Zaffern-Noskowicz family. Collection

Israel Zaffern was born in Lazansky, Czechoslovakia, on 14 June 1905. He became a warehouse clerk and emigrated to Belgium in 1929, where he settled in Antwerp. On 25 April 1937, Israel Zaffner, then a butcher’s apprentice, married Gitla Noskowicz, born in Lask, Poland, on 1st October 1907. She had emigrated to Belgium in March 1937 to marry Israel. The couple relocated to Brussels, where they opened a restaurant at Place Anneessens. On 13 August 1938, Gitla gave birth to a son, Nathan. Daughter Lisa was born on 2 October 1939. In 1942, Nathan and Lisa Zaffern were placed in hiding in Schaerbeek, Brussels, at the home of Theodore and Celina Debroek, friends of Israel Zaffern and Gitla Noskowicz. Their only son Georges Debroek had been deported to Germany upon refusing to become a forced labourer for the Nazis. Nathan Zaffern was later on transferred to the home of Henri and Irma Van Horenbeck, also in Brussels. Both Nathan and Lisa Zaffern survived the war. In 1946, a maternal family member located the children in Belgium and, after a judicial battle involving the Vaad Hahatzala, took them to the United Kingdom with her. Lisa remained in England, while Nathan Zaffern emigrated to Israel. Nathan and Lisa’s parents did not survive the war. Gitla Noskowicz and her sister Hinda Noskowicz were arrested in August 1943 and deported from the Dossin barracks via transport XXII A on 20 September 1943. Israel Zaffern was arrested in November 1943 and was deported from the Dossin barracks via Transport XXIII on 15 January 1944. Although he was selected as a forced labourer upon arrival (tattoo number 172435), he did not survive.

Nathan Zaffern