Vera Weizman

Vera Weizmann (Hebrew: ורה ויצמן‎‎; November 27, 1881 – September 24, 1966), wife of Chaim Weizmann, the first president of the State of Israel, was a medical doctor and a Zionist activist.

Vera Chatzman was born in the town of Rostov, in the Russian Empire, the daughter of Isaiah and Feodosia Chatzman. She initially studied music before taking up medical training in Geneva, Switzerland. There she met Chaim Weizmann at the University's Zionist Club.

In 1906 she married Weizmann at Zoppot, Prussia, today called Sopot, in Poland, and later that year they settled in Manchester, England. There they had two sons, Benjamin born in 1907, and Michael born in 1916. The Weizmann family lived in Manchester for thirty years, from 1906 until 1937. In 1913, Vera Weizmann received her English medical license and worked as a doctor in the public health service at clinics for infants, developing advanced techniques for infant supervision and nutrition.

The Weizmanns’ younger son, Michael, served as a pilot in the British Royal Air Force during the Second World War and was killed on active service when his plane was shot down over the Bay of Biscay.

In 1916, Weizmann gave up her work as a pediatrician when she joined her husband upon his appointment as the scientific adviser in chemistry to the British Admiralty during the First World War. In 1920, she was one of the founding members of the Women's International Zionist Organization (WIZO), and served as its president, alternating with Lady Sieff, for forty years. When the Second World War broke out in 1939, she devoted all of her efforts to Youth Aliyah (Aliyat Hanoar), an organization that she established in England and continued to head as honorary president while living in Israel.

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