Yitzchak Ben Zwi

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Jizchak Ben Zwi, 1952

Jizchak Ben Zwi ( Hebrew יצחק בן צבי; originally Isaak Shimshilevich ; born on December 6, 1884 in Poltava , Russian Empire , today Ukraine ; died April 23, 1963 in Jerusalem ) was an Israeli historian, politician of the Zionist labor movement, and from 1952 to 1963 the second president of Israel .

Life

The Poalei Tzion members: Ostrovsky, Kaplan, Barels and Jizchak Ben Zwi (back right), 1917

Jizchak Ben Zwi was the eldest son of the Jewish scholar and author Zwi Schimschi Schimschelewitz. While still in Ukraine, he was active in underground Jewish units that were founded to protect Jews during the pogroms of 1905.

After participating in the founding of the Marxist-Zionist party Po'alei Tzijon in the Russian Empire , Ben Zwi went to Jaffa in Palestine in 1907 and helped to set up the underground organization HaSchomer . Ben Zwi worked as a teacher; together with Rachel Janait , he organized the grammar school in Jerusalem in 1909 .

From 1912 to 1914 studied Ben-Zvi, together with David Ben Gurion Jura in Istanbul . After they returned to Palestine in August 1914, they were expelled from the country by the Ottoman authorities in 1915. Both moved to New York , took part in Zionist activities and founded the Hechalutz movement there. Together they wrote the Yiddish book Eretz Israel Past and Present to promote Zionism in the United States .

After he was able to return to Palestine in 1918, he married Rachel Yannait, with whom he had two sons, Amram and Eli. Eli died in the War of Independence defending his kibbutz, Beit Keschet .

Ben Zwi was first a Marxist , then a social democrat . In 1919 Ben Zwi was one of the founders of the Achdut haAwoda party . He was later elected to the City Council of Jerusalem. In 1921 he founded the Histadrut union with David Ben Gurion and others, and in 1930 the Mapai workers' party . In 1924 the Hagana had the pacifist writer de Haan murdered by Avraham Tehomi . Tehomi, who admitted the fact, claimed that Ben Zwi had approved the murder assignment.

From 1931 to 1948 Ben Zwi was President of the Jewish National Council (Wa'ad Le'umi - the parliamentary body before the state was founded) and organized the Hagana. In his capacity as President of the Yishuv , Ben Zwi took part in the coronation of George VI on May 12, 1937 . part.

Ben Zwi is one of the signatories of the Israeli Declaration of Independence of May 14, 1948 and became a member of the first Israeli parliament in 1949 . In the first and second Knesset he was the representative of the Mapai people . After the death of Chaim Weizmann , he was elected second President of Israel on December 8, 1952 . He was re-elected twice as president and held this office until his death in 1963. During all that time he lived in a modest wooden hut in Jerusalem.

Ben Zwi was a recognized researcher of Jewish history , ethnology, and the history of the Holy Land. The Ben-Zvi Institute for the Study of the History of Israel and Jewish Groups in North Africa and the Middle East bears his name.

It is depicted on the 100 shekel banknote.

The writer Aharon Reuveni was Ben Zwi's brother.

Works

  • געזאמלטע שריפטן. New York:פועלי ציון פאלעסטינע, 1937.
  • מיט דער צווייטער עליה. Buenos Aires:קיום, 1956. (with A. Fisher פישער)
  • ארץ-ישראל אין פארגאנגענהייט און געגענווארט. New York:פועלי ציון פאלעסטינע, 1918. (with Ben-Gurion בן-גוריון)

Individual evidence

  1. Shlomo Nakdimon, Shaul Mayzlish:דה האן - הרצח הפוליטי הראשון בארץ ישראל, Tel Aviv: הוצאת מודן, 1985; P. 203 ff.
  2. ^ Mordecai Naor: Eretz Israel , Könemann, Cologne, 1998, ISBN 3-89508-594-4 , page 202.
  3. Aharon Reuveni at ITHL
  4. cf. Seraj Assi: Should Palestinians 'Return' to Judaism? In: Haaretz , June 10, 2018.

Web links

Commons : Jizchak Ben Zwi  - collection of images, videos and audio files