Child of the Jordan Valley

Naftali Oppenheim’s Lake Kinneret

Bitmuna presents photos of Jordan Valley and its residents taken by German who made aliyah in 1912 and was tragically killed in 1953

Reuters | Published: 01.12.07, 11:57

Naftali Oppenheim was born in Giessen, Germany in 1912. As a youngster he was active in a Zionist youth movement and studied photography in his spare time.

In 1937 he made aliyah with his friends from the “Telem” group (which eventually founded Kibbutz Ein-Gev) and settled in Hatzer Kinneret.

He contracted polio, but despite his handicap he decided to continue honing his photography skills and set out on his donkey carriage to capture the Jordan Valley landscape and its residents with his camera.

In 1953, while on night watch at his kibbutz, Oppenheim was accidentally shot and killed.

The work he left behind includes thousands of negatives, 4,000 of which were scanned by the Bitmuna lab. Some of the photos are currently on display at the Eretz Israel Museum. This and the following Bitmuna columns will present Oppenheimer photos that are not featured in the exhibit.