Pépère, Freddy

Son of Lina and Haim, was born on September 19, 1929 in Kassel, Germany. He spent his youth in the inferno of the concentration camps; After his release from the camps he moved with his family to live in England and then decided to volunteer for the State of Israel and joined the ranks of the Palmach, joining the Palmach, which later became known as the French Commando. It was a group in the Negev Brigade, whose members were mostly veterans of the French Resistance against the German occupier during the Second World War; Another part came from North African countries and elsewhere. The commander of the unit, which numbered about seventy to eighty fighters, was a devout Catholic who believed in the Zionist idea and came to Eretz Israel in order to help the Jewish people in the war for its existence. The Palmach men saw them as something different, mainly because of their clothing, which consisted of camouflage clothes, crepe-soled shoes, and a commando knife in their gear, and the unit participated in the conquest of Beersheba during Operation “Horev” In order to remove the Egyptian army from Israel, it was assigned to conquer the 13th outpost, which was the western outpost of the Thamila. The men of the unit occupied the outpost and stood up against the Egyptian counter-attacks, which were carried out with great force, which exceeded their number and equipment until they were forced to withdraw. On the 24th of Kislev 5709 (December 26, 1948) Freddy fell in battle with many of his friends and was laid to rest in the military cemetery at Kibbutz Revivim. His name was commemorated in the Torah scroll in memory of those who fell in the War of Independence.