Hedva Wirtheim, of Blessed Memory

My mother-in-law died on Saturday morning after a prolonged illness. I will never forget this brave woman, who never once cried or uttered a complaint.

She came to Palestine from Austria at the time of the Anschluss. Her mother and sister were unable to escape Europe and died in Nazi concentration camps.

Hedva helped found Kibbutz Neot Mordechai in the north of Israel, where she contracted malaria while draining the swamps. I remember a picture of her from this period: a slim young woman, hauling a concrete building block.

During World War II, she married Zeev, who was given a two-hour leave from the British army for their wedding ceremony. She waited more than two years until his return from the fighting in Europe.

After the establishment of the State of Israel, Neot Mordechai was under constant shell fire from Syrian positions in the Golan Heights. The shell fire continued until the Six Day War put an end to this horror; however, the subsequent War of Atonement saw Syrian tanks come within a few miles of the kibbutz, which was never evacuated.

Hedva taught mathematics to the children who grew up on the surrounding agricultural communities. Although she had three children of her own, every Friday she took the time to bake a cake for a young man who suffered from cerebral palsy and to clean his room.

In later life, Hedva worked as a volunteer at a botanical garden and as a volunteer teacher to the blind.

I remember when traveling with her on a train how she shared the food she had brought for the journey with total strangers.

If only the "me-first" world of today could learn from this remarkable woman's modesty, altruism, courage and generosity.