Itzhak Stern (; 25 January 1901 – 30 January 1969) was a Polish Jew and a Holocaust survivor, who worked for Sudeten-German industrialist Oskar Schindler and assisted him in his rescue activities during the Holocaust. After World War II, Stern moved to Israel.
Life
Early life
Stern was born 25 January 1901, in Kraków, then part of Grand Duchy of Kraków, Austria-Hungary (present-day Poland). He was an important leader in the Jewish community, and was the vice president of the Jewish Agency for Western Poland and a member of the Zionist Central Committee. who was then working as an accountant for Schindler's fellow Abwehr agent Josef "Sepp" Aue, who had gained control of Stern's formerly Jewish-owned place of employment as a (trustee). Schindler showed Stern the balance sheet of a company he was thinking of acquiring, an enamelware manufacturer called Ltd <!--!--> owned by a consortium of Jewish businessmen (including Abraham Bankier) that had filed for bankruptcy earlier that year. Stern advised him that rather than running the company as a trusteeship under the auspices of the (Main Trustee Office for the East), he should buy or lease the business directly, as that would give him more freedom from the dictates of the Nazis, including the freedom to hire more Jews. Despite Stern being Jewish and Schindler being a member of the Nazi Party, Schindler was friendly to Stern. Later, Stern said of the meeting: Stern kept in contact with Schindler throughout this time and worked to better conditions for the Jews, including transferring workers to Schindler's factory, distributing aid money, and attempting to inform the outside world of their plight.
In 1944, when the closure of Płaszów became inevitable, Schindler decided to open a new factory, the Brünnlitz labor camp, in Brněnec, occupied Czechoslovakia, for his Jewish workers in order to prevent them from being sent to death camps. Stern and the surviving members of his family were placed on the famous list to be transferred to Brünnlitz by Schindler, although Stern's mother died of illness when she, along with the other female , was transferred to Auschwitz before Schindler could arrange their transfer to Brünnlitz. The male , including Stern and Natan, were transported to Gross-Rosen before they were sent to the relative safety of Brünnlitz, where Stern worked directly with Schindler and became one of the leaders of the Jewish workers.
Personal life
In 1938, Stern was engaged to Sophia Backenrot, who survived the war due to her Aryan appearance in the Drohobycz ghetto. Their marriage was postponed until the end of the war in 1945. They remained married until Stern's death at the age of 68.
Legacy
He was portrayed in the 1993 film Schindler's List by English actor Ben Kingsley. At the end of the film, Stern's widow Sophia appears in a procession of and the actors who portrayed them, placing stones on Schindler's grave on Mount Zion, which is a Jewish tradition showing respect for the deceased. Stern's brother Natan was also one of the in the procession.