Haim Hallala Cohen

Life and remembrance

Haim Hallala Cohen was a department-store accountant. Contemporary accounts remember a 39-year-old family man who remained in Beirut and believed that the relationships of ordinary Lebanese life still mattered despite the violence around him.

He was abducted on 29 March 1985. His body was recovered in December near the entrance to Wadi Abu Jamil, the neighborhood that had long been the institutional heart of Jewish Beirut.

Memorial record

Community role

A husband, father, and working member of the community

Kidnapped

29 March 1985

Reported fate

Killed in December 1985; his body was recovered

Record status

Body recovered

Also recorded as

Haim Halala Cohen, Haim Hallal Cohen

Research note: Some period reports give different descriptions of his work. The dates and recovery location here follow Schulze's consolidated account.

Sources and research notes

Primary source: Kirsten E. Schulze, The Jews of Lebanon: Between Coexistence and Conflict, 2nd revised and expanded edition (2009), printed pages 170–175; PDF pages 103–106.

Kirsten E. Schulze attributes the campaign to the Organization of the Oppressed of the Earth, a group that claimed links with Hizb'allah. Contemporary accounts differ on some dates, occupations, spellings, and the fate of individual victims; those differences are preserved rather than silently resolved.

• Jewish Telegraphic Agency — background report (1986)
• American Jewish Committee archival report (1985)
• L'Orient-Le Jour — the Jamous family appeal (2025, French)