Walter (Gideon) Schocken

Walter "Gideon" Schocken was born in Zwickau on 28 December 1919, the son of Lilli and Salman Schocken.

In 1924, the family moved into a villa designed by architect Hermann Muthesius in the west of Berlin-Zehlendorf at Lessingstrasse 29, which was renamed Limastrasse in 1936.

The Schocken family emigrated and reached Palestine in January 1934. Gideon meets his future wife Dvora Cohen at the grammar school in the "German" neighbourhood of Rehavia in Jerusalem. In 1936, Gideon joins the Haganah, an underground organisation that strives to overthrow the British Mandate in Palestine and achieve national independence for the Jewish people. This campaign ended in 1949 when the war of independence was won and the nascent Jewish state in Palestine became Israel.

At the same time, Gideon studied Classics at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. In 1938, he enrolled at Oxford University. When the Second World War broke out, he abandoned his studies and volunteered for the British army. He served in the Jewish Brigade and fought in North Africa and Italy. Eight years later, in 1946, he was discharged from the British Army with the rank of major.
After the end of the war, Gideon moved to New York with Dvora and his daughter Yael, where he worked in his father's publishing house. He returned to Israel with his family in 1949. He joins the newly formed Israeli army, which he leaves in 1961 with the rank of general. He continues to work in the public sector and for a bank.
Gideon and Dvora have two daughters, Yael (1943-1975) and Tamar (1947-1992), and a son Shimon (born 1954).
Gideon dies in 1981 in Kfar Shmatriahu, Israel.