The Israeli women who caught the monster of the Bois de Boulogne

Episode 43 of the podcast 'Digging Journalism' tells the story of Bina Feiner and Ora Yosha, two childhood friends from Givatayim who were discharged from the IDF and embarked on a hitchhiking trip across Europe in the summer of 1963. In the Bois de Boulogne forest in France, they got a ride from a driver of a blue Dauphine, who sexually assaulted them and robbed them of all their belongings. The two escaped, Ora wrote down the car's license plate, and reporting it to the police led within 48 hours to the arrest of Albert Thibault, a married printer and father of three, dubbed by the media "the monster of the Bois de Boulogne."

Episode 43 of the podcast 'Digging Journalism' brings the story of Bina Feiner and Ora Yosha, two childhood friends from Givatayim, aged 20, who were discharged from the IDF and set out on an adventure hitchhiking across Britain, France, and Switzerland in the summer of 1963. During a trip in France, they got a ride from a blue Dauphine in the Bois de Boulogne forest. The driver, Albert Thibault, 42, a married printer and father of three, sexually assaulted them and robbed them of all their belongings — passports, money, and ship tickets. The two escaped from the car screaming, and Ora wrote down the license plate number. Despite skepticism from the head of the criminal investigations department, the number turned out to be correct. Within 48 hours, Thibault was arrested, dubbed by the French media "the monster of the Bois de Boulogne," after having robbed about 20 young female tourists from Norway, Germany, England, and the United States. The episode also describes the indifferent treatment the two received at the Israeli embassy in Paris, where they were told "go hitchhike" after the incident.