Lawזיגפריד מוזס

Siegfried Moses

Siegfried Moses was a German-Jewish jurist and Zionist leader who became Israel's first State Comptroller, serving from 1949 to 1961.

1887 to 1974Israel's first State ComptrollerLeading the German Zionist FederationCo-founding the Leo Baeck InstituteLegal groundwork for Holocaust compensation

Born: 3 May 1887, Lidzbark
Died: 14 January 1974, Tel Aviv District
Occupation: jurist, accountant

Siegfried Moses was born in 1887 in Lidzbark

Moses was born on 3 May 1887 in Lidzbark, in Prussia. He worked as a lawyer, notary and accountant, with an interest in the legal side of commerce and industry. He helped lay the scientific foundations of the auditing profession.

He was active in the Zionist Federation of Germany and chaired it from 1933 until he moved to the Land of Israel in 1937. Before the end of World War II, he began working on the legal basis for Jewish compensation after the Holocaust.

In 1947 he founded an accounting firm with Alex Weinstein. In 1949 President Chaim Weizmann appointed him State Comptroller, and he held the post until 1961. His office reviewed government finances and efficiency, and from 1950 also the Defense Ministry and the IDF.

He was a leader of the German immigrant community in Israel and a founder of the Leo Baeck Institute in Jerusalem in 1955. He died in January 1974 in Tel Aviv. A street and a retirement home in Jerusalem bear his name.