page_title: Moshe Wallach
section_title: Final years and legacy
hierarchical_section_title: Moshe Wallach / Final years and legacy
caption_attribution_description: English: Graduation ceremony of the professional nursing class at Shaare Zedek Hospital. Standing: Dr. Moshe Wallach, hospital founder. Seated to Dr. Wallach's left is Dr. Schlesinger, his successor as hospital director. Photo taken in Jerusalem, circa 1954 עברית: טקס סיום אחיות מוסמכות של בית החולים שערי צדק עומד דר' וואלאך מייסד בית החולים לידו יושב דר' שלזניגר מנהלו השני של בית החולים, Original Image Name:בית החולים שערי צדק, Location:ירושלים
context_page_description: Moshe Wallach was a German Jewish physician and pioneering medical practitioner in Jerusalem. He was the founder of Shaarei Zedek Hospital on Jaffa Road, which he directed for 45 years. He introduced modern medicine to the impoverished and disease-plagued citizenry, accepting patients of all religions and offering free medical care to indigents. He was so closely identified with the hospital that it became known as "Wallach's Hospital". A strictly Torah-observant Jew, he was also an activist in the Agudath Israel Orthodox Jewish movement. He was buried in the small cemetery adjacent to the hospital.
context_section_description: Wallach retired at the age of 80. He was succeeded as director of Shaare Zedek by Dr. Falk Schlesinger, another German-Jewish physician.
  Wallach was feted on several occasions, beginning with a seventy-fifth birthday celebration at a hotel, which was attended by British Mandate health officials. Before his eightieth birthday, a Torah scroll was commissioned in his honor. Upon its completion three years later, Wallach donated it to the hospital synagogue. Two banquets were held in honor of his eighty-fifth birthday – one in the hospital, attended by the Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Israel, Ben-Zion Meir Hai Uziel, the Minister of Health, representatives of the Doctors Union, and representatives of the Old and New Yishuvs; and the second in the office of the Jerusalem mayor, Shlomo Zalman Shragai, who bestowed a commendation on Dr. Wallach for his years of public service. In honor of his ninetieth birthday, Wallach was awarded an honorary degree from the medical faculty of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The city of Jerusalem also named him a Yakir Yerushalayim (Worthy of Jerusalem); however, Wallach died the day before the presentation ceremony took place.
  Wallach died on April 8, 1957 at the age of 90. He was buried in the small cemetery adjacent to the hospital, on land he had given to the burial society of the Perushim and Ashkenazim of Jerusalem to use as a temporary burial ground during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. After the war, most of the 200 graves in this cemetery were relocated to permanent cemeteries, but a handful of graves remained, including that of Rabbi Yosef Tzvi Dushinsky, the first Dushinsky Rebbe, who died in Shaare Zedek Hospital in 1948. Per his request, Wallach was buried beside the Dushinsky Rebbe, whom he considered his mentor.
  According to Schwester Selma, over half of Jerusalem attended Wallach's funeral. He was eulogized by Who's Who in Israel as the Israeli medical profession's "spiritual leader for two generations". The Jerusalem municipality named the small street west of Shaare Zedek Hospital "Moshe Wallach Street" in his honor.
  Prime Minister of Israel Yitzhak Rabin paid tribute to Wallach in a 1995 address in the United States Capitol rotunda inaugurating the Jerusalem 3000 celebrations. In a speech titled "My Jerusalem", Rabin began:
  "Jerusalem has a thousand faces – and each one of us has his own Jerusalem. My Jerusalem is Dr. Moshe Wallach of Germany, the doctor of the sick of Israel and Jerusalem, who built Sha'arei Zedek hospital and had his home in its courtyard so as to be close to his patients day and night. I was born in his hospital. I am a Jerusalemite".
caption: Dr. Wallach (standing) at a graduation ceremony for Shaare Zedek's professional nursing class, circa 1954. Seated to his left is Dr. Falk Schlesinger, his successor as hospital director.
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