The Beersheba Zoo

The story

The Beersheba zoo, which in its last years was called “Negev Zoo”, stood in Kiryat Meir Betz, south of the western entrance road to the city, and extended over about fifty dunams. It was not built as a zoo but grew into the role, and its beginning was small: in 1954 the teacher Manya Urieli set up a petting corner at the “Shorashim” school in the Neve Noy neighborhood. Over the years the corner began to serve also a public that was not of the school and to receive help from the municipality, and in 1977 Urieli, who was already retired, received a prize from the Ministry of Education for running it. In 1979 Dr. Haim Sivan replaced her in the management and she moved to raising the funds; in that same year Irene Kreitman of London donated the sum that made it possible for the petting corner to become a zoo, in premises of about one hundred and twenty square meters designed for that. In 1983 a nonprofit for fundraising was set up headed by Prof. Reuven Yagil. In 1985 the zoo moved to an area of a thousand square meters that had previously served the Hatzerim transit camp, and was dedicated in 1986 in the presence of the mayor Moshe Zilberman; at that time only two and a half posts were employed in it, and most of the work was done by volunteers. In 1991 the building of the Neve Ze'ev neighborhood began on the zoo's compound, and the Ministry of Housing and the municipality built its fourth premises — the construction took seven years and the premises were dedicated in 1996. At its peak it had about one hundred and thirty species of mammals, birds and reptiles, peacocks roamed free, and it had a petting corner, classrooms, guided tours and pony riding. Some of the animals were injured wild animals that were brought for treatment and rehabilitation, and some of them were returned to nature. At the end of 2022 the zoo was closed and the cages were demolished, ahead of a move to a new site named “Midbarium”.

• Education
• People
• Beersheba