Nobel Laureate author Shmuel Yosef (“Shai”) Agnon will be featured on the new 50 Shekel note to be released next week. The new note will be the highest denomination in Israel’s new currency — at least for the rest of 1985. There are reportedly plans to introduce a new 100 Shekel note during 1986.
A specimen of the new note exhibited by the Bank of Israel this week showed Agnon in a large black skullcap reading, and surrounded by books. The author was an observant man, and many of his literary works were suffused with religious themes.
The present 10,000 Shekel note portraying Golda Meir will be reissued, in almost the same form –with only the three zeros missing: it will be the new 10 Shekel note. The present 100 Shekel note, showing Revisionist leader Zeev Jabotinsky, will be dropped.
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