Gad Beck, Gay Holocaust Survivor, Dies
Gad Beck, the last known gay Jewish survivor of the Holocaust, died in Berlin.
Beck, 88, who was a resistance fighter during World War II for Chug Chaluzi, an underground Zionist resistance youth group, died on June 24, just six days before his 89th birthday. Chug Chaluzi played a major role in saving German Jews and homosexuals during the war.
After he was betrayed by a Gestapo spy, Beck was taken to a German concentration camp in the waning days of the war. He was freed when the Allies liberated Europe.
Beck moved to Israel in the 1950s but returned to Germany in 1979. Following his return, he was appointed director of the Jewish Adult Education Center by the first post-Holocaust head of Berlin’s Jewish community.
He was the son of a Jewish father and a mother who converted to Judaism.
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news. All donations are still being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000 until April 24.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
