GLUSKIN, ZE'EV

GLUSKIN, ZE'EV (1859–1949), Zionist. Born in Slutsk, Belorussia, Gluskin joined the Ḥovevei Zion in Warsaw in the 1880s, became a member of *Benei Moshe, and was among the founders of the Menuhah ve-Nahalah society, which established the settlement of Reḥovot. He was also one of the founders of the Aḥi'asaf publishing house, which introduced innovations in the publishing and distribution of Hebrew books. He participated in the establishment of the Carmel society (1896), which marketed and exported the wine produced in the settlements, and was its first director. In 1901 Gluskin took part in a Ḥovevei Zion deputation to Baron Edmond de Rothschild to persuade him to continue his settlement activities in Ereẓ Israel. In 1904 he was among the founders of the Geulah Company, which was established for the private purchase of land in Ereẓ Israel.

Gluskin went to Ereẓ Israel late in 1905 and took over the directorship of Agudat ha-Koremim ("Vintners Association") and of its wine cellars in Rishon le-Zion and Zikhron Ya'akov. When World War i broke out, he went to Alexandria and helped organize aid both for the refugees from Ereẓ Israel and for Jews who had remained there. He supported the volunteer movement for the establishment of a Jewish regiment in the British Army from among the Ereẓ Israel refugees. He was director of the Geulah Company from 1925–46. He published his memoirs (1946), which contain valuable material on the history of the Jews and of Zionism in Russia and Ereẓ Israel.

bibliography:

D. Idelovitch, Rishon le-Ẓiyyon (1941), index; M. Smilansky, Mishpaḥat ha-Adamah, 3 (1954), 194–206; Y. Pogrebinsky, Sefer "Ge'ullah" (1956), 131ff., 233–5.

[Yehuda Slutsky]