Israel Stamp Reviews

בול 75 שנה לשחרור מחנות הריכוז: התקומה Concentration Camps' Liberation, 75 Years: Resurrection The "Concentration Camps Liberation, 75 Years: Resurrection" stamp was issued by Israel Post on 21 April 2020. Face valued at ₪8.30, corresponding to the postage rate for an unregistered international 0-100g letter, "Resurrection" features the title page of a report published in September 1945 for the First Congress of the Central Committee of Liberated Jews in Bergen-Belsen. The tab below the stamp shows a group of Jewish children being led out of Florence's Great Synagogue by a Jewish Brigade soldier and several Jewish Agency nurses in September 1944. Blue, gray and orange are the stamp's prominent colors. It was designed by Miri Nistor and Tuvia Kurtz , who have been stamp designers with Israel Post since 2001 and 1998, respectively. Bergen-Belsen in Germany ( Google Maps ) Bergen-Belsen originally served as a Wehrmacht-administered POW camp, f...

CMYK Color Printing | צבעי היסוד בדפוס The "CMYK Color Printing / Chlorurus" stamp was issued by Israel Post on 4 February 2020. Face valued at ₪16, the stamp features a multicolored chlorurus parrotfish swimming in a sea among corals and numerous smaller fish. As indicated in the stamp's release notes , "CMYK" is an acronym for cyan (blue), magenta (pink), yellow, and key (black) -- the four basic colors of printing. The upper area of the stamp depicts the CMYK color palette, and the tab below the stamp proper deconstructs a segment of the coral reef into its constituent colors. The stamp was designed by Tuvia Kurtz and Miri Nistor , both veteran designers with Israel Post: Kurtz has been designing Israeli stamps since 1998, and Nistor since 2001. It would be misleading to review the stamp shown above in isolation from the minisheet of which it is a part. Technically a 4×1 minisheet, since the top three rows consist of perforated labels and not actual ...

33rd Conference of Israeli Philatelists | כנס יום הבולאות The 33rd Conference of Israeli Philatelists was held on 25 December 2019 at the Sheraton Hotel in Tel Aviv. Organized by the Israel Philatelic Federation , the event featured seven speakers and numerous award ceremonies and included a raffle and an auction. Each event attendee was given a limited-edition souvenir leaf with a uniquely CTOed 2019 Weizmann Institute stamp prepared exclusively for the event. A light breakfast buffet was laid out as guests made their way to the conference area, mingled and rushed to save seats in the conference hall. Eli Weber | אלי ובר First to address the audience was Eli Weber, president of the Israel Philatelic Federation. The theme of his talk was the future -- the future of philatelic exhibitions, of philatelic research, of authentication methods, of device technologies, and of commerce. As a potential model for the future, Weber cited an exhibition two years ago in Finland at wh...

Monsters | מפלצות There are two kinds of stamp collectors in the world: passion collectors and investment collectors. Passion collectors engage in stamp collecting because it brings them joy; investment collectors do so in the hope it will bring them profit. Where I stand is squarely in the first category. I collect stamps that appeal to me on an esthetic and intellectual level, with virtually zero interest in what demand there might be for them on the market down the road. "Monsters," a six-stamp minisheet issued on November 26th, 2019, is somewhat of an exception to my rule. On the one hand, it's hard to fault it for lacking esthetic appeal -- it is eye-catchingly colorful, it explores a visual realm that is rarely featured on stamps, and its abundance of detail is guaranteed to keep the optic nerves working overtime. On the other hand, "Monsters" fails to move the needle much intellectually, as it is clearly catering to a junior audience. Why, then, ...

Earlier this week I paid my first visit to the offices of the Israel Philatelic Federation in Tel Aviv. My main reason for visiting was to become a member of the Federation, since doing so unlocks a range of benefits that collectors otherwise don't have full access to, such as a quarterly magazine, a library, and reduced admission fees to events. This won't be an in-depth report on the Federation, its staff or its activities -- that I'll save for a later date -- but a few brief impressions accompanied by photos to convey a sense of what my visit was like. The Israel Philatelic Federation is located in an office building at the corner of Tel Aviv's Allenby and Pinsker Streets, just a couple blocks east of the beach. The building exterior is run-down and makes for a poor first impression -- an AM:PM supermarket occupies most of the ground floor -- but it is typical of the area and belies the more cheerful surroundings that await once inside the building and after clim...