Abba Kovner

Abba Kovner (1918-1987) was a Lithuanian Jewish Hebrew poet, writer, and partisan leader. He was a cousin of the Israeli Communist Party leader Meir Vilner [1] Image File history File links Kovner. ... Image File history File links Kovner. ... Hebrew (עִבְרִית or עברית, ‘Ivrit) is a Semitic language of the Afro-Asiatic language family spoken by more than seven million people in Israel and Jewish communities around the world. ... A poet is some one who writes poetry. ... The term writer can apply to anyone who creates a written work, but the word more usually designates those who write creatively or professionally, or those who have written in many different forms. ... Look up partisan on Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Meir Vilner (birth name: Ber Kovner; born October 13, 1918 in Vilnius, Lithuania (then Poland); died June 5, 2003) was an Israeli communist politician and Jewish leader of Arab Israeli Communist Party, also known as Maki, which consisted primarily of Arabs. ...

He was born in the Ukrainian Black Sea port city of Sevastopol but soon moved with his family to Vilnius, Lithuania, where he grew up and was educated at the secondary Hebrew academy of Vilna and school of the arts. While pursuing his studies, he joined and became an active member in the socialist Zionist youth movement HaShomer HaTzair. In June 1941, Nazi Germany invaded Lithuania and erected the Vilna Ghetto. Kovner managed to escape with several friends to a Dominican convent in the city's suburbs, but he soon returned to the ghetto and became cognizant of the baseless killing of thousands of Jews. He concluded that in order for any revolt to be successful, a Jewish resistance fighting force needed to be assembled. He commanded the United Partisan Organization in the forests of Vilnius and engaged in sabotage and guerilla attacks against the Nazis. [2] He continued his partisan efforts and survived through the Holocaust. After liberation by the Russians in 1945, he became one of the founders of the Berihah movement, helping Jews escape Poland after the war. He came to Israel for a short period of time in 1945, and then returned to Europe to continue underground activities against Nazi POW's. However, he was deported from Europe back to Israel, where he eventually fought in the Givati Brigade in the Israel War of Independence. Map of the Black Sea. ... Sevastopol (Ukrainian and Russian: ; Crimean Tatar: ), formerly known as Sebastopol, is a port city in Ukraine, located on the Black Sea coast of Crimean peninsula. ... Location Ethnographic region Aukštaitija County Vilnius County Municipality Vilnius city municipality Elderate Number of elderates 20 Coordinates General information Capital of Lithuania Vilnius County Vilnius city municipality Vilnius district municipality Population (rank) 540,318 in 2005 (1st) First mentioned 1323 Granted city rights 1387 Vilnius ( (help· info), see also... A bilingual poster in Romanian and Hungarian promoting a film about Jewish settlement in Palestine, 1930s. ... A Zionist youth movement is an organization formed for Jewish children and adolescents for educational, social and ideological development, including a belief in Jewish nationalism as represented in the State of Israel. ... Hashomer Hatzair (or Hashomer Hatsair or HaShomer HaTzair) (Hebrew: The Young Guard or Guardian [that is] Young) is a Zionist-socialist youth movement founded in 1913 in Galicia (now in Poland) and was also the name of the groups political party in the Yishuv in the pre-1948 British... The Vilna Ghetto was a Jewish ghetto in Vilnius, Lithuania. ... This article is about an abbey as a religious building. ... The Fareinigte Partizaner Organizacje (United Partisan Organization) was a Jewish resistance organization that took part in the Wilno ghetto uprising during World War II. The partisan organisation was established by Zionist partisans - their leaders were writer Abba Kovner and Yitzhak Witenberg. ... Concentration camp inmates during the Holocaust The Holocaust was Nazi Germanys systematic genocide (ethnic cleansing) of various ethnic, religious, national, and secular groups during World War II. Early elements include the Kristallnacht pogrom and the T-4 Euthanasia Program established by Hitler that killed some 200,000 people. ... Berihah (literally escape in Hebrew) was the organized effort to help Jews escape post-Holocaust Europe for the British Mandate of Palestine. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... The 1948 Arab-Israeli War, called the War of Independence by Israelis and al Nakba the catastrophe by Arabs, was the first in a series of wars in the Arab-Israeli conflict. ...

His book of poetry Ad Lo-Or, ("Until No-Light"), 1947, describes in lyric-dramatic narrative the struggle of the Resistance partisans in the swamps and forests of Eastern Europe. Ha-Mafteach Tzalal, ("The Key Drowned"), 1951, is also about this struggle. Pridah Me-ha-darom ("Departure from the South"), 1949, and Panim el Panim ("Face to Face"), 1953, continue the story with the Israeli War of Independence. The 1948 Arab-Israeli War, called the War of Independence by Israelis and al Nakba the catastrophe by Arabs, was the first in a series of wars in the Arab-Israeli conflict. ...

In 1970 Kovner received the "Israel Prize" for literature.

• See The Modern Hebrew Poem Itself (2003), ISBN 0-8143-2485-1
• See My Little Sister and Selected Poems, trans. Shirley Kaufman (1986), ISBN 0-932440-20-7

External links

• Abba Kovner Biography
• Abba Kovner and Resistance in the Vilna Ghetto