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JTA — When she received the privilege of representing Puerto Rico within the Miss Universe contest, Michelle Marie Colon spoke of her delight in making historical past as the primary Black girl from the territory to grab the honour.
This week in Israel, the place the competition is being held, she has been touting delight in one other side of her heritage: her Jewish great-grandfather who escaped the Holocaust.
Final week, Colon posted a photograph of her holding arms with Noa Cochva, the Israeli entrant into the competition, beneath a wall lined with portraits of victims of the Holocaust.
“My nice grandfather, Rodolfo Cohn, was a survivor of the Holocaust,” Colon wrote. “He moved to the Caribbean and met Dorila Thomas, my nice grandmother; an empowered Afro-Caribbean girl — descendant of slaves — who was the administrator of a farm on the time. Collectively, they shaped a stable household full of affection, constructed upon empathy and resilience.”
She had informed the story in an impromptu discuss whereas the contestants toured Yad Vashem, the nationwide Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem. Dani Dayan, the memorial’s chairman, posted a video on Twitter on Saturday and it quickly went viral.
“I got here right here to Israel realizing that I might be extra linked to my household as a result of my [great] grandfather really escaped from the Holocaust and all of his different members of the family, his sisters, his brothers, even their daughters — 4 daughters — had been killed within the focus camps, particularly in Auschwitz,” Colon stated.
Dayan stated Colon, a 21-year previous pre-med pupil, “shocked her fellow Miss Universe contestants (and likewise Yad Vashem workers).”
Colon’s feedback come at a time when advocates are in search of to show the pageant, scheduled for Dec. 12 in Eilat, right into a political referendum on Israel.
Palestinian advocates have known as for contestants to boycott the competitors, however solely Malaysia and Indonesia have thus far dedicated to doing so.
In the meantime, South Africa’s contestant is attending regardless of stress from the South African authorities to boycott Israel. As well as, this 12 months’s competitors will function a contestant from the United Arab Emirates for the primary time, and a contestant from Morocco for the primary time in many years. Each of these international locations signed diplomatic normalization agreements with Israel in 2020.
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