[Page 302]

I was discharged from the army late in 1949 and assigned to the reserve forces of the state. The army gave me 10 days paid vacation at a hotel in Tel Aviv to arrange my affairs. The vacation went very fast and now I had to make decisions. Kibbutz Brenner urged me to join the collective but I decided to make it on my own. I went to my friend Berale in Tel Aviv and extended my vacation by another 10 days. I then went to the office of discharged soldiers and was given a letter to the reception camp called Nevei Yehoshua in Ramat Gan. As I traveled to the camp I liked the small city of Ramat Gan. I shared a room with two other single soldiers. The camp was a distance from the center of the city and was serviced by busses three times a day. The main bus station was located opposite the Nussbaum restaurant. My room was in a barrack separated from other rooms by boards. I received beds, blankets and other items from the Jewish Agency. There was no charge but I signed that the items would have to be paid sometime in the future. The room had a shower, a hanging closet for clothing, a kitchen table with a wash basin. The outhouse was located outside the barrack. The local bus station was near the barrack.

During my leaves from the army I tried to get in touch with Jews from Sandz who had survived the war. I located some in Ness Tziona such as Awraham Neishtat,–Szpilman. There were also survivors in Tel Aviv and in Haifa and I tried to get in touch with everybody. In Haifa I contacted Chaim Yossef Hameltzar and the Kirshenboim family who I had met previously in Stuttgart, Germany. I slept in Shlomo Goldberger's flat. I met Yehuda Gertner, Dawid Einhorn and Awraham Schlachet. With the vacations finished, I had to start to look for a job and went to Ness Tziona where my acquaintance Awraham Szpilman lived. He was a foreman at the Solel Boneh company. He talked with his boss, Mr. Popper who consented to my employment.

The Solel Boneh company was the largest building conglomerate in Israel. It was founded by the Histadruth or workers union of Israel in the 1920s. The Histadruth was a union and also a job provider. It was founded in the 1920s and grew immensely with time.

Awraham took me on to work at the military airfield base of Tel Nof where they fixed the runways. Awraham also arranged lodging for me with another Sandzer Jew who lived near Ness Tziona at the village of Sarafand El Harab to avoid traveling from Ramat Gan to Ness Tziona each day. The place was an Arab house that stood near the main highway where I was picked up each morning by a truck and driven to the work site. The work was difficult under the beating sun. Then I tried to work at laying the foundations of a building but gave it up. I decided to learn a building trade. I gave notice and left the job in December.

I returned to Ramat Gan and went to the employment office where I saw Mr. Kurlander. I told him that I wanted to learn a building trade and he asked what trade I wanted to acquire. I consulted my friend Wolf Kempfner (Shwitzer) and he suggested tiling. I reported to Mr. Kurland and told him that I wanted to learn to lay down floors. He gave me all the tools and a letter of recommendation to a local office of the Solel Boneh. At the time there was a big project that was being built for new immigrants between Uziel and Fabrigat Streets. I presented myself at the site and started my training. The supervisor named Nahum was from Lodz, Poland. He was an excellent instructor and I acquired the trade. He was a patient man and taught us all the aspects of floor tiling, from mixing the cement to the exact tile measurements. While acquiring the trade, I was paid a lira a day in cash to keep me going.

In February of 1950, I started to work on a regular basis and I earned 2.50 lirot a day. I worked with a group of workers who took on jobs on the basis of units of work rather than the standard monthly payment. We worked with “Amidar Building Company.” The latter was a joint government, Jewish Agency for Palestine and Keren Kayemet L'Israel (Jewish National Fund) company that built housing for new immigrants. We then worked on a big project at the Borochov section where we were paid by the day. I also worked for Solel Boneh, which was building housing for the old timers in Israel. I also took Hebrew courses at the reception center that were offered by the Histadruth in one of the barracks. I also attended English courses given at the Borochov center.

I renewed my communications with my uncle Chaim Lustig in Brazil that had suffered greatly while I was in the service. I also renewed contact with the Shtapler family in Geretstrid, Germany, and with Katie Freitlieg in Frankfurt, Germany. At the end of the barrack lived a fellow named Mishke who used to entertain us with his accordion. Awraham Wallach lived in our barrack but in name only. He worked with Solel Boneh as a scaffold builder.

He had a sister and brothers who lived in Salama in an Arab house. Wallach lived there and on occasion came to the reception camp and insisted that I join him socially. He wanted to introduce me to a friend of his from Sanok, Poland. She was married and had a daughter but left her husband in Germany. She lived in the Agemia section of Jaffa. I met her and we enjoyed each other's company. We went to dance, to the movies and enjoyed life.

In 1950 I met Zvi Sheinfeld who owned the house in which we lived in Sandz. He told me that that he was married and had a small daughter. They lived in an Arab house in Lod. His father and sister also lived in Israel. His sister Gusta was married and lived in Kfar Saba. His father lived with his sister. Zvi invited me to visit him in Lod which I did. I also visited his sister in Kfar Saba.

At Solel Boneh there was a kitchen that provided breakfast and lunch at reduced prices until 1952. I then started to work on a project along the “Flyers Road Street” where Solel Boneh was building popular–priced apartments. We worked as a group and were paid by the section. We finished our assignments quickly and took off. At the time I ate at various restaurants. One in particular served meals that replaced meat with broccoli and eggs or filet of fish. In the evenings I would travel to Tel Aviv where I attended Hebrew classes to improve my Hebrew at the Balfour school. On Friday nights, some fellow brought girls from Tel Aviv who solicited business. There were several dance places in Ramat Gan and also a movie house. The same year I was also called for reserve duty in the Israeli Army. I was sent to several courses and was promoted to the rank of corporal in the reserves. My home base was in Kfar Yona, the training courses in Caesarea and the shooting ranges in Givat Olga.

I visited my uncle Abish in Kibbutz Brenner. He was later moved to a special old age home in Tel Aviv. I visited him on occasion and he always had the same question: When would I get married? During one of these visits, I met my grandmother Esther's sister Sarah, my father's aunt. She spoke only Yiddish and we discussed the old homestead. In November my uncle Abish passed away. I attended the funeral that took place at Kibbutz Brenner where he was buried.

The days were difficult and shortages were everywhere. The government introduced rationing and everything was sold through coupons that were distributed by the government. Of course, a black market developed for everything, especially meat. The national treasury was empty and the small amount of foreign currency that the state received had to be saved for vital expenses such as fuel, weapons, medicine and industrial machinery to develop the country and provide jobs to the thousands of immigrants who needed everything from housing to food.

I managed to survive but had to do a lot of combinations to obtain the food that I needed. The most difficult item was meat. I bought a record player in partnership with my friend Ezriel. I bought many cantorial and romantic records, Yiddish comedies and light operas. Saving some money I bought a bicycle to give me some mobility. The record player attracted many people who came to listen to the recordings and frequently dances were held in our barrack. I received letters from my uncle in Brazil that I replied to. He also sent a package of clothing that included nice shirts, socks and other clothing items. By chance I also discovered that a nephew of my mother's named Chaim Brandstater lived in Ramat Gan. I established contact and visited him. He was an elderly bachelor who had left Poland prior to the war and had recently visited Poland. He showed me some family pictures that I had never seen before. I also came in contact with my father's niece Mania Ebershtark. She was the daughter of Liebe Jakubowicz, lived in Nevei Ne'eman and was married to Awraham Perlberger. They had a son named Moshe. I also established contact with the daughters of my father's brother in Tel Aviv such as Mari, the daughter of Sara, married to Alfred Rimler and their son Menachem. They provided me with a picture of my father's brother Zvi Kannengisser with his wife; they were married before 1938.

While walking along Bialik Street in Ramat Gan, I heard a voice calling me. I turned about and it was Shoshana Kaufman who had served with me in the Palmach forces. She was the one responsible for my nickname in the Palmach days. Shoshana had been distributing fruit soup to the soldiers. When I approached the distribution table I asked for a half portion of soup. She granted my request but I became known as “Hatzi Manah” or half portion. We reminisced about the old days and the present days. She lived with her parents and young sister Zina in Givat Bracha near Kfar Onu. They had a farm with cows, turkeys, a large house and a large garden around it. Shoshana invited me to visit her and I took her up on it. I visited the farm and met her family, including her married sister Chaya who had a baby. We arranged several social parties at her house. On Saturdays, we went to the pool named “Gali Gil” where we all met and then went to Shoshana's home to continue the parties. I had a very nice time at these social gatherings. I made many friends at these parties. I also organized some social dance meetings that were attended by many girls and fellows from the area.

At the time I became a member of the Sandzer society in Israel. Yehuda Knabel was the presiding officer. The society organized a social evening for the Sandzer Jews in Israel that was very successful. I helped with the selling of the tickets. At the gatherings in Shoshana's house I met a girl named Esther and started to date her. One day she opened her picture album and I saw her with a beautiful friend. I asked Esther, Why don't you invite your friend to your house for a Shabbat? She decided to invite her friend Rivkah. I was instantly attracted to her but she was rather cool. She was very pretty, short, had two braids. She was from Poland. I did not accept her coolness toward me and persisted in my interest in her. I guess I was in love at first sight. I asked her where she lived but she refused to disclose it. There were few telephones and fewer telephone books in those days to look up addresses. After a while I asked Esther for Rivkah's address. I had some acquaintances in the Salama reception center and on occasion I went to dances at the camp. One day I decided to present myself at the house of Rivkah without any announcement or invitation. I looked up Rivkah's address and went directly to her place. She lived with her father Yaacov Tenenbaum from Janow Podlaski who had lived in Biala Podolsk in Poland, her brother Asher and her stepmother Rachel, a native of Lithuania. I started to visit her place and slowly I started to date her.

The entire year of 1953 we spent seeing each other. The relationship stopped and started. Maybe Rivkah had higher aspirations. Perhaps she was hoping to marry a doctor or an engineer. I continued to visit the family and also bought myself a DKW motorcycle.

In 1954, I was called to reserve duty during the summer. I reported to company 106 of the Harel Brigade as in previous years. But presently the situation was tense and our brigade was posted along a line stretching from Abu–Gosh to Jerusalem proper at the Mandelbaum gate and Abu Tor. We were positioned in defensive positions. I took along my motorcycle to the army and used it frequently. One day I gave my sergeant a lift and the chain snapped on the bike. I tried to repair it but it was never the same. I tried to sell it but it proved very difficult. Eventually I sold the bike. Upon my discharge, I resumed working for Solel Boneh and was building flats at Ramat Aviv in Tel Aviv. That year my niece Laura from Brazil, the daughter of Chaim Lustig, and her husband came to visit me. I introduced them to Rivkah. Then Rivkah and I broke up.

As mentioned earlier, the Israel government introduced an austerity program to cope with the serious economic situation in the country. Unemployment was very high, especially in the “ma'abarot” or reception camps, and foreign currency reserves were scarce. Ben Gurion decided to negotiate an agreement with Germany whereby West Germany was to pay Israel for the slave labor and persecution of Jews during the Holocaust and to compensate for Jewish property that was stolen by the Nazis. The Reparations Agreement between Israel and West Germany was signed on September 10, 1952, and entered in force on March 27, 1953. According to the agreement, Germany would pay to Israel a sum of 3 billion marks over the next 14 years; 450 million marks were paid to the World Jewish Congress. The payments were made to the State of Israel as the heir to those victims who had no surviving family. The money was invested in the country's infrastructure and played an important role in establishing the economy of the new state. The reparations would be paid directly to the headquarters of the Israeli purchase delegation in the city of Cologne, Germany, which would receive the money from the German government in annual installments. The delegation would then buy goods and ship them to Israel, according to the requests from a Tel Aviv–based company that had been set up to decide what to purchase and for whom. A great part of the reparations money would go into purchasing equipment and raw materials for companies that were owned by the government, the Jewish Agency and the Histadrut labor union. The Israeli government also decided to establish an office to begin to pay survivors for their hardships during the war. All these decisions were made despite large protests against dealing with Germans. The opposition parties had a heyday in campaigning against the agreements but the government decided to implement the programs.

I received payment for my hard work in the camps in Israeli money. Now I could begin to think of getting a small place of my own and began to make inquiries. Meanwhile I met Ella who had served in my unit of the Palmach. I started dating her and once brought her to my reception center. I suggested that she move in with me but she refused. She wanted me but did not like the place and we started to drift apart. Near the reception camp lived a Sandzer Jew named Samek Teitelbaum, now Bar–Ilan, with his wife and three children. He worked at the police garage and always dressed in a police uniform. He lived in a nice two–family house. Menashe Wolf and his wife Lucia and small child also lived in a nice two–family house on Eilat Street. The entire development was built by the Progressive building company. I visited them and even participated at their Passover seder. I met his brother Shlomo who was still a bachelor. We spent time together. These two families were pleased with their flats and I decided to purchase an apartment in this area. In 1955 I finalized the purchase of my apartment that consisted of a room and a half. The price of the place was 5,000 Israeli pounds (the exchange rate of the pound was U.S.$1=1.80 Israeli pounds) or about U.S.$2,800. I took all the money that I received from the Germans and paid toward the apartment but it was not enough. I also took a loan from Bank Hapoalim. Still I was short. I took all my savings and still needed 500 pounds to finish the deal. I asked my friend Arnold Remer to loan me the money, which he did. Thus, I acquired my flat located at the Progressive Street 28. The street name would be later changed to Haroe Street 246, Ramat Gan. I fixed up the place and left the reception center.

I was then introduced to a girl named Malka whose parents were originally from Austria. The family was well to do and had a store in Tel Aviv and lived in a nice house in Ramat Gan. She was rather young and I began to visit the family where I was invited almost every Saturday. I even took her to Tel Aviv to celebrate Purim in 1956. Her parents were very anxious to marry their daughter. I bought her a golden watch but my heart was not in it. Something told me to stop. Meanwhile, in May I received an order to present myself for reserve duty. I decided to stop the relationship and stopped visiting the family. The moment was very propitious since I was going to be away for some time. Prior to my departure, her father showed up and inquired why I had stopped the relationship. I told him that he knows his daughter better than anyone.

I reported for military duty at the Naballah base where new weapons were presented to us. The army was getting ready for the Sinai action of the 1956 war. I started to renew my contact with Rivkah whom I loved. We went to the movies, to shows and I even took her to my place. In September 1956, Solel Boneh sent me to Eilat by plane. This was the first time that I flew in a Dakota. The flight took one hour and fifteen minutes and I was in the Solel Boneh barrack in Eilat. Solel Boneh was building the first hotel in Eilat, which was called the Queen Sheba Hotel. The barrack was extremely hot. To cool the place, pipes were placed in the windows through which cold water was running. This refreshed the room. The working day started at five o'clock in the morning when it was still cool. Later, a tender came to take us to eat breakfast and we returned to work. For lunch we were also driven. I ate supper at the restaurant. I also tiled the floors of several warehouses at the Timna mines. Then the Sinai action started.

From 1949 to 1956 the armed truce between Israel and the Arabs, enforced in part by the U.N. forces, was punctuated by raids and reprisals. Among the world powers, the United States, Great Britain and France sided with Israel, while the Soviet Union supported Arab demands. Tensions mounted during 1956 as Israel became convinced that the Arabs were preparing for war. The nationalization of the Suez Canal by Egypt's Gamal Abdel Nasser in July 1956, resulted in the further alienation of Great Britain and France from Egypt. Both countries signed secret military agreements with Israel.

On October 29, 1956, Israeli forces led by Moshe Dayan attacked Egyptian forces in the Sinai Peninsula. Early Israeli successes were reinforced by an Anglo–French invasion along the canal. Although the action against Egypt was severely condemned by the nations of the world, the ceasefire of November 6, which was promoted by the United Nations with U.S. and Soviet support, came only after Israel had captured several key objectives, including the Gaza Strip and Sharm el Sheikh, which commanded the approaches to the Gulf of Aqaba. Israel withdrew from these positions in 1957, turning them over to the U.N. emergency force after access to the Gulf of Aqaba, without which Israel was cut off from the Indian Ocean, had been guaranteed.

I was immediately called up and ordered to report to a base in Eilat where I was to instruct soldiers in the use of new weapons. A special unit was created to protect Eilat and vicinity. Many of the construction workers were also in the reserve unit. Our job was to defend this strategic post. I was also instructed in the use of new weapons. We patrolled the area, especially the airfield of Eilat. The commander of the region, named Dani, had his headquarters near the airport. With the end of military operations, I was granted a liberty pass to fly north and spent time to recuperate. In December I was back in Eilat to finish the job. I returned north in January to my place and started to see Rivkah on a steady basis. In April 1957, I was sent by Solel Boneh to build houses in Beer Sheva for new immigrants. (They were part of the “Gomulka Aliyah.”)

The Gomulka Aliyah refers to the Polish Jewish aliyah that started in 1955. Wladyslaw Gomulka was one of the leaders of the Polish Communist Party. He was the de facto leader of Poland from 1945 to 1948, and again from 1956 to 1970. Between 1945–1947, thousands of Polish Jews left Poland illegally and headed to Czechoslovakia and then to German, Austrian and Italian D.P. camps. Then, in the spring of 1947, the Polish borders were hermetically closed. Jews who wanted to leave Poland for Palestine had to obtain exit papers based on admission requests from the British Mandatory Administration in Palestine. Few Jews left Poland. Then a gradual increase in the number of applications and exit papers began. In 1955 2,500 Polish Jews were permitted to leave Poland and in 1956 19,000 Jews were permitted to leave. Overall in the late 1950s another 40,000 Jews left Poland.

I worked from Sunday to Friday in Beer Sheva and then went home for Shabbat where I met Rivkah. This continued for some time. During the week, we stayed at a rented room of Solel Boneh that paid premium payments and extra payments for food. I managed to save some money to pay back the loan that I took from Remler. I was then sent to work at Ashdod in the power plant. Other housing projects followed, namely in Rishon LeTzion and in Holon. Toward the end of 1957, we started to think of marriage. Rivkah worked for a textile company called “Hanko.” She did not earn much but she managed to save.

  Nowy Sącz, Poland     Yizkor Book Project     JewishGen Home Page

Copyright © 1999-2024 by JewishGen, Inc.
Updated 26 Mar 2016 by JH