Max Bodenheimer

Max Isidor Bodenheimer (Hebrew: מקס בודנהיימר‎‎; 12 March 1865 in Stuttgart – 19 July, 1940 in Jerusalem) was a lawyer and one of the main figures in German Zionism. An associate of Theodor Herzl, he was the first president of the Zionist Federation of Germany and one of the founders of the Jewish National Fund. After his flight in 1933 from Nazi Germany, and a short sojourn in Holland, he settled in Palestine in 1935.

Max Bodenheimer was born on 12 March 1865 in Stuttgart to an assimilated Jewish family. He studied at Tübingen, Strassburg, Berlin and Freiburg universities from 1884 to 1889.

In 1890 he moved to Cologne to start a law practice. In 1891 he published his first Zionist article in the weekly "Die Menorah" (Hamburg). In Cologne he met David Wolffsohn and the two became close friends. Bodenheimer and Wolffsohn participated in various Zionist groups and activities in Cologne and also established a Zionist group named “Zion”. At that time Bodenheimer began correspondence with Theodor Herzl.

In 1896 he married Rosa Dalberg and had three children: Simon Fritz, a professor of zoology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Henrietta Hannah, who wrote a biography of her father, and Ruth, a lawyer.

When Bodenheimer died, the national institutions flew flags at half staff and a eulogy was delivered by Ussishkin, president of the Jewish National Fund.

Bodenheimer participated at the 1st Zionist Congress and was elected to be a member of the Inner Actions Committee. In 1898 he visited Palestine as a member of the delegation which accompanied Herzl to meet the German Emperor, Wilhelm II. Bodenheimer took part in the Zionist Congresses, helped to write the constitution of the Zionist movement and the Jewish National Fund (JNF), and was the chairman of the Board of Directors of the JNF in Germany. When the First World War broke out, he moved the JNF offices from Cologne to The Hague.

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