Al Cislowski  

He was born in Poland and survived many camps including Birkenau and Stuthoff. He came to Israel in August 1947 after spending a year in Cyprus and Camp Atlit under British rule. With 2 other boys he rented a room in Natanya and looked for work.

Three months later when the United Nations partitioned Palestine they knew there would be war.  He volunteered to what was the beginning of an army. After a short military training he became a soldier.  

He fought in Beth Shaan, Nazereth and Zrain.  He was wounded on the road to Afula when his convoy was bombarded and he was hospitalized.  When he recuperated he returned to his fighting unit (Chativat Golani Gdud 13) and continued south to free the Negev.  He was in the army until the end of 1949 when he moved to Tel Aviv to begin a new life in a new and peaceful land.  

Bela Cislowski

She survived the Lodz Ghetto and Auschwitz.

She came to Israel in September 1947 with a group of teenagers from Cyprus and Camp Atlit.  She was sent to Kibutz Ginosar on the shores of the Kineret.  She was only 16 years old.  

She attended school half a day and worked half day.  After the declaration of the Jewish State, war preparation began. The British harassed them constantly looking for weapons. Since most Kibbutz members were Palmachnika, including Kibbutznik Yigal Alon, they had other duties and left us teenagers to maintain and defend the Kibbutz.  After two weeks of intensive training she got a rifle and was put on watch.  The rifle was taller than her.

She learned Morse code which was the only way of communication in that region since there were no telephones.

Day and night she stood on the roof receiving and transmitting messages to warn others about danger.  When peace came, she moved to Tel Aviv where she met her husband.   

 Freddy Diament

A survivor of the concentration camps, he was smuggled through the British blockade almost reaching Haifa.  He was arrested and imprisoned in a British detention camp near Haifa for 3 weeks before being released due to public pressure reflecting sympathy for Holocaust Survivors.

In 1947 he was sworn in as a member of the Haganah and participated in punitive action against the murderous Arab Village, Zemach, on the top of the a Golan Heights.  He was arrested as a suspected member of the Haganah and imprisoned by the British at Latrun.

With friends he founded the first Kibbutz of Survivors in Eretz Yisrael called Kibbutz Buchenwald later  changed to Kibbutz Netzer.

As the war broke out he was mobilized into the Israeli Army and served in the Givati Brigade, and participated in the Conquest of the City of Ramleh.

With a bulldozer he worked day and night digging anti tank trenches, cutting the highway from Lodd Airport to Tel-Aviv to prevent an Iraqi tank brigade waiting to break through to occupy Tel Aviv.  He braved crossfire and crawled on his belly to attempt to recapture a bulldozer. This attempt was critical because there were only 5 bulldozers in all of Palestine at the time.

Later he participated in the conquest of Ber-Sheva, and then built with the engineering corps a road to the Egyptian strategic military air force at El Arish which was just conquered by the Givati Brigade.  While visiting a nearby Kibbutz, he met Professor Yehuda Bauer who coincidentally will deliver The “1939” Club Memorial Lecture on Resistance next Sunday.  In 1960 he came to the United States.  

  Leon Knobel

Prior to coming to Israel in the period 1945 and 1946, he organized self defense groups (Hagana) in the kibbutzim as well as the Bricha movement (illegal immigration) from Poland to Germany's D.P. Camps.  In 1947, the Bricha movement transported immigrants from Germany to France and Italy.  

Upon his arrival by ship in Israel in 1948, he enlisted in the Israeli army and was an active participant in the liberation of the State of Israel.

In recognition of all his  activities, he received from the Israel Defense Department (Misrad Habitachon) the Metal of Defense (Ot Hagana) #48796). He is proud and honored to have been an active participant in the creation of the State of Israel.     

Nandor Markovic

He trained in Marseilles as a member of MAHAL with a Bnai Akiva group.  Growing up as an anti-Zionist, he became motivated to fight for Israel as a member of the very Zionist Stern Gang because of the meanness of British Foreign Secretary Bevin in refusing to admit Jews into Palestine.  He came into Israel on the ship called Carpathia, or Exodus, entering Pardes Hanna where he was inducted in the new Israel Defense Forces - ZAHAL.     

Leon Pesses

During World War II he was sent to Germany for forced labor to work on airplanes.  He learned to fix Messerschmitts, Spitfires and Commandos.  He came to Israel on the Aliyah Bet Ship the SS Wedgwood, after he and his wife spent 2 years in the Italian Kibbutz, Avoda, preparing for immigration to Israel.  He was assigned to Cheil Avir, the Israeli Air Force, as a mechanic.  There, ironically, he fixed Messerschmitts, Spitfires and Commandos this time for the Israeli Air Force.  His expertise made his work invaluable.    

Jay Shalmoni

After the second world war ended, he found out that he was alone.  Neither his parents nor siblings came back from the concentration camps.  He made a decision to fulfill his childhood dream of being in Israel by the age of 18 - a dream that he shared with one of his brothers.

He arrived to Israel in a wet bathing suit because he made the decision to jump from the ship.  He swam to the shores of Kibbutz Nitzanim eluding the British.  The kibbutzicks immediately dressed him in kibbutz clothes, took him out to the fields, and told him to pretend that he had been there all along.

In 1947 he joined the Haganah.  He was immediately called in to guard the house of professor Chayim Weitzman.  On November 29, 1947, the day that the United Nations voted for a separate Jewish state, Chayim Weitzman  became Israel’s first president.

Things moved very fast.  He was a guard one week, a warehouse man for hidden arms the second week, and a full fledged member of the fighting unit of the Hagana the third week.  From Tel Aviv down to Kibbutz Negba, Ashdod, Faludgya, he performed many army duties including accompanying the much needed food convoys to Jerusalem

In the beginning they fought the local Arabs, later the Egyptian army.  He lost many friends and  learned to view himself as a survivor for the second time in his young life.  He changed his last name from Friedman because he felt so connected to his new Jewish homeland.     

Nathan Shapow

From the beginning of the war he joined the army, 8^th Division, 82^nd Brigade, 3^rd Company.  The fight began at Lodd airport, Ramie and the surrounding villages.   They conquered the airport and the entire area.  The first plane arrived at Lodd Airport after his unit took over the airport.  They went on fighting on the road to Jerusalem where the difficult battle began.  His unit attacked Latrun where the Jordanian army had help from the Palestinians.  Latrun was a very strategic stronghold of the Arabs.  There were fatalities and injured Israeli soldiers.  In the end, the army conquered Latrun - but at a very high price.  Most of the fighting occurred on the road to Jerusalem.  At that time the Jordanian army surrounded the old city of Jerusalem and the holy places.  They then fought the Jordanian army.  He got sick with Malaria.  He was sent with a patrol to the hospital where he spent three weeks.  When he returned form sick bay to his unit, Tel-Hashomer, the order was given to go South and continue fighting until they reached Bar-Sheba and all it’s surrounding villages.  After Bar Sheba they had to regroup, then they had to get ready for anything that came along.  He was part of a Commando Unit under the leadership of the Jaffe Brothers.