eSefarad Noticias del Mundo Sefaradi
For a research aimed at eventually publishing a monograph about rav Francès z»l, I, his great-grandson, call upon everybody who has any information, document or souvenir about him to contact me.
Rav Eliahou Francès z»l, who was born in Thessaloniki on January 10, 1879, served as private secretary of two of the local Chief Rabbis in the ’20, rav Benzion Meir Hai Uziel z»l and rav Haim Rafael Habib z»l, and then relocated in 1928 to Amsterdam, to serve as Av Beit Din of the Portuguese Synagogue and the Sefardic Community.
He was a candidate in the late ’30 for the tenure of Tel-Aviv-Jaffa Sefardic Chief Rabbi and traveled to Eretz Israel around that time to visit his father, Ha’ham Shalem Rav Moshe David Francès zal, who immigrated there in 1927.
During his years in Amsterdam, he came quite frequently to Brussels, to visit his son, daughter-in-law and two grandchildren, and prayed at the little Sefardic synagogue on rue Joseph Dupont (next to the main synagogue in the Belgian capital).
He was arrested in Amsterdam by the Germans in October 1942, with his wife Diamante, née Tazartès and their son Daniel, and they all were murdered in Auschwitz-Monowitz upon their arrival there.
Research has been going on for months by now, and has produced first encouraging results, but every document, every source and even every clue that any reader of «eSefarad» might be able to contribute would be a precious contribution to our endeavor.
May I congratulate Mrs. and Mr. Benveniste for their tremendous work in producing this bulletin, and thank them sincerely for having accepted my request to publish this «call for information».
Shalom to all,
Yehoshua Amishav, Rishon LeZion, Israel
