Mitzpe Revivim

  • Issue: December 2000
  • Artist: Zina Roitman
  • Designer: Yizhak Granot
  • Stamp Size: 25.7 mm x 20 mm
  • Plate no.: 362
  • Sheet of 50 stamps, Tabs: 5
  • Printers: Helio Courvoiser S. A., Switzerland
  • Method of printing: Rotogravure

Mitzpe Revivim (Revivim Observatory) was established in 1943, along with Bet Eshel and Gevulot, as an agricultural experiment station in the Negev. A small group, cut off from other Jewish settlements, set out to conquer the wilderness and thus determine the fate of the Negev and its inclusion within the State of Israel. The settlers' first home was a cave - a Byzantine water hole. In the first year, they constructed the enclosure and castle. During the War of Independence, Revivim was cut off until the Egyptian invasion was halted at Bier Asluge. The siege of the Negev was not over until Operation Horev in December 1948.

After the war, the settlers moved to an adjacent hill and established the permanent location where Kibbutz Revivim now resides. In 1983, the obsevatory - its buildings, bunkers and hidden ammunition stores - was reconstructed and turned into a museum of the settlement history and period, attracting many visitors, both adult and youth.

The Council for Preservation of Buildings and Historic Sites - a public organization acting within the Nature Protection Society- was established in 1984 by the Knesset Education Committee. The Council acts to prevent destruction of sites and buildings; initiates and encourages preservation and development plans; imparts educational values stressing the importance of preserving constructed heritage in Eretz Israel as part of its cultural history and increases public awareness of the need for preservation.

The Council operates a number of sites: the Miqwe Yisrael visitors' center, the Atilt illegal immigrant camp, the Ayalon Institute at Givat Ha'kibbutzim in Rehovot, the David Ben Gurion Training Center in Seggera, the Woman Fighter site in Nizzanim and the workers camp in Sedom. It is partner to the renovation of hundreds of additional sites, approximately one hundred of them serving as visitors' centers and historical museums open to the general public.

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Buildings & Historic Sites (III) - Mitzpe Revivim