Yigal Allon, 1918-1980
Allon led the Palmach and was an IDF major general who oversaw the Southern Command. He served in the Knesset from 1955 until his death. After the 1967 war, he proposed returning the West Bank…
Shulamit Aloni, 1928-2014
Founder of the Meretz party, Aloni was known for advocating for peace and for human and civil rights, especially as a voice for women and against Orthodox control of society. She fought in the Palmach…
Yocheved Bat-Miriam, 1901-1980
Bat-Miriam, born in Belarus, is considered one of the four “mother poets” of modern Hebrew. Her 1937 book, “Eretz Yisrael,” examines the Land of Israel as a woman. She wrote many poems about biblical women…
David Ben-Gurion, 1886-1973
Ben-Gurion was Israel’s first prime minister and its leading political force for two decades. Born in Poland, he arrived in Palestine in 1907. He formed socialist-leaning Mapai, the dominant political party, in 1930 and became…
Ralph Bunche, 1904-1971
Bunche, an American diplomat, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1950 for brokering the armistice agreements between Israel and four Arab neighbors in 1949. He served in 1947 with the U.N. Special Committee on Palestine,…
Harry Truman, 1884-1972
The 33rd U.S. president, Truman had the United States vote for the U.N. partition plan for Palestine in November 1947 and made the United States the first country to recognize the State of Israel in…
Charles Winters, 1913-1984
A U.S. businessman who wasn’t Jewish, Winters bought three surplus U.S. B-17 bombers on the pretense that they were for his Caribbean transport service. Instead, he delivered them to the nascent Israeli Air Force in…
Yigael Yadin, 1917-1984
Yadin was a military commander and an archaeologist. He led the Negev campaign against the Egyptians in the War of Independence and served as the second IDF chief of staff from 1949 to 1952. He…
