Love Odyssey – Fact/Fiction

WHAT IS FACTUAL:

In Love Odyssey, I narrate events about real people with whom I have taken some liberties for literary purposes. Accordingly, please allow me to give you the actual background about these people:

• HENRY JACOBER was Hungarian born and lived in London. He made a good deal of money and became a Lord, and then worked with the Israeli Mossad. In the late 1950’s, he began working with Gheorghiu-Dej (the dictator of Romania before Ceausescu) for the Israeli government, who wanted to get Romanian Holocaust survivors out of Romania and into Israel to populate the new country. 
  • Jacober began his business deals by building for the communist Romanian government, a chicken farm, free of charge, if the government would allow 500 Jewish families to leave for Israel. Jacober understood that the Romanian government liked chickens more than Jews.
  • In 1965, when Gheorghiu-Dej died and Nicolae Ceausescu came into power, Romania owned thousands of chicken, pig, turkey and sheep farms with slaughterhouses, storehouses, packaging plants and fleets of Mercedes trucks and cars to transport the meat. Everything paid for by Henry Jacober on behalf of the Israeli government and the United Jewish Appeal.
  • When Ceasuescu learned about these transactions, he was furious. Not because he was losing his Jews, but that the deals were just bringing in chickens and pigs. He wanted CASH, cold dollars, GOLD. And so, the Israeli government with Henry Jacober as middleman, paid the Romanian government between $2,000 and $25,000 per Jew depending on their education and importance, for visas to Israel. Under Jacober’s dealings, more than 230,000 Romanian Jews emigrated from Romania. Ceausescu received millions of dollars for this business as well as abandoned apartments with furniture and art and vacated jobs from the Jews who were sold.
  • But the trunk-loads of cash and the overseas accounts were not enough for Comrade Ceausescu. The communist leader wanted machine guns, weapons, ammunitions, and war tanks. And when Ceausescu received these, he copied them and made dozens more, selling them to his friends and America’s enemies: Gaddafi and Arafat. And who knows who else?
    
• NICOLAE CEAUSESCU, the communist dictator of Romania from 1965-1989 did not come into power through a coup d’état or revolution, or in Transylvania, or in Transylvanian Trilogy’s imaginary town, Spera. He was officially nominated and elected by the Romanian Communist Party after the death of Gheorghiu-Dej, the previous dictator and his mentor.
  • There are historical events in my novel that did take place: Ceausescu did work closely in a symbiotic Machiavellian system with Arafat, Gaddafi, Sadam Hussein, Ali Bhutto, and Kim Jung II, the “Great Leader” of North Korea. Ceausescu was at the center of all these diabolic leaders as they made billions of dollars from nuclear arms, terrorism, biological warfare, synthetic diamonds, and the sale of human beings. 
  • All their corrupt business deals and atrocities that I narrate in my novel are accurate. Only the dates and sequence of events may have been altered to better fit the chronology within the fictional storyline.
  • In my trilogy, I have used Romania’s dictatorial regimes of Fascism and Communism to create an atmosphere of evil that poisoned all Romanians during these years. One form of totalitarian government led to another: Fascism led to Communism which led to Terrorism. Tall these governments used common lethal techniques: secret police, informers, fear, lies, double-crossing, dehumanization, torture, psychiatric drugs, the destruction of the human soul.
    
• ANNOTATED BIO OF PRESIDENT NICOLAE CEAUSESCU:
  • Ceausescu was the General Secretary (leader) of the Romanian Communist party from 1965 to 1989 and hence the last Communist leader of Romania with his overthrow and execution in December 1989. 
  • His government was considered the most repressive in the Eastern bloc at the time. His secret police, the Securitate, was responsible for human rights abuses and he suppressed and controlled the media and press, implementing methods that were among the harshest, most restrictive and brutal in the world. 
  • Ceausescu worked closely with Arafat, Gaddafi, Sadam Hussein, Ali Bhutto, and Kim Jung II, the “Great Leader” of North Korea. Ceausescu was at the center as they made billions of dollars from nuclear arms, terrorism, biological warfare, synthetic diamonds, and the sale of human beings. 
  • As anti-government protesters demonstrated in Timiosara in December 1989, he perceived the demonstrations as a political threat and ordered military forces to open fire on December 17, causing many deaths and injuries. The revelation that Ceaușescu was responsible resulted in a massive spread of rioting and civil unrest across the country. The demonstrations, which reached Bucharest, became known as the Romanian Revolution- the only violent, bloody overthrow of a communist government in 1989. 
  • Ceaușescu and his wife fled the capital in a helicopter, but they were captured by the military after the armed forces changed sides. After being tried and convicted of economic sabotage and genocide, they were executed by a firing squad on December 25, 1989.  
  • Ceaușescu was succeeded as President by Ion Iliescu, who had played a major part in the revolution, with the help of the American, British and Russian governments. 
    
• IRAN and Iran’s President, Rafsanjani, from 1989-1997, were involved directly with Ceausescu. This was during December 18-21,1989, the time of the Romanian revolution and several days before Ceausescu was executed. Ceausescu went to Tehran to give Rafsanjani all his gold for safekeeping in Rafsanjani’s private bank, the Bank of Tehran. Ceausescu did not trust the secrecy banking laws of Switzerland. In return, Rafsanjani gave Ceausescu a group of Iranian Revolutionary guards to protect him upon returning home to a smoldering revolution. The gold has never been found or claimed by the Romanian government or by anyone else.
  • Rafsanjani was the richest man in Iran until his death in 2017. But before, in December 1989, after Ceausescu deposited his gold in Tehran and died, Rafsanjani had invested large amounts of money to increase his real estate holdings of pistachio farms and expanded his industrial and technical investment portfolio. Until his death, he was very active in Iranian politics and extremely respected, rich and powerful.
    
• ARGENTINA, IRAN and RAFSANJANI  The New York Times: (January 9, 2015; February 7, 2015; March 5, 2015; December 29, 2016) and The New Yorker: (July 30, 2015; January 23, 2015; January 31, 2015; June 29, 2016);  
  • All the above articles report on a cover-up in the murder of Argentine judge, Alberto Nisman, (2015) who was investigating the 1994 terrorist bombings of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires that killed 85 people. The bombing was the worst in Argentine history and was done with the planning of Iran’s President Rafsanjani, Rouhani, the present President, and Hezbollah.
  • Argentina’s previous Presidents, Hector and Christina Kirchner, have covered-up the homicide of judge Nisman and have said it was suicide. As of 2017, Christina Kirchner has been under investigation in Buenos Aires. She has not been indicted and is still active in Argentine politics. 
  • Pope Francis has signed a petition for the investigation of the death of judge Nisman. At the time of the terrorist bombing, Pope Francis was a Jesuit Cardinal for Buenos Aires.

FASCISM in ROMANIA:  

• 2.5 million Romanian Jews were killed during the Holocaust.
• However, the “Bucharest Jews” were saved because General Antonescu, an ally of Hitler and the military leader of Romania during World War ll, kept them alive as he waited to sell them to the highest bidder. U.S. Secretary of Treasury, Henry Morgenthau with Sulzberger of The New York Times, tried to raise money to buy the Jews, but President F.D.R. kept stalling and did not allow the refugees to enter the U.S. during the war.
• After World War ll, Romanian Jewish survivors were “sold” to leave Romania and immigrate to Israel, Canada and the U.S. Ceausescu received cash for each person from the Israeli Mossad, as well as their real estate holdings, art, treasures, and jobs.
• There is an official report made by President, Basescu and Elie Wiesel (2010) about Fascism in Romania, with the Romanian government’s confirmation of their guilt and war crimes. This report was one of the requirements for Romania’s entry into the European Union.

COMMUNISM in ROMANIA: 

• More than 2 million Romanians were killed during the period, 1948-1989. (The New York Times, September 30, 2013).
• The end of Communism in Romania was achieved by the only “bloody revolution” of the Eastern European countries in 1989.
• Romania’s secret police, Securitate, was as lethal as East Germany’s, Stasi.

TERRORISM in ROMANIA:   

• Arafat, Gaddafi and Ceausescu established terrorist and nuclear programs together. Gaddafi was the banker. Ceausescu trained Arafat’s PLO’s in Romania and Ceausescu established atomic energy facilities and nuclear research centers in Magurlele and Cernavoda, Romania.
• Ceausescu served as intermediary for Norway to sell heavy water to India for India’s centrifuges (used as a coolant) and nuclear development program, which would have been for Norway a breach of international law and IAEA rulings.
• Gaddafi information taken from Wikileaks Information: Gaddafi and Ceausescu meet in Tripoli and do business together at the time there is bombing in Paris and the bombing of Radio Free Europe in Munich. Gaddafi is blamed.
• Ion Iliescu, former President of Romania after Ceausescu (1989-1996; 2000- 2004), was a student-friend of Gorbachev in Moscow. He worked behind the scene with Gorbachev and President Regan, Prime Minister Thatcher, and Pope John Paul to overthrow Ceausescu. He was rewarded by becoming Romania’s president after the execution of Ceausescu.
• Pakistan’s former President, Ali Bhutto, arranged for Dr. Khan to go to Holland to work for URENCO, (manufacturer of enriched uranium for nuclear power utilities worldwide) where Dr. Khan stole secret blueprints for high-speed nuclear centrifuges and then returned with his Dutch wife to Islamabad to establish an atomic center. He became Pakistan’s Father of nuclear warfare.
• Ceausescu did the same thing at the same time and sent one of his spies to URENCO in Germany to steal blueprints and set up an atomic center with centrifuges in Cernavoda, Romania. His engineer son became director of the nuclear facility.
• The Romanian Revolution is re-enacted in the novel, Love Odyssey, as it began in Timisoara and spread to the capital, Bucharest. The dates and sequence of events are accurate.

WHAT IS FICTION:

• There was no doctor who worked within Ceausescu’s government to begin the revolution or to overthrow the dictator.
• The Love story and characters do not resemble anyone in History or in the present.

REAPPEARANCE OF FICTIONAL CHARACTERS.

OUR 4 HEROINES ARE 24 YEARS OLDER THAN WHEN WE FIRST MEET THEM IN THE GIFT OF DIAMONDS

• Mica:  is married to André, a cardiologist at New York Hospital and they have twin sons. Mica is a choreographer for the Martha Graham student troupe and is also helping Romanian orphans as a Goodwill Ambassador with UNICEF. Her U.N. contacts help her and her friends, the Four Musketeers, support the Romanian revolution of 1989.
• Anca: The main female protagonist of Love Odyssey, is a pediatrician at New York Hospital. She returns to Romania to save her ex-husband from post-revolutionary rebels. She is helped by her Gypsy friend in Transylvania who unknown to Anca, works secretly with the C.I.A.
• Marina: emigrated from Romania to New York City with Mica’s help. Marina is a botanist-chemist and came to America to become an entrepreneur in Cosmetics. She brought with her from Transylvania secret creams used by Gypsies and magic elixirs to stay young and beautiful. Her fortune helps finance the Romanian revolution.
• Cristina: emigrated from Romania to Paris and with Mica’s help, she remained in Paris to become a well-known fashion designer. Her story and Marina’s story is the subject of the third novel of the Trilogy, TREASURE HUNT, as the four friends are untied and seal their friendship and achievements as they celebrate with their motto – We are the Poets of Our Lives.

PHOTOS OF WORLD LEADERS WITH CEAUSESCU:

I have included below some photos from Ceausescu’s regime of 24 years when he was at the peak of his power. I have found these photos on Googles Image and Public Domain. I believe a picture is worth a 1,000 words.

Gheorghe Zamfir–Invertita