Year
 
Jewish Agency for Israel
 
Israel
 
Jewish History & Culture
1974            

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Chairman of the Jewish Agency. Louis A. Pincus and Arie Dulzin.

Alternate Chairman of the Executive of the WZO - Jewish Agency, American Section: Charlotte Jacobson.

Treasurer of the Jewish Agency: Arie Dulzin.

Chairman Settlement Department: Raanan Weitz.

Chairman Youth Aliyah Department:Yosef Klarman.

Chairman Immigration and Absorption: Pinhas Sapir, Mordechai Kirshblum.

New immigrants in 1974: 31,979.

 

 

January 11: US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger begins shuttle talks with Israel and Egypt aimed at attaining a separation of forces.

January 14: Fuel prices on Israel soar by 40% to 100%.

January 18 : Israel and Egypt sign the first Sinai disengagement agreement after the shuttle diplomacy by Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. Israel withdraws from the Suez Canal's west bank to a line 15 to 20 kilometers east of the canal. Egypt reoccupies the east bank in a zone 8 to 10 kilometers wide; a UN buffer zone is established between them. Egypt secretly agrees to clear and reopen the Suez Canal and allow passage of nonmilitary cargoes bound for Israel and to rebuild adjacent cities. Syria is not a party to the agreement.

January 21: President Katzir assigns the task of forming a new government to Golda Meir.

February 2: The Syrians shell Israeli military positions and civilian settlements on the Golan Heights.

February 3: Syrian Foreign Minister, A. H. Khaddam, announces that Syria is carrying out a "continued and real war of attrition. Its aim is "keeping Israel's reserves on active duty and paralyzing its economy."

February 10: A grass roots protest movement targets the political and military establishment in the wake of the events of the Yom Kippur War. One of its dominant figures is Motti Ashkenazi, the commander of the fortification at the north of the Suez Canal, the only fortification that did not fall to the Egyptians.

February 25 : Israeli troops complete their withdrawal from the west bank of the Suez Canal.

February: U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger delivers a list to the Israelis of their prisoners of war held by Syria. Israel later declares that the receipt of this list fulfilled a condition for holding disengagement talks with Syria.

March 10 : Prime Minister Golda Meir and her new coalition cabinet, including Moshe Dayan as defense minister, are sworn in. This government is the shortest lived in the history of the State of Israel.

March 31: Israel is shocked by a statement from Washington, that there is a "foreign legion" serving inside Syria that consists of troops from Kuwait, Morocco and Saudi Arabia, as well as a number of North Korean pilots, and an armored brigade from Cuba with more than 100 tanks.

March: The Gush Emunim (Bloc of the Faithful) movement is founded. It is a religious organization whose purpose is to establish permanent Jewish control over the territories occupied in 1967. Its spiritual guide is Rabbi Zvi Judah Kook (1891-1982), son of the late chief rabbi of Palestine, Abraham Isaac Kook (1865-1935). It will evolve into a politically active movement.

April 1 : The Agranat Commission interim report on the Yom Kippur War is released. It recommends the dismissal of Chief of Staff David Elazar, intelligence chief Eliahu Zeira and his three deputies, and the suspension of southern front commander Shmuel Gonen. It absolves Defense Minister Moshe Dayan and Prime Minister Golda Meir of direct personal blame. Elazar resigns. The public and press criticize the commission of absolving Dayan.

April 11: A government crisis ensues and Golda Meir resigns as prime minister, bringing down the month-old coalition government.

April 11 : Palestinian terrorists infiltrate from Lebanon and kill 16 civilians, mostly women and children, at Kiryat Shmonah. Israel retaliates by raiding villages in Lebanon.

April 14: Motta Gur is the new chief of staff.

April 26 : The Labor Party elects former Chief of Staff and Ambassador to the U.S. Yitzhak Rabin to form a new government.

May 15 : Three Palestinian terrorists infiltrate from Lebanon into Ma'alot, where they take about 120 schoolchildren hostage. Their demand for the release of imprisoned Palestinian captives is rejected. When Israeli troops storm the school, 20 children, 1 Israeli soldier, and the 3 terrorists are killed. Israel retaliates with jet raids on villages in Lebanon.

May: Yitzhak Rabin forms a new Labor government. Notably absent are Moshe Dayan, Abba Eban and Pinhas Sapir. Rabin is the first native-born Israeli to lead his country. Shimon Peres replaces Moshe Dayan as Minister of Defense.

May 31 : Israel and Syria sign a Golan Heights disengagement agreement after one month of shuttle diplomacy. Israel returns all territory captured in the Yom Kippur War plus the town of Kuneitra, taken in 1967. The Syrians will renege on their agreement to repopulate Kuneitra with civilians. Israel gains exchange of prisoners of war. Buffer zones are established, separated by a neutral zone occupied by UN forces.

June: Several Palestinian terrorists infiltrate from Lebanon and attack Kibbutz Shamir, in Upper Galilee, killing three women. Five days later, infiltrating by sea, three Palestinian terrorists attack a family in a Nahariya apartment house. A mother and two children are killed, as well as an Israeli soldier. Israel retaliates with air attacks on Lebanon.

June 12-24: UN President Richard Nixon visits the Middle East, including Israel.

June 25 : Israeli troops complete their withdrawal from the Golan Heights. An exchange of 56 prisoners of war for 382 Arabs, including 10 Iraqis and 5 Moroccans, takes place.

July 10: The Agranat Commission submits a second interim report.

July 25: Several hundred Jewish settlers arrive at Sebastia in the West Bank with the intention of erecting living quarters without the approval of the government. A confrontation develops with IDF soldiers. The incident ends on July 29 with the forcible evacuation of the settlers.

August 18 : Archbishop Hilarion Capucci, Greek patriarchal vicar in East Jerusalem, is arrested for smuggling arms into Israel for use by terrorists.

August, September: Confrontations with the PLO continue on the Lebanese border and in "Fatah-land", and area of southern Lebanon.

September: A TWA airliner en route from Israel to New York crashes into the Ionian Sea, killing all 88 aboard. In January 1975, the U.S. will confirm the crash was caused by a bomb explosion.

October 5: Zalman Shazar, Israel's third president, dies.

October 26-29: The Arab Summit at Rabat, including King Hussein of Jordan, recognizes the PLO as the "sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people" and issues a declaration calling for the creation of an independent Palestinian state. The manifestations of Palestinian extremism and support in the arab world feed the mood in Israel that gives increasing support for the settlement activity on the West Bank, and encourages the opposition parties of the Right in their determination to come to power after 36 years of Labor governments.

November 8: The Israeli Lira us devalued from IL 4,20 to IL 6.00 to the dollar. The government cancels subsidies on basic commodities and temporarily bans car imports. Protests are mounted throughout the country.

November 13 : Yasser Arafat addresses the UN General Assembly. Over 100,000 Israel supporters rally in New York to protest Arafat's appearance at the UN.

November 19 : Three Palestinian terrorists shoot their way into a Beit Shean apartment house, killing 4 and wounding 23 civilians.

November 22: The UN General Assembly recognizes the PLO as the sole spokesman for the Palestine Arabs, grants the PLO observer status at the UN, and affirms the Palestinian right to national independence and sovereignty.

November: The UN Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization's (UNESCO) Commission for Social Sciences, Humanities and Culture votes to invite the UNESCO director general to withhold assistance to Israel for Israel's persistent alteration of the historical features of Jerusalem. Later, UNESCO votes to exclude Israel from the European regional group, making Israel the only member not part of a regional group. A storm of protest ensues, with the US Congress threatening to withhold contributions to UNESCO until the body rescinds its anti-Israel measures.

November: Russian ballet dancers Valery and Galina Panova make their debut in Israel. They were granted permission to emigrate to Israel, as the Soviet Union responds to world opinion.

December: Archbishop Hilarion Capucci is sentenced to 12 years' imprisonment by an Israeli court for smuggling arms into Israel for use by terrorists.

Aharon Appelfeld, Israeli novelist, writes "Badenheim 1939", which depicts the false tranquility of European Jewry before World War II.

 

 

August: Sylva Zalmanson, Soviet dissident jailed in 1970 for her part in the plot to hijack an airliner from Leningrad to reach Israel, is freed and leaves for Israel.

October: Oscar Schindler, a German Catholic who saved more than 1,500 Jews during the Holocaust by employing them in his factory, dies. More than 400 Jews whom he saved attend his funeral at the Latin Cemetery in Jerusalem.

Mel Brooks produces "Blazing Saddles", a parody of American western films. It is described by Brooks as a "Jewish western with a black hero."

The publication of "The Journal of Jewish Art" edited by Bezalel Narkiss, Israeli scholar of Jewish art, begins under the auspices of Spertus College, Chicago.

Abraham David Beame becomes the first Jewish mayor of New York.

 

 
 

 

 

 

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12 Nov 2007 / 2 Kislev 5768 0