Gen. Haim Bar-Lev Is Born
November 16, 1924 Haim Bar-Lev, an Israel Defense Forces chief of staff, is born in Vienna, Austria. His family moves to Yugoslavia before settling in Palestine in 1939. He studies at the Mikveh Israel agricultural…
Shimon Peres Is Born
The only politician in Israeli history to hold the positions of both President and Prime Minister, Shimon Peres is born in Belorussia to Yitzchak and Sara Perski.
Supreme Court Justice Shoshana Netanyahu Is Born
Retired Israeli Supreme Court Justice Shoshana Netanyahu, the second woman to serve on Israel’s highest court, is born in the free city of Danzig (Gdnask, Poland).
Yitzhak Rabin Is Born
Yitzhak Rabin, Israel’s 5th Prime Minister, is born in Jerusalem to parents who came to Israel during the Third Aliyah. He is the first Israeli Prime Minister to be born in Eretz Yisrael.
Yitzhak Navon Is Born
Yitzhak Navon, Israel’s fifth President, is born in Jerusalem.
Shas Rabbi Ovadia Yosef Is Born
September 23, 1920 Ovadia Yosef, a Sephardi rabbi, politician and community leader, is born in Baghdad. He moves from Iraq to Jerusalem at age 4 with his family. While studying at Porat Yosef Yeshiva, he…
Yigael Yadin Born
March 20, 1917 Yigael Yadin, a general also known for his archaeological work, is born in Jerusalem. His father is an archaeologist, and his mother is a women’s rights activist. Yadin joins the Haganah when…
Chaim Weizmann Joins British Admiralty
Chaim Weizmann, first President of Israel, then working as a chemist in Manchester, England, is appointed to the British Admiralty as an Honorary Technical Adviser on acetone supplies.
Abba Eban Is Born
Israeli politician, diplomat, historian, and writer Abba Eban is born in Cape Town, South Africa.
Revisionist Zionist Shmuel Katz Is Born
Shmuel Katz, a leader of Revisionist Zionism and a founder of the Herut Party in Israel, is born in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Teddy Kollek Is Born
Teddy Kollek, Zionist leader and long-time mayor of Jerusalem, is born in Nagyvázsony, Hungary.
Justice Haim Herman Cohn Born
March 11, 1911 Haim Herman Cohn, a lifelong fighter for human rights who organizes Israel’s judicial system, is born in Lubeck, Germany. As a child, Cohn studies Hebrew and the Talmud with his grandfather, then…
David Ben-Gurion Arrives in Jaffa
David Gruen, who in 1910 would change his name to David Ben-Gurion, and his girlfriend Rachel Nelkin arrive in Jaffa with a group of other young adults from Plonsk, Poland.
Labor Politician Aharon Zisling Born
February 26, 1901 Aharon Zisling, one of Israel’s founding fathers, is born in the Russian Empire in Minsk, now the capital of Belarus. He immigrates to Palestine in 1914 during the Second Aliyah and emerges…
Politician Ya’akov Hazan Is Born
June 4, 1899 Ya’akov Hazan, a leader in socialist politics through Israel’s first four decades, is born in Brest Litovsk, Russia. He is a founder of the Hashomer Hatzair scouting movement in Poland in 1915…
Levi Eshkol Is Born in Ukraine
Israel’s third prime minister, Levi Eshkol, is born Levi Shkolnik into a Hasidic family near Kyiv, Ukraine.
Prime Minister Moshe Sharett Is Born
Moshe Sharett is born as Moshe Shertok in Kherson, Ukraine. Sharett’s parents were early Zionists, having been involved in the BILU movement in the early 1880’s.
Avraham (Granot) Granovsky Is Born
Avraham (Granot) Granovsky, a signatory of the Israeli Declaration of Independence and Director-General of the Jewish National Fund, is born in Moldova.
Joseph Sprinzak Is Born
Joseph Sprinzak, who would serve as the first Speaker of the Knesset and twice as Interim President, is born in Moscow, Russia.
