YONE GRINFELD

YONE GRINFELD (1884-February 25-1953)

            He was born Belaya Tserkov (Bila Tserkva, lit. “white church”), [also known humorously in Yiddish as] Shvarts-tume or “black filth,” Kiev region, Ukraine.  He received both a Jewish and a secular education.  He was from his youth among the most active Zionist leaders, initially in the city of his birth and later in Kiev.  He was a member of the central committee of the Zionist Organization and served in the administration of the Zionist Youth Party in Ukraine.  Over the years 1917-1920, he was one of the principal organizers of the fight for Jewish autonomy and a member of the national secretariat.  He played a truly important role in the committee for pogrom victims in 1919-1920.  From 1921 to 1936, he lived in Warsaw.  He was a member of the international association of the Zionist Socialist Youth.  He was also active in the management of the Jewish National Fund and in the committee for laborers in the Land of Israel.  In 1936 he moved to Israel and until his death was active in Histadrut Haovdim (Federation of Labor).  He published articles in the organs of Zionist Youth in Ukraine and in Poland.  Together with Meyer Grosman, A. Tsherikover, V. Latski-Bertoldi, and Y. Shekhtman, he edited the large anthology: Di idishe avtonomye un der natsyonaler sekretaryat in Ukraine (Jewish autonomy and the national secretariat in Ukraine) (Kiev, 1920), 320, 46, 8 pp., which includes all the materials and documents on Jewish autonomy in Ukraine, as well as the “labor plan and organization of a national secretariat,” which he worked out.  He died in Jerusalem.

Sources: Elye tsherikover biblyografye (Eliahu Tsherikover bibliography) (New York, 1948); Arye Rafaeli (Tsentsiper), Bemaavak legeula (In the struggle for redemption) (Tel Aviv, 1956), see index.