Mizrachi, Shabtai

Son of Miriam and Gamliel, was born in 1928 in the Iraqi part of Kurdistan. In 1931, at the age of three, he immigrated with his family to Jerusalem. Although he excelled at his studies, he decided to stop them, despite the plea of ​​his widowed mother, after completing sixth grade in the “Mizrachi” Talmud Torah in the Old City, and to work to help the orphaned family. As a boy he worked in the construction of the family home in the Zichron Yosef neighborhood. During the day he worked in various crafts (metalworker, paint, electrician, builder). In the evenings he studied in vocational school classes and acquired a high school education, and in the meantime he was active in the Haganah and in its training. His friends recognized him as a serious, silent, dedicated and persistent man. At the beginning of the War of Independence he volunteered for full service. He was sent to Sodom and then returned to Jerusalem, completed a reconnaissance course and participated in all the battles and operations. Shabtai fell with some of his comrades in the convoy on their return from Hartuv on the 7th of Adar 2, 5708 (18 March 1948.) He was brought to eternal rest in the cemetery in Sanhedria in Jerusalem.