In the wake of the deadliest shooting rampage in modern US history comes reports of an Israeli hero.
An Israeli lecturer who died in the massacre at a U.S. university saved the lives of several students by blocking the doorway of his classroom from the approaching gunman before he was fatally shot, his son said Tuesday.
Students of Liviu Librescu, 76, an engineering science and mathematics lecturer in at Virginia Tech for 20 years, sent e-mails to his wife, Marlena, telling of how he blocked the gunman’s way and saved their lives, said the son, Joe.“My father blocked the doorway with his body and asked the students to flee,” Joe Librescu said in a telephone interview from his home outside of Tel Aviv. “Students started opening windows and jumping out.”Liviu Librescu, was respected in his field, his son said.“His work was his life in a sense,” Joe Librescu said. “That was a good place for him to practice his research.”The couple immigrated to Israel from Romania in 1978 and then moved to Virginia in 1985 for his sabbatical, but had stayed since then, said Joe Librescu, who himself studied at the school from 1989 to 1994.In Romania, the academic community also was mourning Librescu’s death.“It is a great loss,” said Ecaterina Andronescu, rector of the Polytechnic University in Bucharest, where Librescu graduated in mechanics and aviation construction in 1953. “We have immense consideration for the way he reacted and defended his students with his life.”He also received a Ph.D from the Bucharest-based Academy of Sciences in 1969, and received an honorary degree with the Polytechnic University in 2000.At the Polytechnic University, his picture was put on a table and a candle was lit, and people lay flowers. “We remember him as a great specialist in aeronautics. He left behind hundreds of prestigious papers,” said one of the professors, Nicolae Serban Tomescu.Librescu, who specialized in composite structures and aeroelasticity, published extensively and received numerous awards for his work. He also received several NASA grants and also taught courses at the University “La Sapienza” of Rome, Italy, and at the Tel Aviv University in Israel.
May G-d bless Liviu and give comfort to the family he leaves behind. Indeed, may G-d bless all of the victims and their families.
Update: According to Ynetnews, Liviu was a Holocaust survivor, and the professor with the highest number of publications in the history of Virginia Tech.
Update: According to an Iranian Foreign Ministry statement:
“While condemning this [attack], [Iran] expresses condolences with the nation and the families of those killed….Attacking innocent people, irrespective of their race and nationality, is contrary to divine and human values no matter which group or person carries out such an act under any name.”
I’m guessing they have not been informed that Liviu was a Jew and an Israeli.
