Steinka, Shmuel (Shmil)

Son of Tzirel and Hanoch. He was born on November 21, 1901, in the city of Kowel, Poland, where he also studied at a yeshiva, where he earned his living by teaching Hebrew and preparing children for a bar mitzvah. The family lived in the French Saar region, and when the Nazis entered the area in 1935, Shmuel decided to immigrate to Eretz Israel. He immigrated to Israel in 1937. He worked as a builder and worked as a truck driver. He was a member of the Transmobil cooperative, and during his spare time he read books in German, Polish and Hebrew. On 11 Tishrei, 6.10.1938, he went to the north of Israel near Rosh Hanikra to receive vegetables and fruit brought to Israel. The produce was loaded onto three trucks that left for Tel Aviv, and two truck drivers joined the drivers on the way between Nahariya and Akhziv, where the trucks encountered a gang of murderers who opened fire on the drivers and killed two of them. Their whereabouts have not been known to this day. Survived by his wife and son, Zvi Avni, composer and music professor, and ten brothers and sisters, most of whom perished in the Holocaust. The details of the incident and the circumstances of Shmuel’s disappearance were published in the newspapers Davar, Haaretz and Hakker.