The Jewish Agency for Israel Timeline


Year
 
Jewish Agency for Israel
 
Israel
 
Jewish History & Culture
1963            

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Chairman of the Jewish Agency Executive: Moshe Sharett.

Alternate Chairman of the Executive of the WZO - Jewish Agency, American Section: Dr. Emanuel Neumann and Rose L. Halperin.

President of the World Zionist Organization: Nahum Goldmann.

Treasurer of the Jewish Agency: Louis Arie Pincus.

Chairman of the Immigration Department: Shlomo Zalman Shragai.

Chairman Absorption Department: Aharon Zisling.

Chairman Settlement Department: Raanan Weitz.

Chairman Youth Aliyah Department: Moshe Kol.

New immigrants in 1963: 64,364. Immigrants originate primarily from Morocco and Romania.

 

 

March: Foreign Minister Golda Meir informs the Knesset that "a number of German scientists and hundreds of German technicians are helping to develop offensive missiles in Egypt, and even armaments banned by international law." David Ben Gurion asks Shimon Peres to raise the matter with the German government. The Mossad approaches the daughter of one of the scientist's and tries to persuade her to convince her father to leave Egypt.

March 6: The Knesset approves a government decision to set up an educational television network.

March 25: Isser Harel, the head of the Mossad, resigns over differences of opinion with Ben Gurion regarding the activity of the West German scientists in Egypt.

March: The Hebrew Union College opens its Biblical and Archaeological School in Jerusalem.

April 14: Yugoslavian president Tito replies to Ben Gurion's letter. The answer is a disappointment to the Israeli leader.

April, 17: Egypt, Syria and Iraq sign a treaty of alliance in Cairo. They put their armies under a unified command and proclaim that the aim of the alliance was the "liberation of Palestine." Jordan remains outside. Israel recognizes that King Hussein needs peace with Israel in order to preserve the stability of his regime. A series of meetings between the King and Israeli leaders is organized. Once the King comes to Tel Aviv in utmost secrecy, where he meets Golda Meir. Another meeting takes places in London.

April 21: The first International Book Fair opens in Jerusalem.

April 23: Yitzhak Ben Zvi, Israel's second president, dies.

April: Work begins on the new development town of Karmiel in the Lower Galilee.

May 2: Ahdut Haavoda proposes the establishment of an alliance with Mapai and Mapam.

May 13 : During a Knesset debate, the Germans are accused of continuing to threaten the Jews with "extermination". The government critics are led by Menachem Begin. He denounces Ben Gurion's decision to sell Israeli-made "Uzi" sub-machine-guns to Germany and abuses him for maintaining diplomatic relations with Germany. Ben Gurion does not want to harm the steadily improving German-Israeli relations. He insists that the public has no reason for alarm and that the missiles were unusable.

May 21: Zalman Shazar, a prominent Labor movement personality, past editor of "Davar", former government minister, and chairman of the Jewish Agency, as third president of Israel.

May 27: The arrival of former West German defense minister Franz Josef Strauss for a visit prompts agitated demonstrations.

May: Haifa University College is established. It will function under the supervision of the Hebrew University until granted independence in 1970.

June 2: Norwegian General Odd Bull replaces Swedish General Carl von Horn as chief of the UN truce observers in the Middle East.

June 16: Prime Minister David Ben Gurion resigns from the government "because of personal needs" and retires to Sde Boker. On his recommendation, he is succeeded by Minister of Finance Levi Eshkol as prime minister and minister of defense.

June 26: A new government, led by Levi Eshkol, is approved by the Knesset. Eshkol presents it as a "government of continuity." Abba Eban is appointed deputy prime minister.

August 7: The Knesset passes a law establishing the Nature Reserves Authority and the National Parks Authority.

August 19 : A number of shooting attacks by Syrian forces along the Sea of Galilee culminate in the killing of two settlers from the Israeli border village of Almagor.

August 29: The first edition of "Aurora" is published. Its purpose was to address the intellectual interests of Spanish speakers in Israel.

August: American Orthodox leaders warn that the Conservative synagogue movement "constituted a serious threat to Israeli Jewry."

September 3 : The U. S. and Great Britain introduce a UN Security Council resolution condemning the "wanton murder at Almagor in Israel territory of two Israeli citizens on August 19." The Soviet Union vetoes the resolution.

September 10: The Arab League resolves to block the diversion of the Jordan waters by Israel.

October 21: Prime Minister Levi Eshkol announces the annulment of some facets of military rule in the Arab sector.

November 14: During excavations in Masada the skeletons of two young men and a women, whose long hair is still braided, are discovered. The skeletons originate from the Roman period.

November 24: President Zalman Shazar represents Israel at the funeral of President John F. Kennedy.

December 3: UN General Assembly Resolution 1912.

December 12: A decision is made at a conference of Arab chiefs of staff to jointly divert the Jordan River headwaters to prevent access by Israel.

December 18: Levi Eshkol announces the shortening of compulsory army service for men by four months.

Brother Daniel, born in 1922 as a Polish Jew, Owald Rufeisen, who converted to Christianity in 1942 and became a Carmelite monk in 1945, is denied his petition to be recognized as a Jew under the Law of Return by the Supreme Court. The Court agrees that Brother Daniel is a Jew according to the Halakha but says that the Law of Return is based on Jewish national historical consciousness and on the ordinary secular meaning of "Jew". He is offered citizenship by naturalization.

Israeli military advisers begin assisting General Joseph Mobutu of the Congo in a civil war in which pro-Communist forces are aided by Egypt. Congolese troops are trained in Israel and, in 1964, will rout the rebels.

Leonard Bernstein conducts his "Kaddish", an oratorio for narrator, chorus and orchestra.

Yaacov Agam, Israeli painter wins the First International Prize at the São Paulo Biennale for his artistic research into the third dimension and movement in painting.

Yigael Yadin's "The Art of Warfare in Biblical Lands" is translated into English.

 

 

January: A Dutch court in Arnhem rules that a bronze sculpture by Honoré Daumier, purchased by a Dutch art collector at a 1941 Nazi art auction, be returned to the estate of Jakob Goldschmidt, a German Jewish banker. It is expected that this decision might affect millions of dollars of confiscated Jewish properties disposed of by the Nazi regime.

February: "Der Stellvertreter" ("The Deputy"), a play by Rolf Hochhuth, a German protestant, opens in Berlin. It indicts Pope Pius XII for his failure to protest publicly and officially against the mass murder of Jews by the Nazis. The pope is portrayed as a cold and calculating figure, more interested in protecting the financial and institutional interests of the Church than in his moral responsibility as the vicar of Christ.

February: The Soviet press publishes an exchange of letters between Nikita Khrushchev and Lord Bertrand Russell. Russell expresses dismay at the death sentences meted out to Jews for alleged economic crimes. Khrushchev denies Soviet anti-Jewish feelings and brands such accusations "a vicious slander on the Soviet people."

April: The Warsaw Jewish newspaper "Folks-shtimme" publishes a report on military honors awarded to Jews in the Soviet army in World War II. It is estimated that 500.000 Jews served in the Soviet army during World War II, and 160.772 Jews, or 1,74% of all persons so honored , received various military awards and metals.

October: During Simhat Torah services, 15.000 Jews, mostly young people, sing and dance in front of the Moscow synagogue, and 10.000 crowd into the Leningrad synagogue and surrounding streets.

Membership in the Zionist Organization of America is 87.000. This is a decline from 250.000 in 1948.

November: At the second session of the Second Vatican Council, Cardinal Augustin Bea submits a draft of Attitude of Catholics toward Non-Christians, particularly toward the Jews. It is not discussed by the council but is postponed to the third session, to be held in August 1964.

Hannah Arendt writes "Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil", in which she criticizes the Israeli court judging Adolf Eichmann for not indicting wartime Jewish leadership, who performed vital tasks for the Nazis that facilitated the "final solution".

Barbra Streisand, popular singer, is invited to perform at the White House by President John F. Kennedy.

A reproduction of the Sarajevo Haggadah, one of the most famous Hebrew manuscripts of the medieval period, is published by Cecil Roth.

Paul Celan (1920-1970), Austrian Jewish poet, publishes a collection of his poems, "Die Niemandsrose" - "The No-Man's Rose", which contains numerous Jewish themes and illusions. Several of his poems commemorate the victims of the Holocaust. Celan is a survivor of Nazi labor camps, where his parents perished.

The State Museum of Köln mounts "Monumenta Judaica", an exhibition of 2,000 years of Jewish history and culture on the Rhine. It is documented in an 800-page catalogue and attracts tens of thousands of visitors from Germany and abroad.

Natalia Ginzburg, Italian novelist and playwright, writes "Family Sayings", a psychological novel based on recollections of her youth, including bourgeois assimilated Italian Jewish life in Turin.

Stan Getz, U. S. jazz musician, releases "Jazz Samba", a record album that includes songs that make Brazilian bossa nova music an international sensation.

Maurice Sendak, American writer and illustrator, writes "Where the Wild Things Are", one of the favorite books among children all over the world.

Eugene Paul Wigner is awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics.

 

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