Nasser, Ezra (“Aziz”)

Son of Pircha and Rafael. He was born in 1920 in Orfa, Turkey. When he was two, the family moved to Aleppo, Syria, where Ezra attended the Alliance school. In 1934 he immigrated with his family to Eretz Israel. Because of the difficulties of absorption, Ezra and his father bore the burden of earning a living. Then a change occurred in the boy’s personality: the mischievous young man became a responsible adult. In addition to his work, he was active in the Hanoar Haoved movement and in the Ha-Po’el organization, where he practiced swimming and cycling. As a person who was educated in the spirit of nationalism and love of the land, he joined the ranks of the Haganah during the 1936-1939 riots and worked extensively in the fields of defense and immigration. At the outbreak of World War II, he accepted the call of Yishuv institutions, enlisted in the British Army and was assigned to the Ports Operations Company, 1039. He served in Egypt and was sent to Greece with the force to help stop the German invasion of this country. In April 1941, the IAF surrendered and many of its soldiers were captured, including Ezra among them. He spent two years in German captivity and there he showed courage and a spirit of volunteerism. On 8 Adar, February 13, 1943, he volunteered to replace his friend by working in the coal mines, and when the Polish foreman cursed the Jews, Ezra defied him, and the inspector shot Ezra in the back and killed him. He was buried without a military ceremony next to the fence of the Polish cemetery in Yevgenyno, and only with the intervention of the Red Cross was there a military procession to the cemetery to honor his memory. In Shlomo Seleucid’s book “In the Shackles of Shavei” he is mentioned, and his memory was immortalized in “The Book of Volunteerism” in the “Yearbook of the Press” and the book” Remember” of the Jabotinsky Institute. His brother Jacob contributed to the construction of a synagogue in Sde Boker to commemorate his memory.