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70 years after | Israel today

2022-04-01T15:43:06.563Z


Protest against negotiations with Germany, new sparkling wine and shortage of "kippi shoes" • This is what happened in the country this week seven decades ago


"Day of Rage" in Tel Aviv

From January 14, 1952, when the Knesset voted and embellished the government's power to begin negotiations with Germany on reparations (compensation for the Holocaust), the Herut movement led by MK Menachem Begin focused on trying to thwart the move, especially after the Israeli delegation went to Europe for talks with the Germans.

In early March 1952, Herut announced that it intended to organize a mass conference in Tel Aviv on the 25th of the month, under the name "Day of Rage."

The announcement put the government systems in the country under great tension, and the police, the army, the MDA and the hospitals conducted exercises and preparations, as it was clear that the political system in Israel was in conflict.

Posters fluttering one side to the other were pasted all over the country, with large letters shouting "Save the honor of the people - come and participate" (Herut).

The headline read: "We declare a day of mourning and rage for the House of Israel, its sons slaughtered by the Nazis and their honor.

Mapai Party posters were shorter, but no less aggressive, saying: "This is the time to stand guard, defend democracy and forcibly thwart Begin's and Herut movement's putsch attempt."

On the appointed day, the forces were held from the early hours of the morning: Hundreds of policemen were stationed near the roads leading to the Mugrabi cinema with batons and tear bombs in their hands, taking care not to make contact with the crowds on their way to the demonstration.

Ambulances from all over the country came to reinforce MDA in Tel Aviv, and the army was on standby, as were medical teams.

Eventually, the mountain gave birth to a mouse: the demonstration, which began at 4:00 PM, ended after three hours during which all the leaders of the Herut party spoke.

The arrangement was exemplary and without incident, and by 7:30 pm the Mugrabi cinema area was empty of people.

"Soon on the tracks": In Haifa, people dream of a subway

The Carmelite in Haifa in its first year of operation, 1959, Photo: Moshe Frieden, GPO

At a large conference of the Mapai party, held in Haifa on March 27, 1952, the mayor, Abba Hushi, asked for a special announcement and said excitedly: "Similar to the reforms in the cities of the modern world."

Hushi was a first-rate performer, but his words were a bit exaggerated, as it was not a "metro" in the conventional sense and the plan did not get on the tracks "soon".

However, the news published the next day in the press created great enthusiasm and feelings of pride among the residents of Haifa.

The Carmelite adventure in Haifa began a few months earlier, when a group of Jews from Switzerland who were among the mayor's acquaintances sent to Haifa an international expert on urban transportation, who spent several weeks in the city, at the end of which he submitted a report.

Following this, experts from a large Swiss company in the field arrived in Haifa, who immediately approached the work, and within a few months an establishment plan was submitted that he felt confident in - and it was submitted to the Ministry of Transportation and the Investment Center for approval.

The Swiss company announced that it would complete the construction of the Carmelite line from the port area to the top of Mount Carmel within 18 months, however, as the management later said: "They have never encountered bureaucracy and awkwardness like in Israel."

Construction began only in May 1956 and ended in March 1959.

New in wine: "Israeli champagne"

A bottle of President's wine, Photo: From the Bidspirit website

On April 1, 1952, the management of Carmel Mizrahi Winery in Rishon Lezion gathered many guests and journalists, who came to celebrate the launch of the first Israeli champagne, which bore a label with the name "President Wine".

After a tour of the winery, the guests went to a large hall where they met the employees and the winery management, feasted on small gourmet dishes served in buffet style, and tasted the new wine while listening to a lecture on the wine industry in Israel.

The spokesman stressed that "the title of 'President' wine 'is champagne and not champagne, since as is well known only the sparkling wines from the champagne region in France deserve the title of champagne."

For the production of champagne, the winery commissioned an expert from Czechoslovakia, who prepared the wine according to an old French method, in which the fermentation process is slow and lengthy.

An interesting statistic about wine consumption in Israel was given at the event: "Many immigrants have come to Israel in recent years from Europe, where they are used to wine consumption, so it is no wonder that wine sales have risen by 300 percent in recent years!"

Wine expert Rani Rogel, whose grandfather, Dr. Leo (Arie) Sussman, managed the Carmel Mizrahi Winery in Rishon Lezion until 1953, says that "President Wine" was not a great success.

According to Rogel, the taste of the wine was mediocre and its price was relatively high, at a time when drinking champagne in the country was considered a luxury and a boast.

"Although Carmel Mizrahi exported 'President Wine' to Jewish communities abroad, in the late 1970s the sparkling line was closed, and today only a few wineries in the country produce sparkling wines."

There are no slippers for Passover

Slippers by "The Magpie", Photo: From the Nostalgia Online website

On March 27, 1952, about three weeks before the Passover holiday, the Magefer company published an ad in the newspaper entitled "We apologize."

The text itself reads: "We apologize to our loyal customers, and also apologize to all those from large to small, who expected to receive as a gift for Passover the fine slippers made by our factory. Unfortunately, the Ministry of Commerce and Industry did not complete all the bureaucratic procedures required to announce the plan. "The new economy, and today we received, together with other shoe manufacturers, an order to freeze inventory until the completion of the required work on behalf of the government, which they estimate will take at least another three weeks."

"Government is cruel"

At the end of March 1952, about 100 families living in the Givat Ram area of ​​Jerusalem received an expropriation order, which required them to "find themselves alternative housing by July 1, since the area is designated for the construction of the campus in the capital."

These families were evacuated at the time from the Shimon Hatzadik neighborhood on the border with Jordan, with a government promise to allocate them alternative plots of land.

Moshe Edri, head of the residents' committee, told the Al Hamishmar newspaper that "in practice the government not only did not honor its promise, but also informed us on the sidelines that it does not consider itself responsible for alternative housing. Such cruelty, opacity and malice can only exist in a Jewish government. ".

Cinema is also becoming more expensive

Notices were posted on the bulletin boards on March 31, 1952 regarding an expected increase in movie ticket prices.

"Citizen! Have you noticed that the price of a movie ticket does not reach the handful of peanuts offered to you on the street, and does not exceed the price of brushing a pair of shoes? For two years ticket prices have not increased Just some of the many above-mentioned price increases. "

The missing / IDF bases that were

BHD 12

Photo: Nostalgia Online Archive,

Training Base 12 operated from the early 1950s in the Tel Hashomer camp and later in Tzrifin (later, "Yadin Camp"), and served as the IDF Women's Corps' training center until 2001. After that, until 2019, the place functioned as an officer's school for troops. Fighting supporters, and later the IDF's professional training system was established there.

In 2019, the place was demolished together with all the nearby IDF bases, in favor of the construction of a residential neighborhood.

The grocery store / sweets and dessert

Ice cream in the bath

Photo: Nostalgia Online website,

In those days, many years before the spread of ice cream refrigerators in every corner and explosion, it was possible to lick ice cream stalls in a limited number of flavors, mainly vanilla, chocolate and banana punch.

A cup-shaped waffle contained one ball - and a bathtub contained two.

In the early 2000s, the bathtub disappeared from the stands, perhaps following a survey that found that 80 percent of customers preferred the trophy.

A few months later a graffiti campaign began demanding: "The baths be returned."

Want a phone line?

Pay huge prices

Photo: Zoltan Kluger, GPO,

At the end of 1948, there were about 20,000 telephone lines in Israel, and the Ministry of Transportation, which was also in charge of the post office and the telephone, accumulated 15,000 requests for the installation of additional lines.

The first government initiated an ambitious plan in 1949 to install 30,000 new telephone lines within 30 months, but by the appointed date, March 1952, it turned out that only a third of the installations had been carried out.

The Minister in charge, David Pinkas, announced on March 30, 1952, "Increasing the rate of installations, when each line will cost 148 pounds" - a huge sum, in the days when an IDF judge or general earned 100 pounds in photography: participants in a telephone technician training course, 1952

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Source: israelhayom

All news articles on 2022-04-01

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