Shraga Har-Gil was born in Germany in the 1920s and emigrated to Mandate Palestine as a child; during the 1940s he joined the Haganah, fought in the 1948 War of Independence and was badly wounded in battle. He married, had children, became a prominent journalist who wrote for the Hebrew daily Ma'ariv, divorced and lives today in Tel Aviv with Ulla, a non-Jewish German woman who is 18 years his junior.

Ulla Gessler was born in Germany in 1944. She married briefly during the 1960s, had children and divorced. She was deeply involved in an organization devoted to reconcilation between Germans and Jews, and that is how she met Shraga; he was invited to address the organization in 1997, and he and Ulla simply clicked immediately. They fell in love, and ultimately Ulla moved to live with Shraga in Tel Aviv.

Around this time, Shraga's son Amir - who has directed several prize-winning documentary films - began to make a film about his father. The idea was to document Shraga's fascinating life story, which parallels the birth and development of the State of Israel. Ultimately, however, the film became a documentary about Shraga and Ulla's love story. It is called "The Art of Living."

About halfway through the film, Ulla tells the following story:

In 1999, about five weeks before she moved to Tel Aviv, Ulla decided to investigate the issue of financial compensation for the factory in East German territory that had been owned by her father and grandfather before and during the war. She telephoned the municipal archives of the town in which the factory had been located, and was told by the archivist, "You will never receive any money for that factory." Why not? asked Ulla. "Because," said the archivist, "That factory manufactured the cannisters for the gas used in the Nazi death camps."

At that point in the film, Ulla's voice catches. She says that she immediately told Shraga the terrible story about her father, and that Shraga's response was, "Don't tell anyone." The camera pans over to Shraga, who is sitting in a chair near the window of his apartment, and shows him smiling with pure embarrassment.

When I met Ulla for coffee a couple of weeks ago, she told me that she had always felt a strong sense of personal guilt about the Holocaust, even though she was only a baby when the war ended and her parents had never discussed the subject. She said that the telephone conversation with the archivist was the realization of her deepest fear, and she sat and cried for hours after hanging up the phone. But in another way, she said, knowing the truth was the beginning of her journey to emotional freedom: freedom from that haunting sense of guilt; freedom from the unhappiness - a distant father, an unsuccessful marriage - that had dogged her all her life; and freedom from the past.

She was disappointed when Shraga told her to keep her discovery a secret, she said, and happy when it came out on film. The making of that film was another step on the road to emotional freedom.

But what really set her free was her love story with Shraga, and the life she has made for herself in Tel Aviv. Shraga, she said, taught her to love life; he is the first man she ever really wanted to be with. She moved here to be with him, but discovered that living in Tel Aviv was another step to freedom. She loves the beach, the cafes, the theatre, the concerts. She loves her weekly classes in Israeli folkdancing, and the circle of friends she has built for herself.

Recently her book, Fifteen Portraits of Israeli Women, was published in Germany. It is a collection of interviews with Israeli women such as Yehudit Katzir, author of Closing the Sea, Ruth Almog and Yehudit Arnon, founder of the Kibbutz Dance Company. I interviewed women with whom I identified, said Ulla, and I let them talk for themselves.

Meanwhile, Shraga has written a film script called "The Jew and the Daughter of the Murderer." It was inspired, of course, by Ulla.

Watching Ulla and Shraga together is really a pleasure. Their love is not sticky and sentimental. It is quite obviously based on enormous mutual respect and caring. And they take genuine joy in each other's company. Shraga has a wicked sense of humour, and tells marvelous stories from the perspective of a slightly cynical veteran journalist.

Here is what you should know about Ulla: She is one of the warmest, bravest, most generous and open women you will ever meet. She glows with happiness and radiates contentment, because she has found love, freedom, intellectual stimulation and self-acceptance at a relatively advanced age.

Next year, on Shraga's eightieth birthday, he and Ulla will be married. Ulla's married name will be Har-Gil Gessler.

"I am comfortable with my name now," she said. "I know now that I am myself, not my father."