אוסף משה ובתיה כרמל

Moshe Carmel was born in 1919 in the Geula neighborhood in Jerusalem. His parents were Rachel and Binyamin Mizrachi, both of whom were born in Jerusalem. With the founding of the Etzel Movement, Moshe volunteered in the organization. When it was dismantled, he continued serving in the IDF. While in the Etzel he was sent with his class to a battle in Northern Jerusalem, near the American Colony Hotel (later known as the Mandelbaum Gate). He tells the story that during the battle he found himself inside a photography store that went up in flames from the shooting and bombings of our troops and the Jordanian Legionnaires. He noticed some albums that were burning. But by his sense of mission he was able to save the four albums in this collection. This rare collection would not have survived without the help of his wife, Batya Carmel nee Steinberg, who was born in 1921 in Jerusalem. She grew in the Geula neighborhood, as did her husband. The albums that he saved moved with the family, from apartment to apartment, at a time when life in Jerusalem was difficult: it was war-time, the city was over crowded and it was a time of austerity. Moshe, Batya and their two children; Rachel (Gordon), the eldest and Roni, lived in a three room apartment along with Moshe's parents and five of his brothers. With great effort and resourcefulness Batya took great care of the albums. At the end of the war Moshe started working in the furniture store of the Zozorvsky family on Shlomzion Hamalkah Street, which was well known in Jerusalem. At the beginning of the 1960's Moshe started working in the restaurant business (in addition to running the furniture stores he owned). In 1963 he purchased the Mandarin restaurant- the first Chinese restaurant in Jerusalem. He opened the "Aris Sun Club" in Jaffa along with his partner, the well known singer Aris Sun. He also purchased the discotheque "Mandy's". Later, with other businessmen he acquired the 'Citadel" opposite the walls of the Old City. In 1972 Moshe and some partners bought the "Lido" beach at the Dead Sea. It included a coffee shop, restaurant and a beachfront. In 1981 a few months after he sold the property, the place was abandoned, vandalized and parts of it was destroyed. We are fortunate to have these albums with us today due to Moshe Carmel who saved them from being burnt and Batya Carmel who protected them throughout the years until her death in 2005. Moshe passed away in 1998. They both hoped that this valuable historical collection would be accessible to the public in a worthy setting. Their children, Rachel Gordon and Roni Carmel chose to donate the albums to the archives at Yad Ben-Zvi, and in this way fulfilled their parents' wishes. The albums have been uploaded to the internet which is a tribute and memorial to their parents. There are four albums in the collection. The first album includes picture of the Hebrew University on Mount Scopus, from its inception in the 1920's until the 1930's. The pictures in the second album are unique pictures of the Palestinian riots in Hevron in 1929, Motza and Jerusalem as well as photographs of the British army during the Mandate Period. On the back side of many of the photographs there is a stamp of the photography store of the American community that was in the 'Post' Hotel near the Jaffa Gate. The third album consists primarily of photographs of the activities and people from the Holy War Army under the command of Abad Al Kader Al Husseini, in and around Jerusalem. Among the pictures are scenes of the destruction of the commercial center in Mamilla (early December 1947), the explosions on Ben Yehuda Street, the Palestine Post and the national institutions, as well as harsh pictures of the attack on the Hadassah convoy (April 1948). Some of the photographs bear the stamp of the photographer Ibrahim Risas, whose shop was located near the Jaffa Gate. The last album has pictures of the activities of the Jewish underground, primarily the Etzel and Lehi movements against the British and Arabs throughout the country. Pictures in this album also have stamps of the photographer Ibrahim Risas and of his colleague Halil Raad, one of the first Arab photographers in Jerusalem. اقرأ أكثر