Zoharah Levyatov

Zoharah Levyatov was born in 1927 in Tel Aviv

Zoharah Levyatov was born in Tel Aviv in 1927 to Zita and Yehuda Levyatov, who had immigrated in 1919. As a small child she moved with her parents to Kiryat Anavim, a kibbutz they helped found. The family later lived in Tel Aviv and Rehovot, and she finished high school at Tichon Hadash in Tel Aviv.

After school she joined the Palmach and served at Tel Yosef and Ein Harod. She took part in the Night of the Bridges operation at the a-Zib bridge and was wounded in the eyes. She later became a squad commander, and her fiancé Shmuel Kaufman was killed in a training accident in 1947.

She then went to the United States and studied medicine in Philadelphia and at Columbia University. When the War of Independence began she left her studies for an Air Force flight course in Bakersfield, California. She finished it in June 1948 and returned to serve as a light transport pilot and deputy squadron commander in Tel Aviv.

On 3 August 1948 her plane hit the wall of the Monastery of the Cross during takeoff in Jerusalem, and she died on the way to the hospital. She was promoted after her death and in 1950 was reburied at Mount Herzl. Her diaries were published, and her life inspired books, a play and streets named after her.