MS 313 Archive of Youth Aliyah

Youth Aliyah

Youth Aliyah (Aliyat Hano’ar) was founded in 1933 in Germany by Recha Freier. The aim of the organisation was to provide young people with vocational training in Palestine. Whilst Recha Freier was responsible for organising activities in Germany, Henrietta Szold oversaw activities in Palestine. The work in Palestine was arranged in cooperation with the Jewish Agency, the Va’ad Le’umi and the kibbutz movement. By the mid-1930s the organisation’s activities had expanded and as the decade progressed it rescued an increasing number of children from Nazi Germany and Austria. In the immediate aftermath of the Second World War, Youth Aliyah took many thousand orphans to Palestine as illegal immigrants. After the foundation of the state of Israel in 1948, it focused its attention on the rehabilitation of immigrant children from the Middle East or in poverty. Many of the projects undertaken by Youth Aliyah were funded by the Jewish Agency and it became a department of this organisation.

 

About the collection

The archive contains a small series of committee minute books, but by far the larger part of the collection is made up of photograph albums and photographs. There are six minute books for the administrative committee, 1948; two for the annual general meeting, 1944-66; and single volumes for the executive committee, 1986-90 and for the publicity committee, 1960-71. The photograph albums date from 1929 onwards, but the majority are more recent. The three earliest, for 1929 and 1931, relate to Ben Schemen village in Palestine. The other photograph albums relate to a number of children’s villages, including Alonei Yitzhak, Neveh Haddash, Nitzanim, Talpiot, Yemin Orde. The photographs, 1930-98, cover the children’s villages, educational programme and vocational training, the Ethiopia appeal, visits by dignitaries, the Youth Aliyah European Conference, 1992, and Youth Aliyah events. Publicity material includes slides with accompanying audio cassette tape, videos and films, publications. There is also a series of sample books of designs for a variety of cards, calendars, and other merchandise, 1954-76

Date range:

1929-98

Former references: 

A1071, A2009

Size:

31 boxes, 27 large volumes, 15 reels of films