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ALONG with exposing the darkest side of human nature, the shootings at Virginia Tech last week reminded us that there are true heroes among us - like Holocaust survivor Liviu Librescu, a professor who blocked his classroom door to allow students to escape through the windows. After the Holocaust, the Romanian Librescu - whose career stalled, said his son, for refusing to swear allegiance to the regime - risked arrest under the Communist system by having his science papers published in the West, until intervention from the Israeli government allowed him to immigrate there in 1979. "This saga epitomizes the...

Uncommon heroes Graeme Hamilton, National Post Published: Saturday, April 21, 2007 Liviu Librescu's actions saved lives at Virginia Tech. Graeme Hamilton looks at why courage is so rareWhen a deranged gunman began his shooting rampage at Virginia Tech's Norris Hall on Monday, most of the dozens of students in the vicinity cowered under desks or fled, according to witness accounts. But, before being fatally shot himself, 76-year-old Professor Liviu Librescu thrust himself against his classroom door and held off Cho Seunghui long enough to allow many of his students to jump to safety. The professor's heroism gives rise to...

A representative of Romanian President Traian Basescu gave a national medal in Israel on Friday to the family of a Romanian-born Virginia Tech professor who saved his students from a rampaging gunman Monday. The presidential representative attended Liviu Librescu's funeral in Ra'anana on Friday and bestowed on his widow and children the Order of the Star of Romania for his bravery and his contributions to science, Israel Radio reported. Librescu, an internationally respected aeronautics engineer and lecturer, was an engineering professor and Holocaust survivor who left Romania for Israel and then the United States. Witnesses to Monday's shooting said Librescu...

Tears, Pride for Holocaust Survivor, Virginia Tech Librescu At Israel Funeral By Joel Leyden Israel News Agency Jerusalem ----April 21...... "Daddy, tell me the story again," said the 6-year-old girl. "Tell me how he saved the big children." It had been hours earlier in this pristine, palm tree lined Ra'anana cemetery that hundreds stood mourning and praising Holocaust survivor and Virginia Tech hero for sacrificing his life so that his students would live. "He was a good man," said Amanda. "Will he come back to life now?" she asked. It was this young girl's first trip to a cemetery. I...

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...

Liviu Librescu Saved His Student's Lives

April 18, 2007, 6:45 a.m. We Need More HeroesSpiderman is not going to save us. Liviu Librescu may. By James Bowman Reacting to what many in Britain and elsewhere are regarding as the disgraceful behavior while in captivity of the British sailors and marines kidnapped by the Iranians, Simon Heffer recently wrote in the London Daily Telegraph: “Why are some so weak-minded compared with those 18- year-olds who, within living memory, went over the top on the Somme, or splashed through machine-gun fire onto the Normandy beaches?” Heffer himself belongs to the “I-blame-the-parents” school of thought on this matter...