צפת בשלהי המאה התשע עשרה
By Zeev Galili
Translated by Leah Keshet
For years, I have been walking in the footsteps of my grandfather who was killed in the disaster at Meron one hundred years ago* I interviewed tens of family members and historians of the period * I dug through memoirs and books of historical research and discovered only part of the pieces of an ancient puzzle * And suddenly there appeared an unknown great-grand-daughter from Canada and the diary of her grandmother describing the whole period, and the picture emerged * Following this discovery – a reunion with family members of my uncle, who had emigrated from our land 103 years ago * A story about family from the land of Israel and a story about personal rediscovery.
A few weeks ago, I turned on my computer in the morning, and the first email that flashed on the screen leapt at me like a bolt of lightning.
An unknown lady wrote that she had read an article I had written on the internet some dozen years earlier, about my grandfather Moshe Rosenthal, who had been killed in the disaster on Lag Ba'Omer, 1911 in Meron.
The writer, who knew that she was the great-grand-daughter of Moshe Rosenthal, wanted to find out how we were related. She added that she had in her possession a copy of memoirs, the handwritten diary of her grandmother, Yocheved Segal Z"L
I almost fell off my chair in surprise and excitement. Yocheved Segal was the youngest sister of my mother, and a beloved aunt. I had no idea that she had a granddaughter in Canada – a mathematics ..professor, Leah Edelstein-Keshet