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Zvi Zimmerman was born in January of 1913. He was the son of Benjamin (Alter) Zimmerman and Zlata Pessia (Babe) Bitterman. He attended secular high school in Poland and studied law at the University of Krakow. From the time he was 13 years old, he was a devoted Zionist. While in Poland, he was a member of the Youth Movement of General Zionists; Chairman of Kedima, the Zionist Student Union in Krakow and Deputy Chairman of Kedima's national organization; and Deputy Chairman of the Zionist University Graduates. Zvi was in the Krakow ghetto until its liquidation in March, 1943. He was imprisoned in a sub-camp, from which he escaped to join anti-Nazi partisans in the mountains. He managed to get to Budapest, where he spent the rest of the war helping to save Jews. He worked with people who provided false passports to give Jews "Aryan" identities and was involved in the founding of an orphanage that was able to save some 100 Jewish children. Zvi made aliyah in 1944 and later testified as a witness at the trial of Adolf Eichmann. |
Zvi was a member of the Haifa City Council from 1951 to 1959. In 1959, he was elected to the Fourth Knesset, where he became a member of the Internal Affairs and House Committees. He was re-elected to the next three Knessets and served on the Labor-Welfare and Finance Committees. In the Seventh Knesset, which first sat in 1969, he became Deputy Speaker of the Knesset. He was a member of the Herut-Liberal Bloc. For three years beginning in 1983, he served as Israel's ambassador to New Zealand. Zvi Zimmerman died on June 10, 2006.
Selected Bibliography
Zimmerman, Henryk Zvi, Prezezyiem, pamietam, swiadcze (I Have Survived, I Remember, I am a Witness) (Baran i Suszczynski, Krakow, 1997). For a paraphrased excerpt in English: http://www.holocaustforgotten.com/Slawik.htm
Zvi - Henryk Zimmerman testifying at the trial of Adolf Eichmann in the District Court of Jerusalem, https://www.knesset.gov.il/mk/eng/mk_eng.asp?mk_individual_id_t=591
See also the website of Israel’s Knesset at: http://www.knesset.gov.il/mk/eng/mk_eng.asp?mk_individual_id_t=591