Benjamin Dunkelman was the son of Ashkenazim immigrants from the town of Makov (modern Maków Mazowiecki, Poland) in the Russian Empire.
His father was David Dunkelman, the founder of the Canadian men's retailers, Tip Top Tailors[1] and his mother Rose was a committed Zionist.
[3] At the age of 18, Dunkelman went off to work on a kibbutz in Palestine, at that time a League of Nations Mandate administered by Great Britain.
"[4] He loved the Holy Land, and only reluctantly returned to Toronto[4] in 1932 to assist his father, but went again to Palestine in the late 1935 to develop new settlements.
At the same time, the policy of Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King of only sending "active" members who had volunteered to fight overseas ensured there was a shortage of replacements.
[3] In March 1945, Dunkelman played a key role in taking the steep Balberger Wald ridge in the dark forests of the Hochwald.
Initially, he took command of a mortar unit in the Mahal, the legion of Jewish and Christian foreign volunteers fighting for Israel.
[3] Dunkelman's skill with mortars brought him to the attention of the Israeli High Command, and he was instrumental in the breaking of the siege of Jerusalem, which had been besieged by the Jordanians almost since the beginning of the war.
[4] In his autobiography, Dual Allegiance,[5] Dunkelman tells the story of how, between July 8 and 18, 1948 during Operation Dekel, he led the 7th Brigade and its supporting units as it moved to capture the town of Nazareth.
Shortly after the capture of Nazareth, Dunkelman received orders[8] from General Chaim Laskov to expel the Palestinian civilian population from the town, which he refused to carry out.
In 1967, he almost died of a heart attack, which led him to retire from the family's business of running the Tip Top Tailors company.
[4] In September 1969, the Dunkelman Gallery hosted the personal archaeological collection of the Israeli Defense Minister, General Moshe Dayan, which mostly consisted of art from ancient Canaan and Phoenicia.