Rabbi Avraham Zuckerman
Rabbi Avraham ZuckermanAriel Zuckerman

Rabbi Avraham Zuckerman, the eldest of Israel’s religious Zionist rabbis and the venerable dean of the Bnei Akiva Yeshiva network, passed away on Saturday night. He was 98 years old.

Rabbi Zuckerman was hospitalized on Tuesday at the Hillel Yaffe Hospital in Hadera and was released on Friday afternoon, before the Sabbath, to his home in Kfar HaRoeh where he passed away.

Born in Lithuania in 1915, Rabbi Zuckerman studied at local yeshivot and moved to Israel in 1936.

In 1939, he co-founded the Bnei Akiva yeshiva in Kfar HaRoeh along with Rabbi Moshe Tzvi Neria. He headed the yeshiva along with Rabbi Neria for over fifty years.

Rabbi Zuckerman founded the Bnei Akiva Yeshiva network and served as its head for many years. After the death of Rabbi Neria, Rabbi Haim Druckman was appointed chairman of the Bnei Akiva Yeshiva network and Rabbi Zuckerman was awarded the title of dean of the network of yeshivot.

In 2011, he published a book entitled Luchot Even (lit. the stone tablets, an allusion to the Decalogue), a commentary on the weekly parasha (Torah portion).

Rabbi Zuckerman is survived by his wife, Rivka, three daughters and two sons, 36 grandchildren and more than one hundred great-grandchildren. He will be laid to rest on Sunday at 3:00 p.m. at the cemetery at Kfar HaRoeh.