Posted on 04/18/2007 10:03:45 PM PDT by IsraelBeach
Israel Professor, Murdered Saving Students At Virginia Tech, Buried in Ra'anana
By Joel Leyden
Israel News Agency
Jerusalem ----April 19...... In a remarkable act of sacrifice and bravery, a 75-year-old Israel professor and Holocaust survivor was murdered in the massacre at Virginia Tech on Holocaust Memorial Day, Monday when he leaped between the crazed gunner and his students.
According to eye witnesses the heroic action of Liviu Librescu, a lecturer in the Department of Engineering Science and Mechanics, saved the lives of an unknown number of students in his class. Asael Arad, an Israeli Virginia Tech student told Israel Army Radio that "all the students lived - because of him,".
The last person to see Professor Liviu Librescu alive appears to have been Alec Calhoun, a student at Virginia Tech who turned as he prepared to leap from a high classroom window to see the elderly academic holding shut the classroom door. The student jumped, and lived. Minutes later, the professor was shot dead.
Librescu's wife told the NRG Web site that her husband had loved his job with "all his heart and his soul."
Librescu was a gifted scientist in Romania, and the government tried to prevent him from moving to Israel. He was eventually allowed to leave the country after then Israel Prime Minister Menachem Begin made a special appeal to President Nicolae Ceausescu, Ynetnews reported.
Librescu immigrated to Israel from Romania in 1978 but moved to Virginia in 1986 for his sabbatical and had remained their ever since. The professor has two sons, one named Arieh who lives in Israel, and another, Joe, who resides in the US.
Librescu was described by his colleagues as a "true gentleman."
He was one of 32 people murdered in what has been described as the biggest single shooting attack in US history. Between his first and second bursts of gunfire, the Virginia Tech gunman mailed a package to NBC News containing pictures of him brandishing weapons and video of him delivering a diatribe about getting even with rich people.
NBC said that a time stamp on the package indicated the material was mailed in the two-hour window between the first burst of gunfire in a high-rise dormitory and the second fusillade, at a classroom building. Thirty-three people died in the rampage, including the gunman, 23-year-old student Cho Seung-Hui from South Korea, who committed suicide.
The package included a manifesto that "rants against rich people and warns that he wants to get even," according to a law enforcement official who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak about the case.
Late Wednesday, MSNBC showed a photo from the package of Cho glaring at the camera, his arms outstretched with a gun in each hand. He wears a khaki-colored military-style vest, fingerless gloves and a backwards, black baseball cap. "NBC Nightly News" planned to show some of the material Wednesday night.
Virginia Tech reported shootings on two sides of the 2,600-acre campus, the first at about 7:15 a.m. at a co-ed residential hall called West Ambler Johnston, and resuming about two hours later at Norris Hall, an engineering building.
According to students, at around 7:15 a.m. the gunman appeared in West Ambler Johnston and began searching rooms for his ex-girlfriend. He killed two people, Ryan Clark, and a freshman identified by students as Emily Hilscher.
In the second attack, the gunman shot professors and students in classrooms and hallways of the engineering building, killing around 30 people.
The carnage ended Monday with the gunman shooting himself in the face. There were 33 deaths in total.
Students complained that the university did not adequately warn them about the gunman until over two hours after the first incident and around the time that the second round of killings began. At that time, an e-mail was sent.
Virginia Tech President Charles Steger defended the university, saying authorities believed the shooting at the dorm was a domestic clash and an isolated incident. They also mistakenly thought the gunman had left the campus.
"We had no reason to suspect any other incident was going to occur," Steger said.
He added, "We can only make decisions based on the information you had on the time. You don't have hours to reflect on it."
Steger explained that it was difficult to inform everyone at Virginia Tech because there were thousands of people arriving to the campus on Monday morning.
"Today the university was struck with a tragedy that we consider of monumental proportions," Steger said. "The university is shocked and indeed horrified."
In his speech at the United State Holocaust Memorial, US President George W. Bush paid tribute to Liviu Librescu, the aeronautics engineering professor who died while trying to save students during the shooting spree at Virginia Polytechnic Institute.
“That day we saw horror, but we also saw acts of quiet courage. We saw this courage in a teacher named Liviu Librescu. With the gunman set to enter his class, this brave professor blocked the door with his body while his students fled to safety. On the Day of Remembrance, this Holocaust survivor gave his own life so that others might live. And this morning we honor his memory, and we take strength from his example.” President Bush said.
Liviu Librescu’s body was transported to Israel, on Wednesday, to be buried at the cemetery of the central Israel town of Ra'anana.
Marilena, his wife, also flew also from New York Wednesday and due to arrive in Tel Aviv today, 37-year-old son Arieh told Deutsche Presse-Agentur in a telephone interview.
He was a mensch. I pray that have the same courage if I am in a similar situation.
Why didn’t any students help this 75yr old man?
Don’t blame the students. They froze. While this hero from Israel knew what to do, as many Israelis would. In Israel we are trained in the army to respond. As civilians, we expect terrorism and our sensitive to our environment at all times.
May Liviu Librescu serve as a source of inspiration to all.
May his family know no more suffering.
From what I can tell, he told them to escape. Frankly, I doubt he wanted any of them to risk their life for him.
Out of this ridiculous killing spree, at least there is one heroic figure - Liviu Librescu.
God bless his soul.
Sitting in an early morning class on a Monday and some maniac kicks in the door and blows away your prof? Brother, I probably would have froze too.
It’s no accident that the hero Librescu specialized in a discipline that demands respect for reason and reality. It’s also no accident that the killer chose to slaughter specifically in a building where such a value is taught.
-—While this hero from Israel knew what to do, as many Israelis would. In Israel we are trained in the army to respond. As civilians, we expect terrorism and our sensitive to our environment at all times.-—
These are things Americans must learn.
G-d bless this good man’s family.
I think because he was a man and a leader and he'd told them to get the hell out and under incredible stress they obeyed the only one of them who had any idea what he was doing. That'd be my guess, anyhow.
I have profound respect for a man as brave in real life as most of us only imagine ourselves.
Interesting how the only person with any balls was a man in his late 70s.
One final note: take a look at how many times Herr Professor was published and awarded, compared with the piece of sh-t that killed him.
I agree. Also, this man had seen evil once before and knew to face it with the courage of a righteous man.
There is a special place in heaven for this wonderful man. And a special place in hell for his murderer.
-—Why didn’t any students help this 75yr old man?-—
The strong must protect the weak. The students have now seen a good example of this.
The professor did well.
Now, will the news media declare the next mass murderer in Israel or Iraq to be “mentally disturbed,” or is that only a label that they use on such criminals in the U.S.?
When you’re young, you don’t believe you can or ever will die, not in any immediate sense, theory is about the best you do.
When somebody gets spattered right next to you, a whole bunch of things you never thought about before suddenly demand attention, and you don’t have time to process it all then.
You also don’t have nearly the experience an older person has with just how ugly it can be when honor requires you to live with a bunch of human beings another 30 or 40 years, when those “people” are raised and taught by liberals and other assorted scumbags.
Used to be kids saw death up close and personal more often than not, on the farm, out on a hunt, Indians or bad guys, factory accidents, but now death and survival situations are just colored dots on a box with an “off” switch on the side.
I’m not sure what the answer for those kids is.
I know that lying down while someone shoots you dead isn’t good enough for me, or for my own children.
I don’t have a better way in mind, for getting my kids around this kind of weakness yet, but this incident has opened my eyes to the need, and I will have an answer before long.
Cringing on the ground while an animal is trying to kill you or eat you is unacceptable, but it isn’t hard to understand where they get it from.
The students were young, just out of high school....
Where they teach “conflict resolution”. Essentially, that boils down to “don’t do anything to antagonize the other person, negotiate with them, and give them whatever it takes to end the conflict.” This is reinforced by the disciplinary actions of the schools.
Basically, they were taught to surrender, cower, and it will all be OK; they hadn’t been out in the world long enough to realize that that *never* works. No discredit on them - they just did what they were taught to do and knew no better.
ALL dishonor on the “educators” that never taught them to stand up for themselves and FIGHT for what you believe in. I should know, I had the same disability as a youngster. It took me a while to realize that there were things in life worth fighting for.
What an honor to have this man buried in my city!
I'm very sad he's gone, but this man truly lived a most remarkable life.
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