Peretz Bernstein

Peretz Bernstein ( Hebrew: פרץ ברנשטיין, born June 12, 1890 in Meiningen as Shlomo Fritz Bernstein, † March 21, 1971 in Jerusalem ) was a Zionist activist and Israeli politician and one of the signatories of the Israeli declaration of independence.

Life

He was born in Meiningen, the son of a Jewish merchant Samuel Berstein, and he spent his childhood and primary education. In 1906 the family moved to Eisenach, Peretz visited in the Wartburg City high school and completed a commercial vocational school, because he wanted to be working as grain traders later. In 1910 he moved to Rotterdam, but remained with the remaining in Eisenach family connected even he graduated from 1911 to 1912, the basic military training in Thuringia. Back in Rotterdam, he worked with other Jewish merchants in a grain trading post and became interested in modern Hebrew language to be interested. Its trade links to Asia Minor gave him background knowledge, which he could use as an employee, then editor of the Dutch Zionist weekly newspaper Jodse Wachter. In 1917, he joined the Zionist organization in the Netherlands, where he served as secretary and board member; 1930 to 1934 he was its president. In Berlin in 1926 he published his first book on the subject of anti-Semitism, and later memoranda on " The Jewish and the social question." Out of concern for the safety of his young family, he emigrated in 1936 in the British Mandate of Palestine, where he became editor of the Hebrew -language newspaper Haboker ( The Morning ). He joined the Jewish Agency and was also a board member there, acted furthermore 1946-1948 as director of the economic sector. Bernstein was on 14 May 1948, the signatories of the Israeli declaration of independence and was appointed to the Government, Ben Gurion as Minister of Trade and Industry in the transitional government.

With Germany he was after the Second World War in connection therewith; he supported by forces one to him personally known Eisenach foster family who had taken care of his ailing father during the Nazi dictatorship in Germany. Peretz was elected in 1949 in the first Knesset as a member of the General Zionists ( Tzionim Klaliym ), but lost his place in the Cabinet. After 1951, he was re-elected, he returned in the fourth and fifth government back in the office of trade and industry minister. Bernstein was also a candidate for the presidential election to the Knesset in 1952, but withdrew his candidacy after the second round of the election after he was decapitated second behind the eventual winner Yitzhak Ben-Zvi.

Bernstein returned in 1955 and in 1959 returned to the Knesset, but not attained his cabinet position. In 1961, the General Zionists merged to form party with the Progressive Party ( Miflaga Progresivit ) to the Liberals; Bernstein was chosen as one of its two presidents. In the same year he was re- elected to the Knesset and supervised the alliance with Menachem Begin's Herut Party, from which eventually formed the Gahal Group. In 1963 he ran again for president, but lost by 67 votes to 33 against Zalman Shazar. Bernstein lost his seat in the elections of 1965 and died in 1971.

Works

• ( as F ( ritz ) B. ): The anti-Semitism as a group phenomenon. Attempt at a sociology of Jew-hatred. Jewish Verlag, Berlin 1926 & Königstein im Taunus 1980