Tag #139870 - Interview #88064 (Pavle Sosberger)

All the time we were in touch with our friends in Israel and visited them often. I and my wife were going to Israel every few years, depending on whether we were able to find accommodation and finances. In 1990 I was invited to museum Yad Vashem, where I received an award, the Golden Menorah for my work during the last couple of years. What I did was collecting the data about Jews from Vojvodina who got killed during the Holocaust and about Jewish life in this part of Serbia. There were about 19000 Jews killed in Vojvodina and by 1989 I had the data about 15000 of them. Today this list is even longer. For me that was the biggest prize for the Jewish work. One more prize I received for my work on saving the data about Jewish life in Vojvodina in 2001. Award is from city of Novi Sad and was presented to me by the mayor. 

The first time I visited Israel was in 1972. It was an official delegation of Vojvodina’s Jews. The motive for the visit was the 30th anniversary of the Raid in Novi Sad and Vojvodina. It was very formal, we were received by the President of the State of Israel, and then we visited Knesset too.

Last time when we were in Israel it was in 1993, then my grandchildren Eli and Dina were in Israel for year, and we went to visit them. We have been on good terms with the consulate and later on with the Israeli embassy in Yugoslavia. They would come to me to a private visit and they visited the Jewish Community.