Accueil

Professor
Nobel Peace Prize 

Elie Wiesel was born in 1928 in Sighet, Transylvania. He was fifteen years old when he was deported to Auschwitz along with his family. His mother and his sister died there. He was later deported to Buchenwald with his father, who died shortly before the camp was liberated in April 1945.  

Fostered by the Oeuvre de Secours aux Enfants (French Jewish humanitarian organization) in 1945, he studied philosophy in Paris and later became a journalist. During an interview with the famous French writer, Francois Mauriac, he was persuaded to write about his experiences in the death camps. The result was his internationally acclaimed memoirs, La Nuit, since translated into more than thirty languages.

He became an American citizen in 1963, and professor in Humanities in Boston college. In 1980, he became the Founding Chairman of the United States Holocaust Memorial Council.

A devoted supporter of human rights all over the world, Elie Wiesel has also defended the cause of Soviet Jews, Nicaragua's Miskito Indians, Argentina's Desaparecidos, Cambodian refugees, the Kurds, victims of starvation and genocide in Africa, of apartheid in South Africa, and victims of war in Ex-Yugoslavia.

He has received numerous awards including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the U.S. Congressional Gold Medal and the Medal of Liberty Award, and the rank of Grand-Croix in the French Legion of Honor. In 1986, Elie Wiesel won the Nobel Peace Prize, and soon after, Marion and Elie Wiesel established The Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity.

He was appointed as a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations in 1998.