Babich Maria

Babich, Mariya During the German occupation Mariya Babich helped some Jews who were incarcerated in the ghetto of Równe, Wołyń (today Rivne, Volyn District). Babich also sheltered a Jewish baby in her home and raised her for four years, taking care of all her needs. The baby’s mother, Mina Osipow, perished during the Aktion on November 6, 1941, but her father, Itzhak Osipow, who served in the Red Army, returned to Równe after the war and found his daughter Irit alive thanks to Babich. Irit was the only surviving member of Osipow’s entire extended family. Thereafter, Babich became part of the Osipow family and she later immigrated with them to Israel. When Yad Vashem recognized Babich’s wartime deeds, she became one of the first to plant a tree in the institution’s Avenue of the Righteous Among the Nations. When Babich died, in 1971, she was buried in the cemetery on the grounds of the Russian monastery for women in Ein Kerem, Jerusalem. On 30 May 1978, Yad Vashem recognized Mariya Babich as Righteous Among the Nations.