Weil, Simone (politician)

Simone Jacob was born into a secular Jewish family.

She studied at the Lyceum in Nice , which she graduated in 1944.

On March 30, 1944, at the age of 16, Simon Jacob was arrested by the Gestapo in Nice, together with her sister Madeleine and mother Yvonne, she was imprisoned in the Drancy concentration camp , then they were deported to Germany and were detained in Auschwitz. They were transferred from Auschwitz as Soviet troops approached to Bergen-Belsen, where on March 15, 1945, their mother died of typhus (Simone’s father and brother Jean went missing in Lithuania) ^[6] .

Upon returning to France, she graduated from the Law Faculty of the University of Paris . Licensed in Law, a graduate of the Institute for Political Studies in Paris .

• 1957-1959 - Attache at the Ministry of Justice.
• 1959-1970 - Deputy Head of the Department of the French Ministry of Justice.
• 1968-1969 - Technical Advisor to the Cabinet of Rene Pleven (Keeper of the Seal).
• Since 1970 - General Secretary of the Higher Council of Magistracy.
• Since 1972 - Director of ORTF (French Broadcasting and Television Authority).
• 1974-1976 - Minister of Health of France.
• Since 1977 - Chairman of the Information Council on Nuclear Energy.
• 1976-1979 - Minister of Health, responsible for social security.
• 1979-1993 - Member of the European Parliament .
• 1979-1982 - President of the European Parliament.
• 1982-1984 - Chairman of the Legal Committee of the European Parliament.
• 1984-1989 - Chairman of the group of liberal democrats and reformers of the European Parliament.
• In 1987 - President of the French Committee for the European Year of the Environment.
• In 1988 - President of the European Committee for the Year of European Film and Television.
• 1993-1995 - Minister of State, Minister of Social Affairs, Health and Cities of France.
• 1997-1998 - Chairman of the Supreme Council for Integration.
• 1998-2007 - Member of the Constitutional Council of France .
• Since 2003, member of the Steering Committee of the Trust Fund for Victims, established by decision of the International Criminal Court.

In 2001-2007, Weil was the first chairman of the Holocaust Memorial Foundation, then until her death, honorary chairman ^[7] .

On December 31, 2007, Simone Weil's autobiographical book was published, entitled "Life" ( Fr. Une vie ). The book was sold in the amount of 555,000 copies , translated into fifteen languages ^[8] and received the Green Laurel Award for 2009 ^[9] . On October 9, 2009, at the invitation of Maurice Druon and Francois Jacob Weil, she submitted her candidacy for entry into the French Academy . On November 20, 2008, she was elected in the first round by 22 votes in favor, with 5 abstentions and 2 against (13th chair of Pierre Messmer ) ^[8] .

Since January 11, 2008, on behalf of the President, Nicolas Sarkozy has been preparing a new preamble for the French Constitution, which states that national identity cannot be built on ethnic principles, but this proposal did not find support ^[10] . According to a survey conducted in early 2010, Simone Weil was named the most respected woman in France by respondents ^[11] . After the death of her husband Antoine in April 2013, Simone Weil retired from public life ^[12] .

Simone Weil died on June 30, 2017 at her home, in a Paris apartment, a little before her 90th birthday. On the same day, numerous politicians and public figures, independently from each other, began to appeal to French President Emmanuel Macron with a proposal to bury the remains of Simone Weil in the Paris Pantheon ^[13] . At the same time, two petitions were launched on the Internet for the burial of Weil in the Pantheon - one day they received 120 thousand and the other 110 thousand signatures ^[14] . On July 5, President Emmanuel Macron delivered a speech, announcing that an agreement had been reached with Weil’s relatives to bury her in the Pantheon and to rebury her husband’s ashes with her.

Thus, on July 1, 2018, Simone Weil became the fifth woman buried in the resting place of those whom the French Republic considers its most honored representatives ^{[15] [16]} .

• Grand Officer of the Legion of Honor ( January 1, 2009 ) ^[17]
• Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor ( July 13, 2012 ) ^[18]
• Knight of the National Order of Merit
• British Empire Officer

• Honorary Doctor of Princeton University ( USA , 1975 )
• Honorary Doctor of the Weizmann Institute ( Israel , 1976 )
• Honorary Doctor of the University of Cambridge ( Great Britain , 1980 )
• Yale University Honorary Doctor (USA, 1980)
• Honorary Doctor of Georgetown University (USA, 1981 )
• Honorary Doctor of Urbinsky University ( Italy , 1981)
• Honorary Doctor of the Brussels Free University ( Netherlands , 1984 )
• Honorary Doctor of the University of Glasgow (United Kingdom, 1995 )
• Honorary Doctor of the University of Pennsylvania (USA, 1997 )
• Honorary Doctor of the University of Montreal ( Canada , 2007 )
• Honorary Doctor of the University of Netanya (Israel, 2008 )

• Onassis Foundation Athens Prize (1980)
• Charlemagne Award (1981)
• Eleanor and Franklin Roosevelt Foundation Prize (1984)
• Truman Peace Prize ( Jerusalem , 1991)
• B'Nai B'rith Gold Medal ( Washington , 1993)
• Stresemann Association Gold Medal ( Mainz , 1993)
• World Health Organization Gold Medal "Health for All" (1997)
• Prince of Asturias Prize (2005)
• Laurent Perrier Prize of the Great Age (2005)

• 2014 - Law / La loi, le combat d'une femme pour toutes les femmes (dir. Christian Faure), in ch. the roles of Emmanuelle Devos / Emmanuelle Devos

• 2014 - Simone Weil. Fighting Life / Simone Veil, l'instinct de vie (dir. Laurent Delahouse, Sarah Briand)

• Weil, Simone-Ani - article from the Electronic Jewish Encyclopedia
• Biography on the website of the French Academy (fr.)