Shimshi (Orbach), Zvi

Son of Chaya and Moshe. Born on December 11, 1906 in the town of Baer, ​​Podolia region in the Ukraine, to a well-to-do family where he received a traditional national education,. He studied at the regional Real school, where he excelled in his studies and was active in the Tzeirei Zion movement. In 1920 he stopped his studies and immigrated to Eretz Israel in this group of pioneers. He arrived in Israel after nine months of wandering and began working in orchards and paving roads. Influenced by his father’s letters from the Diaspora, he returned to school, entered the Herzliya Gymnasium in Tel Aviv, and made a living working during the hours after school. After completing his studies in 1925, he worked as a teacher and was active in the Hebrew Language Guards Battalion, where he served as deputy chairman. After a while he brought his parents to Israel, and then went to study political economics at Columbia University in New York, where he excelled in his studies and won a scholarship. During his studies, he was active in the local “Menorah” club and on the committee for the Herzliya high school. In 1935 he returned to Israel and was appointed to the Tel Aviv District Officer in the service of the Government. At the same time, he belonged to the Haganah. In the years 1936-1939 he was a district manager of the southern moshavot, and from 1942 served for four years as an officer in the Netanya and Emek Hefer districts. In 1946, he was transferred to Jerusalem as an administrative assistant in the General Secretariat and was awarded the prestigious title of “British Empire Member” (M.B.E). On 23 Tamuz, July 22, 1946, he was killed in the bombing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, where the offices of the Chief Military Headquarters and the Chief Secretariat of the Mandatory Government were located, by the hands of the Irgun Zvai Leumi. He was buried in the Nahalat Yitzhak cemetery in Tel Aviv. He left a wife, a daughter and a son.