A Train Ride Backwards: Memories of an Israeli Nuclear Scientist

While being a very personal and intimate story, this is a tale of growing up in Israel and becoming one of the team that built the (famous) Dimona nuclear research center. Some twenty years later, the author was loaned to the Israel Defense Forces. This was then followed by a six-year stint at the Nuclear Safety Division of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna, capped by being appointed as the Scientific Secretary of the International Chernobyl Project. Because of his international experience he became, upon his return to Israel, involved in the drafting of several international treaties. He subsequently became the Director of the Israel Atomic Energy Commission’s External Relations, and appointed a Member of this Commission, headed by Israel’s Prime Minister. This book was originally intended for his family, but very soon the author realized that his personal story cannot be decoupled from his professional experience, and so both share the pages. A later tragedy, when his daughter passed away, influenced the lives of himself, his wife of 56 years, the whole family, and the contents of his book. This book was originally published in Hebrew in February 2016.