Dr. Zlatko Wamoscher

Doctor,

Gentleman,

Lover of Man and Nature

We have inscribed this on his grave, how an entire can life be reduced to a few words, it is impossible and also unfair, especially about such a complex man with such an interesting and enthralling life story, that was at times also tragic .

Father was born in the town of Djakovo, Yugoslavia, on July 26, 1923 to a modern Jewish family and grew up in the city of Osijek. As an only child he enjoyed a nice bourgeois life who excelled at school, until his adolescence and the outbreak of the Second World War. In an instant his life and that of his family changed irrevocably, from a young vibrant family, that enjoyed going on trips and was happy, life at the beginning of the 1940’s became insufferable. Father, along with a number of friends his age, 16 – 17, volunteered to help Jewish refugees, mainly women and children, who were imprisoned at the concentration camp near the town of his birth, Djakovo. With the help of the Osijek Jewish community, they assisted with food, and tried to enable reasonable life at the camp as much as possible, however a terrible typhus outbreak and the shortage of food made this into an extremely difficult task. Only recently we became aware of the fact that he helped save 57 children and infants from the camp, some of whom live in Israel.

In the spring of 1942 when the situation worsened his parents sent him using forged documents towards Italy hoping that he would survive. He never forgave himself for being the sole survivor of his entire family, a dark cloud that hung over his life until his death. Of course he never managed to reach Italy, however after hiding for a certain while in Zagreb he managed to reach the Adriatic shore which was under Italian, rather than Ustaše, rule.

Towards the end of 1942 all of the Jews were transferred to the concentration camp in the city of Kraljevica, and in the summer of 1943 to the concentration camp on Rab Island, where Father met Mother and since then they have never parted. In September, 1943 Italy surrendered and this was the opportunity to escape to the mountains and join the partisans. Until the end of the war Mother and Father were with the partisan and lived mainly in the area of Gjelina which was in the Croatian forests. Father at first was a fighter and later he supervised a group of Italian POWs who operated a brick factory, which was also the power source for the partisans in the area.

In the Spring of 1945, after the war ended, Father returned to Osijek where he understood that no one but himself survived from his family, and he left immediately. He never forgave the Croatian people, especially the neighbors and acquaintances who changed instantly to become the Jewish People’s greatest enemies.

Father and Mother lived in Zagreb after the war, he was a medical student and she owned a plant nursery for flowers and a flower shop. Business was not bad, but when they heard about the founding of the State of Israel, along with many of their Jewish friends they immigrated to Israel in December 1948 with very little belongings and money. A new chapter begun - as pioneers in the State of Israel, they founded the Kidron Settlement in 1949. Mother worked on a giant farm almost entirely on her own and Father began learning medicine in Jerusalem almost from the beginning. In 1954 two important events happened - Father became a medical doctor and their eldest daughter was born, known today as Dr. Segel Ronit.

Father served as a medical doctor in the rural area in the south. As such, he would drive a jeep and could enjoy one of his favorite hobbies – hiking and archaeological findings. Since then he never stopped hiking, and we his children got the hiking bug as well, and we continue with this tradition to this day. We have learned to appreciate every flower, hill and tree. Father would see a chiseled rock protruding from the ground and would immediately know what period it was from and who built the place. He became and enthusiast of archaeological findings and we would run across the country just to see a few rocks found from the Herod period, for example.

Another known favorite hobby of Father was photography. Hundreds and maybe thousands of photographs and slides which he took and were the source of many viewing nights at Mother and Father’s home. Father also continued the stamp collection which was almost the only thing remaining from his father, and he continued it and loved it very much. The amount of hours in the nights which he lovingly dedicated to stamps were ample, there was not a single family member to whom Father did not try to transfer his love of stamps. As children, we received our general knowledge from the stamps, learning about nations, countries, animals, paintings, famous individuals, etc. Father taught us all this through the stamps. His stamps, bearing works of art, chess, Nobel peace prize winners, national costumes, etc. and many others and of course stamps from Yugoslavia and its nations and from Israel from its establishment, fill entire cabinets to this day.

Father completed his Israeli identity by becoming a medical officer for the IDF, serving in all of Israel’s wars, until the Yom Kippur War in which he was the commander of the hospitals for burn victims established in Ashkelon. We remember the long periods in which he served as a reserve duty soldier, especially during the War of Attrition, when he was called to replace young doctors who could not handle the stress and overload of work at the shores of the Suez Canal.

We lived in Bitzaron until Father was appointed district medical doctor of the HMO’s Yehuda District which is responsible for a vast area from the border of the Beer Sheva District until the Center area. As such, he dedicated much of his time to elevating the importance of family medicine, and he as well dedicated much time to making professional medicine available outside of hospitals and establishing professional clinics such as the Remez Clinic in Rehovot, which did not exist before that period. Due to the appointment, the family moved to Rehovot where he lived until his last day.

Father loved music very much and together with Mother he was one of the earliest membership card holders of the philharmonic. He loved listening to Mahler and also was a great fan of ballets. He would go to performances and he also has a huge collection of ballet recordings from all over the world. Unfortunately, significant hearing problems that worsened over the years caused him great distress, in all walks of life however mainly due to his inability to continue to listen to music.

An important thing which I feel must be added is that he was an interesting conversationalists, and his vast knowledge almost in every subject, his curiosity and phenomenal memory created a situation in which even though he never cut into a conversation with his knowledge, when you needed to know something in depth you could always ask him and he would know. It is hard to summarize and finish a life story of almost 92 years which began in a foreign land, continued in a large dark pit and ends here in Israel, but there is also an optimistic side. Father believed that raising a family and having a normative life in the State of Israel are his private victory over the evil, ostracism, and humiliation he experienced in his past. He did everything in his power to build his new, different and optimistic life as much as possible, and the proof is two children, six grandchildren and three great-grandchildren, and that’s just the beginning…

I think he succeeded. December 2014