Barzani and Ziva

She is the eldest daughter of Hadya and Moshe (the rest of the children are boys). She was born on February 27, 1926, in Mosul, Iraq, and immigrated to Israel with her family in 1935. In Jerusalem, she studied until the age of 16 in the Rivka Somekh school. Ziva was forced to stop her studies and work as a seamstress to support the large family of ten, but in the evenings she continued her studies. Since sewing did not support the large family, she went to work in the kitchen of the Hadassah Hospital on Mount Scopus. Her parents, who suffered greatly, wanted to return to Iraq in 1944, but their daughter prevented them from doing so and left her in Jerusalem. She wanted to join the Haganah during the struggle, but she agreed to her parents’ request not to do so, since she was the family’s only support. With the United Nations General Assembly resolution of 29 November 1947 and the beginning of the Arab attacks, she enlisted together with all the Hadassah employees in the ranks of the Hagana. In those days, the attacks on the roads and the cars going up to Mount Scopus increased. Her parents urged her to leave the hospital because of the danger. “It is the duty of every young wife, whose hand does not have a weapon, to help the wounded and bring them back to battle,” was her answer. The road to Mount Scopus passed through the Arab Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood and when the war broke out, the movement was allowed to mount convoys secured by the British army. On the morning of April 13, 1948, a convoy left for Mount Scopus, after the British promised that the road was open and safe. The convoy encountered an Arab ambush in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood and hundreds of Arabs hurled heavy gunfire at it. Some of the vehicles managed to get out and return, but two buses, an ambulance and an escort vehicle were ambushed. For many hours the convoy members fought and tried to prevent the Arabs from approaching the vehicles. Fire from our positions in the city and Mount Scopus, as well as armored vehicles sent to the area, failed to help the convoy. British military forces in the area did not intervene and did nothing to help, despite appeals to them. In the afternoon, the Arabs managed to set fire to two buses on their passengers, and only late in the evening the British intervened and rescued the survivors from the trapped vehicles. Ziva’s mother, who saw her on the way out, stood and watched the battle and the destruction of the caravan between her passengers and her daughter. Ziva was brought to rest in the cemetery in Sanhedria, Jerusalem.