jews d
Alon Ben-Gurion speaks about his
grandfather during a JNF meeting
in West Bloomfield.
in
the
been on the attack and survival was
far from certain.
“He had a war before he had a
state. This is very uncommon among
nations,” he said. There was heavy
pressure to not declare a Jewish state,
with many observers cautioning that
the Arabs would destroy it in short
order. U.S. Gen. George Marshall
asked the Jewish community to hold
off on the decision for three months.
“Three days before the Declaration
of Independence, it was not sure if a
state would be declared,” Ben-Gurion
said of the deliberations his grand-
father presided over. “Ten of the 30
people making the decision wanted
to go with Marshall.” When David
Ben-Gurion asked his generals the
odds of withstanding the attacks,
they responded, “50/50.” One percent
of the Jewish population died in the
war, but Israel would be established,
survive and flourish.
FAMILY TALES
JNF
Celebrates
Israel
Grandson of David
Ben-Gurion talks of his
grandfather and JNF’s work
in Israel’s Negev desert.
DON COHEN CONTRIBUTING WRITER
F
TOP TO BOTTOM: Alon Ben-Gurion holds his sister dur-
ing a visit to their grandfather, David Ben-Gurion; Judy
and Max Robins of West Bloomfield; Co-chairs Karen
Freedland-Berger and Andy Goldberg flank honorees Dr.
Hershel and Dorothy Sandberg of Bloomfield Hills.
22
July 5 • 2018
jn
riends and supporters of the
Jewish National Fund filled the
social hall at Congregation Beth
Ahm in West Bloomfield June 14 to
hear from Alon Ben-Gurion, a grand-
son of Israel’s first Prime Minister
David Ben-Gurion. Best known for
planting trees in the Land of Israel for
more than a century, a current JNF
priority is building and supporting
communities in Israel’s Negev des-
ert, working to fulfill the elder Ben-
Gurion’s vision of making the desert
bloom.
Alon Ben-Gurion is general man-
ager of the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel
in New York City and a sought-after
international hospitality consultant.
A third-generation Israeli, Ben-
Gurion was a paratrooper in the
Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and an
officer when wounded in the 1973
Yom Kippur War.
But Ben-Gurion didn’t talk much
about himself; he knew his audience
had come to hear about his paternal
grandfather. David Ben-Gurion (1886-
1973) had emigrated from Russia
to Ottoman Palestine in 1906 and,
after becoming a leader in the Labor
Zionist movement in 1935, became
chairman of the executive committee
of the Jewish Agency, which essen-
tially served as the pre-state govern-
ment. Later in his life, he moved to
Kibbutz Sde Boker in the Negev with
his wife, Paula.
“Who would have believed it?”
Alon Ben-Gurion said of the gather-
ing that celebrated 70 years of the
State of Israel.
No one can deny the outsized role
his grandfather had in establishing
the Jewish State, but Alon said when
someone would call his grandfather
“the Father of the Nation,” he would
humbly respond “no one man could
be responsible for something like
that.”
Ben-Gurion told a number of his-
torical and personal stories about his
famous grandfather.
With the end of the British
Mandate for Palestine in May 1948,
the yishuv (Jewish settlement) had
to decide what to do. Ever since the
United Nations had voted to partition
Palestine in 1947, Arab forces had
Being the grandson of an intellectual
and political powerhouse who lived
and breathed the Jewish state was
complicated. “How was he as a saba
(grandfather)?” Ben-Gurion asked
rhetorically. “When he was building a
country, you were not the first thing
on his mind. He was my saba, but he
belonged to the people.”
He recalled how when he was 12
his grandfather asked him what he
wanted for his birthday, and he asked
for a book on the Roman Empire. The
elder Ben-Gurion approved. He often
read two books a day and learned
many languages — Greek for philoso-
phy, Spanish for Don Quixote, Turkish
to deal with the Ottomans — so he
could read things as originally writ-
ten. The next day Alon received a box
with a dozen books about the Roman
Empire.
Alon told about when his grand-
mother, Paula, sent a picture of David
to her parents. They asked why she
wanted to marry him, saying he was
short, ugly and had no hair. “He has
potential,” she told them.
Alon told about Paula, a feisty
woman, visiting a hospital when one
of the staff told the nurses, “Take
good care of the patients and you
may marry a prime minister.” Paula
looked at her, noting, “I didn’t marry
a prime minister; I made a prime
minister.”
Prior to his talk, Karen Freedland-
Berger of West Bloomfield and Andy
Goldberg of Bloomfield Hills, co-pres-
idents of the Michigan JNF Board,
spoke about the reinvigoration of the
JNF locally and the important work
being done in Israel. Dr. Hershel and
Dorothy Sandberg of Bloomfield Hills
were inducted into JNF’s Century
Council, and Judy Robins of West
Bloomfield received her Sapphire
Society Pin for a gift creating a nurs-
ery that also serves as a bomb shelter
in Halutza, a city in the northwest
Negev. •