David de Levita

David Joël (Dabbi) de Levita was born into a socialist Jewish family. His parents Adolf de Levita (23 June 1868 - 26 April 1934) and Catharina de Levita-Godefroi (24 May 1892 - 4 June 1943) worked in diamond processing and were active members of the Algemeene Nederlandsche Diamantbewerkersbond.^[1] His father was also involved in founding the Amsterdam branch of the SDAP.^[2] David had two younger brothers, Frans (19 January 1928 - 31 May 1944) and Henri (19 May 1931 - 4 June 1943). An older brother Frank had died in 1926 at the age of two.^[3]

David attended the Jekerschool and he was from at least the school year 1935-'36 with Margot Frank in fourth grade. That year they went on a school trip to the Pyramid of Austerlitz. A photo taken there shows David de Levita and Margot Frank among about forty children.^[4] His brother Frans was in the same class as Sanne Ledermann, a close friend of Anne Frank. After finishing primary school in 1938, David went to the Vossius Gymnasium and Margot to the Municipal Lyceum for Girls.^[5]

As a result of anti-Jewish measures introduced by the German occupier, all Jewish students were sent to so-called Jewish schools in 1941. Both David and Margot then ended up at the Jewish Lyceum in Amsterdam. Margot was placed in class 4B2. David was placed in the parallel class 4G, with among others Heinz Geiringer, Eva Schloss-Geiringer's older brother.^[6]

Like Margot, David received a call to report for transport to Nazi Germany in July 1942. A neighbour helped him get a job as a bicycle courier for the Joodsche Raad in Amsterdam, He thereby obtained a ‘Sperr-stempel’ and thus a postponement from forced deportation.^[7] With only five other children, he started the 1942-'43 school year in class 5G.^[6]

During a large razzia on 25 and 26 May 1943, about three thousand Jews were rounded up in the city centre of Amsterdam.^[8] That night, David stayed with Ezechiël (Eddy) Luza, a friend he knew from the Jewish Lyceum.^[9] Eddy's family was planning to go into hiding and David came to say goodbye. The next day, he discovered that his own nieghbourhood had been sealed off and that his mother and youngest brother Henri had been rounded up.^[10] They were murdered in Sobibór extermination camp on 4 June 1943.^[3]

During the summer of 1943, David and Eddy Luza, together with David's brother Frans, who had also escaped the razzia, stayed at various hiding addresses, including a water sports campsite in Friesland. When they returned to Amsterdam, Frans decided to find a hiding place himself.^[11] He was arrested in late 1943 and died in Auschwitz on 31 May 1944.^[3] Eddy Luza was arrested at a passport control in August 1943 and deported to Auschwitz, where he died on 31 March 1944.^[9] After his friend's arrest, David fled to an uncle and aunt in Nijmegen. With their help, he found a hiding address in Hattem, where he stayed until the end of the war.^[12]

After the liberation of the Netherlands, David returned to his uncle and aunt in Nijmegen. There he went to the graduating class of the gymnasium. As he had not completed the entire school year, he did not receive a diploma. He then took the state examination and began studying medicine in Amsterdam in September 1945.^[13] He became a psychiatrist with a specialisation in child psychiatry and treated traumatised Holocaust survivors. During his career, David was attached to several universities as (special) professor. In the 1990s, he focused on the transgenerational trauma of descendants of war victims.^[14] Besides his work as a psychiatrist, he was also a visual artist and musician.

On 23 July 1953, David married Henriette (Jet) Isaac (7 November 1929 - 9 January 2013). Like him, she was a psychiatrist. Together they had three children.^[15] After the death of his wife Jet, he remarried visual artist Maartje Pinkus.^[15]

Source personal data.^[16] Addresses: Weesperzijde 59, Amsterdam; Rijnstraat 61 II, Sarphatistraat 143 II (1939), Amsteldijk 104 III (1946).