Dichinger, Menashe (Willi)

Son of Yehoshua-Felix. He was born on May 7, 1920, in a small town in a small Jewish community of forty-eight, mostly assimilated. His father was one of the first Zionists in the area and for decades worked for the idea and the Zionist enterprise. He also educated his children in this spirit, and when Menashe was ten, he began to study Hebrew. He later organized the Maccabi Hatzair branch in the town and was active there throughout his stay there. On the day of the annexation of Austria by the Germans, his father was taken to the Buchenwald concentration camp. Menashe continued his Zionist activities and in December 1938 emigrated to Eretz Israel. Two months after his immigration, he joined the “Alonim” group, where he was a member of Haganah. At the same time, he received word from his mother that his relatives in America had prepared documents and money to allow him to come to the United States, but he rejected the offer altogether. On the morning of the 22nd of Adar (13.3.1939), he left with two of his colleagues and on the way they boarded a mine and Menashe was killed on the spot. Menashe was buried together with his friend Eliyahu in the cemetery of Kibbutz Alonim.