Haggadah Collections » PHOTO Passover gathering 1918 Jerusalem

PHOTO Passover gathering 1918 Jerusalem

Passover 1918 in Jerusalem – Jewish Soldiers and the Leaders of a Community Emerging from War

This remarkable photograph records a gathering of Jewish soldiers, military chaplains, Zionist officials, Jerusalem communal leaders and members of the local Maccabi movement during Passover 1918, barely four months after Jerusalem had passed from Ottoman to British control.

A stamp on the reverse, apparently from the photographic archive assembled for the Encyclopaedia Judaica, describes the image as “Group of officers in Jerusalem: Passover 1918” and gives its source as the State Archives, Jerusalem. A second known copy was reproduced in The British Jewry Book of Honour, where a number of the military participants were named.

The photograph is particularly valuable because several people on this copy have also been identified by handwritten annotations placed directly beside or across them. These include Bentwich, Hoofien, Thon, Frankenthal, Grajewsky and Mindel, while one young officer is intriguingly marked simply “me.”

The identities revealed by these clues transform the photograph. It is not merely a picture of Jewish soldiers celebrating Pesach. Gathered together are people who would play significant roles in the military, religious, political and financial history of the Jewish community in Palestine.

Passover after hunger and war

The background to the photograph is recorded by one of the men actually pictured: Eliezer Siegfried Hoofien.

Hoofien was then responsible for administering American Jewish relief funds in Palestine. In his detailed report to the Joint Distribution Committee covering 1917–1918, he recalled that during March 1918 the British military authorities approached him to ask whether Jerusalem’s Jewish community would receive Jewish servicemen who were being granted leave to spend Passover in the Holy City.

The answer was immediate.

Despite the desperate economic situation in Jerusalem after years of war, Hoofien believed that approximately one hundred Jewish families would willingly take two or three soldiers apiece into their homes for Pesach.

The plan had to be abandoned because the military authorities feared an outbreak of typhus and prohibited the soldiers from entering private homes. Instead, the community housed and entertained them in a large residence belonging to an absent Bukharan Jew in Jerusalem’s Bukharian Quarter. Hoofien states explicitly that both Seder nights were celebrated there. His financial accounts record a Passover reception for 300 Jewish soldiers.

This contemporary evidence also requires some caution regarding a later handwritten note on the reverse of the photograph stating that the Seder took place in the “Maccabi gym hall.” The photograph or another reception may indeed have taken place at the Maccabi premises, but Hoofien’s firsthand testimony provides much stronger evidence that the actual communal Seders were held in the Bukharian residence.

What Hoofien wrote about the effect of the visiting soldiers is perhaps the most moving document connected with the photograph.

Jerusalem’s Jews had endured years of requisitions, shortages, disease and poverty. Many had survived on relief bread. Against this background, Hoofien described the arrival of hundreds of vigorous Jewish servicemen as something psychologically transformative. Their presence, he wrote, “immensely strengthened the self-consciousness of our Jewish population” and gave Jerusalem’s Jews renewed energy after years of “famine, humiliation, and sickness.” He considered the money spent welcoming them “one of our best investments.”

The photograph can therefore be understood almost as a visual counterpart to Hoofien’s words: exhausted Jerusalem Jewry suddenly confronted with hundreds of young Jewish men in Allied uniforms, openly celebrating Passover in Jerusalem after the collapse of Ottoman rule.

Eliezer Siegfried Hoofien

The civilian annotated “Hoofien” is identified with very high confidence as Eliezer Siegfried Hoofien (1881–1957).

Born in Utrecht in the Netherlands and trained as an accountant, Hoofien became active in Zionism while still young. In 1912 he moved to Palestine as deputy director of the Anglo-Palestine Bank. During the First World War, when Ottoman authorities attempted to suppress the bank, Hoofien succeeded in keeping its operations functioning and became one of the central figures in the economic survival of the Yishuv.

His wartime role went far beyond banking. The Joint Distribution Committee appointed him its distributing agent in Palestine, placing enormous responsibility in his hands at a time when much of Jerusalem depended upon external relief. His report describes finding wheat when children depended upon a daily piece of relief bread, supporting hospitals and schools, caring for widows and orphans, and maintaining communal institutions through the final months of Ottoman rule.

It was Hoofien who financed the Passover reception represented by this gathering.

There is something particularly poignant about seeing him in the photograph among the very soldiers he later described. He understood their importance not principally in military terms, but in what they represented to the Jews of Jerusalem: strength, dignity and the possibility of a different Jewish future.

Hoofien later became director general and eventually chairman of the Anglo-Palestine Bank, later Bank Leumi. At the creation of the State of Israel he helped prepare the country’s monetary system and became an economic adviser to the new government.

Dr. Ya’akov Yohanan Thon

Beside Hoofien is the man annotated simply “Thon,” almost certainly Dr. Ya’akov Yohanan Thon (1880–1950).

Thon was a lawyer and one of the key administrators of the early Zionist movement in Palestine. He had worked alongside Arthur Ruppin in Berlin and moved to Palestine in 1907. When the Zionist Organization established its Palestine Office, Thon became Ruppin’s deputy.

During Ruppin’s absence from 1916 to 1920, Thon effectively headed the Palestine Office. After the British conquest he helped organize a representative Jewish communal council in Jerusalem and became its first chairman.

Thus, at the exact moment this photograph was taken, Thon was one of the men attempting to construct Jewish civic organization almost from scratch under a completely new regime.

The proximity of Thon and Hoofien is particularly appropriate. One represented much of the Yishuv’s political and administrative infrastructure; the other its financial and relief machinery. Contemporary documents repeatedly place the two together in Jerusalem’s small circle of communal decision-makers.

Major Norman de Mattos Bentwich

The inscription “Bentwich” has been independently confirmed by comparison with contemporary photographs and by the caption accompanying the other known copy of the image.

Norman de Mattos Bentwich (1883–1971) was a British Jewish lawyer, Zionist and army officer. Before the war he had worked in the Egyptian Ministry of Justice and taught at the Cairo Law School. During the First World War he served on the Palestine front and reached the rank of major. In 1918, soon after this photograph was made, he became Senior Judicial Officer in the British military administration of Palestine; in 1920 he became Attorney General.

Bentwich therefore stands at a remarkable intersection of the photograph’s worlds: British officer, committed Jew, Zionist and future architect of the legal administration of Mandatory Palestine.

His later life was equally notable. During the 1930s he became deeply involved in assisting Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany and served in international efforts concerned with those refugees.

In the photograph he appears not as the later professor, jurist and statesman, but as a soldier in a Jerusalem whose political future was still completely unsettled.

Lieutenant Edwin Herbert Samuel – the man marked “me”

Perhaps the most fascinating annotation on the photograph consists of only two letters:

“me.”

They appear on Lieutenant Edwin Herbert Samuel (1898–1978), who is independently named in the published caption of the photograph and has been matched with other contemporary portraits.

Samuel was only nineteen years old at the time.

He was the son of Herbert Samuel, who two years later would become the first British High Commissioner for Palestine. Edwin himself had joined the British Army and reached Palestine in 1918, where he served as liaison officer between the Jewish population and General Allenby’s headquarters in Jerusalem. He subsequently joined the Jewish volunteers and served as an instructor in the 40th Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers.

After the war he began a public-service career that would last approximately half a century and eventually inherited his father’s title as Viscount Samuel.

Rabbi Yitzchak Uri Frankenthal – Jewish military chaplain

The prominently positioned uniformed rabbi is annotated “Frankenthal” and is also named independently in the published caption as Rev. I. Frankenthal, C.F.

He was Rabbi Yitzchak Uri Frankenthal (1881–1955).

Frankenthal was born into a rabbinic family and received part of his yeshiva education in Jerusalem. He became a naturalized British subject in 1909 and served for a time in South Africa. During the war he returned to the Middle East and ministered to Jewish soldiers in Egypt. He was formally appointed a British Army chaplain in June 1917.

His responsibilities were extensive. Military records describe him serving Jewish troops in the Alexandria district and also units east of the Suez Canal and on the front line. He knew Hebrew and Yiddish, had knowledge of French and understood Arabic and German. A military assessment described him as energetic in carrying out his duties.

Only a month before this photograph, on 28 February 1918, the 38th Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers—the first British Jewish battalion commonly associated with the Jewish Legion—arrived in Egypt from Britain. At the welcoming service in Alexandria’s Great Synagogue the following day, Frankenthal delivered the address welcoming them.

His central position in a Jerusalem Passover gathering of Jewish servicemen is therefore entirely appropriate.

Rev. Shimon Chaim Grajewsky – expelled and returned in uniform

The other bearded military chaplain is identified by the inscription and published caption as Rev. Shimon Chaim Grajewsky (c.1867–1942).

His personal story gives the photograph extraordinary symbolism.

Grajewsky was born into a rabbinic family, received part of his education in Liverpool and studied at the famed Volozhin Yeshiva. Motivated by Zionism, he settled with his family in Jerusalem.

Then the First World War intervened.

Like thousands of other Jews, Grajewsky was expelled from Palestine by the Ottoman authorities. He subsequently became a Jewish chaplain to British forces in Egypt. By 1916 he was ministering to wounded Jewish soldiers in Alexandria and later became chaplain to Jewish troops throughout Egypt. In June 1918, only a few months after this photograph, he was mentioned in despatches.

If the identification is correct—and the documentary evidence makes it exceptionally strong—the symbolism is difficult to miss:

a rabbi expelled from Palestine by the Ottoman authorities returned to Jerusalem wearing the uniform of the army that had just driven the Ottomans from the city.

And he returned for Passover.

Rabbi Haim Moshe Elyashar – probable identification

The elderly civilian rabbi standing near Grajewsky is very probably Rabbi Haim Moshe Elyashar (1845–1924).

The published caption calls an elderly figure in this section of the photograph “the Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem.” Its positional descriptions have proved imperfect, so this should not be treated as absolute identification. Nevertheless, comparison with known photographs and, more importantly, the historical circumstances make Elyashar an excellent candidate.

He would have been approximately 73 years old.

Elyashar belonged to one of Jerusalem’s great Sephardi rabbinical families. His father, Rabbi Yaakov Shaul Elyashar, had himself been Rishon LeZion and Hakham Bashi. Haim Moshe combined rabbinical scholarship with public service and commerce and was involved in establishing major Jerusalem institutions, including Shaare Zedek Hospital and Misgav Ladach.

The timing is particularly significant. In 1918, after the collapse of Ottoman authority ended the old Ottoman appointment of Hakham Bashi, Haim Moshe Elyashar stepped in to perform the functions of the Rishon LeZion. At the same time a new Jerusalem rabbinical council was established bringing together Sephardi and Ashkenazi rabbis, with Elyashar and Rabbi Yitzchak Yerucham Diskin at its head. That body formed part of the institutional development that eventually led to the Chief Rabbinate.

The elderly rabbi in the photograph may therefore represent something very specific: the old rabbinic leadership of Ottoman Jerusalem standing beside the new Jewish military and civic institutions emerging under British rule.

Joseph Baran Meyuhas – probable identification

The man standing behind Thon is a strong candidate for Joseph Baran Meyuhas (1868–1942).

The identification remains provisional, based partly on comparison with a near-contemporary photograph, but his presence would make excellent historical sense. Hoofien’s own wartime report repeatedly places Meyuhas, Thon, Hoofien and other leading Jerusalem figures together in the committees managing Jewish communal affairs.

Meyuhas came from an old Jerusalem Sephardi family and became one of the city’s important educators, writers and communal leaders. He taught Hebrew, Arabic and French, directed educational institutions and helped found the Midrash Abarbanel/Ginzei Yosef library, which developed into the Jewish National and University Library, today’s National Library of Israel. His family was also among the early Jerusalem households to adopt Hebrew as its everyday spoken language.

After the war he became president of Jerusalem’s Jewish Community Council and served in major national institutions of the Yishuv.

If the identification is correct, his position immediately behind Thon is particularly fitting: both men belonged to the tiny group attempting to give Jerusalem’s fragmented Jewish population a representative civic structure.

Second Lieutenant N. I. Mindel

An officer whose faint handwritten surname initially appeared to read “Mendel” can now reasonably be identified as 2nd Lieutenant N. I. Mindel.

The important evidence is that the independently published caption to this exact photograph names 2nd Lt. N. I. Mindel among those present. Once that name is known, the inscription on this copy is entirely compatible with Mindel.

We have not yet reconstructed Mindel’s full biography securely enough to add details without speculation. Nevertheless, his identification is valuable because it provides another instance in which the handwritten annotations correspond to names independently preserved with another copy of the photograph.

Lieutenant J. Hart – 2/4th Hampshire Regiment

Another officer is very probably Lieutenant J. Hart of the 2/4th Hampshire Regiment, who is named in the published caption.

An independent period photograph of Hart has been compared with the man standing immediately on Frankenthal’s right, apparently holding the cane, and the identification appears strong.

Hart’s regiment itself provides useful historical context. The 2/4th Hampshire Regiment had been serving in Palestine, and its final fighting there occurred in April 1918. It left Egypt for France in May and arrived on the Western Front in June, where it would soon participate in major fighting during the final months of the war.

If Hart is correctly identified, the photograph therefore caught him during a narrow window: celebrating Passover in Jerusalem shortly before his battalion was transferred from the Middle Eastern campaign to the Western Front.

Second Lieutenants C. Isaacs and G. Isaacs – the Isle of Wight Rifles

The published caption identifies two officers seated “at the foot” of the group as:

2nd Lt. G. Isaacs
and
2nd Lt. C. Isaacs

both of the 1/8th Hampshire Regiment.

The two seated officers in this portion of the photograph appear to wear the distinctive large cap badge of the 8th Battalion Hampshire Regiment, Princess Beatrice’s Isle of Wight Rifles, strengthening the caption identification considerably.

Whether C. and G. Isaacs were brothers has not yet been established documentary-wise, although their shared surname, rank, regiment and presence together naturally raises the possibility.

Their regiment had already experienced an extraordinary war. The Isle of Wight Rifles fought at Gallipoli, then served in Egypt and crossed the Sinai before fighting in the Palestine campaign. In 1917 the battalion participated in the Gaza operations and subsequently fought through Palestine. It remained there throughout 1918 and later took part in Allenby’s final advance northward.

Thus the two Isaacs officers were not tourists visiting Jerusalem. They belonged to a formation that had endured years of campaigning and had helped fight its way into Palestine.

Their relaxed seated position at the bottom of the photograph is particularly evocative: two young Jewish officers, after Gallipoli, Sinai and the battles for Palestine, spending Pesach in Jerusalem.

“Lazarus” – an unresolved officer

One handwritten name appears quite clearly to read “Lazarus.”

The officer’s exact identity has not yet been established.

There are intriguing possibilities. A Lieutenant Lazarus later served with the Jewish battalion and is specifically named by Colonel John Henry Patterson as one of the officers who, together with Ze’ev Jabotinsky and Rev. Leib Falk, worked intensively to organize the enormous Jewish Legion Passover celebration at Rafa in 1919.

Whether the Lazarus in this 1918 Jerusalem photograph is the same man remains unproven, and the identification should therefore remain simply:

Lieutenant Lazarus – exact identity unknown.

The “Maccabees”

Several young men and boys wear broad diagonal sashes. A handwritten annotation above them appears to read “Maccabees,” with an arrow pointing toward this group rather than toward one individual.

This almost certainly refers to members of the Maccabi movement.

Maccabi represented far more than sport in the Zionist world of the period. Influenced by Max Nordau’s concept of “Muscular Judaism,” the movement sought to create a physically confident Jewish youth in deliberate contrast to stereotypes of Jewish weakness. The Maccabi federation in Eretz Israel was established in 1912.

Their presence in this photograph takes on special significance when read beside Hoofien’s account.

The young Maccabi members and the uniformed Jewish soldiers represented precisely the image of renewed Jewish physical confidence that Zionist thinkers had been promoting. To a population that Hoofien described as weakened by hunger, illness and humiliation, they must have presented an extraordinary contrast.

A photograph of transition

What makes this photograph exceptional is ultimately not any one famous person.

It is the combination.

Within the same frame appear representatives of almost every institution from which the emerging Jewish society in Palestine would be built:

Hoofien, representing finance, relief and the economic infrastructure of the Yishuv.
Thon, representing Zionist administration and emerging Jewish civic government.
Bentwich, representing the British Jewish military and legal world.
Edwin Samuel, a nineteen-year-old liaison officer who would spend much of his life in Palestine’s public service.
Frankenthal and Grajewsky, representing Jewish soldiers’ religious life in the British Army.
Elyashar, representing Jerusalem’s centuries-old Sephardi rabbinic tradition.
Meyuhas, representing Jerusalem’s educators, Hebrew revivalists and Sephardi communal leadership.
Mindel, Hart and the Isaacs officers, representing Jewish servicemen scattered through ordinary British formations.
And the sash-wearing Maccabi youths, representing the generation being raised with an entirely new concept of Jewish physical and national identity.

All of them appear together during Passover, the festival whose central story is the transformation of an oppressed people into a free nation.

The symbolism would have been impossible to miss in Jerusalem in 1918.

Only months earlier, the city had still been under Ottoman rule. Its Jewish population had suffered wartime hunger, disease, deportations and economic collapse. Grajewsky himself had been expelled. Hoofien had struggled simply to obtain enough flour to keep thousands of Jerusalem children alive.

Then, at Pesach, hundreds of Jewish soldiers arrived.

Hoofien’s dry financial report suddenly becomes almost emotional when he describes what Jerusalem’s Jews saw before them: healthy, confident Jewish men in uniform. Their presence, he believed, restored something that years of suffering had almost destroyed.

The value of the reception, in his mind, could not be measured only in pounds.

It was an investment in Jewish morale.

This photograph appears to capture precisely that moment: old Jerusalem and a new Jewish world standing together on the same steps at Passover 1918.

Identification note

Several identifications—particularly Bentwich, Samuel, Frankenthal, Grajewsky, Mindel, Hoofien and Thon—are supported by handwritten annotations and/or the independently published caption to another copy of the photograph. Haim Moshe Elyashar, Joseph Baran Meyuhas and J. Hart are strong or probable identifications supported by historical context and comparison with other period photographs but should presently be treated as provisional. The two Isaacs officers are strongly supported by the published caption and their regimental insignia, although their precise placement and relationship to one another require further research. “Lazarus” remains unidentified beyond the surname.

The positional wording of the old published caption has proved imperfect and should therefore be used primarily as evidence that particular individuals were present, rather than as an infallible guide to exactly where each person stands.