fbpx
Shafir, Yaakov (Shafik)

Shafir, Yaakov (Shafik)

Son of Rachel and Yeruham, was born in 1928 in Ostrowiec, Poland. When the Germans occupied Poland, he was taken to a concentration camp. Jacob moved from camp to camp and managed to survive. At the end of the war he was transferred by the emissaries of the Jewish Brigade to Italy and from there he immigrated to Israel in 1945 with members of the Dror youth movement and joined the Youth Aliyah in Givat Hashlosha. In the farm he worked in banana groves. In 1946, he joined the Haganah and participated in anti-Irgun activities in Petah Tikva. With the outbreak of the War of Independence he was drafted and left the farm. He joined the Palmach, and together with his comrades in the Harel Brigade, he served as a convoy escort on the Tel Aviv-Jerusalem road, where he remained in the besieged city and took part in the battles, On the outskirts of Rafah, while touring the enemy cars that fell into our hands when he was shot by an Egyptian soldier from the ambush on 7 January 1949. A monument in his memory was erected in the military cemetery on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem. This fallen hero is a “maklan” – a hero whose burial place is unknown.

Honored By

Skip to content