Eliyahu Nawi

Eliyahu Nawi was born in 1920 in Basra

Eliyahu Nawi was born in Basra, Iraq, in 1920. His family moved to the Land of Israel in 1926, and he grew up in Jerusalem. In 1947 he married Beruria, who had come from Germany in the 1930s.

He studied at the Doresh Zion school and then at the Mizrachi teachers seminary in Jerusalem. From 1944 to 1947 he studied at the School of Law and Economics, where he chaired the student union. In 1947 he went to the Negev as a liaison between a planned town, the Arab population and the British Mandate authorities.

After his army service he worked as a private lawyer from 1954 to 1957. In 1958 he settled in Beersheba and served as a judge in the magistrates' court until 1963. That year Mapai placed him at the head of its list, and he was elected mayor.

He served as mayor for 5 terms. In those years the city gained Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, the Beersheba Theater and new neighborhoods. In 1979 he hosted Egyptian President Anwar Sadat in the city.

In 1986 he resigned to head the Histadrut judicial authority, a post he held until 1995. He then advised the Minister of Religious Affairs on Muslim and Druze matters until 1996. He died at his home in Ganei Omer in 2012.