Motal

Motol (

After the Partitions of Poland, Motal became part of the Russian Empire. It was in the Kobrinsky Uyezd of Grodno Governorate until the collapse of the Russian Empire in 1917. Between World War I and World War II it was in the Drohiczyn powiat of the Polish Polesie Voivodeship. It is near the center of Polesia which constituted an irregular rectangle of roughly 180 kilometres (110 mi) from east to west and 80 km (50 mi) from north to south.^{[citation needed]}

Motal was a Shtetl. In 1937, Motal had 4,297 inhabitants, of whom 1,354 were Jews. (Reinharz, 1985). During the war an Einsatzgruppen perpetrated a mass execution of the local Jewish community.^[1] The Destruction of Motele (Hurban Motele) was published in Hebrew by the Council of Motele Immigrants in Jerusalem in 1956. It was edited by A.L. Poliak, Ed. Dr. Dov Yarden. The book has 87 pages and contains memoirs and events leading up to the destruction of the Jews of Motele in 1942.^[2]

Anshe Motele Congregation, an Orthodox Jewish synagogue, was founded in Chicago on Sept. 3, 1903, by 14 immigrants who named it after Motel.^[3]

Economics

The largest company in Motol is Agromotol.^{[citation needed]}

Education

Motol has 2 secondary schools and an art school.^{[citation needed]}

Notable people

• Chaim Weizmann, Israel's first President
• Saul Lieberman, rabbi and a scholar of Talmud
• Leonard Chess (Lejzor Czyż) and Phil Chess (Fiszel Czyż), founders of Chess Records
• Étienne Wasserzug, French biologist
• David Bartov, Israeli judge and the head of Nativ
• Serguei Palto, Russian physicist

Motal in literature

• The Slaughterman's Daughter by Yaniv Iczkovits

Sources

• Jehuda Reinharz, Chaim Weizmann: The Making of a Zionist Leader (1985).
• Itzhak Epstein, pdf Jewish Motol: Genealogical and Family History Bibliography

External links

• Photos at radzima.org
• Shtetl Links: Motol Home Page

52°19′N 25°36′E / 52.317°N 25.600°E / 52.317; 25.600

This Belarus location article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

• v
• t
• e