JOFFE, ELIEZER LIPA

JOFFE, ELIEZER LIPA (1882–1944), Ereẓ Israel pioneer; father of the idea of the moshav ovedim . Joffe was born in Yanovka (Ivanovka), Bessarabia, and in 1902 published a call to young Jews to settle in Ereẓ Israel (in the Hebrew daily, Ha-Meliẓ). He went to the United States in 1904 to study advanced agricultural techniques in preparation for his own settlement in Ereẓ Israel. In 1905 Joffe founded the Ha-Ikkar ha-Ẓa'ir ("Young Farmer") association for aliyah to Ereẓ Israel in Woodbine, New Jersey, whose members were students at the agricultural school there. He also published Ha-Ikkar ha-Ẓa'ir, which advocated agricultural training and preparation for life in Ereẓ Israel. At the same time, he founded He-Ḥalutz in New York City. In 1910 he settled in Ereẓ Israel, establishing an experimental farm at ein gannim near Petaḥ Tikvah. He settled in Galilee in 1911 and in 1913 organized American pioneers in the Ha-Ikkar ha-Ẓa'ir group for the autonomous cultivation of the kinneret farm. Joffe expounded his idea of the moshav ovedim in a brochure, Yissud Moshevei Ovedim ("Establishment of Agricultural Smallholder's Cooperatives," 1918) and in 1921 was one of the founders of nahalal , the first moshav ovedim, based on the principles he had formulated. In 1928 he became a founder of Tenuvah (the largest marketing cooperative in Israel), serving as its director until 1936. A leader of the Ha-Po'el ha-Ẓa'ir party, Joffe served as its representative at Zionist Congresses. He published books on agricultural subjects and was the first editor of Ha-Sadeh ("The Field"), a monthly agricultural magazine. His works,   Kitvei Eliezer Joffe, were published in six volumes, together with a biography, in 1956. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: B. Ḥabas (ed.), Sefer ha-Aliyyah ha-Sheniyyah (1947), index; J. Burtniker, Bibliografiyah shel E.L. Joffe (1950); M. Smilansky, Mishpaḥat ha-Adamah, 4 (1953), 35–46; B. Katznelson, Be-Ḥevlei Adam (1950), 140–52. (Yosef Shapiro)