"Ike" Ahronovitch, Holocaust Exodus captain, dead at 86

Israeli President Shimon Peres called Ahronovitch "one of a kind ... a combination of pioneering, courage and love of his people
 
Yitzhak "Ike" Ahronovitch, the captain of the Exodus ship, whose attempt to take Holocaust survivors to Palestine built support for Israel's founding, has died at the age of 86.
 
The Exodus 1947 ship left France in July 1947 carrying more than 4,500 people -most of them Holocaust survivors and other displaced Jews - in a secret effort to reach Palestine. At the time, Britain controlled Palestine and was limiting the immigration of Jews.
 
The British navy seized the vessel off Palestine's shores, and after a battle on board that left three people dead, turned the ship and its passengers back to Europe, where the refugees were forced to disembark in Germany.
 
The ship's ordeal was widely reported worldwide, garnering sympathy for the refugees, especially because they were taken to Germany, where the Nazi murder of 6 million Jews during World War II originated.
 
Ahronovitch was born in Poland in 1923 and moved to pre-state Israel 10 years later. In a statement issued last Wednesday, Israeli President Shimon Peres called Ahronovitch "one of a kind ... a combination of pioneering, courage and love of his people."