Lavi | |
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Coordinates: 32°47′17″N 35°26′31″E / 32.78806°N 35.44194°ECoordinates: 32°47′17″N 35°26′31″E / 32.78806°N 35.44194°E | |
District | Northern |
Council | Lower Galilee |
Affiliation | Religious Kibbutz Movement |
Founded | 1949 |
Founded by | Religious youths |
Population (2015) | 640 |
Website | www.kibbutzlavi.co.il |
Lavi (Hebrew: לָבִיא, lit. Lion) is a kibbutz in northern Israel. Located 310 meters above sea level and 10 minutes from Tiberias, it falls under the jurisdiction of Lower Galilee Regional Council. In 2015 it had a population of 640.
The kibbutz was founded in 1949 by the British branch of Bnei Akiva, a religious Zionist youth movement. Many of the founders were amongst the 10,000 Jewish children who were taken to the United Kingdom from Germany as part of the 1938-1940 Kindertransport following Kristallnacht during the Nazi regime in Germany. In its early years the Bachad movement raised money in the UK for the kibbutz as well as providing agricultural and educational training for Bnei Akiva and Bachad members in the UK on Thaxted Farm, Essex. Lavi was the first kibbutz where children lived with their parents, instead of in communal children's quarters where the children of other kibbutzim were housed and fed.
Among the founders of the kibbutz was Yehuda Avner, a British immigrant who became a diplomat and advisor to several Israeli prime ministers. The first couple to be married on the kibbutz, founders Michael and Marion Mittwoch, celebrated the birth of their 100th great-grandchild in January 2015.
The kibbutz was founded on land of the Arab village of Lubya, depopulated during 1948 by the Hagana forces. The source of the name "Lavi" and "Lubia" is from the ancient Lavi village which existed in the days of the Mishnah and Talmud, in which there was an inn called "Lavi", on the way from Tiberias to Tzippori.