KehilaLink: Mishmar HaYarden, Israel

cemetery

The Old Mishmar HaYarden Cemetery is east of the site of the destroyed village, in the direction of Bnot Yaakov Bridge (route 91). The entrance to the cemetery overlooks a beautiful view of both the Jordan River and the slopes of the Golan Heights.

Obits for the fallen; buried in Roshe Pina — Obituary for the Fallen
Buried in Roshe Pina
(click to enlarge)

The old cemetery contains many graves of First Aliya pioneers. Included among these are graves of Shoshanat HaYarden settlers. Besides Bedouin attacks, a major cause of death was malaria. Interred in the cemetery are the graves of three children who died on the same day from the malarial scourge.

Karmi Grabovsky

Among the fallen of Mishmar HaYarden was Karmi Grabovsky. The Yizkor memorial commemorating those who died in Israel's wars states that Karmi fought until he no longer had ammunition. His mother saw him lose his life. In the book Three Days in Sivan, written by Karmi's family, his mother, Rivka, relates that

Karmi was sitting on a metal drum behind a balcony... the Syrians thought that one of their own people had taken up a position there and they began to move towards him. That was when Karmi let fly with a salvo of shots that brought some of them down. I begged him, 'Let's get out of here, they'll catch you', but he insisted, 'I'm not moving until the reinforcements arrive.'

Rivka tried to flee to Ayelet HaShahar, but she was captured and taken prisoner. The reinforcements did not arrive.

Both members of the Irgun Tzva'i Le'umi (IZL) and residents of Mishmar HaYarden claimed that the reinforcements allocated to them – the twenty-third Battalion of the Carmeli Brigade – were delayed by the Oded Brigade headquarters for political reasons. However, members of the Oded Brigade deny these assertions. Rather, the Carmeli Brigade, they claim, had been moved into the sector from the Western Galilee front, and did not have sufficient time to reorganize.

After the armistice, Mishmar HaYarden reverted to Israeli control, but the moshava was never rebuilt. Instead Kibbutz Gadot was established at the site; a new Mishmar HaYarden was built two kilometers away.

(source: Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael, Jewish National Fund: Old Mishmar HaYarden - An Excursion)

1948 Battle — *(click photo to enlarge)*

photo: Avishai Teicher
(click photo to enlarge)

Haim & Menahem Grabovsky

In late July 1938, Arabs had destroyed the Mishmar HaYarden water facilities. This same day, Haim Grabovsky and his son Menahem had driven their wagon to a spring near the Jordan River. On their way back to the village, father and son ran into an ambush set up by the Arabs, who opened fire on the pair. Haim pushed his son off the wagon so that the boy could find cover. Wounded by the rifle fire, Haim continued to fight; he even managed to get control of, and destroy, the rifle of one of the Arabs.

Members of the village heard the shots and rushed to the site of the ambush. Once there, the villagers

found the son Menahem dead and his father mortally wounded. Haim had recognized one of his attackers, and was able to give this information to his rescuers before he died.

Haim died believing that his son Menahem had survived. Years later Haim Grabovsky's second son, Karmi, gave his life in defense of Mishmar HaYarden during the War of Indepence.

(source: Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael, Jewish National Fund: Old Mishmar HaYarden - An Excursion)

Mishmar HaYarden, Israel משמר הירדן Coordinates: 33° 0' 10.47" N 35° 35' 59.38" E

Mishmar HaYardenWar Memorial

Mishmar HaYarden
War Memorial