Haaretz and the National Library of Israel have signed an agreement to digitize and open digital access to issues of the newspaper since its founding in 1919. Haaretz will now be part of the JPress – Historic Jewish Press (jpress.org.il) website, home to millions of pages from over 300 Israeli and Jewish newspaper titles published in dozens of countries and in 16 languages since the end of the 18th century. JPress is a collaborative initiative of the National Library of Israel and Tel Aviv University.
At the signing, National Library of Israel Chairman David Blumberg noted that Shlomo Zalman Schocken, who bought Haaretz in 1935, donated a number of significant books and collections to the National Library following his family’s arrival in Mandatory Palestine from Germany.
Current Haaretz publisher Amos Schocken stated that in the digital age it is important that Haaretz be available to researchers and scholars, as well as anyone in the general public interested in Israeli press.
National Library of Israel Director Oren Weinberg said that the Library has already begun to digitize the first two decades of the newspaper – from its founding in 1919 through the beginning of the 1940s. He added, “Within a few weeks, visitors to the National Library website will be able to read issues of Israel’s oldest newspaper, enabling them to become familiar with this important reflection of Israeli history and significant piece of the history of the press in Israel.”
Prof. Yaron Tsur of Tel Aviv University, the National Library’s partner for the JPress collection, said, “Haaretz is exceptional in a number ways, giving it pride of place in the landscape and history of the Israeli press. The newspaper’s unique spirit didn’t only attract brilliant journalists, but also writers and poets, artists and intellectuals.”
The JPress initiative was founded by the National Library of Israel and Tel Aviv University in order to present a peerless resource for understanding Jewish history and culture across the world throughout the modern period, as well as for Israeli society in all of its diversity. All of the items in the digital collection are fully searchable. Over the past number of years the National Library of Israel has also been striving to open digital access to the majority of Hebrew newspapers and periodicals alongside Israeli press in Arabic, as well as newspapers serving Israel’s different religious, political and geographic communities.
The JPress collection reflects a dynamic picture of Israeli and Jewish life including, society and state, literature and art, architecture and design, economic, medicine and technology, and more.
We will soon begin uploading Haaretz issues from the period mentioned above. In the meantime, you are welcome to take a look at these sample issues:
The Historical Jewish Press website
