Abraham Swaap was born on 10 March 1923 in Amsterdam as a son of Meijer Swaap and Branca Jacobs. He married Celina Delden in Amsterdam on 5 August 1942, a daughter of Aron Delden and Marianne Waas, who was born on 24 August 1921.
Abraham survived the Holocaust; he was “gesperrt” – exempted from deportation by the Jewish Council and became the 1st clerk in the grocery shop of Eliazer and Sophia Talhuizen at Waterlooplein 74. On 1 April 1943 he was transferred as night watchman to the food preparation department of the Jewish Council.
It was Abraham Swaap himself, who informed the authorities on 9 January 1946, that he stayed at the address Kromme Waal 12 2nd floor in Amsterdam.
His wife Celina Delden became a victim of the raid on Hollandia Kattenburg on 11 November 1942, together with her sister Lena. They eventually ended up together in Westerbork on 26 November, where their parents Aron Delden and Marianne Waas had already been taken on 14 November. They were all deported to Auschwitz on 30 November 1942. Upon arrival there, Aron Delden was selected as a forced laborer and eventually died on 31 December 1944 in the Extern Kommando Blechhammer.
Abraham's parents, Meijer Swaap and Branca Jacobs, who also lived on Waterlooplein in Amsterdam, were deported on 2 October 1942 from Westerbork to Auschwitz where they were immediately murdered in the gas chambers on 5 October 1942.
Meantime mother Marianne Delden-Waas and both her daughters Lena and Celina were immediately murdered in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau upon arrival there on 3 December 1942.
Sources include the City Archive of Amsterdam, family registration card of Meijer Swaap; archive cards of Abraham Swaap, Aron Delden and Celina Delden and the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Abraham Swaap, Celina Swaap-Delden, Meijer Swaap, Branca Swaap-Jacobs, Aron Delden and Marianne Delden-Waas.