Gal Gadot, Sacha Baron Cohen, Harvey Keitel remember Holocaust victims
To commemorate Yom HaShoah, Gal Gadot held an intimate gathering at her home in LA, inviting holocaust survivor Celina Biniaz to share her testimony, with Gal’s family and friends including Sacha Baron Cohen, his wife Isla Fisher, Harvey Keitel, and Wonder Woman director Patty Jenkins also in attendance.
These informal and often emotional events are held courtesy of Zikaron BaSalon (translated as ‘living room memories’), an Israeli, entirely grassroots, non-profit organization that has encouraged over 2 million people to participate in salons, or gatherings, since the first was held in 2011.
Gal Gadot and Celina Biniaz
Zikaron BaSalon works in conjunction with USC Shoah Foundation to bring testimonies of survivors to people’s homes – and in this instance they connected Gal with holocaust survivor Celina Biniaz.
Celina is the youngest female survivor who was on Schindler’s List – she often says “Oskar Schindler saved my life but Steven Spielberg gave me a voice’’. It wasn’t until the release of the film Schindler’s List that Celina started sharing her testimony. See details of her new book here.
Gal Gadot commented, “I don’t know about god, but I believe in people, in the power of one’s decision to do good. Today we had the honour and privilege of hosting Celina Biniaz, a local holocaust survivor who came to share her powerful and extraordinary story with our family and friends. Hearing her testimony about the horrors she and her family went through and seeing the strong inspiring woman she became left no dry eye in the room.
At the end of her testimony Celina looked at me and said, ‘Life is just like what you said in your Wonder Woman movie – only love can save the world,’ and this moment will stay with me forever.
Thank you @zikaronbasalon for helping us put this event together and for keeping the memory alive in a meaningful, accessible way, allowing survivors to share their testimonies with small groups in intimate events in over 65 countries all over the world.
There are fewer and fewer survivors each Memorial Day and by the year 2035 there will no longer be any survivors left to tell their stories. It is our responsibility to keep sharing these stories, for ourselves and for the world – to hear, to know, to learn. To never forget…Thanks also to @uscshoahfoundation for helping us achieve this.”
Since its inception in 2011, grassroots organization Zikaron BaSalon has given a voice to tens of thousands of survivors in living rooms across the world. Providing an opportunity for participants from all backgrounds and ages to take an active part in preserving the memory of the holocaust for future generations, people gather together to open their hearts, think, read, talk, and most importantly — listen. By creating a space for discussions and conversations focusing on the lessons learnt from the Holocaust, Zikaron BaSalon aims to tackle antisemitism and encourage social action – Tikkun Olam – the Jewish principle of repairing the world.
