Raquela a woman of Israel by Ruth Gruber 1978 326pg

 A biography of  nurse who lived through Israel's History 24/12/19

1929 Bet Hakerem was attacked in the Arab uprising  from Deir Yassin.  Moses Montefiore from England  and Judah Touro from the USA both contributed to building outside the Old City of Jerusalem

 By 1936 70 000 Jews had come from Germany. Sephardic Jews name children after both living and dead. 50 000 Palestinian Jewish men and women joined the British army.

Erich Mendelson designed Hadassah hospital, Mount Scopus. Henrietta Szold had Hans Beyth directing youth Aliyah which was set up in 1933. Children came from Europe as well as Arab lands where there were Nazi sympathizers.

1860 Szold born in Baltimore, she later became the first lady of Palestine. She worked with Louis Ginzburg till he met a young wife and so she came to Palestine in 1909 and in 1927 became a member of the Zionist executive council. Recha Freier in Berlin started Youth Aliyah.

The Jewish Brigade was in the British Eight Army fighting under General Mark Clark in Italy. Ted Lurie was the Palestine Post correspondent.. Whitehall feared that the demobilized Jewish soldiers would use their skill to help Jews to reach Palestine.

1878 Petach Tikva started by Jerusalem Jews  for farming. James Tegart planned the forts for the British. From Kibbutz Yagur was used to free the Atlit refugees

1945 July Labour Party came to power in Britain, They kept the White Paper.

         Sept Bevin announced the Anglo American Committee. 1947 Feb 15th Bevin announced that Palestine was being turned over to the UN. After American colonies and Ireland, Palestine was Britain's biggest failure.

Haim Yassky director of Hadassah Medical organization killed in the attack on the bus. The Black and Tan policemen who had once suppressed the Irish were sent to Palestine. After the war a pogrom occurred in Kielce Poland.

The King David Hotel - Sir John Shaw refused to accept the telephone warning to evacuate because of a bomb.

Raquel Prywes trained to be a nurse during the WW2 period,. Raquela  worked as a midwife in Atlit and later in Cypress

YMCA building was build by Americans and UNSCOP met there in April1947. Ein Hashofet named for Louis Brandeis.

There were 2 ships that carried a total of 15 000 refugees and Ben Gurion agreed that they would go to Cypress so that the British did not have to use violence to transfer them. Because of a danger of typhus in the camps, Golda went to Cypress and managed to convince the British to let mothers with babies under a year to get out she met Sir Godfrey Collins who was in charge. 25000 babies had been born on Cypress.

1948 Feb Palestine Post building blown up by Arabs.

When Israel declared independence women and children were allowed to move to Israel but Bevin would not let men of fighting age leave there for another 7 months till Britain finally recognized Israel.in Dec 1948.

When the Jews started winning and going on the offensive the security council called for a 4 week ceasefire. But they also kept control of the amount of food coming into Jerusalem.

1949 July last peace agreement with Syrian sighed under Dr Ralph Bunch 20 month after the war began and 6 thousand Israelis dead.

Carp was an important part of the diet in the early days. Development towns didn't succeed as there was no work there.

In the 1956 Egyptians were captured with Arabic copies of Hitler's Mein Kampf.

1961 June Hadassah Hospital Ein Kerem opened. 1958 Eisenhower had to send troops to save Lebanon from Nasser trouble making. Britain had permission to fly in troops over Israel to save Jordan from Nasser's subversive acts.

Golda had a daughter on kibbutz Rivivim who miscarried and almost died.

Raquela's son in law was Gideon Weiler who died in action his father was Progressive Rabbi Moses Cyrus Weiler of SA.

Yosef Tekoah was Israel's rep at UN and became President of Ben Gurion University in the Negev.

Comment from Jules Miller

Erich Mendelson the architect who designed the Hadassah hospital also designed the Shoken Department stores for the Shoken family in Germany who are the founders & owners of Haaretz Newspaper in Israel .  these buildings were highly acclaimed architecture before WW2 .    

The YMCA building in Jerusalem was designed by  Auther Looms Harmon the same architect the designed the Empire State Building in New York .

Rabbi Weiler actually lost both his sons on the same day at the start of the Yom Kippur war , one on the Golan Heights & one in Sinai.

 An Additional interesting bit of information is that when the Irgun blew up the Acre prison in 1947 allowing over 350 prisoners to escape , they had previously acquired plans of the prison from the British Architect who was a close friend of one of the leaders of the Irgun .

The seed is Mine by Charles van Onselen 520pg 1996 South Africa

This is one of the most fascinating South African History Books  10/10/13

 

 The book starts at about the time of the Mfacane describing the movement of the African families who originated in the Calodon River area and moved into the Southern Transvaal in the area between the London diamond field, Klerksdorp, Walmeranstad and as far as Lichtenberg which we call the Triangle..

Except for the crowded reserves all land was allocated to whites and blacks lived as squatters and made contracts with farmers to be sharecroppers or paid for  the use of the farmers veld to pasture there  cattle and sheep.

1826 After Shaka destruction of the tribes around Zululand and they formation of the Zulu people The mfacane (the scattering) Mzilakatze broke away from the Zulu tribe and drove through the Transvaal destroying the Sotho and Twana tribe leaving the area vacant.

1836  The Great Trek, Dutch speaking farmers only knew extensive farming, their population had enlarged so greatly that they trekked from the Cape to find new farming area.  Initially the white farmers had made a living from hunting the wildlife in the area and keeping cattle. They had no experience in agriculture.  Even Paul Kruger the President of the Zuid Afrikaans Republic realized that land had to be preserved for wildlife and he preserved  what later became the Krugerpark.

Kas kept every receipt, note, account or document that was ever given to him and on this the book was written each receipt is the story of a cow ,ox ,wagon, plough that was bought.  There are descriptions of surviving the droughts, followed by rainy seasons and floods that brought locusts. He had records of how many bags of produce he had sold each year. 

1892 Rindapest wiped out a high percentage of cattle, buffalo, giraffe etc. blacks blamed white and whites blamed blacks for it , vaccine against it came later.  Cattle from Northern Rhodesia were not affected and there, Jewish traders set up in Northern Rhodesia to buy up cattle and drive them south.

 Southern blacks all had an oral history that was handed down and for example we know that certain tribes moved southwards and crossed the Zambezi the year of the big stars which was Haileys Comet.  This virus wiped out a large % of ungulates and when you consider that all goods were transported by oxen you can imagine how badly it hit the economy

The Rindepest is discussed and the fact that some black farmers had cattle that survived.   The authorities did not know how to deal with this which was a respiratory virus and dipping the cattle made it even worse.  This memory is also one of the many reasons why the ANC government wanted an African solution to AIDS.   

1900 How that area was affected by the Boer war where whites left their farms and black were conscripted to be transport riders, cooks etc.

In this period Kas had an Afrikaans partner Swanapoel and they were transport riders taking bags of grain to the minefields on ox-wagon, this was a good partnership and Swanapoel helped him in many ways and it was a solid friendshop.  This type of transporting before the days of the trains is documented in Jock of the Bushveld by Fitzpatrick. In summer the wagon would sink into the muddy roads and in winter there was not grass on the side of the road to feed the oxen.

Then WW1 which put up the price of wool so many farmers moved into sheep. He also discusses the fact that there were rebels in this area  who were against SA supporting the British. Botha and Smuts  drove the Germans out of South West Africa which became a SA mandate.  Interestingly that Afrikaans became the most important language in what is today Namibia 

 1919 The  flu epidemic which affected Europe and American troops returning from the war is well known, a lot of people in the Triangle died.  Today we know it got to SA by migrating  birds.

 

1922 He mentions the  miner strikes and the shootings, mostly in Fordsburg but my grandmother talked about it affecting Dornfontein, Johannesburg.  Smuts put it down. White miners didn't want blacks to be employed in the mines.

1930s After the war there was booms and recessions in the price of agricultural goods. But the worst period was the drought and depression and starvation. You had poor whites who turned to blacks for help.  Kas spoke Afrikaans and could read basic Afrikaans.  Some whites spoke Sotho.

From the 30s the Native Laws started making life difficult for blacks. He mentions that the Stern family owned land in Scheitser Reynicka and their daughter was Irma Stern.Famous artist) The influence of the Communist Party and Labour Party and members to Parliament that represented natives is discussed.

Whites had access to credit later at the Land Bank but blacks had to look to English, Indian or Jewish traders for credit and carry them till the harvest.

  Interesting that while you had the Dust Bowl in Oklahoma etc.  the same time of dust storms affected the Transvaal, and people had to take shelter in the huts during a dust storm.

One year he bought a plow on credit from an English shopkeeper and as a result of the drought there was no money to pay at  the end of the season. When he was subpoenaed he brought his 6 plow donkeys to the store.  All the debtors were at the store at the same time and the owner said he is the only man of honour.  He told Kas to keep his donkeys but the store went bankrupt and closed. 2 years later. After a good harvest Kas  found out which farm the man  had moved to and went to pay money owing. The ex-merchant was amazed and gave him back 30 shillings.  Had Kas paid at the time the money would have gone to the Englishman's creditors. 

 

1939 Tractors started arriving in the late 30s but with the beginning of the WW2 new ones or spare parts were not available and petrol  was  rationed. The government encouraged farmers to used draught animals. So farmers found both livestock and crops received better prices, this was the case for a good few years. At this stage he learned the tecnique of double plowing to reduce the weeds.  Sunflower seed and beans were also in great demand.

Post war tractors started taking the role of the tenant farmer and the Afrikaner nationalism started affecting the relationship between whites and blacks.  One thing that surprises me is that Kas knew the value of reading and writing and yet did not encourage  his children and give them a  chance to go to school. It was mostly the wives who saved up money by breeding pigs and chickens and collecting dry cow pats for sale as fuel to pay for clothes and for the children's school.

1947 the Afrikaners with government help started setting up stores to replace the others traders, these were not successful but they were encouraged to boycott the Indian traders. Poor whites would trade with these shops through the back door. Blacks were hardly aware of this and it was dropped soon afterwards.

  The Afrikaner policy was "Die Kaffier in sy plek, die Koelie uit die land"(The black in his place the Indian off the land).  At this time blacks started feeling the effect of Nationalist bigotry, when his kid was ill he asked the landlord to take him to the doctor, the landlord refused to help and said he could only use his cart for work purposes and would not lend it to him. He had to turn to the neighbor for help his kid almost died. An Afrikaans women who he had in the past given rides on a cart to town and would chat  to him on the way, would now sit behind him.

It now reached a stage that through government policy black were no longer wanted as share cropper but as wage labourers on the farms. This was after a particularly good season where Kas earned well. So rich blacks were not liked and if they were just lazy they also were not wanted.

At one time he had an arrangement with the manager of a wealthy black who owned land.  In the middle of the season the black owner plowed in his seedlings and replanted.It showed that Whites at least had a greater respect for the rules than rich blacks. It was always accepted that the status of the land would change only after the season and crop had come in.

-----------------------------------------

 1950s when the Nationalist government was busy with its ideology of Apartheid and Dr. Verwoed was Minister of Native Affairs. Slowly he wanted to remove "squatters" from white farms and turn them into labourers.

Blacks had to get Passbooks showing where they were living, this also started regulating the number of blacks entering the industrial cities as unemployed blacks were not allowed to reside in cities. Even at this stage when he took bags of corn to the Government Co-op they paid him without saying a word and asked him for his address as he was paid the "voorskot" and the posted him a cheque for the "agterskot" which he never received when he never marketed directly.

When Kas said he was born before the Rindapest the government official said that meant that he no longer had to pay poll tax and was entitled to a small state pension. However if he had a team of oxen he was not entitled to the pension.  

Aaron Cohan ran a trading store and black were scared to allow their daughters to work for him as he had black mistresses.  Hersh was a land speculator and owned a large property Rietvlei  in the area and asked Cohan to keep an eye on it.

Cohen got hold of a black manager who brought in 5 or so extended black families and later the  widow Ma Hersh would be phoned every year and would count the bags of grain produced and send it to the co-op in her name. The black farmers might steal a certain amount of sweet corn at night but her share was very large and was not keen on the new Apartheid laws but eventually she had to comply especially after a bad season and the black tenants had to leave.

Kas also had skills of  medicine man  and a lot of people consulted him but he only took money from people when they were cured .  An Afrikaans women from Caltonville had dismissed her maid in a very acrimonious situation and came  for help as her house was now haunted by a tokalosh which caused the crockery to rattle.  Kas gave her a mixture to spread around the house and she sent him 5 Pound in gratitude.  Caltonwille was a mining town and when the mine pumped the water out it resulted in earth movement and local tremors and later the town started collapsing with sink holes.

At this period the patriarchal system was already breaking down and the children went off to work in cities where they had a better social life.  Thus the rural black family had the grandparents and grandchildren farming.  Many children were closer tho their grandparents than their parents. Kas had 3 wive  and  8 children.

If a poor white bought a piece of land and had a mortgage if he got a good share cropper who would make the land pay without him having capital to develop it. After a few years with field having been cleared the farmer might be able buy a tractor and work it himself. Many whites worked on mines and were absentee landlords as they never had capital or the knowledge to get their farms they had inherited to pay..

Kas bought a tractor by selling cattle which he had trouble finding grazing for, but now depended on a son to drive the tractor, just at a time when the rains were poor in the 1960s

He went through stages of owning a truck or car but as he could not drive this himself and depended on his sons who battled to get drivers licences a problem being semi-literate. 

The book mentions that children who had had a proper apprenticeship with him as farmers, blacksmiths or saddle and shoe repairing succeeded in the proletariat world those that left the farm too young and were unskilled labourers didn't.  One granddaughter got herself a job in car spares for example.

But the Apartheid system was closing in and he ended up on small a plot allocated at Legde an area under the Chieftainess Cathorine.In reality he was a Sotho and this was a Tswana area,but he was enough of a chamelian.Blacks were not as tribal as the whits throught.  He went into goat breeding as their was pasture on the mountain nearby. Blacks moved to the Homeland areas as it offered schools to their children.

1975 the government Bantustan policy came about and Bafutatswana was declared under Chief Magope. The crater where cattle was pastured was to be turned into a game-park and Sun City casino was to be build. The South African government never allowed casino's but independent black areas could. Sol Kursners project did provide employment for many in the area. 

1976 the Soweto Riots began and you have some movement of blacks back into the country.

The first time he bought a tractor his sons or the person paid to drive it did not understand the mechanics. Later on he was able to hire someone who could keep this working and his 5th tractor he hired out and received a % of crops grown. 

In his late 80s he was still active as a farmer but the land available was small holding that blacks in Ledig in the Bantustan of Bafutaswana never had an inclination to cultivate.  When he planted corn the poor starving neighbours would take so he had to plant sunflower . Women and children were alway prepared to help in the harvest of corn or sorghum as the were food but were not so will on cash crops.

 When he had been in the triangle and hurt his shoulder he went to Dr. Huddleson who had arranged for surgery in hospital but now he had no personal connections and he was going blind through cataracts.  He was not prepared to undergo surgery offered.

Conclusion

Thus in the 1930s SA like Argentina was one of the G countries in the world, the Apartheid course that she took up under the Nationalist Afrikanerdom government stunted SA and by the time a black democracy came about it was too late.

Kas was over 90 when he died and the author describes that he was the only white man who stood at the back of the funeral.

 

The life story of Ben Yehuda by Robert St John :tongue of the prophets 1952 398pg

How Hebrew became a Modern Spoken Language    14/8/20

This is a book written about a Jew by a non Jew 

To the writer in 1948 the name Ben Yehuda was merely a street name in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. 

Jews came from 60 different countries with different religious attitudes, languages and cultures but had only a common language in Hebrew. In NY he met Mrs Max Wittmann (Devora) daughter of Ben Yehuda and Hemda her mother who died in summer 1951.

"God would destroy the infidel for tampering with his language". In his lifetime Ben  Yehuda had more enemies than friends but they have been silenced by his success. Hebrew was a language of Tulmudic argument and prayer.

He was put in prison and survived tuberculosis, had 11 children and wrote a volume dictionary that ended in 16 volumes. He had worked in Aretz Israel for 41 years

1858 Born in Luzhky , Lithuania as Eliezer Peralman and was greatly influenced by his father Labelah. He lived with his uncle till his bar mitzvah. He was given Robinson Crusoe by Rabbi Joseph Blucker in Hebrew to read. He was given the family name Elyanof as this was a childless couple and so as an only son was not conscripted into the army,

Moved to a Polotzk Yeshiva, in Glubokaya he met the Jonas family and Devora taught him French and German then  Gymnasium in Dunaburg where he studied with a small scholarship. 

1878 The Tzar liberated the Bulgars from the Turks but he felt the Jews needed to be liberated, and not to wait for the messiah like orthodox rabbis said. He studied at the Sorbonne , Paris and met persons like Victor Hugo, Sara Bernhardt and Adolphe Cremieux. He met Charles Netter, founder of the Mikveh Israel in Palestine. He spent time in Algiers to cure his tuberculosis where he met local Jews.

      The Hebrew monthly in Vienna published his article "A Worthy Question"- every nation has to defend its own nationality and only settlements in Israel can do that.

Hebrew was a spoken language till 200 BC then Greek became a common language of Jews. In Europe medieval Germanic written in Hebrew letters. but to unify the people a common language of Hebrew  was needed and had to be modernized. In Paris he supported himself by translating French into Russian.

1881 Devora joined him in Vienna where he met Peretz Smolenskin they married in Constantinople and went to Palestine. They agreed they would only speak Hebrew to their children. To get to Jerusalem took a cart and slept at Bab el Wad and then up the hill the next day 24 km to Jerusalem. Here he worked for a Hebrew paper under Israel Frumkin for the paper Hahabtzeleth. He was given his own paper to run called Mebasseret Zion

The Jewsih population lived in poverty and filth and they had to be orthodox to live with them. Jews lived off charity sent by Jews abroad and pious people came to die in Jerusalem. The people who went abroad to raise money kept about a third for themselves. Few Jews had taken out Turkish citizenship and only the Sparadim considered nothing wrong with working. The leaders were opposed to agriculture as tilling the soil was considered  vulgar. Ashkenasim and Spparadim  had no common language.

He got help from Nissim Behar who was in charge of Alliance Israelite Universelle. Ben Yehuda was given a post at this French school but he was unofficially paid under the table. Many Jews objected to Hebrew being taught this way.

Jehiel Michael Pines represented British Jewry with the Montefiore Memorial Foundation.

Ben Yehuda's writing in the Hebrew paper Hashahar influenced many in Eastern Europe and the Biluim arrived  acronym for  "Sons of Jacob Come let us go"

When Elizer and Devoras first son Ben Zion was born they only spoke Hebrew to him the next Ittamar the later AviHayal.

1878 Petah Tikva inaugurated. Set up by Jews from Jerusalem and Jaffa and Hebrew not Yiddish would be the language.

1882 Rishon Lezion started but people stayed in Jaffa till a deep well had been constructed.  

With connections and bribery the Turks gave permission for the Hetziba (deer) to be published as a weekly paper.  One article said that money from abroad should be used to buy land to provide work, this upset people receiving the "Haluka" 

Ben Yehuda now had to write Hebrew Text books and David Yellin helped write plays for children.They also started translating books into Hebrew including the "Arabian knights" He taught Hebrew in Hebrew. Also a Hebrew geography of Palestine published.

William Hertzberg was the  rep in Palestine to administer funds from Germany and gave him funds for a Hebrew dictionary. Because of orthodox objections, the ben Yehuda were evicted from their home by the landlord but his supporters forced the landlord to take him back. He wrote against the Smita laws being taken literally and called for a proper accounting of the Halukah monies. There was an official Herem placed against him.

1887 he went to Moscow.he was also well received in Paris.Meanwhile Devora moved to a Sparadi area in Jerusalem where she was more welcome.

It was never known in history for a person to create a language. An attempt to create a Jewish state would arouse dormant antisemitism.  Debora taught Hebrew at the Evelina Rothchild girls school, but the school medium was English.

1891 Debora died of tuberculosis at the age of 37

The Turks had become suspicious of Jewish nationalism and stopped immigration but people smuggled in easily. When the Askenazim would not bury her the Sparadim agreed to so then the Askanazim relented.  AviHayal and 2 younger sisters died. They wanted to promote Rabbi Jacob Meir to represent the community and he had to learn French sto be able to do that.

 You needed literature in Hebrew and he translated Victor Hugo's Notre Dame and Mollers Le Tartuffe.

Every publication of the paper had an explanation of the new word to be used. At the settlements Israel Belkind set up schools where only Hebrew was used. A wealthy man Helpren from Smolensk set up Nes Tziona and remained there working as a labourer. Warsaw Jews set p Rehovot. 

To stop Arab stealing their flocks Israel Feinberg set up guards.  Baron Rothschild set up wine making. Meir Dizengoff established a bottle making factory at Tantura but Yellow Fever and Malaria swept through it.  At Rosh Pina silk making was set up. A perfume factory was set up which caused geranium and roses to be planted.

Debora's sister studied natural sciences in Moscow and took the Hebrew name Hemda and married him. She had to learn Hebrew otherwise Russian not Yiddish was spoken to the children Ottomen subjects were supposed to wear the fez as respect to the Sultan.

1892 Train from Jaffa to Jerusalem completed.  Ben Yehuda supported the effort of Rothschild agents who did not get on with the settlers.   A Russian group called Bnei Moshe supported Hebrew schools in Palestine, it's  leader was Ginsburg who changed his name to Ahad Ha'am. Ben Yehuda's supporters were young while his opponents were the older generation.

Sultan Abdul Hamid II censorship was severe.  When the Jewish community brought a herem against Eliezer he was put on trial by the Turks till Rothschild used his influence and the case was dropped.

Professor Soloman Schecter visited him and later became president of the Jewish theological Seminary of the US. Reporters volunteered to send to Jerusalem articles about their settlement. Saul Tchsernikowski became the Hebrew ``poet of paganism" "poet laureate of the Jews"

1897 by then a real Jewish life began to develop, Jaffa had become almost half Jewish. The Lamel school supported by German Jews instruction was in German but Hebrew as a foreign language was being taught in most Jewish schools. Hemda basically ran the Hetziba paper giving Eliazer time for his dictionary.

Hadera was at this stage a "Village of Death as Yellow Fever and malaria had killed every one of the original settlers. Zichron Ya'kov was settled principally by Romoanians including Aaron Aaronsohn and his sister Sara - NILI spies.  Often young men returning from an education in France considered themselves too good for the labour needed.

Metulla was set up buying the land from Druse.

Israel Zangwill the writer from London and Herbert Betwitch  met Ben Yehuda in Jerusalem.  

The early Zionist congresses never mentioned the issue of a national language. The Turkish censor would not allow the issue of Zionism to be in the press.

He got a grant from the Jewish Colonization Association of England. Narcisse Leven founder of Alliance Israelite gave him a grant for the dictionary. However the French philanthropists favoured Argentinian settlement because the Rabbi's in Jerusalem insisted on the Orthodox running everything. Political support seemed to come easier from Non Jews than Jews.

Lord Lionel Rothschild made it possible for Ben Yehuda to do research  on philology at the British Museum.

1900 the British fought the Boers who wanted independence.

1906 Professor Boris Schatz of Vilna set up the Batzalel art school in Jerusalem

1907 Russia Japan War caused a split in views who to support and this followed by a wave of Jewish immigration.

Z.D, Levontin of The Anglo-Palestine bank gave him a loan to print the dictionary and also Otto Warburg gave him help.

In Berlin "Langenscheidtsche Verlagsbuchhandlung" a company specializing in dictionaries agreed to publish. Hemda got financial backing for them from Jewish Organizations. First volume with letters alef and bet came out dedicated to Baron Rothschild. Second volume dedicated to Otto Warburg.

After Hertzel's death the obvious person to take his place was Max Nordau but he withdrew himself as he had a Christian wife, so David Wolfson was chosen.He was later succeeded by Professor Otto Warburg.

1908 Young Turks deposed the Sultan in Constantinople. They allowed Jews to construct houses and opened immigration.

1909 Tel Aviv founded and Authur Ruppin set up an office by German Jewry to buy land. Shmaryahu Levin translated Dickens and Mark Twain into Hebrew.

Ephraim Hareuveni researched biblical plant names and Avrahm Zvi researched ancient music terms.

Russia built a teachers college in Nazareth and even Arab peasants began to speak Russian.

Wealthy Germans built the Technikum in Haifa to be in German but the students insisted on Hebrew.  This was the period of "The War of Languages '' and the US ambassador to Turkey came and negotiated peace.

1914 volume 5 was dedicated to London Jewry.  During WW1 no haluka money arrived but Maurice Wertheim son in law of Henry Morganthau brought $50 0000  This caused an argument between the leaders so he took the suitcase of money, went out of the room and said when you have an agreement call me.

Louis Brandeis insisted that Ben Yehuda and family come to the US where they spent the war years there  and returned in 1919 to Palestine

1917 US joined the war and Edmund Allemby drove out the Turks after 400 years in Palestine. Ben Yehuda had argued that Britain was the best friend for the Jews.

1920 Herbert Samuel as High Commissioner for Palestine declared that English, Arabic and Hebrew were the official languages in 1922.

1920 With the money he was given in the US, in  Talpiot he laid a cornerstone for a house named Matam Am. 

1922 aged 64 he died.

1951 Volume 13 of the dictionary averaging 600 pages each volume  had been printed.