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The Joseph Trumpeldor Labor Battalion The Labor Battalion "Gdud HaAvoda" originated during the road building operations near the Tiberias-Tzemach road. Considered to be an army of workers based on equality, the battalion's units were to be scattered throughout the country and to be engaged in all kinds of construction and rural works. This was their finest hour. It was the birth of a grand enterprise. All this happened here on this road, between Tiberias and Tzemach. Six months after Trumpeldor's fall, on Sept. 1st, 1920, the Krymchaks, the ''pioneer" groups and others, all assembled near the hot springs to declare The Labor Battalion. On that day, at about noon time, everyone stopped working (much to Tomashov's regret), put on their good clothes and arrived at the foot of the mountain where the assembly took place. Yehudah Kopelevich (Almog), Israel Shohat and Itzhak Landoberg were all seated on the stage, surrounded by members of "Hashomer" organization as well as the armed Jewish policemen from Tiberias. Torches were lit on top of the mountain and the "The Joseph Trumpeldor Labor Battalion" was declared by Yehudah Kopelevich, his eyes spitting fire and his hair blowing in the wind. People standing in silence awaiting the order while the torches are burning and the wind against their faces. Garfinkel, all excited, turns to Tomashov: "It seems that after all a lost work day is not so terrible." It was Tomashov who urged again and again not to quit but to keep on the paving of the roads. "We must prove to everyone that we know how to build roads and on time". Haruvi commented that the three of them, senior members of the "Second Aliyah", worried at first that "these" members of the "Third Aliyah" who were road builders had no faith and sacrifice, like the first generation. |
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