Michael Dekel

Michael Dekel was born in 1920 in Pinsk

Dekel was born Michael Diksel in Pinsk, then part of Poland, in 1920. As a child he studied in the Tarbut school network. After Pinsk was annexed by the Soviet Union, he and his family were exiled to Siberia.

During World War II he served in the Red Army and was badly wounded by a mine. After the war he led a Betar group in a displaced persons camp in Austria and was among the Irgun leaders there. In 1947 he took part in an Irgun attempt to take over the Gnadenwald camp, during which Haganah member Eitan Avidov was killed; another Irgun man was convicted of the killing.

He immigrated to Israel in 1949 and joined moshav Nordia in 1950, where he managed the farm for many years. He later studied political science and sociology at Tel Aviv University and completed a bachelor's degree in 1971.

He joined the directorate and central committee of Herut in 1966 and was elected to the Knesset for Likud in 1977. He served as Deputy Minister of Agriculture from 1981 and as Deputy Minister of Defense from 1985 to 1988. He supported Jewish settlement in Judea and Samaria and in the Galilee.

He lost his seat in the 1988 elections. He died in 1994.