Jock Isacowitz
Jock Isacowitz | |
|---|---|
| Born | Joseph Louis Isacowitz 7 February 1915 |
| Died | 30 January 1962 (aged 46) |
| Resting place | Westpark Cemetery |
| Citizenship | South Africa |
| Alma mater | University of the Witwatersrand |
| Occupation(s) | Pharmacist, politician |
| Spouse | Eileen Lurie |
| Children | 3 |
| Part of a series on |
| Apartheid |
|---|
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Joseph "Jock" Louis Isacowitz (7 February 1915 – 18 June 1974) was a South African Liberal Party politician, anti-apartheid activist and co-founder of the Springbok Legion.[1][2]
Early life
[edit]Isacowitz was born in Benoni in the province of Transvaal in 1915 to Jewish parents, Sarah Leah Bear and Israel Isacowitz.[3][1] His father, Israel died at the age of 34-35 in 1921 when Jock was six-years-old. He attended Benoni High School and later the University of the Witwatersrand, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Pharmacy (Hons).[3] He was of Lithuanian Jewish descent.[1]
At university he befriended Jewish students Rusty Bernstein and Kurt Jonas. He was influenced by Jonas, who introduced him to Marxism.[4][5][6]For a time he was a member of the South African Communist Party and identified as an atheist.[7][5] He resigned from the party in February 1946, writing that its totalitarian character "offended my conscience."[2]
He fought in the Second World War with South African forces in East and North Africa, where he was a sergeant-major and was wounded in action.[3][1] The horrors of the Holocaust led to his rejection of anti-Zionism and joined a socialist Zionist organisation.[5][1] He joined the South African Jewish Board of Deputies, serving as a delegate on the national executive and went on missions to visit Holocaust survivors in Displaced persons camps in post–World War II Europe and absorption centres in Israel.[1]
Political career
[edit]Prior to the formation of the Liberal Party, he co-led with advocate Jack Unterhalter, one of three separate liberal groups in Johannesburg.[7] Their formation sought to establish relations with the African National Congress and the South African Indian Congress.[7]
He was a founding member of the Liberal Party, attending their inaugural meeting in Cape Town in 1953.[4] He achieved his earlier aim by setting up meetings between the party and the ANC.[7] However, he expressed his frustration: "I was not happy with the attitude of many members of the National Committee towards the ANC... I recognise the difficulties arising from difficult personality differences with the ANC but I am afraid that some of our members can't divide this from a proper appreciation of the historic role of the ANC. I do not feel justified in opening discussions again and carrying them on further, until we have clarified our own basic attitude towards the ANC."[7]
He built up the party's support base in the Transvaal and served in several positions as Transvaal Chairman and National Vice-Chairman. He was also a key organised for the party and chaired its conferences.[8]
He was regarded as a threat by the apartheid government and banned from attending all meetings for two years. In the wake of the Sharpeville massacre in 1960, a State of Emergency was declared and he was jailed for 3 months.[1][2]
Personal life
[edit]He married Eileen Lurie and they had three children together. His son, Roy, later made aliyah to Israel, where he became a newspaper journalist.[9]
Death
[edit]He died of Leukemia on 30 January 1962, 18 months after his prison release.[1][2] He was survived by his wife and children, as well as his mother, Sarah. Sarah died in Netanya in Israel in 1982 and Eileen died in 2010 in Johannesburg.
References
[edit]- ^ a b c d e f g h Feinberg, Tali (7 December 2020). Unsung hero who fought fascism, racism revealed in son’s book The South African Jewish Report. Retrieved on 4 February 2025
- ^ a b c d Isacowitz, Roy (7 February 2012). Jock Isacowitz remembered Politicsweb. Retrieved on 4 February 2025
- ^ a b c (22 February 1962). Jock Isacowitz - Completely Dedicated in the Struggle for Democracy Contact. Retrieved on 4 February 2025
- ^ a b Bernstein, Rusty (2017). Memory Against Forgetting Memoir of a Time in South African Politics 1938 - 1964. Johannesburg: Wits University Press. p. 103. ISBN 9781776141562.
- ^ a b c Shimoni, Gideon (2003). Community and Conscience: The Jews in Apartheid South Africa. New England: University Press of New England for Brandeis University Press.
- ^ Murray, Bruce (2022). WITS: The 'Open' Years: A History of the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg 1939-1959. Johannesburg: Wits University Press. p. 103. ISBN 9781776148127.
- ^ a b c d e Everatt, David (2009). The Origins of Non-Racialism: White Opposition to Apartheid in the 1950s. Johannesburg: Wits University Press. ISBN 9781868147991.
- ^ Brown, Peter (March 1962). Jock Isacowitz Liberal Opinion. Retrieved on 4 February 2025
- ^ Derfner, Larry (14 November 2020). An Israeli Search for a South African Icon: A Son’s Biography of His Father Haaretz. Retrieved on 4 February 2025
- Jewish South African anti-apartheid activists
- South African anti-apartheid activists
- 1915 births
- 1962 deaths
- South African Jews
- South African Zionists
- South African people of Lithuanian-Jewish descent
- South African prisoners and detainees
- Liberal Party of South Africa politicians
- University of the Witwatersrand alumni
- South African military personnel of World War II
- Deaths from leukemia in South Africa
- Burials at Westpark Cemetery
- People from Benoni, South Africa