Rishon LeZion

Rishon LeZion (Hebrew: רִאשׁוֹן לְצִיּוֹן  (audio) , lit. First to Zion), is the fourth-largest city in Israel, located along the central Israeli coastal plain 8 km (5 mi) south of Tel Aviv. It is part of the Gush Dan metropolitan area.

The city had a population of 235,123 at the end of 2012. Founded in 1882 by Ukrainian Jewish immigrants, it was the second Jewish farm settlement established in Palestine in the 19th century, after Petah Tikva.

Etymology

The name Rishon LeZion is derived from a biblical verse: "First to Zion are they, and I shall give herald to Jerusalem" (Hebrew: ראשון לציון הנה הינם, ולירושלים מבשר אתן‎) (Isaiah 41:27) and literally translates as "First to Zion".

History

Rishon LeZion was founded on July 31, 1882, by ten Hovevei Zion pioneers from Kharkiv, Ukraine (then the Russian Empire) headed by Zalman David Levontin. Reuven Yudalevich was also a member of the group. The pioneers purchased 835 acres (337.91 ha) of land southeast of present-day Tel Aviv, part of the townland of the Arab village of Ayun Kara (literally ' fountain of the crier'). Ayun Kara was the scene of a bloody battle between Turkish and New Zealand troops on November 14, 1917.Local citizens carried the wounded to a hospital in Rishon. A stone cenotaph was erected by the people of Rishon LeZion to the memory of the New Zealanders who fell that day, but it has since been destroyed.

List of Sephardi chief rabbis of the Land of Israel

This list of Sephardi chief rabbis of the Land of Israel documents the rabbis who served as the spiritual leader of the Sephardic community in the Land of Israel from the mid 17th-century to present. The Hebrew title for the position, Rishon LeZion, (lit. "First to Zion"), has been used since the beginning of the 17th-century, and is sourced from a verse in Isaiah 41:27.

17th century

18th century

19th century