Migdal, Yehuda

Son of Leah and Avraham-Chaim. Was born in 1888 in Poland, which was then part of Tsarist Russia. When he was 17, he immigrated to Israel for the first time. In Israel, he worked as a member of the Hashomer and Bar-Giora organizations in the defense of Jewish settlements throughout the country. This was a typical route for the Hehalutz of the Second Aliya. For a while he even belonged to the Shepherds’ Association, whose goal was to organize groups of Jewish shepherds to replace the Arab shepherds who grazed the herds of the moshavot. Yehuda Shemer in Sejera, from there to Migdal, near Tiberias, and here he decided to adopt the family name Towers. He was later sent to Yavne’el and even reached the streets where he took part in a big fight that broke out in Zarnuga between Jews and Arabs. In 1914 he was called by his father to return to Russia because the local authorities complained to his father that Yehuda had not come to the army. At the outbreak of World War I, Yehuda was “stuck” in Poland and could not return to Eretz Israel. He married and the couple had two daughters. In 1922 Yehuda returned to Israel. He settled in Haifa and worked as a member of the “Haganah” of Solel Boneh. He sent his money to his wife and daughters and waited for the moment when she would come to Israel and live together as a united family. His wife, who arrived later, was among the builders of the Haifa-Nazareth highway. Yehuda did not give up his dream of working in agriculture and purchased a piece of land he had cultivated. Due to the general weakness that attacked him, Yehuda was forced to stop the guard duty and opened a kiosk in Haifa. During the bloody riots of 1936-1939, on the 24th of Adar 5738 (March 27, 1938), on his way to his place of work, Yehuda was hit by the bullets of an Arab sniper and died. He was brought to eternal rest in the Haifa cemetery. He left a wife, two daughters and a son. His friends in the Hashomer organization wanted to move his grave to the Shomer section in the Tel Hai cemetery, but his widow objected.