Dr. Israel Eldad was the spiritual leader of the most ruthless and notorious Jewish underground organization – the Fighters for the Freedom of Israel (Leḥi) – that fought to free Palestine from British rule.
After a successful anti-colonial struggle and the establishment of a Jewish state, Dr. Eldad Eldad began teaching TaNaKh and Hebrew literature at a high school until Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion intervened to have him fired. The prime minister was afraid Eldad would imbue the students with Sternist ideology and therefore claimed it was dangerous to allow him to teach. Eldad took legal action and won in court but few were willing to hire him after Ben-Gurion had labeled him a danger to the state.
Eldad – who held a doctorate in Schopenhauer and translated all of Nietzsche’s works into Hebrew – eventually became a professor of humanities at Haifa’s prestigious Technion and later at what would become Ariel University.
