Biography

Dan Ben-Amotz (Hebrew: דן בן אמוץ, April 13, 1924 – October 20, 1989) was an Israeli radio broadcaster, journalist, playwright, and author, as well as a former Palmach member. Despite having immigrated from Poland in 1938, he was often considered the epitome of the "Sabra", a native born Israeli Jew. Moshe Tehilimzeigger (later Dan Ben-Amotz) was born in Równe (then in Poland, now in Ukraine). He was sent to the British Mandate for Palestine by his parents in 1938.

His parents were murdered in the Holocaust.In Palestine he was sent to Ben Shemen Youth Village, where his counselor was Shimon Peres. He changed his name to Moshe Shimony and later to Dan Ben-Amotz, feeling the latter had the right sabra sound. Reinventing his personal history to portray himself as a true native sabra, Ben-Amotz claimed to be an orphan who had relatives in some of the older Zionist settlements.In the 1940s, Ben-Amotz served in the Palmah and joined the Palyam during the 1947–48 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine.