This is a black and white photograph of Moshe Sharett visiting the Jewish Brigade in Italy in 1945. Sharett, wearing a hat, vest, jacket, and tie, is standing in the middle of a group of men from the Jewish Brigade. The soldiers, all in uniform, are standing in a field, posing informally for the photograph. One soldier has his hand resting on another’s shoulder, another is holding a rifle. One soldier is wearing an officer’s hat, while the rest of the soldiers, probably of lower rank, are wearing berets.
The Jewish Brigade was a British unit founded in 1944. The brigade consisted of Jews living in Mandatory Israel and served during World War II in Northeast Italy. Moshe Sharett was, at the time, the head of the Jewish Agency’s political department.
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Jewish Brigade – The Jewish Brigade, comprising mainly Jews living in pre-state Israel, was the only unit that fought in World War II as an independent Jewish military group carrying a Jewish flag. Soldiers from Israel enlisted into the regular units of the British Army as early as 1940. In September 1944, after discussions between Chaim Weizmann and Winston Churchill, the British government agreed to establish a Jewish brigade. The Jewish Brigade, which included approximately 5,000 soldiers, was deployed to Northeast Italy, where they met Holocaust survivors for the first time. The Jewish Brigade was seen by the survivors as a symbol of hope for the possibility of renewed Jewish life in Israel. The Jewish Brigade was disbanded in 1946, but many of the skills learnt in the Brigade helped Israel in the War of Independence. In 2017, the Italian government honoured the thousands of members of the Jewish Brigade who had helped to liberate Italy during World War II.
Moshe Sharett – Moshe Sharett (1894–1965) was the first foreign minister and second prime minister of the State of Israel. Born as Moshe Shertok in the Ukraine in 1894, he immigrated to Israel with his family in 1906 at the age of twelve. His parents were among the founders of Tel Aviv, and Sharett was in the first graduating class of the Herzliya Gymnasium high school. Sharett spoke fluent Arabic and Turkish and served as an interpreter in the Ottoman Army during World War I. As head of the Jewish Agency's political department, Sharett was influential in convincing the British to establish the Jewish Brigade during World War II. He was a signatory on Israel’s Declaration of Independence and became Israel’s first foreign minister, central in brokering the ceasefire agreement after the War of Independence and creating good relations with foreign countries and the United Nations. Sharett also represented Israel in the reparations agreement with Germany. In 1953, when David Ben-Gurion retired, Sharett became the second prime minister of Israel. He died in 1965 at the age of 71.
