A Child Without a Shadow: A Story of Resilience

by Shaul Harel, Dalia Harel, Ela Moscovitch-Weiss

The moving story of Professor Shaul Harel’s life from darkness to light, from Holocaust survivor to world expert in pediatric neurology and child development.

This is the story of Prof. Shaul Harel, formerly Charlie Hilsberg, who lost his shadow in 1942 at only five years old, when he was separated from his family and surroundings and saved from the furnaces of Auschwitz by the Belgian resistance.

This book reveals his story, from his time as a “hidden child” in France and Belgium during the Holocaust, through his experiences in orphanages, his immigration to Israel, the serious injury he sustained in his military service, the choice to study medicine, and lastly the mark he has made in the field of pediatric neurologyand child development in Israel and in the world.

A story of overcoming impossible trauma and reaching professional and personal success against all odds. The book channels a universal message of survival, optimism, and hope.

Genres: Nonfiction, World War II, Biography, History, Memoir, Holocaust

378 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 19, 2021

Reviews

[Beverley Latimer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Deeply moving and insightful.

What can I say other than I salute you Prof. Shaul Harel!
Thank goodness for those brave individuals who risked their lives to hide and save the lives of Jewish children during WW11.
Despite being torn from his family, and then becoming a hidden child during WW2,
Shaul's dedication to the work of child neurology is truly remarkable.
If I could give this book ten stars then I would. I can't recommend this book highly enough!

[Deborah · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a book about a family, and one of the sons overcoming immense struggles since he was a boy. This boy became a man and triumphed over all of it. He was awarded numerous honors. I lost count. Amazing.

[Grady · Rating 5 out of 5]

‘For me, the real heroes of the Holocaust in Belgium were the rescuers’ – A Profound Memoir

Israeli author Dr. Shaul Harel earned his MD from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and completed his residency in pediatrics at the Tel Aviv Medical Center, followed by further training at UCLA and USC in pediatric neurology. He is a professor at Tel Aviv University’s School of Medicine, the co-founder of the Israeli Child Neurology Association, and is president of the International Child Neurology Association, having received many honors and awards for his contributions to medicine. Pertinent to this book (a memoir) is his organization of the Hidden Children Convention in Belgium in response to his own history as a Holocaust survivor with the invaluable assistance of the Belgian resistance.

The Preface written by John R. Benfield, MD opens this extraordinary book with an informed bit of history: “The importance of this book transcends the obvious. The apparent and very real significance is the survival of four-year-old Charlie Hilsberg of Brussels because ‘Mademoiselle,’ a 20-year-old gentile beauty, heroically stepped forward and arranged his becoming a hidden child. The Germans murdered his parents, his brother and his sister, and six million other Jews. After his time as a hidden child, Charlie learned to smile and laugh again, made his way to Israel, and became Shaul Harel when Ben Gurion said every Israeli needs an Israeli name. Shaul married Dalia, an outstanding Sabra…’ That excerpt describes the beginnings of the authors: Shaul and Dalia who wrote this book.

Not only is this book an impressive survey of the Holocaust’s impact on Jews, both as a tribute to those who perished at the hands of the Germans as well as the altered lives of the survivors. The ‘memoir’ opens in Poland in 1926, sharing the roots of Shaul’s family, and movement to Belgium where the Holocaust’s disruption of Shaul’s life began. Supplemented with photographs that add immediacy to the history shared, the book travels from Belgium to France and to Israel and then moves into Shaul’s military involvement in the Netherlands and his decision to enter the field of Medicine with his eventual achieving fame and honors as a Pediatric Neurologist.

The book would likely never have been written had not the otherwise secretive Dr. Harel returned to Belgium to explore and uncover the truth of his murdered family at Auschwitz. Both immensely moving and rich in the story of one man’s survival as a child with ‘a dream,’ A CHILD WITHOUT A SHADOW is a tribute to ‘survival, optimism, and hope’ as well as an impressive overview of the achievements and distinction of Dr. Harel’s career. This is one of those books that immediately gains an honored place in the library of all of us. Very highly recommended as a resource of history and honor of a man’s life.

[Julie Eagle-cardo · Rating 3 out of 5]

While this book proved an uneven read, it still makes an extremely powerful contribution to the annals of writing on hidden children during the Nazi regime. To begin with, the story should have been written in the first person. Indeed, Prof. Harel finally slips into the 1st-person in the Epilogue after using the distant-sounding 3rd-person voice in the previous 276 pages -- diluting the intimacy and dramatic impact of his extraordinary tale. But what truly drags down this otherwise excellent memoir are several laborious, excruciatingly dull and unnecessary chapters, particularly "Thirty Years of Running from Place to Place" and in everything under the "Conferences, Conferences" section. Yes, the intense connection between the doctor's early childhood trauma on one hand and his professional devotion to early childhood development on the other make Harel's story especially fascinating. And the book admirably explores those deep and powerful connections. But the author does his tale a huge disservice by weighing down age after page with endless, boring minutiae about every conference planned and attended, every accommodation, meal, car, ad nauseum. Several other parts also often sound extraneous and unnecessary, though, unlike the unbearably boring stuff on conferences, etc., at least added some intriguing autobiographical details. Still, Dr. Harel definitely needed much stronger editing. That would have elevated the story-telling vastly.

With that said, however, I still recommend this compelling book. The narrative takes two unquestioningly captivating topics -- how the hidden children were affected and how any of us are shaped by our early emotional experiences -- and blends them into the remarkable story of one of those children. That Dr. Harel contributed so much to the child development field gives the tale an especially riveting twist. I only wish the book had skipped over much more of the minutiae, and focused even more intently on the link between the author's personal past and professional passion.

[Dee Miller · Rating 3 out of 5]

Audible Plus 8 hours 35 min. Narrated by Bill Lewis (A)

5 stars for Dr. Shaul Harel and his wife, Dalia, and their lives as exemplary citizens of Israel.
3 stars for the ghost writer Ela Moscovitch-Weiss's story. So much repetition
As l read in another review, "A brilliant life written by a less than brilliant writer."
Nevertheless less I recommend the book for those who can read the print version and skim through parts that are repetitive. The lives of the Harel's are fascinating as adults, and what they were able to accomplish together is amazing. I wonder what they are going through right now in Israel? He is 87. It's got to be horrendous for them to see all the work they poured into building Israel into a world medical and economic leader being attacked again.
This book is Dr. Harel'ls tribute to the citizens of Belgium who hid and saved the lives of 3,000 Jewish children during WWII, including his older sister and his own.
A few thoughts of his that I jotted down.
"We must excell to succeed. "
"I see medicine as a bridge to peace.""
As Israelis, they did not have huge salaries or a lavish lifestyle, but they were able to travel with their children and later grandchildren because of the pediatric neurology conferences he attended. "We invested in experiences not in assets."

[Sherilee · Rating 2 out of 5]

While I'm sure this man lead an amazing life, the book was not amazing. It was just a bullet point of different facts of his life. Lots of medical information that I found hard to understand and follow as I am not a medical professional.

[Sharyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an autobiography of a “hidden child” in Belgium during World War II who became a world renowned doctor specializing in child neurological trauma and child development. Interesting!

[Elizabeth Fellows · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Child without a Shadow
This is a heartbreaking true story which took place during WWII in Warsaw, Poland.
A young boy called Charlie Hilsberg was separated from his family who were all taken to Auschwitz. Anti-semitism was already prevalent in Warsaw beginning in the 1930’s, in the Jewish community. In 1932 their family decided to immigrate to Brussels as things were getting worse in Poland. Things were getting bad in Brussels, so the family decided to go South Th France.They were sent to camps in France in 1940, that were as bad as Auschwitz, riddled with diseases.Treatment was brutal and cruel.
The family left France for Belgium, thinking it would be better. However they were not safe anywhere and eventually they were sent to Auschwitz. A Jewish underground was developed in Belgium which hid Children with Christian families. There were several women who created code books pertaining to name changes for the children.
Andree Geulan joined the group who hid children. She was an excellent asset to the cause in protecting children.
This book goes into detail about the time Shaul Harel was a hidden child during the war. This story is amazing and very disturbing. The author shares the explicit story of all the different places that Shaul ended up living during the war, about his strengths during such turmoil, and his amazing story about the rest of his life. Definitely worth reading.

[Chrissie Heasman · Rating 3 out of 5]

What an amazing man-who overcame being separated from his family at the age of 5, hidden in Nazi controlled Belgium and then despite arriving in Israel at the end of the war having no formal education, became this ground-breaking, passionate doctor. He became world famous in his field of child development. I love the way this book honours the early intervention for babies/toddlers and doesn’t take the lazy ‘wait and see’ approach.
Loved it!

[Ronald Mathews · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Most Interesting Life

When I started reading this, I never thought I wouldn't be reading anything more than about your trials and tribulations from the Holocaust. To read about your lifetime achievements was icing on the cake!!! You lived the US Army motto "Be all that you can be". Bravo!!!

[Michael Johnston · Rating 3 out of 5]

A Child Without a Shadow is the remarkable story of one of the lost children of the Holocaust. The Holocaust broke over Shaul Harel's family like it did for Jewish families across Europe - slowly and then with increasing speed and inevitability. As the Nazi's moved to round up all the Jews in Belgium, Shaul's parents made the unimaginably heartbreaking decision to give Shaul to the Belgian underground who were hiding children from the Nazi round-ups.

That decision saved Shaul's life as his parents and two siblings died in the death camps. He was only five when he was separated from his parents and later was separated from his only remaining siblings moving from one location to another to protect him from the Nazis. At the end of the war he was placed in an orphanage and then finally immigrated to Israel.

Many of the youngest hidden children were permanently scarred from the loss of their parents and the absence of loving, caring homes, but Shaul found the resilience to not only carry on, but ultimately to rise to the top of his profession as a child neurologist.

Because of his early trauma, Harel blocked most of his memories of those lost years, and the book is part description of his journey to uncover those memories and part exploration of how and why he was able to find the resilience to rise above the trauma.

Shaul Harel's story is not unique, but there is much to learn about the cost of the Holocaust on human lives from his story and the stories of other lost children.

While the story is remarkable, the writing is not that of a professional writer. The narrative is stilted, at times repetitive, and filled with odd, awkward phrasing and a strange third person narrative style (e.g., "Shaul was uncertain what would happen next") even though he is the author.

Not a brilliantly written story, but it certainly is a brilliantly lived life and worth reading for that.

[Geoffrey Sutton]

I finished reading A Child without a shadow: A story of resilience. The story is peas a memoir of the life of Shaul H. He was a Jewish boy in 1930s Belgium born into a loving and closely knit family until the Nazi invasion robbed him of his parents and an older brother and robbed them of their lives. Shaul survived. The shadow he lost was his early identity along with early memories of what happened in those early years as he was moved from home to home by caring Belgians who risked their lives to save so many Jewish children. Following the war, we learn of a different kind of survival. Shaul goes to Israel where he gets an education but adapting to the new culture is not easy.
The story is compelling. One thing is missing. As a psychologist who has evaluated many children who have survived abuse and neglect, Shaul does not consider the role of intelligence. I agree with him about the power of resilience and the importance of the early nurturance he received before all he’ll broke loose. However, Shaul is an exceptional man who became a leader in his medical field as a clinician and medical researcher. People with high intelligence have a higher capacity to learn from, adapt to, and solve problems more than others. It is not any child who can learn multiple languages, gain entry into medical school, and pass challenging exams.
The only downside to the book is the grammatical errors and structure that interferes with a smooth read. I hope that an editor will be involved in a new edition.

[Barbara Langlois · Rating 2 out of 5]

Major disappointment. I have read a number of memoirs and biographies of Holocaust survivors, people who were hidden or who survived the camps and to market this as such is incorrect. It is a memoir of the author’s life and his Holocaust and post Holocaust experiences are only a very, very small part of this. One of my bigger complaints about this book is it’s like looking at a PowerPoint or reading a PowerPoint presentation; just a bunch of little bullet points with no substance. Most annoying was he wrote the book in the third person even though it is about his own experiences. He refers to himself in the third person as Charlie/Shaul and when recounting something he thought or spoke, will put it in quotation marks with the comment: Charlie said, Charlie thought, so on. Charlie didn’t think or say, Shaul didn’t think or say - you did! The third person narrative was very difficult for me and I kept putting the book down because of it. I did finish it, but came so close to quitting so many different times. There were large portions of the book where I skimmed, sometimes only reading a sentence or two on the page. I did not find his attendance at various professional conferences in the least bit interesting. He may be a very successful, respected Dr within his profession, but I thought he came off sounding like a braggart.

[Anne Brown · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book introduced me to a new part of WWII history - the Jewish children who were hidden from the Nazis. My admiration goes out to these unsung heroes who risked their lives to save these children, most of whom lost most of their families to the hours of concentration camps.

While the book was a bumpy read at times it's hard to deny the inspiring story of a young boy who was taken from his mother's arms at the age of 5 and not reunited with a family member until years later - and then became a renowned physician specializing in pediatric neurology, a field he pioneered. It's testament to the power of the human mind and how a little kindness can have everlasting consequences.

[Joanne Reinhart · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Power of the Mind

The book was recommended to me by a friend.
A window into a painful reality for Shaul. I suffered the traumatic " is of my mother to suicide at the age of 12. Many people have asked me how I came through it seemingly unscathed. I credit most of that to people in my life who loved me through it......Many people. I am not without lasting scars. I believe being diagnosed with Bipolar was a direct result of repression. I am happy to say there is life after the pain.
Resilience is key. You have to want it and work with those who can lift you up.
This book is for anyone who has suffered adversity and needs to know there is a way through it.

[Michael L. · Rating 3 out of 5]

A truly compelling story about one person’s triumph over the horrors of the Nazis during WWII and his eventual rise to world recognition as a ground breaking child neurologist. Unfortunately, this book suffers because it was written in the scientist’s use of the third person, by the inclusion of far too many extraneous details and, most painfully, from the absence of professional editing. The book reads more like a first draft rather than a polished finish product. Too bad, because the story deserves far better.

[Mary Krantzler · Rating 4 out of 5]

Resilience of a young boy

Though not well written the story is amazing. How this young child, separated from his parents at a very early age, in order to save his life, grew up to be a famous Pediatric Neurologist of world renown. His years of being a hidden child, moved from one place to another during the Nazi nightmare, showed his extraordinary strength, because of the love given to him by his parents and siblings. An inspiring story.

[Nancy · Rating 5 out of 5]

emotional, well told, story of resilience

I was captivated by this book. I have always loved history and have read many stories about wwII and this one puts a new perspective in my understanding of this time in history. I wanted to be a part of hiding these children, but wonder if I would be brave enough. Little Charlie, I am so glad you were able to not only survive, but to make a huge positive impact on the world. God Bless

[Mary Augustine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Enjoyed this book! I appreciated how the author handled the terrible situation with the Nazis. I hadn’t realized that people had to hide children to keep them from being killed in the gas chambers.
It was great to read of the successes in life of those who survived. It reminds us of all who were killed by abortion and what the world missed by their deaths.

[Barbara · Rating 5 out of 5]

The truth of the Jewish people

This book is very important to the history of World War II and the plight of the Jewish people in Europe. I only wish that every College student that is protesting today against Israel and the Jewish people could read this memoir and realize the damage of their words and actions. Thank you for sharing your life story.

[BrendaKay · Rating 5 out of 5]

What amazing life!

This book reinforces that we are stronger than we think, this book was excellent. I would advise anyone we really wants to learn about how the Holocaust effected everything and everyone.

[Kathryn Spurgeon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Moving

A touching story about the hidden children, mostly about his personal experience. I sympathized with him and the others. Sometimes tedious in the middle with names and places I couldn’t relate to, I otherwise enjoyed reading this

[Lois Ernst · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Power of Resilience

An amazing book of a man’s sharing of his truth. This is an intimate story of a Holocaust survivor’s life— his “story” and his inner experiences. A Memoir not to be missed.)

[Chelsea · Rating 5 out of 5]

amazing

I have read a lot of books and Holocaust survivors, but this one has been really touching. It is not going notice that this talented doctor worked with children. His compassion and ability empathize with children is profound, given him being robbed of his childhood

[Sharon Kane]

Review

I found this book interesting and sometimes sad as to what the Jewish people went through at the hands of an absolute horrible man (Hitler). The people who helped all the hidden children and give them life were something special.

[Nancy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Harrowing yet heartwarming!

The boy with no shadow left a legacy of medical advances that benefit every child born in the free world today! From hiding in fear, loss of family…from the Nazis to world recognition.

[Charity Knudson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Impact

Hard to believe such monsters walked among us. Could it happen again? I think so. This book should be added to history classes. Dr. Hagel is truly amazing. God did indeed have a special purpose for him.

[Sherry Walljasper · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good read

Tearing your heart out, making you proud of the children and their helper who overcame the horror of possible extenction. Loss of family, grief and sorrow blooming into new lives lived well. Incredible.

[Cathy Yockey]

An inspiring story of hope

Dr Sharel shares his deepest tboughts, hurts, and victories as a Holocaust survivor. Poignantly writer, his story is a testimony to risking all to right the injustices in our world.

[M. Gail Kmieczak · Rating 5 out of 5]

Silent children

Being a child during the holocaust ripped from his family Saul describes how he survived and became a physician that learned how early development can harm a child yet surpassed many and not only told his story but that of many.