The Romanian Jewish Community

         I am Gabriela Crisan nee Hassan. I was born on September 13, 1922, in Bucharest.

         In September 1940 the numerus nulus was decreed for Jews in higher education. In the spring of 1941 I found out that the Jewish Community had set up a special school where Jewish students could continue their studies. I attended their courses until 1944.

         The students who were taking those classes were directly affected by the anti-Semitic events occurring under Antonescu’s regime. They organized groups that were trying to oppose by any means the segregationist measures taken by the administration. I joined one of these groups, which was composed of students in electrical engineering. Our mission was to fight Antonescu’s regime the best way we could.

         At the beginning of 1944, there was a ‘fall’, as we called it back then. This means that some of our colleagues had been exposed by the Government agents. There was a wave of arrests. Step by step, as they were unveiling the hierarchy of the groups, the investigators got to me. Their lead was my fellow-student, Dan Lazarovici, whom they seized on February 6, 1944. The terrible tortures that he was inflicted by the secret police during the interrogation made him confess, after a 3-day ordeal, that I was a member of the underground student organization too.

         As a result of Dan Lazarovici’s confession, 12-15 agents showed up at my place on the night of February 9/10, 1944. They blocked all exits, broke the door down, came in and began a search, without stating what they were looking for. In order to gain easier access, they had brought Dan Lazarovici along; he was in a pitiful state. They were brutally going through my books, looking for compromising materials, but didn’t find any.

         They arrested my sister and me and took us to one of their headquarters, on Armoniei St. When we got there, the so-called interrogation began. ‘Did you produce materials against the regime? What activities have you performed against the regime?’ They were referring to the things about which Dan Lazarovici had been forced to give a written statement. At first, they kept him in the room to confront me; at some point, they took him out.

         As I denied all his statements, they began to hit me: first my palms, then my soles, then my buttocks. They were using a piece of rubber that had been cut off from a truck’s tire; it was about 10 inches wide. At first, I felt a bit of a smart, but I clenched my teeth and didn’t scream at all. Nevertheless, at some point, I passed out; I was lying on the floor and I became unconscious. I don’t know what else happened. When I came around, they were carrying me outside. Like I said, it was the month of February.

         When they arrested me, there was no snow or rain. But when they carried me out of their headquarters on a stretcher, it was snowing, and the scattered flakes that touched my face caused me to regain consciousness. I found myself at the Army Hospital. They took Dan Lazarovici there too, but he was on a different floor. He had actually died on the way. They put me in a cell; they wanted to make sure that, in case I didn’t die, I wouldn’t be able to get away. I learnt the things I’m telling you now from one of the nuns who served as nurses in the hospital. They were kind-hearted and merciful and they immediately came to look after me; thanks to their compresses and their hypodermics, I came back to my senses in the morning. They stayed by my side for three nights in a row. There were three of them. One of them, Magdalena Matei, remained my friend until the end of her life, which occurred about 5 years ago; she was the friend of our family. What can I say? She wasn’t Jewish, but she was a human being – that’s what she was. As soon as I was able to speak, her first concern was to find out who my parents were; she asked me to give her something that my parents would recognize so that she could go to them and let them know about me. To be honest, I hesitated at first. I feared the secret police might have instructed her to find out the things that I hadn’t disclosed during the interrogation. So I refrained from telling her anything, making up all sorts of excuses. However, seeing her so earnest and devoted made me change my mind. I realized she wasn’t feigning it; she really was a good-hearted woman and her vocation was to help those in need. So I wrote a note to my father and sent her to his store. In his turn, my poor father suspected that was an attempt of the secret police to spy on my.

         On April 12 they released me. I was placed under house arrest and had to report to the police every week.

         (Edited text)