Aba Dunner

Aba (Avrohom Moshe) Dunner (13 November 1937 – 17 July 2011) was a social and religious activist, who represented and worked for the interests of European Jewry, first as the personal assistant to Rabbi Dr. Solomon Schonfeld, then as Secretary to the British office of Agudat Israel, and in his latter years as Executive Director of the Conference of European Rabbis. Although born in pre-war Europe, Aba spent the majority of his life in England, where he was active in both communal work and the business world.

Aba Dunner was born in Koenigsberg (today known as Kaliningrad), then part of Germany, on 13 November 1937. His father was Rabbi Josef Hirsch Dunner, a scion of the distinguished Dunner family of Cologne, and from 1936 chief rabbi of East Prussia. His mother, Ida, was the daughter of Dr Wilhelm (Zev) Freyhan, a leading member of the Jewish community of Breslau, and one of the original founders of Agudat Israel at the Kattowitz Conference of 1912. Ida's mother came from the illustrious Hackenbroch family of Frankfurt-am-Main; her great-grandfather was part of the original strictly orthodox group who split off from the main community and invited Rabbiner Samson Rafael Hirsch to lead a breakaway community.

As the officially recognised Jewish religious leader of East Prussia, Josef Dunner was arrested on Kristallnacht; the Nazis were unable to transport him to concentration camp in Germany, however, as the Poles would not allow the transfer of political prisoners through the Polish Corridor. As the Nazi authorities considered their options, Ida got in contact with Solomon Schonfeld, and was able to obtain through him a rabbi’s visa, enabling the small family to come to England via the Netherlands in December 1938. On arrival in London, the Dunners settled briefly in Golders Green. Before very long Josef was asked to become the rabbi of Westcliff, until 1940, when he was briefly interned as an enemy alien on the Isle of Man. On his release, Josef was appointed as a rabbi to immigrant and evacuated Jews in Leicester, where the family remained until 1947.

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