In this case it was bot very accurate but this fact make it even more interesting.
I am interested in Jewish people from Siedlce in Poland or nearby places. The laconic text in Wikipedia for Neta Harpaz catches my eyes.
The statement born Neta Goldberg in 1893 must have been false. The name Neta is today given in Israel to the new born baby girls (Hebrew meaning seed or plant). Indeed quick check and we know that a boy born to Goldberg family in 1893 was give a name Natan.
Now after proper identification we can discuss further the person ... Nathan Goldberg. He changed sometimes his name to Nathan Neta Harpaz. This was a colorful person - with quite interesting and complex life. He was not afraid of challenges.
So we learn that he was born in Kosava near Siedlce ... apparently it is in Belorus near Slonim.
Still it seems that during his life as a young boy and youngster much of his life was around Siedlce.
We can learn about this individual that he lived his life very intensively. His father was not just a Hassid he was also a businessman from Radzyn. The family was moving all around ... we read that Natan was learning in Heders and Yeshivot in Sieldce and Losice ... and finally moved to Warsaw with the family, worked in the family business ... all that until age of 16. In 1906, during the pogroms there, at age of 13 and 14 was busy with transferring arms to Siedlce Jewish self defense organisation as part of Poalei Zion activities. This is interesting -this is the first documented instance of organised Jewish resistance against pogroms of the mob and the Tzarist Secret Ochrana.
In 1908 left Poland to Eretz Israel at age of 15 or 16 years.
The mystery continues. According to the Encyclopedia of the Founders and Builders of Israel (Volume 3 pp. 1122-1123). So we "learn" - that in 1913 In Eretz Israel he was until 1913 ... living as a worker and working activist. He become ill with fewer disease and returned to Poland. There he was enlisted to the Russian Army and with the end of the war returned to Eretz Israel. Seems to be totally wrong info ...
Now the true info is here ... to the Wikipedia in Hebrew - In 1914 Harpaz was elected to the center of "Hapoel Hatzair". World War I acted to relief the hardship of the Jewish workers. During the war (1917), 10 of the workers, members of Hapoel Petah - Tikva were charged with spying for the United Kingdom, and were required to turn themselves to the authorities. Harpaz accompanied them to Jaffa questioning and assumed the leadership of these workers. All 11 were imprisoned by Ottomans in Damascus. Three of them died in prison, and - their name is called Kibbutz Givat three near Petah - Tikva. While he was in prison, his wife and son died in childhood, hunger and malaria then were during the war in Petah Tikva.
| היום הראשון להופעת העיתון "דבר", 01.06.1925 בתמונה: דניאל לייבל, זלמן שזר, ברל כצנלסון, נטע הרפז, משה שרת, חיים קרופניק צלם: משה וורוביצ'יקhttp://www.archavoda.org.il/avodaarch/VirtualMuseum/BerlPics1.asp Harpaz with his political friends in 1925 |
His life after WWI needs another blog page - or one can just read more in the Wikipedia in Hebrew (sorry for that).
