Bar-Giora (organization)

[1] Bar Giora's founder, Israel Shochat made his Aliyah to Ottoman Syria (later British Mandate for Palestine) in 1904.

He already had experience of underground militias during the Tzarist pogroms and on his arrival he came under the influence of Michael Halperin (see here), attracted by his talk of an army of Jewish fighters.

In 1907 Yitzhak Ben-Zvi arrived from Poltava; as leader of Russian Poale Zion he had been on the run from the secret police for a year.

Shochat and Ben-Zvi travelled together to the 8th World Zionist Congress in The Hague and on their return established the first incarnation of Bar Giora.

In October 1907, Shochat led an expanded group to Sejera leaving Ben-Zvi in Jaffa as their man inside Poale Zion.