The Jeff Malka Sephardic Collection

Oriental Jews in Eretz Yisroel

Moshe David Gaon was born in Macedonia in 1889. After getting a degree from the Vienna University (Austria), he immigrated to Erets Yisrael and settled in Jerusalem. He was a school master in various primary schools in Jerusalem, Izmir [Smyrna] (Turkey) and in Buenos Aires (Argentina).

Upon returning to Jerusalem he became a member of the Sephardi Community Committee and at the same time a Municipal Council member until his death in 1958. Very active, he published many publications among which the most important is this two volumes book, published in 1928 & 1938 and a bibliographical historical survey of the Ladino press.

This is a biographical dictionary of some 2750 rabbis, scholars and notables etc., born in Spain, Provence in France, Italy, the Ottoman Empire including the Balkans and the Middle East and North Africa. A great majority of these persons have visited Erets Israel or immigrated to it.

Source:

Gaon, Moshe David. Yehudei HaMizrah beEretz Israel
Vol 2 (which contains the 750 page biographical dictionary), Jerusalem, 1938.

Acknowledgements

We acknowledge the tremendous contributions and lifelong dedication of Mathilde Tagger, z"l who made this index available. For many years, and right until her untimely death, Mathilde Tagger was a very close friend and collaborator with Jeff Malka. Together they worked to promote Sephardic genealogy research and educate the public about its enormous potential.

In addition, we express our grateful appreciation to Dr. Jeff Malka for his monumental ongoing effort to collect and make accessible Sephardic genealogical information, and for his generosity in contributing his extraordinarily valuable collection to JewishGen.

Search the Database

This collection can be searched by via the JewishGen Israel Database, the JewishGen Jeff Malka Collection or the JewishGen Sephardic Collection