Porat (Pashtitzky), Alexander (Alex)

Son of Avigdor (David) and Rivka. He was born on October 11, 1928 in Lodz, Poland. When he was 10 years old, World War II broke out with all its horrors and horrors. Young Alex was imprisoned in the ghetto and in concentration camps. His life might have been saved by his audacity to claim to the Germans that he was a locksmith apprentice – a profession that was highly sought after by the persecutors. In all his sufferings he, the boy, was worried about his family, especially his younger brother. He also filled his soul and strengthened his spirit of yearning to immigrate to the Land of Israel. At the end of the war he found himself the sole remnant of his extensive family. He organized a group of boys around him, whose sole aim was to row the shores of the country. After a brief training period in Italy, Alex came to Israel and settled with his group in Kibbutz Beit Zera. In the War of Independence, which was held shortly before his ascension, Alex served in the Palmach ‘s’ Palmach’ battalion in the Harel Brigade and took an active part in the bloody battles to liberate the Castel, breaking into the Old City through the Zion Gate, defending Katamon and conquering the Hill of Radar. Alex’s friend says that when one of the “selections” was heard on the radio during the Eichmann trial, Alex whispered in his ear: “I was standing there on the field … a child … Anyone who did not feel his life felt a sense of lack. Such helplessness will never understand what right it is to be able to fight and even to fight for the defense of our existence as Jews in this land. “This right was exercised by Alex to the end. He was a veteran of the Plant Protection Division of the Ministry of Agriculture, and published 35 scientific articles in the professional press, among them the most prominent of his colleagues, In which he wrote the book “Pigs and Pitfalls in Hadasim” and the writing of the chapter “The Citrus Pests.” He also wrote the value of citrus pests in the Encyclopedia of Agriculture, Volume 3. His professional orientation and resourcefulness in the field of orchards was a great thing, and a generation of counselors, fieldmen and peddlers was educated according to His approach and use it a lot. Alex was picked off when he was in full professional activity – when he was injured in the discharge of his duty during the reserve duty, on the 12th of Adar 5738 (19.2.1988). He was 49 when he died. He was brought to rest in the land of Monash village, where he lived with his wife and three children. In Alex’s literary estate, apart from his articles, the fruit of his scientific work, he also found a diary and poems full of emotion written in Yiddish.