Zvi Yavetz

Zvi Zucker (later Yavetz) was born in Czernowitz, Ukraine.[1] When he was five years old, he was diagnosed with polio and his father committed suicide.[1] After the German occupation in 1941, he was sent to a concentration camp. His relatives, including his mother, were murdered, but he survived the Holocaust and escaped in 1944.[2] Arriving in Turkey, he was transferred to Cyprus and eventually reached Mandatory Palestine.[2]

Initially, Yavetz joined a kibbutz in the Jordan valley.[3] Then he left to study modern history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.[3] While at university, Yavetz worked as a teacher for deaf and speech impaired children.[3] He received a master's degree and PhD in history, classics and sociology in 1950 and 1956, respectively.[4] In 1960, he carried out post-doctoral research at University of London and Lund University.[4]

Yavetz died in January 2013 and was buried at Kibbutz Tel Yitzhak cemetery.[5]

After completing his PhD., Yavetz helped to found Tel Aviv University.[5] In 1956, he was named the department chair of general history and later, dean of humanities faculty at the university.[5]

In 2008, Yavetz published his autobiography, My Czernowitz.[1] He adopted his mother's family name, Yavetz, when he learned that all members of her family had been killed in the Holocaust.[3]

In 1990, Yavetz was awarded the Israel Prize for humanities.[5] In 1997, he was awarded a doctorate (Honoris Causa) from Beer Sheba University and Munich University.[4]

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