Pre State Israel
In the Israel of the nineteenth century, a few small wineries were owned by Jews. These were small household presses catering mainly to local consumption and religious needs. The raw materials were supplied by the few Arab vineyards in the surrounding hills. The vines had almost disappeared due to the law forbidding Moslem believers to drink alcohol. However, it was noted how well wild vines and olive trees adapted to the shallow soils of the hills and foothills, and the coarse sandy soils of the plains.
At the time there were moves to encourage Jews to return to agriculture so that they could become self-sufficient instead of surviving on charity and philanthropy. An Englishman, Sir Moshe Montefiore, the most prominent visitor to the Eretz Yisrael during this time, was one of the first to publicly urge the planting of vines and olive trees so that the Jews might learn to support themselves. (He drank a bottle wine every day and lived to be 100 years old – an early advertisement for the healthy properties of wine!)
The first recorded winery was opened in 1848 by a Rabbi Yitzhak Shore in Jerusalem, coinciding with the third of Montefiore's seven visits. In 1855 Montefiore made the first purchases of land to encourage agricultural settlement.
In 1870 Rabbi Avrom Teperberg founded Efrat Winery in the Old City of Jerusalem, and also the Mikveh-Israel Agricultural School was founded, southeast of Jaffa. The school, under French patronage and managed by Charles Netter from Alsace, emphasized the new importance of agriculture. Mikve-Israel Wine Cellars, on the same site, were the first to use European varieties. Many of the new wave of immigrants who "returned to Zion" towards the end of the nineteenth century, learned the rudiments of agriculture at the school, before planting vineyards in the places where they were to settle. The agricultural school still exists on the original site, near the town of Holon, but sadly the winery is no longer operational.
With the beginning of modern Jewish settlements in 1882, the urge to return to the land intensified. The new immigration wanted to escape the pogroms in Eastern Europe and to reclaim the land of their forefathers. They were idealists, unused to physical work, who went through unspeakable hardships.
In 1882 the struggling new settlers of Rishon Le Zion sought financial support from Baron Edmond de Rothschild. He not only offered support but at the end of 1882 commissioned a report to check out the agricultural possibilities in what was a barren land: too sandy on the coast and too stony on the hills. One of his expert horticulturists from Versailles at this early stage recommended vineyards as being practical.
Initially efforts were made to plant wheat and potatoes which were dietary necessities. When it was clear this would not work, the settlers turned to grapes in 1884. Rothschild, who sponsored early Jewish pioneer settlements in the Land of Israel, had high hopes that viticulture would develop as the main economic basis for the Jewish villages.
He invited specialists from abroad, and brought in grape varieties used in the south of France, grown in similar weather conditions to those locally. However, in order to bypass phylloxera, cuttings were brought to Israel from Kashmir in India. Initially the grapes were sold to other wineries like Mikve-Israel and Rothschild subsidized the growers so no losses would be made.
He then built large above-ground wineries at Rishon Le Zion in 1890 and at Zichron Ya'acov in 1892, and sent a Bordeaux winemaker to take charge. The first harvests were wasted due to the immense heat, forcing the winemaker to insert cooling spirals filled with cold water into the fermenting wine to save subsequent vintages. In the end, at enormous cost, Rothschild decided to build underground cellars at Rishon le Zion in 1894 in order to keep the wine at a steady temperature.
A glass bottle factory was built near Tantura on the coast, not far from Zichron Ya'acov. Meir Dizengoff, a chemical engineer, who later became the first mayor of Tel Aviv, managed the plant. However, it was not a success.
Rishon Le Zion, (meaning‘first to Zion‘) was the first of the new settlements in modern Israel. The town, now numbering more than 200,000 people, is a far cry from the few pitched tents in the sand which can be seen in early photographs. The winery became a living symbol of Zionism and part of the history of modern Israel; when Theodore Herzl, the founder of modern Zionism, visited Israel in 1898, he made a point of visiting Rishon during his short stay in the country. The winery buildings were where electricity and the telephone were used in Israel for the first time! The winery remains fully operational in the center of town to this day – the oldest industrial building still in use in modern Israel!
The Baron paid a high price for grapes in order to assure the settlers a decent standard of living, and subsidized them during the frequent early disasters. The worst of these was when phylloxera struck in 1890-91, and the infected vines had to be uprooted and replaced.
In 1895 the Carmel Wine Company was formed by E.Z. Lewin-Epstein, one of the founders of Rehovot, to market the wines of Rishon Le Zion and Zichron Ya'acov Wineries. The first export office was opened in Poland, followed by Austria (1897), Germany, Britain (1898) and America (1900). The company in Britain was known as "Palestine Wine Co." and the main wines were called ‘Palwin.’ This brand name is still used there for sacramental wines – the Palwin kiddush wines remain the biggest brand in the kosher market.
Herzl himself became a shareholder of the Carmel Wine Co. formed in Austria.
By 1902 the name Carmel Mizrahi was first used to denote the company marketing wines to the near east - Egypt, Turkey, Russia and within Palestine. (Mizrahi means ‘eastern’ or ‘oriental’.)
The first major award to be given to an Israeli wine was the Gold Medal presented to Carmel No.1 at the famous Paris Exhibition of 1900. Carmel shared the winner’s podium with some of Bordeaux most famous Chateaux! In those days wines were known by numbers being easy for new immigrants to identify. This custom still exists for the Palwin sacramental wines sold in England.
There followed new waves of immigrants who were to form the basis of the Labour 'practical' Zionist movement. Epitomized by David Ben-Gurion, Israel's first prime minister. They were prepared to work the land revitalizing what had been laid to waste for centuries.
In 1906 the management of the wine cellars at Rishon le Zion and Zichron Ya'acov was deeded to the farmers, who founded the "Société Cooperative Vigeronne des Grandes Caves Richon-le-Zion and Zichron Jacob Ltd.". The registration of the name in French was in recognition of the Baron's contribution.
Two workers in the vineyards and at the winery during the early years of the Carmel ‘ wine growers co-operative’ were none other than David Ben-Gurion himself, in 1907, and Levi Eshkol - another future prime minister of Israel, who managed one of Rothschild's original vineyards near Rishon le Zion in 1915.
After this, the wine business expanded and sales increased, particularly during the First World War, when German, British and Australian troops passed through the country. When the war was over though, the industry lost its principal markets: Russia, because of the Revolution; the United States because of Prohibition and Egypt and the Middle East because of Arab nationalism. Many vineyards were replaced with citrus groves, almonds and olive trees.
Baron Edmond de Rothschild
Baron Edmond de Rothschild, the founder of the modern Israel wine industry, was a co-owner of Chateau Lafite with his brothers. The leading Bordeaux Chateau had first been brought into the Rothschild family by his father James.
In Israel today the name is still honored. The winery towns of Zichron Ya'acov and Binyamina are named after the Hebrew names of James and Baron Edmond (Jacob and Benjamin respectively). One of the new wineries of the 1980’s was named “Baron” and Carmel’s premier label was known as Rothshild for many years. Even today the Baron’s picture is featured on Carmel’s Private Collection series sold in Israel.
The original Baron Edmond lived from 1845 to 1934 in France, and he was buried in Zichron Ya'acov in a beautiful park named Ramat Ha'Nadiv (‘Nadiv’ means donor or benefactor). His support for new settlements was vital and many towns which are now thriving would not have survived their early years without his immense contributions.
In the early 1980's a portrait of Baron Edmond de Rothschild was featured on the new five hundred shekel note, an honor reserved for only the most important founding fathers of the modern state. Appropriately considering his main legacy, on the reverse side of the note, was a vine and a bunch of grapes...
The State of Israel
During the Second World War, the industry began to grow again. By the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, the vineyards only covered 4,250 acres, but there were fourteen wineries in existence. Eliaz and Segal were founded in the early years of the state. New areas were planted and with successive waves of immigrants, drinking habits gradually changed. During the early years of the State, seventy-five percent of the wine consumed was sweet, but later the trend was almost totally reversed and two-thirds of the consumption was to become dry and semi-dry.
James Rothschild, son of Baron Edmond, arranged to sell the Rishon le Zion and Zichron Ya'acov Wine Cellars outright to ‘The Wine Growers Cooperative’ ( Agudat Hacormim) in 1957. Thus the involvement and interest of the Rothschild family in the Israel wine industry extended from 1882 until 1957. Also in 1957, the Israel Wine Institute was formed in cooperation with the industry and government, and was initially managed by an agronomist and enologist from France. Preference was given to planting vines in new regions, with new varieties. The main wineries at this time were ‘The Wine Growers Co-operative’, known as Carmel, Eliaz (now Binyamina), Friedman-Tnuva (precurser of Stock), Carmei Zion (Segal) and Mikveh-Israel. The main areas of vineyards were in the Shomron Region around Zichron Ya'acov, and the coastal plain, Judean lowlands, known as the Samson Region. Initially, many wines were generically named, but in 1961 Israel was a signatory of the Madrid Pact and names such as Port and Sherry disappeared from the domestic market place.
What happened between then and now was a result of a new search for quality and the emergence of the 'New World'. Advice from California was sought, there were new plantings of grapes including Cabernet Sauvignon and Sauvignon Blanc, and experiments began with varieties developed to suit the California climate, like Ruby Cabernet and Emerald Riesling. In the 1960’s Carmel sold the country’s first varietal Cabernet Sauvignon & Sauvignon Blanc.
In 1971 the first varietals were released in the export market by Carmel, and it was in 1972 that Professor Cornelius Ough from the University of California at Davis advised that the Golan Heights would be a perfect site for growing high quality grapes and the first vines were planted there in 1976 by pioneering kibbutzes and moshavs.
In 1980 the Carmel Special Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon 1976 was launched – still thought by many to be Israel’s first really international class wine. However the early 1980’s was nearly the nadir of the Israel wine industry. The three biggest wineries were Carmel, Stock/WEST and Eliaz. Carmel had serious financial difficulties and by the end of the decade Stock/WEST, then country’s 2nd biggest winery became bankrupt. However in the 1980's there followed a new dawn which was to herald the changes which were to rejuvenate the industry. There was a concentrated period of planting on the Golan and in the Upper Galilee to improve grape quality. New wineries such as the Golan Heights Winery (1983) and Baron Wine Cellars - now 'Tishbi' (1985) were built and Carmel began a program of investment to improve their existing wineries. In 1990 Barkan took over the Stock operation with new owners.
In 1987 at the I.W.S.C. in London, the Yarden Cabernet Sauvignon 1984, only the second vintage produced by the Golan Heights Winery, won not only a Gold Medal, but also the Winiarski Trophy as the best red wine in the Competition. This was followed by Yarden wines winning the prestigious "Grand Prix d'Honneur" at Vinexpo Bordeaux three times in a row, a unique achievement. Israeli wine had arrived!
Grape Varieties – Then
When the Israeli Wine Industry was first developed in the 1880's, grapes such as Alicante Bouschet, Clairette, Carignan, Grenache, Muscat and Semillon were planted. These were considered suitable by Baron Edmond de Rothschild because of the similarities of climate between the south of France and Palestine.
In 1887, Rothschild, a co-owner of Chateau Lafite, sent an expert French gardener, Gerard Arman, to Palestine. One of his previous assignments had been to plant grapes for the Maharajah of Kashmir with cuttings from French vines. Asked to do the same for Jewidh settlers, and faced with an epidemic of phylloxera in France, Arman decided to bring to Palestine cuttings from Kashmir. Thus the first French vines arrived in the Land of Israel from India!
The main indigenous vines tended to be for table grapes. Dabuki was one of these, mainly planted by Arabs, particularly in the Hebron area. It was often used to supplant a poor harvest, or for distilling alcohol. It is now not so fashionable.
By the 1960's, Carmel controlled over 90% of the vineyards in Israel (today the figure is nearer 50%). Most of the red wines were based on Carignan, and medium dry white wines were based on Semillon. Carmel Hock & Grenache Rose was the most popular table wines. Table wines were still under the shadow of the sweet, sacramental wines which were usually red and fortified. The vineyards were planted mainly in the hot coastal regions.
In the 1980’s Emerald Riesling took over as the dominant variety. Created at the University of California at Davis, the grape never took off in California. Indeed it is at its best in Israel producing an aromatic semi dry wine. Here it performed a similar job to Liebfraumilch in Britain, and Lambrusco in the United States - it introduced many to the simple enjoyment wine drinking for the first time,
Drinking Habits
An important change took place in the drinking habits of Israelis in the 1970's. Whereas, traditionally, consumption was sweet, this changed to 80% of the wines consumed being dry or semi-dry and only 20% sweet.
Annual consumption at 3-4 liters of wine per head remained very low within Israel. Reasons given for this were varied: Jews traditionally didn’t drink much alcohol and Israelis generally preferred Coca Cola or Sprite! It was said a hot country is not conducive to drinking wine and Israelis eat much spicy food and salads, neither recommended with wine. Finally for orthodox Jews, drinking in the religious context was usually moderate and the Israeli Arabs who are Muslims were forbidden to drink alcohol.
Probably one of the main reasons was also that the wines were not so good! The wines were usually sold in kiosks or dusty supermarket shelves. There was no stock control and wine just did not have the image it had elsewhere.
However, the stage was set for the quality revolution that was about to occur.
