Ammami (Kolkin), Eliyahu

Son of Ita and Yitzhak. He was born in the city of Mariupol in the Ukraine on September 28, 1898. In his youth he received Torah education and excelled in all his studies, and was later accepted to the Technion in Rostov, the machinery department. He later joined the “Tse’irey Zion” association and, with the founding of Hechalutz, abandoned his studies and other occupations and immersed himself in public work. In 1920 he set out with the first of the Third Aliyah via the Caucasus to Eretz Yisrael and arrived in Eretz Israel after many incarnations in October 1921. He joined the “Ha-Emek Ha’emek” in Eretz Israel and worked on the Afula-Nazareth road in Dir-el-Balah, Sejera, Balfuria and Kfar Yehezkel. In his work he showed great diligence, initiative and intelligence. He worked as a guide in organizing fishers, worked in carpentry, developed the machinery garage and set up a locksmith’s workshop for various crafts. He was also a member of the national council of the Hapoel sports association and later joined the Haganah, where he devoted himself to security problems. During the 1936-1939 riots he was a corporal of the Gafririm and taught various courses. As part of his job he accompanied the “Tower and Stockade” rises of Nir-David, Sde Nahum, Maoz Haim and others. After the outbreak of World War II he was one of the first to enlist in the British army despite his high age. At his initiative, a group of tractor operators was established, most of them from the Jewish workers’ union, which was the nucleus of Unit 870 for mechanical engineering equipment. After a training period in the Sarafand camp, the unit was sent to Syria, where in the winter of 1942 it was engaged in paving roads and fortifications in the areas of Kuneitra and Marjayoun. On 21 Shvat, February 8, 1942, while serving in Marjayoun, he died in a road accident. He was buried in the cemetery in Ein Harod. He left a wife, two sons and a daughter. His biography and activities were published in a memoir published by members of Ein Harod; In the book “History of the Haganah,” and the organization of the workers in his honor devoted a book called “The Engine, the Car and the Tractor.”