Steinberg, Meir (Carl, Negus)

Was born in the city of Nuremberg, Germany, where he studied at a Jewish elementary school and was able to finish it at the time of the Nazis and their decrees against the Jews, who became more and more stringent. During World War II, he spent two years in a youth company in Gvat, where he moved to Kibbutz Givat Haim and started working in the carpentry shop, and was called “Negus” during the Second World War. , On the repair ship “Blenheim” as a carpenter with the rank of Corporal, Meir aspired to study in the sciences, and during his service began to prepare for the matriculation exams When he was released, he was admitted to the Beit HaKerem Teachers’ Seminary for a two-year course for discharged soldiers, who was 23 years old and thirsty for knowledge, and spent every hour of classes sitting on his books or visiting the National Library. From his class, to teaching in the Old City, a position that was also used as camouflage for the Hagana before the British, where he taught at the girls’ school and the kindergarten. His kibbutz Givat Hayim demanded that he return to them as a teacher but his position was not to be abandoned. He returned to his place in the Old City and continued his work there after being cut off from the New City. Meir served as a machine gunner and ran with the machine gun from position to position to strengthen the defenders’ resistance. In one of the attacks, he was seriously injured in the stomach, was transferred to a hospital and died shortly thereafter, on the day of the declaration of the State of Israel, and was buried in the Old City of Jerusalem. And to remember fighters who fell in the battle for Jerusalem and were brought for burial on the Mount of Olives.