Shraga Netzer, one of the founders of Mapai and the Labor Party, died at his home in Tel Aviv last Thursday. He was 87. Netzer was born in Sosnitza, Russia, in 1898 and came to Palestine with his wife Dvora in 1925, after organizing a network of Jewish productive and self-supporting organizations under the new Soviet rule.
Throughout the years when he worked in the Tel Aviv municipality’s sanitation department Netzer was an important “power broker” in Mapai, even though he never held a formal position in the party. Despite his friendship with David Ben Gurion, Netzer remained faithful to Mapai when the leader split away to form Rafi. He never sought Knesset membership though his wife served as a Knesset member.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
