Yehiel Dresner

Yehiel Dov Dresner (; October 13, 1922 – April 16, 1947) was an Irgun member in pre-state Mandatory Palestine and one of 12 Olei Hagardom.

Early life Dresner was born in Lwow, Poland (modern Lviv, Ukraine) to a Jewish family, one of four sons; his mother was from a distinguished rabbinical family. In his youth, he participated in Zionist activities, and when he was 11, his family moved to Palestine and settled in Jerusalem, where he joined the Betar youth movement. Dresner was 15 when Shlomo Ben-Yosef was hanged: the incident had a powerful effect and instilled in him an urge for vengeance against the British.

Due to his family's difficult financial situation, Dresner dropped out of high school and began working. After learning that the police planned to arrest him too, Dresner left his home and job and adopted the false identity of Dov Rosenbaum.

Dresner went on to serve as a senior Irgun commander in Ramat Gan and Petah Tikva. He personally participated in a February 1946 raid against the RAF airbase at Lydda in which several British military aircraft were destroyed, and an April 1946 arms raid against a Ramat Gan police station which saw a large amount of arms and munitions seized. During that raid, an Arab constable and two Irgun fighters were killed, and one, Dov Gruner, who was later hanged alongside Dresner, was wounded and captured. Dresner was also involved in railway sabotage operations, planting mines on railway tracks to derail trains.

On December 29, 1946, Dresner participated in the Night of the Beatings, an Irgun operation in which British soldiers were abducted and whipped in retaliation of the whipping of an imprisoned Irgun member. The car he and his teammates were traveling in ran into a British roadblock. In the ensuing exchange of fire, one Irgun man, Avraham Mizrahi, was killed and the remaining four taken prisoner.

Captivity, trial, and execution Following their captivity, Dresner and his surviving teammates were initially imprisoned together in a paratrooper's camp, where, according to a report Dresner later smuggled out of prison through scraps of paper to Irgun commander Menachem Begin, they were repeatedly subjected to severe beatings and humiliations by their captors.

On April 14, the four men were transferred to Acre Prison and placed in the condemned cells.

In the early morning hours of April 16, all four were hanged in Acre Prison. Each man sang Hatikvah on his way to the gallows, and was joined by the other Jewish prisoners. The executions were carried out in great secrecy, and without the presence of a rabbi.

Aftermath The bodies of Dresner, Alkahi, Kashani, and Gruner were taken to Safed in a British armored convoy and buried them there. The British authorities had refused a request by them to be buried in Rosh Pinna, near Shlomo Ben-Yosef's grave, and for months, guarded the graves to prevent the Irgun from stealing the bodies to carry out their final wish. Neither the chevra kadisha or the families had been informed of the burials. Despite a curfew being imposed, hundreds of Jews defied the authorities and marched to the cemetery. The executions earned the British worldwide scorn.

Dresner had maintained his Dov Rosenbaum persona from the time he first assumed that identity, and was thus buried under that pseudonym. His true identity would not become known until after the British departed Palestine and the state of Israel was established.

Yehiel Dresner is considered a national hero in Israel today, and streets have been named for him.