Odette Rosenstock

Odette Abadi (née Rosenstock; 24 August 1914 – 29 July 1999) was a French physician, and member of the Resistance during World War II. She was a co-founder of the Réseau Marcel ("Marcel Network") which saved more than 500 Jewish children from death during The Holocaust. Although she was arrested and tortured by the Gestapo, she refused to divulge the locations of the hidden Jewish children and was sent to two concentration camps. After Bergen-Belsen concentration camp was liberated in 1945, Abadi continued her profession as a doctor, with a focus on tuberculosis.

On 29 July 1999, Abadi died by suicide and the Les Enfants et Amis Abadi organisation was created the following year by one of the children she saved. In 2008, a square in Paris was named "Place Moussa et Odette Abadi" as a tribute to the couple's work. On 28 October 2017, the "Square Odette et Moussa Abadi" was inaugurated in Nice in recognition of their work.

Early life and education Odette Rosenstock was born in Paris on 24 August 1914, to garment factory owners Camille and Marthe Rosenstock. She also grew up with a younger sister. Although born Jewish, her family did not practice the Jewish religion. Secretly, Rosenstock appreciated some of the principles and her Jewish background but hid her desires due to the Nazi movement in Germany. Concerned about injustice and the growth of Nazism, she began attending meetings and debates as a teenager. She graduated from high school in 1933 and began studying medicine.

Career Physician and inspector After qualifying as a doctor during the Spanish Civil War, Rosenstock went to the Pyrenees in 1938 to welcome and rescue Spanish Republican refugees from the war. She returned to Paris to finish her medical studies and earned a diploma in hygiene-prevention. The next year, she met Moussa Abadi, a fellow doctor, in December 1939 through a mutual friend.

Réseau Marcel During this time, Rosenstock remained in communication with Abadi who encouraged her to join him in Nice, where he had fled. In order to reach Nice, she swam across the river to get from Occupied France into the Free Zone. Both Rosenstock and Abadi obtained false papers identifying them as Christian as Vichy police began rounding up Jewish people. Under the false name of Sylvie Delattre, Rosenstock acted as a social worker for the Church and approached Protestant families, while Abadi sought convents and Catholic schools to hide the Jewish children. Using the Churches resources, Rosenstock and Abadi falsified baptism certificates and gave Jewish children a new identity. After Allied troops liberated the captives at Bergen-Belsen in April 1945, Moussa Abadi received a note in Nice that read “Odette is alive.” They were married legally at the town hall of the 12th arrondissement, and later through a religious ceremony performed by Rabbi Farhi. She also wrote a book about her time in concentration camps during WWII called Terre de détresse which was published in 1995.

Legacy Les Enfants et Amis Abadi organisation was created on 4 May 2000 by one of the children saved by the Abadis, Jeannette Wolgust. Its purpose is to bring together the children hidden by the couple and preserve their memory. On 13 September 2008, a square in Paris was named "Place Moussa et Odette Abadi" as a tribute to the couple's work. On 28 October 2017, the "Square Odette et Moussa Abadi" was inaugurated in Nice in recognition of their work.