Nandi* TellifRreart
of Reunion With Mother in Russia
By MOSHE RON
Jewish News Special
Israel Correspondent
TEL AVIV — It is interesting
to read the account of the former
Israeli ambassador in Moscow,
Mordehai Namir (a prominent
labor leader in Israel, former
member of the cabinet, general
secretary of Histadrut and mayor
of Tel-Aviv), describing how he
met his old mother in the city
of Kherson in Russia.
Namir is now writing his biogra-
phy and describes how, after many
endeavors, he succeeded in ob-
taining from the Russian authori-
ties a special license to visit his
old mother, Batia Nemirovsky, in
Kherson.
Namir writes: "My correspon-
dence from Eretz Israel with my
mother in Russia had been stopped
in 1941, when the Germans at-
tacked the Soviet Union. When I
arrived in Moscow as first secre-
tary of the Israel Embassy in 1949,
I started to look for my mother
with the aid of the British Red
Cross, the Joint Distribution Com-
mittee and the Soviet foreign of-
fice. No trace was found. But when
I was appointed Israeli ambassa-
dor in Moscow after the departure
of Golda Meir, my mother heard
that her son Mordehai Nemirovsky
(Namir) had become ambassador,
but she was afraid to contact me.
By chance, I received a letter from
a friend in Israel who wrote to
me that he had received news from
Kherson, that my mother was liv-
ing in that town."
Namir relates how, after many
endeavors, he finally got the ad-
dress of his mother. It was shortly
before he had to leave his post in
Moscow. When he came to say
goodby to the then Vice Foreign
Minister Andrei Gromyko, he asked
him for a favor: he wanted to see
his old mother before leaving Rus-
sia.
Gromyko promised Namir to
deal with his application and
shortly afterwards he received
a message from the foreign of-
fice that be could visit his moth-
er. Kherson was then out of
bounds to foreign diplomats
and the Intourist office dealt
with Namir's journer on which
he was accompanied to Kherson
by the first secretary of the em-
bassy, Zeev Argaman.
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1971'. •
_ME INTROIT JEWISH
Histadrut Employ on Vast Scale
Of the 230,000 employes, in His- -
TEL AVIV (ZINS) — Israel's
General Federation of Labor His- tadrut enterprises, 130,000 were
in
agriculture and related fields;
only
concerned
with
tadrut, is not
the working conditions of mem- 25,000 were employed by the giant
contracting
firm, Sold Bones; an-
bers, but is also a mighty indus-
trial and commercial entrepreneur. other 15,000 are workers in Koor
(a
holding
company
of industrial
Latest figures show that His-
tadrut enterprises in 1970 had an firms); 12,500 in marketing
branches;
9,000
in
various
kibutz
industrial production that amounted
to 2,000,000,000 pounds (;480, - industries; and approximately
the Volga River and In One of the
woods the father died. The mother
and daughter dug his grave with
their own hands. They do not even
know where his grave is. The moth-
er told how the Germans killed
60,000 of the 75,000 Jews of Kher-
sod. Even now, anti-Semitism is
5,000 employed in cooperatives.
strong in Kherson, especially 000,000).
among working-class people. Jews
try to hide their origin. There is
no synagogue in 'Kherson. Namir
got a license and tieket for his rel-
ative, whom, he hid seen at the
port, to accompany him on the
STILL-THE WORLD'S LA' RGEST -
steamship to Odessa, but the rela-
tive thought it would be better if
she would refrain from such a step.
Free Loaner Service
'Namir writes that when he ar-
To Our Customers
rived at his mother's house he
noticed that a man of about 50
WE SW. THE MOST
had disappeared from it. His moth-
er told him that he was a Jewish
"REMEMBER"
neighbor, an old Communist, who
was afraid to stay in the house
with a foreign displomat. He
WE GIVE THE MOST'
stayed away from home as long as
Namir was in his mother's house
. . . When. Namir said goodby
MILT LEVIN
WE CARE THE MOST RED STOTSKY
to his mother, the neighbor sud-
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denly entered the room and picked
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up an album of pictures from Is-
rael, which Namir had brought his
an
Mil
mother. The neighbor looked at the
album with great nervousness and I
temerity. He asked Namir whether I
these were true pictures of Israel.
He didn't believe his eyes and I
suddenly he lifted the album and
pressed his lips on it. At last he
turned to Namir, embraced and I
I
kissed him, and ran away . .
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The mother kept silent and •
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begged her son to take the al- •
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a choice of 400 beautiful
I
returned to the steamship, he
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25 collars and 12 cuffs, per-
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he was accompanied to Kharson
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Namir writes that when his
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mother asked him questions about
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afraid of a physical danger to a
country without a government.
Namir comforted her and told her
there was no such danger and that
Ben-Gurion would be premier of
Israel,again in the end.
In the second half of the book,
when Namir had been minister of
labor, he met the Russian ambas-
sador at a reception in the Czech-
oslovak embassy in Tel Aviv. He
asked him to help bring his old
mother to Israel. The Russian am-
bassador promised his help. Namir
wrote to his mother to appeal to
the Russian authorities to allow
her to emigrate to IsraeL But he
never received an answer from the
Russian ambassador or to his let-
ter to his mother.
One day a letter arrived from
Kherson to a friend of Namir's,
reporting that Namir's mother,
Batia bat Yehuda Leib, had died
on Aug. 28, 1952.
In this way, the tragic chapter
of his meeting with his mother,
who did not succeed in coming to
Israel, had come to an end.
PACKER • PONTIAC
'
MORDEHAI NAMIR
Namir tells: "We flew by plane
from Moscow to Odessa and con-
tinued on our way by steamship
to Kherson. We got a special cabin
with two beds, whereas the other
hundreds of passengers were lo-
cated on the middle deck of the
ship. We noticed that two agents
watched all our movements on the
ship. They were also lucky to get
a cabin next to ours. Whenever
we tried to make contact with a
passenger, the agents intervened
and did not let us start a conversa-
tion. These agents followed us
everywhere, even when we went to
the
_ toilet."
_
When the ship arrived at Kher-
son, hundreds waited on the quay
in order to see their relatives.
Namir recognized a woman who
was his relative. But when he left
the ship and tried to contact her,
she had disappeared. Namir and
Argaman went to a hotel. The
manager, an old woman, already
knew who her two guests were but
she did not give any sign that she
knew the reason why these two
diplomats had come to Kherson.
When Namir asked her how he
could get to the street where his
mother lived, she advised him to
order a taxi. Namir took a big
bag with him, containing clothes
for his mother and his relative.
In order not to attract attention
and arouse suspicion among the
inhabitants of the house, Namir
asked the taxi-driver to let him
out in the vicinity. The house was
a delapidated ruin, inhabited by
three families, one of them Ukrain-
ian. Before the Second World War,
Namir's mother had lived in a big
house, in a flat of several rooms
with the entire family. But after
the war, all her endeavors to get
her flat back failed. She already
knew that she would be able to see
her son after 26 years of separa-
tion, and the meeting was drama-
tic. For 10 minutes mother and
son embraced, kissed and looked
into each other's eyes. During this
'time they were unable to utter a
word. At last they burst into tears.
They did not believe their eyes
and thought it was a dream.
The old mother cried out after
the long silence: "Moire." It
was characteristic that also In
this heart-moving scene she did
not forget her vicinity and asked
her son to speak quietly so that
the neighbors should not be able
to listen to their dialogue . . .
When the surprise. was over,
mother and son .told each other
what had happened to them after
the war. Namir's father, mother
and their daughter - fled when the
German invasion began. They wan-
dered for thousands of 'kilometers
into Eastern Russia. They crossed
== ==
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