Rishon Lezion trip planner

Rishon LeZion is the fourth-largest city in Israel, located along the central Israeli coastal plain 8km south of Tel Aviv. It is part of the Gush Dan metropolitan area.Founded in 1882 by Jewish immigrants from the Russian Empire, it was the second Jewish farm settlement established in The land of Israel in the 19th century, after Petah Tikva. In it had a population of.EtymologyThe name Rishon LeZion is derived from a biblical verse: "First to Zion are they, and I shall give herald to Jerusalem" (Isaiah 41:27) and literally translates as "First to Zion".HistoryRishon LeZion was founded on July 31, 1882, by ten Hovevei Zion pioneers from Kharkiv, Ukraine (then the Russian Empire) headed by Zalman David Levontin. Reuven Yudalevich was also a member of the group. The pioneers purchased 835acres of land southeast of present-day Tel Aviv, part of the townland of the Arab village of Ayun Kara (literally 'fountain of the crier'). Ayun Kara was the scene of a bloody battle between Turkish and New Zealand troops on November 14, 1917. Local citizens carried the wounded to a hospital in Rishon. A stone cenotaph was erected by the people of Rishon LeZion to the memory of the New Zealanders who fell that day, but it has since been destroyed.