My friend Eric Levy, who has died aged 94, was a teacher, an activist and a tireless campaigner for human rights.
He was one of more than 500 “human shields” who went to Baghdad in 2003 to try to stop the war and – when that failed – to attempt to prevent the targeting of Iraqi civilian infrastructure sites. He later told me he had no regrets. “We may have failed to stop the invasion, but by putting ourselves in harm’s way, we sent a clear message to the world.”
Born in Manchester to Jewish-Egyptian parents – Theo, a cotton trader, and Violette (nee Riches) - he moved to Cairo aged six but, with war clouds gathering, was sent to school in Switzerland. After attending a small, private boarding school there he returned to England but, finding the British class system stifling, he emigrated to the US, full of ideals.
Eric’s American dream did not last long. Arriving at a time of McCarthyism, the second Red Scare, Jim Crow laws and the outbreak of the Korean war, Eric later recalled: “It took me a year and a half to change from being for the US state to being against it. Against their foreign policy in Korea”. His involvement in the growing anti-war and civil rights movements there would prove the start of a lifelong participation in the struggle for peace and justice around the world. While living in LA, Eric met LaFlorya Gauthier; they married in 1958 and had a daughter, Susan. After their divorce, Eric settled in London where he worked as a teacher.
An accomplished bass-baritone singer himself, Eric was deeply moved by the music of the activist and singer Paul Robeson. He met Robeson several times while living in the US and recalls how, on one occasion, activists surrounded him to shield him from possible white supremacist snipers.
It was this act of courage – putting one’s body in possible harm’s way for a principle – that Eric would emulate in 2003 when he travelled to Iraq.
In recent years, after returning to London, Eric became one of most recognisable figures at protests calling for the release of Julian Assange, and in January 2021 made headlines when he was arrested for breaking Covid-19 regulations at a protest outside Westminster magistrates court.
Always optimistic about the possibility of change, Eric once said: “If you want an example of courage look at that day where, despite the snipers on the hill, Paul Robeson stood tall surrounded by a shield of humanity, and sang St Louis Blues.”
He is survived by Susan, a granddaughter and a great-granddaughter.
