Georges Brunschvig

[2] In 1934, he founded a law firm on the Marktgasse in Bern and married his childhood friend Odette Wyler, with whom he had two daughters.

[1] As president of the Bernese Jewish community and a board member of the SIG, Brunschvig was among the first in Switzerland to receive word of the deportation of German Jews to extermination camps.

[1][4] However, his and the SIG's efforts to stop the expulsion of Jewish refugees to Germany by Swiss authorities were largely fruitless.

[1][4] This incident caused Brunschvig to abandon the restraint he had previously imposed upon himself so as not to lose what influence he had with the authorities.

[2] In 1969, he successfully defended Mordechai Rachamim, an El Al sky marshal who had shot and killed a Palestinian terrorist after the man had opened fire on passengers in Zürich Airport.

In 1967, he and his friend Reynold Tschäppät, by then mayor of Bern, convinced Bernese commercial leaders to launch a Bratwurst campaign in support of Israel, with one franc per sausage sold going to the Jewish state.