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March 1, 2002/Adar 17, 5762, Vol. 54, No. 24
Journalist Pearl was 'gentle soul' - and son of Israelis
TOM TUGEND
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
LOS ANGELES - Until the very last moment, the family of murdered journalist Daniel Pearl never lost hope that he would be released by his Pakistani kidnappers and return safely.
Dr. Judea Pearl, and his wife, Ruth, said in a statement that they simply could not believe that anyone could harm a son they described as "such a gentle soul" and as "the musician, the writer, the storyteller, the bridge builder."
The family's unflagging hope was best illustrated in an e-mail message the father sent to members of a local Israeli choir on Feb. 21, only a few hours before the U.S. State Department confirmed the brutal slaying of the Wall Street Journal reporter.
The family's grief has been shared by a circle of Daniel Pearl's close friends, many of whom date their friendship back to shared school days in the Los Angeles area.
"The Pearls are not affiliated with a synagogue, but they are deeply attached to their heritage and very cognizant of who they are," said Gary Foster, the family spokesman.
Israeli newspapers reported that Daniel Pearl had celebrated his bar mitzvah at the Western Wall.
A private memorial service is planned for March 3.
Some of Daniel Pearl's closest friends were fellow backpackers between 1978-1981 in the Explorer Post, a co-ed affiliate of the Boy Scouts of America.
One was Rachel Knopoff, now a Manhattan Beach, Calif., physician, who remembers Pearl as "the greatest guy I have ever known. I had a huge crush on him, and so probably did most of the girls in the troop. He was the funniest, smartest, nicest guy I ever met."
At Birmingham High in Van Nuys, Calif., whose current student body observed a minute of silence in honor of their slain alumnus, Pearl "was the teen-ager everyone wanted to be," observed the Los Angeles Daily News.
Pearl grew up in a family that nourished the intellectual and musical talents he was to display later on.
After graduating from the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, Judea Pearl and his wife Ruth, an electrical engineer, moved to Princeton, N.J., where their son was born in 1963.
During the month following Pearl's kidnapping, there was deep concern that publication of his family's Israeli roots would further endanger his life.
Foster, the spokesman, and other representatives of Dow Jones, the Wall Street Journal's parent company, worked intensively behind the scenes in New York, Los Angeles and overseas to alert news organizations to the danger inherent in publishing the names of Pearl's parents, or their background.
Since the death announcement, it has become known that Pearl's parents carry dual American and Israeli citizenship.
Although Daniel Pearl was born in the United States and always considered himself solely an American, Israeli law considers him an Israeli citizen as well.
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