French Swimmer’s Hebrew Tattoo Commemorates Auschwitz Survivor Grandpa
Fabien Gilot at the FINA World Championships in 2013. Image by Courtesy Clive Rose (Getty Images)
The Olympic swimmer who scored a silver medal in Rio this week always has the grandfather who survived Auschwitz in his thoughts — and on his arm.
Fabien Gilot, the French swimmer who is part of the the men’s swimming team that won second place in the 4×100 freestyle relay race on Monday, has an inner arm tattoo commemorating a grandfather who has spent time in Auschwitz, reported an article in The Jewish Chronicle.
The words, which spell “Ani Klum Biladeihem” in Hebrew, translate into “I am nothing without them” and commemorate his grandfather Max Goldschmidt, a Jewish man who made it through Auschwitz and the Holocaust in the 1940s and passed away in 2012. According to French media, Gilot admired his grandfather his whole life.
“[Goldschmidt] was born in Berlin and moved to France after the war, in Fabien’s eyes he was a hero,” said his father Michel Gilot to French media in 2012, after his son’s team brought home the gold medal at the London Olympic Games. “He admired him and was very attached to him.”
A native of Damien in the north of France, 32-year-old Gilot has been part of the French Olympic swimming team since Athens 2004.
Contact Veronika Bondarenko at [email protected] or on Twitter, @veronikabond.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a Passover gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Dive In
-
Fast Forward In the ashes of the governor’s mansion, clues to a mystery about Josh Shapiro’s Passover Seder
-
Fast Forward Itamar Ben-Gvir is coming to America, with stops at Yale and in New York City already set
-
Fast Forward Texas Jews split as lawmakers sign off on $1B private school voucher program
-
Fast Forward Shapiro recites Priestly Blessing given to him by fire chaplain after Passover arson
Most Popular
- 1
News Student protesters being deported are not ‘martyrs and heroes,’ says former antisemitism envoy
- 2
Opinion My Jewish moms group ousted me because I work for J Street. Is this what communal life has come to?
- 3
News Who is Alan Garber, the Jewish Harvard president who stood up to Trump over antisemitism?
- 4
Fast Forward Suspected arsonist intended to beat Gov. Josh Shapiro with a sledgehammer, investigators say
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward In the ashes of the governor’s mansion, clues to a mystery about Josh Shapiro’s Passover Seder
-
Fast Forward Itamar Ben-Gvir is coming to America, with stops at Yale and in New York City already set
-
Fast Forward Texas Jews split as lawmakers sign off on $1B private school voucher program
-
Books What is ‘Zionism without Zion?’ New history asks, but can’t answer
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.