Alex Bein Library

Alex Bein (1903-1988) was born in Steinach an der Saale on January 21, 1903. In the 1920s he studied History, first in Erlangen, then in Berlin at the Friedrich Wilhelm University. In 1927 Bein completed his doctorate under the supervision of Friedrich Meinecke with a dissertation on Alexander Hamilton's idea of the state. From 1927 on, he worked at the Reich Archives in Potsdam, but quit his job in 1933 to emigrate to Palestine.

In Palestine, Bein earned special merits for the development of the archival system there. In 1955 he succeeded Georg Herlitz as director of the Zionist Central Archives, and in 1956 David Ben Gurion appointed him the First State Archivist. He was a member of the Institute for Zionism Research at Tel Aviv University. Bein is still considered one of the leading historians of Zionism. Together with Julius H. Schoeps, Bein edited the seven-volume "Briefe und Tagebücher“ ("Letters and Diaries") of Theodor Herzl (1983-1996).

Alex Bein died in Stockholm on June 20, 1988. His estate library came to the Moses Mendelssohn Center in 1992 and includes approximately 7,000 volumes on the fields of Zionism, Palestine/Israel, German-Jewish history, and archival studies. The collection contains approximately 2,000 titles in Hebrew.

Alex Bein Library

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