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In January 2022, the three hundred and twelfth issue of the magazine MB Yakinton was sent to the homes of its 2,000 subscribers around Israel, in addition to being published online. Some of its readers had emigrated from German-speaking regions in Central Europe to Mandatory Palestine in the 1930s after the rise of Nazism. Most, however, were the descendants of those immigrants, their children and grandchildren.
The name of the organization to which the magazine belongs is printed in blue on the top of the issue’s cover – Irgun Yotzei Merkaz Europa (IYME) – along with its English name, The Association of Israelis of Central European Origin, and the German translation, Die Vereinigung der Israelis mitteleuropäischer Herkunft. The issue marks the nineteenth anniversary of IYME and its magazine. Both commenced their activities in 1932, the former under the name Hitachdut Olej Germania (HOG) and the latter as Mitteilungsblatt (MB). The blue title on the white background of the cover serves as a kind of implicit expression of the connection between these two institutions and the State of Israel.
While the top part of the cover, in white and blue, presents the future, the bottom part, in shades of grey, takes the reader back in time to the past. This section features an illustration by the Israeli artist Yair Noam (1922–2021) that captures the moment when a man disembarks from the ship that had brought him to a new place. With a clenched and alert expression, he holds onto a suitcase with one hand and the handrail of the stairs with the other so as not to fall on his new path. At the dock, a man and a woman are facing and waving to him. The German inscription “Fredchens Ankunft” (Fredchen’s Arrival) indicates that the man is probably a German speaker. Given the biography of Noam, who was born in Berlin as Manfred (Fred) Nomburg and fled to Mandatory Palestine in 1938 – we can assume that “Fredchen” had immigrated there as well around that time. Noam may have drawn his own moment of arrival in Mandatory Palestine.
Between 1933 and 1945, approximately 90,000 German-speaking Jews fled their homeland in Europe and emigrated to Mandatory Palestine to seek shelter from the persecution they had experienced by the Nazis. Upon their arrival, they had to struggle with cultural, linguistic, occupational, and other hardships that accompanied their new life in this foreign land, utterly different from the landscapes of their previous lives in Europe, to which they were accustomed and of which they felt an inseparable part. They discovered practical assistance and a spiritual sense of continuity of their cultural and linguistic connection to the German Sprachraum within the framework of the organization and its magazine.
More than seven decades later, both continue to support the German-speaking Jewish community and preserve their heritage in Israel. To this day, IYME and MB Yakinton are the two most important diasporic institutions for the Yekkes in Israel.
Each issue of MB Yakinton, which in recent years had been published approximately every two months (culminating in a total of five issues annually), begins with two notes to the reader: one by IYME’s president, Devorah Haberfeld (*1948), and the other by the magazine’s editor. These two texts usually discuss current political events in Israel while reflecting on them through the legacy of German-Jewish Zionist principles, share IYME institutional updates or insights with its community, or express special or personal comments perceived to be relevant. In the above-mentioned anniversary edition, the two texts discuss the history of IYME and MB Yakinton, as well as their role within the Yekkes community and in Israeli society today.
Hitachdut Olej Germania (HOG) was founded in Tel Aviv in February 1932 by German-Jewish Zionists involved in the Zionist Federation of Germany (ZVfD) and the Zionist Organization (ZO); its first two presidents were Theodor Zlocisti (1874–1943) and Ernst Lewy (1896–1963). The struggles they had experienced after making Aliyah led them to believe that veteran immigrants should assist the new immigrants. Thus, the aim of HOG was to provide a link between the new immigrants from Germany, albeit in small numbers, and the veteran society of the Yishuv. During its first year of operation, HOG advised new immigrants on employment opportunities, housing, investments, and legal matters, and represented them before the local authorities and the German consulate.
As of the winter of 1933, however, the number of immigrants from Germany increased due to the rise of the Nazis to power. While during the first year of its existence, HOG dealt with 540 inquiries, during its second year of operation (1933), the number of applications rose to 20,345. In fact, up until October 1933, when a special German Department was set up in the Jewish Agency (JA), it was only HOG that provided assistance to the immigrants. At that time, the two organizations cooperated on many issues and divided the areas of action between them: the German Department in the JA was responsible for organizing immigration to Mandatory Palestine alongside the formation of settlement plans, as well as arranging training for the advancement of the pioneering Zionist enterprise; HOG maintained continuous contact with the immigrants, and through its network of branches around the Yishuv, assisted them in finding work and a place to live.
By 1937, HOG was already operating through four central offices in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Petach Tikva, as well as twenty branches in the various localities. Two years later, in 1939, the number of branches increased to thirty-six. In light of the expectation of increased immigration from Austria after its annexation to Nazi Germany, negotiations began between HOG and the leaders of the Austrian immigrants in Mandatory Palestine, who, until then, had operated within their own limited framework, regarding the merger of the two associations into one organization. This was established in 1939 and was called Hitachdut Olej Germania ve Olej Austria (HOGOA), the Association of German and Austrian Immigrants. In 1939, cooperation also commenced with immigrant associations from Danzig (Gdańsk) and especially with refugees from Czechoslovakia.
During the second half of the 1930s, internal struggles developed between the Association’s leadership about its direction: should it engage in politics? The position adopted was that politics could serve as a means to achieve goals, but it would not become its primary focus. In 1942, it was decided to separate the political from the social: a political party was set up under the name Aliyah Hadasha (New Immigration), which operated until 1948. The continuation of apolitical activities, such as welfare, was to be taken care of by Irgun Olej Merkaz Europa (IOME), the Association of Immigrants from Central Europe.
With the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 and in the decades that followed, the needs of the German-speaking community changed, and the organization also changed its purpose: from originally being focused on helping immigrants to integrate into their new place, it began to assist its aging members with their daily needs, for example, by setting up retirement homes for its members who had grown older. Obviously, over the years, the Yekkes community no longer consisted solely of the immigrant generation, but increasingly included their descendants, the majority of whom were native-born Israelis. Reflecting this demographic shift, the organization changed its name in 2003 to Irgun Yotzei Merkaz Europa (IYME). Naturally, the ethnic characteristics of the members of the German-speaking community had changed: the second, third, and subsequent generations became fully integrated in Israel, the country of their birth. In addition, they shared other ethnic affiliations and were no longer defined solely as Yekkes, as might be expected in Israel’s multicultural immigrant society.
Fig. 1: IYME President, Devorah Haberfeld, speaking before more than 200 organization members and volunteers at the 56th Annual Conference in Tel Aviv, July 2005. More information about the event can be found here: https://online.anyflip.com/ddvko/fyoa/mobile/index.html; © Emanuel Maymon.
Thus, alongside its traditional social activities, IYME is also committed to preserving the history and heritage of the Yekkes, for example, by connecting the subsequent generations to their roots and by cooperating with other heritage institutions such as the Wing for the Heritage of German-speaking Jewry in the Hecht Museum and the Archive for German-speaking Jewry in Israel (the Yekkes Archive), both in the University of Haifa. Furthermore, it seeks to link the history of the Yekkes to broader domestic political and social issues. Its annual commemoration ceremony for the 1938 November pogroms, for example, also serves as a means to raise awareness against antisemitism, prejudice, and violence and to implant values of liberalism, tolerance, and democracy.
In September 1932, HOG’s first newsletter was printed on a typewriter as an information leaflet for German Jews in Mandatory Palestine. Following the large numbers of immigrants from Nazi Germany since 1933, the Mitteilungsblatt expanded but was still published in the form of an information leaflet in German, with some articles written in Hebrew. With the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939, it changed its format to a weekly newspaper, providing news about the situation in Europe and Mandatory Palestine in German. Then, for about another two years, half a page or even less was allocated to text in Hebrew, mostly about Aliyah. From the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, it appeared as a weekly newspaper printed mostly in German.
In March 1985, the MB changed its format from a newspaper to a monthly periodical called the Central European Immigrant Organization Newsletter, which emphasized its affiliation with IOME. With this change, from a newspaper to a community magazine, articles again appeared in both German and Hebrew. In the early 2000s, the name of the magazine was changed to MB Yakinton to reflect the heritage of the magazine and, at the same time, to emphasize its connection with the heritage of the Yekke community: the word ‘Yakinton’ in Hebrew is a combination of the two words ‘Yekkes’ and ‘newspaper’ (‘Iton’). Alongside this structural change, linguistic changes were also made: while more Hebrew articles appeared, the number of articles written in German was reduced, and they were usually translations of the first. Visual changes were also made, from a black-and-white format to a color brochure with a magazine-like appearance.
The generational change among the Yekke community evidently also affected the magazine’s structure and content. As reflected in the three hundred and twelfth issue (and others), MB Yakinton served as a platform to connect different generations. Its authors were second-generation Yekkes who reflected on their parents’ past experiences and memories in German-speaking regions and in Israel, or their own experiences growing up in a Yekke family, which preserved its connection to the German language and cultural sphere in Israel that expected its citizens to integrate into the local society.
Today, the magazine invites the third generation to reminisce about their family history, sometimes even as a joint project with their grandparents by writing the family history together, sharing the experience of the joint trip to the latter’s former homes in Europe, or reflecting on photos. In this manner, the magazine not only connects between generations, but also between spaces: Germany, Austria, the German-speaking regions in Central Europe, and Israel. Nonetheless, it also presents articles on current Jewish matters in these countries, as well as their connections with Israel. Thus, just like the Yekkes, MB Yakinton serves as a connecting link between these places.
Fig. 2: The landing page of IYME’s website in August 2025, accessible in Hebrew and English. In addition to information about the association’s many activities, the website holds all digitized issues of the MB Yakinton; https://irgun-jeckes.org/.
For more than 90 years, IYME has operated as a voluntary organization with hundreds of volunteers. Along with the MB Yakinton, they have been an inseparable part of the German-speaking Jewish community in Mandatory Palestine and later in Israel, first assisting immigrants upon their arrival and later supporting their needs in Israel. Thus, both continue to honor and follow the legacy of their ancestors in their current activities, providing support and assistance. In addition, with the change of generations, they also play an active and vibrant role in preserving a sense of belonging and creating a Yekke community in Israel. Thus, unlike other heritage institutions such as museums, archives, or research institutions, which focus on the production and documentation of knowledge, IYME and MB Yakinton derive intangible senses, feelings, and emotions of the Yekkes. In other words, in their various activities, both institutions not only document and preserve the Yekke history and heritage, but also create a Yekke present and future in Israel.
Website of the IYME, accessible in Hebrew and English: https://irgun-jeckes.org/
Digitized issues of the MB Yakinton: https://irgun-jeckes.org/category/mb-digital/
IYME’s Yekkes descendants Facebook group in Hebrew: Hoppe Hoppe Reiter – צאצאי ייקים צעירים למען שימור מורשת הייקים: https://www.facebook.com/groups/HoppeHoppeReiter/?locale=he_IL
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution - Non commercial - No Derivatives 4.0 International License. As long as the material is unedited and you give appropriate credit according to the Recommended Citation, you may reuse and redistribute it in any medium or format for non-commercial purposes.
Dr. Irit Chen is the academic director of the Archive for German-speaking Jewry in Israel (‘Yekkes Archive’) at the Haifa DAAD Center for German and European Studies in the University of Haifa and a teaching associate. As of May 2024, she has served as the editor of the MB Yakinton. She completed her PhD dissertation entitled “The Israeli Purchasing in Cologne between Germany and Israel 1953–1965” in the Department of Contemporary Jewry and Jewish History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Irit Chen, Past and Future: The Association of Israelis of Central European Origin and its Magazine, MB Yakinton, in: [Hi]stories of the German-Jewish Diaspora, September 03, 2025. <https://diaspora.jewish-history-online.net/article/gjd:article-37> [September 04, 2025].
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution - Non commercial - No Derivatives 4.0 International License. As long as the material is unedited and you give appropriate credit according to the Recommended Citation, you may reuse and redistribute it in any medium or format for non-commercial purposes.
