David, son of Pinchas and Rachel, was born in Jerusalem in 1930. His great-great grandfather made aliyah with his wife and seven children in 5617 and settled in Jerusalem. When he was a baby, his parents had to leave Jerusalem to find work. They moved to Petah Tikva, as his mother’s parents were among the founders of the city. At age three, he lost his father, and his grandfather, a manual laborer, adopted them into his eleven-member family.

When he studied in Yeshivat HaYishuv HeHadash in Tel Aviv, he joined Brit Hashmona’im, a National Religious movement. They would practice maneuvers and listen to lectures in Zionism. In summer 5705 (1945), at age fourteen, he joined Lehi. He faced the admissions board in a dark public bomb shelter, without an oath, without a Bible or a flag or a pistol (as was the IZL custom), and he accepted upon himself to fight to expel the foreign occupier and establish a Jewish state.

Mainly, he put up posters. In order to meet his companions at three in the morning, he would sleep in a public park under the starts. Afterwards, he would go to class, as if he had slept all night in his house.

Due to the financial situation and his underground membership, he had to drop out and returned to Petah Tikva, where he supervised putting up posters and recruited other youths to the movement. When marital law and a curfew were imposed, and no transportation was available, they would walk to Tel Aviv and back, avoiding military checkpoints. Every poster they got they would put up in major thoroughfares. He was trained in firearms in Raanana and field maneuvers in Zikhron Yaakov.

At seventeen-and-a-half, he enlisted in the IDF. After his release, he became a teacher. He pursued his studies, earning a master’s degree at Jerusalem’s Hebrew University and at Bar-Ilan University. He wrote a book called The Hebrew Calendar, which talks about the Jewish calendar and how it relates to the seasons and nature.

In 1953 he married Tamar Zafran. She gave birth to Rachel, Nurit, Pinchas and Shlomo. The latter two are officers in the reserves of the Paratroopers Brigade.