Meir Dizengoff

Meir Dizengoff (Hebrew: מֵאִיר דִּיזֶנְגּוֹף; born Meer Yankelevich Dizengof, Russian: Меер Янкелевич Дизенгоф); 25 February 1861 – 23 September 1936) was a Zionist leader and politician and the founder and first mayor of Tel Aviv (1911–1922 as head of town planning, 1922–1936 as mayor). Dizengoff's actions in Ottoman Palestine and the British Mandate for Palestine helped lead to the creation of the State of Israel. David Ben-Gurion declared Israeli independence in 1948 at Dizengoff's residence in Tel Aviv. Dizengoff House is now Israel's Independence Hall.

Meir Dizengoff was born on Shushan Purim, 25 February 1861 in the village of Ekimovtsy near Orhei, Bessarabia. His father was a follower of the Hasidic master of Sadigura, and his mother was the descendant of a rabbinic dynasty. In 1878, his family moved to Kishinev, where he graduated from high school and studied at the polytechnic school.

In 1882, he volunteered in the Imperial Russian Army, serving in Zhytomyr (now in Ukraine) until 1884. There he first met Zina Brenner [he], whom he married in Alexandria on his way back to Ottoman Palestine in the early 1890s.

After his military service, Dizengoff remained in Odessa, where he became involved in the Narodnaya Volya underground. In 1885, he was arrested for insurgency and spent 8 months in jail. In Odessa, he met Leon Pinsker, Ahad Ha’am and others, and joined the Hovevei Zion movement.

Upon his release from prison in 1886, Dizengoff returned to Kishinev and founded the Bessarabian branch of Hovevei Zion, which he represented at the 1887 conference.

He left Kishinev in 1888 to study chemical engineering at the Sorbonne in Paris. At the Sorbonne he met Elie Scheid, a representative of Baron Edmond de Rothschild's projects in Ottoman Palestine.

In Kishinev Dizengoff met Theodor Herzl and became an ardent follower. However, Dizengoff strongly opposed the British Uganda Scheme promoted by Herzl at the Sixth Zionist Congress. Instead, Dizengoff favored the formation of Jewish communities in Palestine. Dizengoff became actively involved in land purchases and establishment of Jewish communities, most notably Tel Aviv.

Winston Churchill visited Palestine in March 1921 and met with Dizengoff. During a ceremonial speech with Churchill, Dizengoff declared: “this small town of Tel Aviv, which is hardly 12 years old, has been conquered by us on sand dunes, and we have built it with our work and our exertions.” Churchill was impressed with the motivation and determination of the pioneers, under the leadership of Dizengoff. In Palestine, Churchill told an anti-Zionist delegation: “This country has been very much neglected in the past and starved and even mutilated by Turkish misgovernment… you can see with your own eyes in many parts of this country the work which has already been done by Jewish colonies; how sandy wastes have been reclaimed and thriving farms and orangeries planted in their stead.” That same day he told a Jewish delegation he would inform London that the Zionists are “transforming waste into fertile... planting trees and developing agriculture in desert lands... making for an increase in wealth and cultivation" and further that the Arab population is “deriving great benefit, sharing in the general improvement and advancement.”