Page 30 - Kol Bogrei Habonim - September 14

DENIS SHIFRIN

Born - Liverpool 1927; Joined Habonim – 1935; Hachshara at
Gorsey Leaze and Redhill – 1944-46; Movement work: Head
Office, Rosh Peleg – 1946-49; Married Gussie – 1948;. 1949
Aliyah to Kfar Hanassi – 1949; Moved to Tel Aviv - 1951;
Moved to Ra’anana 1985; Founded and illustrated
“Etzba’ony.” In 1960 Established Advertising Agency.
Illustrated children’s books and encyclopedias. University
guest lecturer on printing and visual perception; Prime
Minister’s Office- 1971-88; Iton Vatikei Habonim, editorial
committee – 1994-2012

I Education….” “In future, only Vatikim over the
n my early youth, I was an addictive joiner.
age of 19 should be allowed to go on
School sports’ teams, art classes, amateur
acting groups, the Shul choir, the Wavetree
“many good chaverim have been allowed to go
Jewish Scouts Brigade, Habonim at Zion House Hachshara.” “In recent years,” Izzy persisted,
where my Madrich was the much-loved Yehuda on Hachshara. The result is that most kibbutzim
Goodman. Many years later, he officiated when contain several psychologically and
Gussie and I got married. During the war, I educationally immature chaverim, whose
belonged to the OTC (Officers Training Corps) reasons for going on Hachshara were very
and the ATC (Air Training Corps). My mother unsound.” The reasons included: “An excess of
was continually ironing uniforms. But the one emotional Zionism and Utopian descriptions of
lasting love was Habonim. I joined a Gedud in kibbutz life by wartime madrichim, etc.”
1935. Camps were a delight – whether in
sunshine or pouring rain, from Boneh to Tsofeh I sent my letter from kibbutz hachshara at
to Vatik and Madrich with zigs, singsongs, horas Redhill. In rather convoluted prose, I attempted
and warm comradeships galore. to justify why one should “choose” chalutziut
and persevere in a kibbutz way of life. “It is not
In 1944, our Shaliach Baruch Rosenthal (Tal) an adventure of a year or two, but an experiment
convinced me that Palestine had a surfeit of involving a life-time.”
doctors and needed chalutzim to settle the land
so I joined Kibbutz Hachshara at Gorsey Leaze. Izzy eventually got to Kibbutz Kfar Hanassi in a
Meanwhile Izzy Abrahams, my closest friend, coffin. He died in 1949 in a climbing accident
left for Bangor University to study agriculture in on Mt. Snowdon. I, for my part, left Kibbutz
preparation for settling in Palestine as an Kfar Hanassi in 1952.
“educated” pioneer! In July 1947 two letters Apart from Izzy’s death, do I regret any thing?
appeared in Binyan, Vatikei Habonim’s Perhaps my naivety. However, “it sounded like
periodical:- a good idea at the time.”

One letter was from Izzy. He wrote: “there is no
contradiction between chaluziut (pioneering) and

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