Herzl’s grandparents’ remains to be reinterred in Jerusalem next week

The remains of the grandparents of Theodor Herzl will be brought to Israel and reinterred next to his grave on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem, according to Hebrew media reports.

The bodies of Shimon and Rivka Herzl will be brought from Belgrade and buried in a ceremony on August 5.

The burial will be held 77 years after the date that Herzl, widely considered the father of modern Zionism, was buried in Jerusalem in 1949. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Isaac Herzog are expected to attend the ceremony.

The initiative, spearheaded by World Zionist Organization (WZO) Chairman Yaakov Hagoel along with Serbian authorities, had been postponed several times over the past four years due to the security situation, the Hebrew daily Israel Hayom reports.

Herzl’s grandparents are believed to have influenced his early attachment to Zionism. Shimon Herzl was a Jewish community leader in Belgrade and was close to Rabbi Yehuda Alkalai, an influential figure in the Zionist world at that point.

Herzl, who founded the Zionist Organization (later the WZO) in 1897, was buried in Vienna after he died of a heart ailment in 1904. In 1949, his remains were taken to Israel and reinterred on Mount Herzl, named in his honor.