Mendel Portugali

Mendel Portugali was born in 1888 in Călărași (Kalarash), Bessarabia, Russian Empire (now a part of Moldova).

On his return home, Mendel decided he wanted to be a tradesman, but his parents were bitterly opposed to the idea, which they considered beneath the family's dignity.

He spent his time trying to get the Moldovans to rise up against what he perceived to be an oppressive regime, but they refused to see him as anything but yet another Jewish revolutionary inciting them against the Tsar.

His house was searched, seditious literature was found and Mendel was sentenced to three years of hard labour in Siberia.

Mendel joined Poale Zion, worked as a math teacher and learnt farming from his Moldavian neighbours.