years ago, but it is an event that sticks in the minds of many; it is time now that we find out exactly who was behind it and why.”

Hakoah Club president Phil Filler and NSW Jewish Board of Deputies president Yair Miller welcomed the development.

“While we have no more information than what is in the media, we appreciate the ongoing efforts of the NSW police force and other authorities to bring the perpetrators to justice,” Miller said.

Police have asked anyone with information to contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or use the Crime Stoppers online reporting page: https://www1.police.nsw.gov.au/.

JOSHUA LEVI

The former Hakoah Club site.

The festival of learning, which was organised by the Shalom Institute and held at the University of NSW (UNSW), came under fire in recent weeks for agreeing to host vehement Israel critic Peter Slezak.

The academic, who co-founded Independent Australian Jewish Voices, had been banned from speaking at the event in the past.

But despite talk of people boycotting the festival and fears that Slezak would renege on an agreement not to discuss Israel, his session, “The Wicked Son – Confessions of a Self-Hating Jew”, avoided controversy

The UNSW academic only referred to the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel in passing, when he jokingly said that he probably wasn’t allowed to murmur the initials of Jewish Dutch philosopher Baruch (de) Spinoza.

When questions were opened up to the audience, it was the chief ­executive of the Shalom Institute, Hilton Immerman, who broached the topic of BDS when he asked Slezak if he supported the boycotting of ­universities.

Slezak told the audience he is ambivalent towards the BDS campaign against Israel. However, as recently as January this year, he signed a statement supporting Jake Lynch’s campaign against Israel, which called for the University of Sydney to cut all ties with the Technion in Haifa.

The organisers of Limmud-Oz said Slezak’s presentation turned out to be a “storm in a teacup”.

“As a board, we have not bowed to that pressure [to remove people from the program],” the board said in a statement to The AJN.

“We will continue to be guided by the Limmud principles, and we will continue to make the case that Limmud is needed in this community as an open and safe and inclusive place for the entire Jewish community that allows everyone to take one further step on their Jewish journey.”

The board also disputed a claim made by JCA president Peter Philippsohn last week that Slezak would not appear at Limmud-Oz events in future.

The board said that it would continue to participate in an ongoing and open dialogue with the community, but stressed “it has not made any decisions regarding future Limmud events or any commitments to anyone regarding future Limmud events”.

Highlighting the success of the event, organiser Michael Misrachi said, “The feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. The extraordinary thing about Limmud-Oz is the way it brings together people from across the community – left and right, religious and secular, young and old – to engage in and talk about ideas and issues facing the Jewish community and world in a meaningful way.”

For full Limmud coverage, see this week’s AJN.

JOSHUA LEVI

Dr Peter Slezak.

Victoria and Sydney were the only two states represented, with nine awardees from the former and four from the latter. Of the 13 Jewish honourees, three were made Members of the Order Australia (AM), while a further 10 received the Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM).

Melbourne councillor Rosalind Blades received an AM for a glittering career in local government and services to the community, while Sydney-based Professor Ralph Tobias was recognised for his work in promoting entrepreneurial innovation. Melbourne’s Dr John Graham Rogers was the third recipient of the prestigious award for services to medicine, in particular clinical genetics and paediatrics.

Blades said her award was the culmination of years spent trying to “give back”, while Tobias spoke of a life “trying to develop Australian industries and technologies”.

Rogers said his involvement with children was among the most rewarding of his career.

“I’ve always enjoyed my interactions with children. Children bounce back from illness in a way that adults don’t,” he enthused.

Jewish medal recipients include Maccabi mainstay Harry Procel, health advocate Rimma Sverdlin, former Woollahra mayor Isabelle Shapiro, Jewish Holocaust Centre guide Kitia (Henrietta) Altman, former social worker Miriam Suss, patron of the arts Marie-Claire Szekely, co-founder of Melbourne’s Jewish Holocaust Museum and Research Centre Abram Goldberg, volunteer Dalia Ayalon Sinclair and refugee advocate Phillip Shulman.

Altman said she felt “mandated” to educate people about the horrors of the Holocaust.

“The Holocaust revealed the capacity of ordinary people to do evil to others,” she said.

“But people always have choices.”

A former executive director of the Jewish Community Council of Victoria and UIA, among many other communal roles, Suss said her work with the Jewish community’s most disadvantaged was a career highlight.

“It was challenging; there were many hard times. We worked with the most disadvantaged in the Jewish community. But in terms of personal rewards, that can’t be bettered.”

For full coverage, see this week’s AJN.

ADAM KAMIEN

Co-founder of Melbourne’s Jewish Holocaust Museum and Research Centre Abram Goldberg received a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM).

In a video produced by Melbourne’s Jewish Care that yielded 6500 views within two days, residents of Gary Smorgon House are asked to watch the music video for hit Gangnam Style, and to voice their views.

“It’s awful,” one resident utters.

“I don’t like it … don’t put it in front of children,” he says, before adding: “If you are dancing, then have a lady in your hand and dance together.”

Another resident takes a philosophical standpoint: “Listen, let them dance, let them sing, but don’t make wars. That’s the problem.”

Amid all the thrusting and strutting, some residents felt nostalgic for their youth.

One says: “I wish I was young again”, with another echoing: “I wish I could move like that.”

One resident remained silent throughout the film, only ­occasionally sipping on his tea, looking both satisfied and intrigued by the display.

The film’s producer, 25-year-old Jeremy Blode, said the clip’s popularity was unsurprising.

“It’s universally funny, everyone knows the song,” the freelance photographer, who made the clip for Jewish Care’s 2013 Annual Appeal, told The AJN. “I showed this clip to my different family members, from age 13 upwards, and everyone found it funny, so I had a feeling that people would like it.”

Marketing and communications manager of Jewish Care Ayal Tusia denied viewers had reason to find the clip offensive.

“It’s a nice, light-hearted video to show the humour of our residents. It was not made with any ill intention; it’s just bit of fun and I think people have warmed to it.”

TIMNA JACKS

Above: A still from the clip. View the clip below.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NaQsGlhf2hs

Craig Rosen was discovered to be a perfect tissue match for a critically ill patient overseas after an international search, and donated his stem cells late last month after a long series of procedures and tests.

He was discovered to be a match by the Australian Bone Marrow Donor Registry (ABMDR), which he has been registered with since 2007 after seeing a promotion for Gift of Life Australia (GOLA).

“When you register with GOLA, they do a tissue type test and put all that information on their database,” he told The AJN. “If someone needs a bone marrow or stem cell transplant, the chance of them finding a match in a sibling is about 25-30 per cent. Outside their family, the best chance of finding a match is within their ethnic gene pool.”

Rosen received the call from ABMDR three months ago and required extensive medical testing before the procedure went ahead, including a full physical exam and blood work.

While the recipient was prepped with chemotherapy to kill their white blood cells ahead of the transplant, Rosen was put on a course of hormone injections to stimulate his own stem cell production.

“The hormones created new stem cells which spill over into my blood stream.

“These stem cells create new white blood cells for the recipient,” Rosen explained.

The doctors hooked Rosen up to a plasmapheresis machine, which separates stem cells from the rest of the blood.

The patient’s identity, gender, age and location are unknown, but Rosen was told the transplant was a success.

“Craig is a remarkable person and I’m in awe of him,” GOLA Victorian coordinator Yehuda Kaplan said. “Here is someone willing to undergo what he went through for someone he doesn’t even know.”

Rosen said it was a privilege to help. “I was really humbled for the opportunity to help someone this way.

“The hormone injections were an uncomfortable few days but I was being called upon to help save the life of someone who is desperately ill.

“I would do it all again tomorrow.”

For more information, visit http://www.giftoflifeaustralia.org.au.

ALEXANDRA ROACH

Lianne and Craig Rosen during Craig’s stem cell donation procedure.