80 years after her temple 'burned and closed,' Holocaust survivor celebrates bat mitzvah
Eighty years after the Holocaust fractured her family, Jacqueline Goldman celebrated a milestone moment in her life as a Jewish woman.
Surrounded by family, friends and fellow congregants, the 95-year-old great-grandmother celebrated her bat mitzvah May 27 at Palm Beach Synagogue.
Flanked by her two sons, Philip and Michael, Goldman spoke before the congregation as she completed the long-delayed coming-of-age ritual for Jewish girls.
War, motherhood and Goldman's philanthropic work postponed the event for decades.
"This was so meaningful to me," said Goldman, a Palm Beach resident who was born and raised in France. "I'm almost 96. When I was 13, my temple was burned and closed. People were deported to the death camps. There was no way I could have a bat mitzvah. It was postponed."
"After the war, when Israel was born, I was busy being involved with this fledgling little country. Then I had children and I was working. All of a sudden, I find myself an old woman, very old. I see what I have missed, all these parts of my life. I am very touched and very moved by the fact that I could become a bat mitzvah girl."
If not for a kindhearted nun, Goldman might not have had that opportunity.
When she was 13 years old, Goldman watched as her father, Daniel Okrent, was deported to the Auschwitz concentration camp in German-occupied Poland. Goldman, her mom, Odette, and younger sister, Micheline, went into hiding after he was taken away, with the sisters later escaping to a convent in southern France.
The mother superior of the convent helped shield Goldman and her sister from German soldiers, repeatedly lying to them about who the girls were.
"She lied to the Gestapo and the Germans to save our lives," Goldman said. "They came looking for us in the convent. They wanted to speak to us, and she rushed us to the chapel. She told us to pray and not talk to anybody. But the Germans insisted. They wanted to speak to us, because it would show that we were Jewish children in hiding.
"But Mother Superior said no. She said they couldn't talk to her children, because she didn't have any Jewish children. They just left. She perjured herself to save a little Jewish girl."
Goldman and her sister spent two years in hiding before the war ended and they were reunited with their family. Goldman's father survived his experience at Auschwitz, but his daughter said he came back a changed man.
"He was 6 foot and about 200 pounds before," she said. "He came back, and he was 78 pounds. He was mentally hurt. He was suffering so much physically, but more for what he had seen and witnessed. It was very difficult to bring him back. We never thought we could. He would wake up at night sobbing. He couldn't adjust from what he suffered to freedom again."
Goldman's experiences before and after the Holocaust spurred her to support organizations that assisted Israel, its people and Jewish institutions worldwide.
She and her late husband, Nathan, who married in France following World War II and then emigrated to the United States, helped build the gateway to the Kotel ha-Ma'aravi (Western Wall) in Jerusalem.
They also supported organizations such as Israel Bonds, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, United Jewish Appeal, Magen David Adom — Israel's national emergency medical service — and the Simon Wiesenthal Center.
"She sees Israel as a glorious hymn of survival for the Jewish people," Rabbi Moshe Scheiner of Palm Beach Synagogue told the Daily News. "Through the past 60-plus years, she has been instrumental in supporting many causes to ensure Israel's survival, through fundraising, chairing numerous galas and serving on national and international boards."
Goldman, who has an honorary doctorate from Bar Ilan University in Ramat Gan, Israel, moved to Palm Beach from New York in 1963.
From her home on the island, she continued her work with charitable organizations.
In 2018, she was awarded the American Friends of Magen David Adom Lifetime Achievement Award.
"No work is too big," Goldman said. "No matter how big the challenge is, if you really want to accomplish something, believe me, you can. You are stronger than you know, you have more power than you know, and your will will take you there, if you want it."
Goldman's survival during the Holocaust and her bat mitzvah celebration eight decades later represents the indomitable and eternal spirit of the Jewish people, Scheiner said.
"Jacqueline's bat mitzvah is an inspiration to us all, Jew and non-Jew alike," he said. "No one can ever take away from you who you are, your faith, your love, your identity and your heritage."
Goldman is sharing her Holocaust experiences and those of her father through an exhibit the temple has created.
She has donated items such as the concentration camp uniform jacket her father wore, his tefillin (black leather boxes containing Hebrew parchment scrolls), prayer books, and Goldman's yellow Star of David that she was made to wear by German authorities.
The exhibit not only shares her father's story, but it also serves as a memorial to the six million Jews who perished in the Holocaust, Goldman said.
"We always say, do not forget," Goldman said. "We don't forget. I want to make sure the world doesn't forget."
Jodie Wagner is a journalist at the Palm Beach Daily News, part of the USA TODAY Florida Network. You can reach her at jwagner@pbdailynews.com. Help support our journalism. Subscribe today.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: 95-year-old Holocaust survivor in Florida finally gets her bat mitzvah
