Ben-Gurion’s stolen glasses returned to Sde Boker museum
Police say spectacles found near military barracks hours after soldier snatched them during tour of first premier’s desert abode; pilferer interrogated, put on remand
Glasses belonging to David Ben-Gurion were returned on Sunday to the founding prime minister’s hut-turned-commemorative museum in the southern kibbutz of Sde Boker, after a soldier stole them during a tour of the site, police said.
The spectacles, which hold “historical and national significance,” were found near a military barracks in southern Israel, where the soldier who filched them had apparently tucked them away, police said in a statement.
The soldier was put on remand after police investigated him, according to the statement.
Gil Schneider, the museum’s manager, told Kan public radio that a staff member had alerted her Sunday morning that the glasses were missing.
“First we had to check, maybe someone took them for treatment, because the items here are treated individually,” said Schneider of the museum’s copious collection, which includes Ben-Gurion’s 5,000-book library.
Perusing hours of security camera footage, Schneider said, she discovered that a person in uniform — apparently a soldier — had seized a moment when his tour guide was not looking to cross the ropes cordoning off the exhibit and slip the glasses into his pocket.
Soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces are often made to participate in “Culture Sunday” trips, during which they are taken to national landmarks before returning to their bases after weekends at home.
It was unclear whether Ben-Gurion’s glasses were pilfered during such a tour.
The museum lodged an online complaint to the police, which the Dimona police station responded to within less than an hour, Schneider said. Later that evening, police informed her that the glasses had been located, and would be returned the following day.
Ben-Gurion, who as head of the Jewish Agency assumed the office of prime minister after proclaiming the founding of Israel in 1948, moved with his wife Paula to the Negev Desert’s Kibbuz Sde Boker after resigning the premiership five years later (he returned in 1955 for another eight-year stint).
In moving south, the founding father famously called on Israel to “make the desert bloom” and tap into the unrealized potential of the Negev, which made up about two-thirds of the new state’s territory.
Upon his death in 1973, Ben-Gurion’s hut was turned into a museum in his memory. Sde Boker also houses the Jacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research, which develop methods for food production in arid areas, and are affiliated with the Beersheba university that carries Ben-Gurion’s name.
