Dan Vittorio Segre (1922–2014)

Dan Vittorio Segre (also called Vittorio Dan Segre), born in Rivoli, Italy, grew up under Fascism in an affluent, assimilated Jewish family. In 1938, after the introduction of Mussolini's anti-Jewish laws, he fled to the British Mandate of Palestine. There he added the Hebrew name Dan to his own. In World War II, he enlisted in the Jewish Brigade of the British Army, then became an officer in the military of the new State of Israel during the 1948 War of Independence. He served for many years as an Israeli diplomat, a press attaché in Paris, and head of the international division of Israel's public radio service Kol Yisrael. He went on to teach international relations at Oxford University, the University of Haifa, Stanford, MIT, and Bocconi University in Milan. In 1998, Prof. Segre founded the Institute of Mediterranean Studies at the Italian Swiss University of Lugano, and served as its first director. For decades, he also was a journalist for major French and Italian papers such as Le Figaro, Corriere della Sera, and Il Giornale, often using the pseudonym René Bauduc in honor of the surname of his wife Rosetta Bauducco. Prof. Segre wrote numerous books, including three volumes of autobiography: Storia di un ebreo fortunato (Memoirs of a Fortunate Jew, 1985, a bestseller); Il bottone di Molotov: storia di un diplomatico mancato (Memoirs of a Failed Diplomat, 1989); and Storia dell'ebreo che voleva essere eroe (Story of the Jew Who Who Wanted to be a Hero, 2014).