Judy Feld Carr - Biography

Judith Feld Carr, CM (born 1938) is a Canadian Jewish musician and human rights activist known for secretly smuggling thousands of Jews out of Syria over a period of 28 years.

Biography

Judith (Judy) Feld Carr was born in Montreal. but grew up in Sudbury, Ontario. She attained a Mus.Bac. in music education and a Mus.M. in musicology and music education from the University of Toronto. Feld Carr taught high school music in Toronto for many years and also taught university musicology.

Rescue of Syrian Jewry

Feld Carr used funds from the Dr. Ronald Feld Fund for Jews in Arab Lands (established at Beth Tzedec Synagogue, Toronto in 1973), donated privately, to negotiate the release of Syrian Jews from the Syrian government. The process took over 28 years, in complete secrecy to protect the lives of those in danger. The Jews were either smuggled out of Syria, or ransomed, the majority of them emigrating to Israel or New York. Feld Carr described the venture: "We were buying Jews, one by one, from a hostile government. It was the best-kept secret in the Jewish world."

Her work ostensibly focused on creating cells with Syrians temporarily abroad, to develop a reliable and secure information network, with coded language based on Chinese cuisine and alcohol. Her nickname was Gin, but she was also known as Mrs. Judy, or simply “the woman from Canada”. Each Syrian Jew was rescued through individual bribes organized by Feld Carr. She recalled, "I bought them like you'd buy cattle...It was as crass and as disgusting a thing as anybody could have ever done." In certain cases, she arranged successful escapes when bribery failed.

Feld Carr facilitated the escape of at least 3,228 Jews, at first through her own work and later as chairwoman of the Canadian Jewish Congress's National Task Force for Syrian Jewry.

Her story is told in Harold Troper's book, The Ransomed of God: The Remarkable Story Of One Woman's Role in the Rescue of Syrian Jews, republished by Lester, Mason & Begg under the title The Rescuer: The Amazing True Story of How One Woman Helped Save the Jews of Syria.

Awards and recognition

Feld Carr has received numerous awards, including the Order of Canada; the Queen's Jubilee Medal; the Abram Sachar Medal as "Woman of the Year", Brandeis University; the Saul Hayes Human Rights Award of the Canadian Jewish Congress; the Simon Wiesenthal Award for Tolerance, Justice and Human Rights; and the University of Haifa Humanitarian Award of Merit. She has received honorary degrees from Laurentian University and the Jewish Theological Seminary, New York.

External links

• Investiture of the Order of Canada, May 31, 2001
• Rescuing Syrian Jews
• Order of Canada Citation
• Mrs. Judy's Secret, a film about her, currently being produced