Chaim Yassky
Chaim Yassky (1896–1948) was a physician and medical administrator in Jerusalem. He was killed in the Arab attack on a medical convoy bringing supplies to Hadassah Hospital on Mount Scopus.
Biography
[edit]Yassky was born in Kishinev, Imperial Russia in 1896. While studying medicine at the University of Odessa, he became active in the Zionist movement.[1] Before World War I he took part in Jewish self-defense against pogromists in Odessa.[2]
In 1917, after the Russian revolution, he co-founded the Russian Maccabee Society, a Zionist youth organization.[3]
After World War 1 he worked in a Military Hospital in Odessa, before leaving for the British Mandate of Palestine.[4]
In 1920, Yassky immigrated with his wife Fanny (maiden name Gorodetsky) whom he married in Odessa; to Palestine, where he was appointed district physician of Haifa.
In 1921, he received a medical degree from Geneva University in Switzerland, after specializing in ophthalmology and in 1927, was appointed acting head of the eye department of the Rothschild-Hadassah Hospital. [5]
As an ophthalmologist, he initiated programs to eradicate trachoma.[1] In 1931, Yassky became director of the Hadassah Medical Organization. He was one of the driving spirits behind the establishment of the Rothschild-Hadassah University Hospital on Mount Scopus, which was opened in 1939.
At the start of World War II, Hadassah formed an emergency committee to administer a health program and to cooperate with the allied medical corps of which Dr. Yassky was a committee-member. After the cessation of hostilities, he helped to plan the group's health work.[6]
Yassky was killed in the Hadassah medical convoy massacre on April 13, 1948, during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, approximately one month before Israel's declaration of independence. A bullet went through his liver and he exsanguinated in about ten minutes.
References
[edit]- ^ a b Physicians, Forerunners of Modern Israel, David Margalith, Jerusalem Academy of Medicine, Tel Aviv 1973, p.75
- ^ Gilbert, Martin (1998), Israel: A History. London: Black Swan. ISBN 0-552-99545-2, p.170
- ^ The New York Times, April 14, 1948
- ^ The New York Times, April 14, 1948
- ^ The New York Times, April 14, 1948
- ^ The New York Times, April 14, 1948
Bibliography
[edit]- Cornay, Joan (2001). Who's Who in Jewish History. London: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-26030-2
External links
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