Shwiki, Yaakov
Son of Pnina and Moshe. Was born in 1902 in the Old City of Jerusalem to a traditional and respectable family that came from Aleppo, Syria. Where his childhood passed and eventually the family moved to the neighborhood of Shimon HaTzadik, Sheikh Jarrah, which included fifty families of hardworking workers. After years of study in the “cheder” and in the elementary school, Yaakov was forced to stop his studies in order to help the family. Already in his youth he was active in the Haganah, and in 1934 he joined the police. Was a prominent figure in the neighborhood: a strong, erect man, dressed in his uniform and helping the weak. In the eyes of his Arab neighbors, he symbolized the Jew who proudly maintained his national honor. As a member of the Haganah, his activity was secretive, but by word of mouth there were stories about his exploits: the liquidation of an Arab gang in his hands and his friends posing as Arabs; About his departure for Arab villages to purchase weapons for the Haganah, etc. In Shwiki’s house the Haganah’s first “weapons cache” was built in the neighborhood, where the regional headquarters of this organization was located, and in 1939, , And the British geologist Blake was chosen to be his personal guardian On July 28, 1940, on one of their tours near the Zohar estuary, near the Nahal Hamer, the two were attacked They were killed by a gang of murderers, and Jacob was brought to rest in the cemetery on the Mount of Olives, where he left a wife, three daughters and three sons. A monument was erected in memory of Blake and Shviki, which overlooks the Dead Sea and Mount Moab, and after the Six-Day War it was found that Jacob’s grave had been destroyed by the Jordanians and after much effort was located and rebuilt
