Netzer Sereni () is a kibbutz in central Israel. Located in the Shephelah between Be'er Ya'akov and Ness Ziona, it falls under the jurisdiction of Gezer Regional Council. In it had a population of .
History Kibbutz Netzer Sereni was founded in 1948 by Holocaust survivors liberated from Buchenwald concentration camp, who had established themselves in 1945 as "Kibbutz Buchenwald", an agricultural collective designed to prepare Jews for life in Palestine, the first such Hakhshara group established in Germany after the war.Judith Tydor Baumel, Kibbutz Buchenwald: Survivors And Pioneers, Rutgers University Press, 1997, Erhard Roy Wiehn (ed.), Wer hätte das geglaubt, Hartung-Gorre Verlag, 2010, Konstanz November 12, 1945, The dining room of Kibbutz Buchenwald, Germany , Yad Vashem websiteMarch 1946, Members of the “Kibbutz Buchenwald” Pioneer Training Group in Antwerp, Belgium , Yad Vashem website The kibbutz was established on the site of the Palestinian village of Bir Salim,Survey of Palestine, 1:20,000 series map, sheet 13/14 "Er Ramle", 1948. Survey of Israel, 1:20,000 series map, sheet 13/14 "Rehovot", 1955. which was evacuated in 1948 under orders from authorities in nearby Ramle, despite requests from the local mukhtar to the Haganah asking for protection. In October 1949, the name was changed to "Netzer" (a Hebrew word meaning "scion", "shoot", "sprout") by the Government Naming Committee.
Between 1948 and 1951 antagonism between the Mapam and Mapai parties led to a split within the kibbutz movement,Kibbutz Movement in Israel Splits; Mapai Delegates Walk out of Mapam-Dominated Parley Jewish Telegraphic Agency, 23 May 1951 and in 1952 120 Mapai members of kibbutz Givat Brenner broke away for ideological reasons and moved to Netzer Sereni.Daniel Gavron (2000) The Kibbutz: Awakening from Utopia Rowman & Littlefield, p59
In 1952, following the arrival of roughly fifty families from Givat Brenner, they requested to rename the kibbutz Netzer Sereni after Enzo Sereni, a Jewish Italian intellectual, Zionist leader and Jewish Brigade officer.Hareuveni, Imanuel (2010). Eretz Israel Lexicon (in Hebrew). Matach. p. 701. Sereni was one of the founders of Givat Brenner. He was parachuted into Nazi-occupied Italy in World War II, only to be immediately captured by the Germans and executed in Dachau concentration camp.
The Government Naming Committee objected to the usage of the non-Hebrew name "Sereni", and ordered the kibbutz to adopt the name "Netzer Haim", "haim" meaning "life" in Hebrew and having been Enzo Sereni's Hebrew name. The poet Natan Alterman advocated for the usage of "Netzer Sereni" in his column in the Davar newspaper. Mapai Knesset member Haim Ben-Asher, a kibbutz member who had been a personal friend of Enzo Sereni, felt an obligation to honor Sereni's original name. In January 1955, he began legislative proceedings designed to force the Government Naming Committee to adopt the name "Netzer Sereni", on the grounds that following the tragic death of Enzo Sereni's only son Daniel in a plane crash over Maagan the previous year, the name "Sereni" had been discontinued. In June 1955, the Government Naming Committee announced that although it continued - and would continue - to keep the Hebrew name, it agreed, out of respect for the Knesset, to change the name of the settlement to "Netzer Sereni."
In popular culture The 2023 Israeli musical film Victory focuses on two fictional couples from Netzer Sereni.Israeli Film Series: Victory HaMenatzchim Toronto Jewish Film Festival. Retrieved on 8 July 2024
Notable people Eyal Ben-Reuven
References