Page 31 - Kol Bogrei Habonim - September 14

IVRI (IRVING)TASKER
Born - Liverpool 1946; Liverpool Ken - 1962-1966; Manchester
Ken - 1966-1970 – madrich in both kinnim; Aliyah - 1970, went
directly to Kibbutz Degania Bet. Moved to Kibbutz Givat Haim
Meuchad 1981. Spent 2 years in the UK as a shaliach for
RSGB; Presently retired and living on Kibbutz Givat Haim
Meuchad

I sat for hours in the library of the King David
n that classic film The Magnificent Seven,
Steve Macqueen told the story to a Mexican
School ‘reading’ Nathan Ausubel’s “Pictorial
sage about a guy who jumped out of a high-
rise window. Passing each floor, he was heard to History of the Jewish People.”
say “So far, so good.” When asked why did he People and events pervade our thoughts. They
say that? “It seemed like a good idea at the color our understanding and perceptions of
time.” I can’t remember. My upper memory’s reality. We relive them in our dreams. One
shot and I didn’t do a back-up. night when I was 16, I remember lying on my
bed listening to my transistor radio. The
But, as a kid, I certainly remember my elder orchestra played a very moving piece of music. I
brother, Malcolm Tarsky - my distant hero. He had no idea what it was. But it conjured up red
was in the RAF, then hachshara (can’t remember sunsets and shifting cumulus clouds. It was the
which one) and finally in Amiad with Len and theme tune of “Exodus.” As you read this, are
Irene, Frank and Dot, Beryl and David. He had you already humming the tune in your head?
come on Aliyah – sorry, made Aliyah, aboard the
SS Theodore Herzl. I read his letters, collected Paul Newman portrayed Ari Ben Canaan in the
Israeli stamps, received photos of him in his movie (a Technicolor Yitzchak Rabin) and his
kibbutz work boots and burst with pride seeing screen father, Barak (Lee J. Cob), uttered those
him in IDF uniform. You could say he had immortal words “God, don’t let my brother die at
become a role model well before that term the end of a British rope.” Hollywood had
became fashionable. infiltrated my consciousness. Had it really been
like this? Like thousands of others I believed it,
When I was 12, Malcolm returned to Liverpool despite Malcolm telling me it was Hollywood
with his new bride, Emmie (Van Dam de Metz). schmaltz. But too late, I was already a confirmed
I found out later that she had been in one class Zionist movie buff.
below Anna Frank. Strangely, after all the years
that I had put him up on a pedestal, he was much In 1962 I joined my school’s first Israel trip.
smaller than I had imagined. He stood there on First impressions count: the dry smell of the land
the platform at Lime Street station in his brown as we stepped off the plane at Lod, nee Lydda,
tweed jacket, one hand holding a small tattered airport and the brown pistol holsters of airport
suitcase, the other arm wrapped around a little security men. Where was Ari Ben Canaan?
girl with a pony tail. Strangely I was taller than However, to my delight I did see many Jordanas.
each of them. By the end of the tour, I had decided to live in
Israel on completion of my university education.
Previously I had discovered the horrors of the
holocaust when viewing the BBC’s “The Whole At the school trip’s reunion, Geoff Goodman
Truth” documenting the liberation of Bergen came over from Manchester to restart Habonim
Belsen. A few sleepless nights ensued. I then in Liverpool. Shelley Shieldhouse, 6 other girls
and I did the spadework. Geoff had given me a

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