Ze'ev Jabotinsky

Ze'ev Jabotinsky MBE (born Vladimir Yevgenyevich Zhabotinsky; 17 October 1880 – 3 August 1940) was a Russian-born author, poet, orator, soldier, and founder of the Revisionist Zionist movement and the Jewish Self-Defense Organization in Odessa.

With Joseph Trumpeldor, he co-founded the Jewish Legion of the British Army in World War I. Later he established several Jewish organizations, including the paramilitary group Betar in Latvia, the youth movement Hatzohar and the militant organization Irgun in Mandatory Palestine.

Vladimir Yevgenyevich (Yevnovich) Zhabotinsky was born in Odessa, Kherson Governorate (modern Ukraine) into an assimilated Jewish family. His father, Yevno (Yevgeniy Grigoryevich) Zhabotinsky, hailed from Nikopol, Yekaterinoslav Governorate. He was a member of the Russian Society of Sailing and Trade and was primarily involved in wheat trading. His mother, Chava (Eva Markovna) Zach (1835–1926), came from Berdychiv, Kiev Governorate. Jabotinsky's older brother Myron died when Vladimir was six months old, and his father died when he was six years old. His sister, Tereza (Tamara Yevgenyevna) Zhabotinskaya-Kopp, founded a private school for girls in Odessa. In 1885, the family moved to Germany due to his father's illness, returning a year later after his father's death.

Raised in a middle-class Jewish home, Jabotinsky was educated in Russian schools. Although he studied Hebrew as a child, he wrote in his autobiography that his upbringing was divorced from Jewish faith and tradition. His mother ran a stationery store in Odessa. Jabotinsky dropped out of school at the age of 17 with a guarantee of a job as a correspondent for a local Odessan newspaper, the Odesskiy Listok, and was sent to Bern and Rome as a correspondent. He also worked for the Odesskie Novosti after his return from Italy. Jabotinsky was a childhood friend of Russian journalist and poet Korney Chukovsky.

From the autumn of 1898 onward, Jabotinsky was registered for three years as a law student at the Sapienza University of Rome, but hardly attended any classes and did not graduate, leading a bohemian lifestyle instead. In addition to Russian, Yiddish and Hebrew, he learned to speak fluent Italian.

After returning as a news reporter to Odessa, he was arrested in April 1902 for writing feuilletons in an anti-establishment tone, as well as contributing to a radical Italian journal. He was held isolated in a prison cell in the city for two months, where he communicated with other inmates through shouting and passing written notes.

In October 1907 Jabotinsky married Joanna (or Ania) Galperina.

Prior to the Kishinev pogrom of 1903, Jabotinsky joined the Zionist movement, where he soon gained a reputation as a powerful speaker and an influential leader. With more pogroms looming on the horizon, he established the Jewish Self-Defense Organization, a Jewish militant group, to safeguard Jewish communities throughout Russia. He became a source of great controversy in the Russian Jewish community as a result of these actions.