ABSTRACT
Rabbi Uziel was born in Jerusalem, where his father, Yosef Rafael Uziel, was the chairman of the tribunal (av beit din) of the Sephardic community. At the age of 20 he began to teach at Yeshiva Tiferet Yerushalayim. Later he founded the Yeshiva Machazikei Torah, which was focused on young Sephardic students. In 1911 he was appointed rabbi of the Sephardic community in Yaffo. Here he established friendly relations with Rabbi Kook, who was then the rabbi of the Ashkenazi community of Yaffo. In many ways, both rabbis maintained the same or similar positions on many issues, which also contributed to the convergence of the Ashkenazi and Sephardic communities of the time in this part of Palestine. During the First World War he was forced to flee from the Turks to Damascus, but before the arrival of the British troops he was back in Palestine. Gradually, he came to serve as chief rabbi of the city of Salonika (today's Thessaloniki in Greece) and Tel Aviv. In 1939 he was appointed the Chief Sephardic Rabbi of Palestine, and held the position until his death in 1953. During his life he held many important political and religious functions. For example, he was a member of the Vaad Leumi (the National Council of Jewish Communities in Palestine, which was active during the British Mandate) and actively participated in meetings organized by the Jewish Agency Ha-Sochnut ha-Yehudit). He also contributed to various religious periodicals, touching upon both religious and secular themes. He is also the founder of the Jerusalem yeshiva Shaar Zion.
