Success at Sea

Most of the Jewish refugees who went from Europe to Palestine after World War II were carried by a poorly equipped and hastily organized shipping fleet whose craft were bought, begged or borrowed wherever they could be.

Founded by two Zionist groups, the tiny line -- named ZIM from a contraction of two Hebrew words meaning merchant marine--ran the British blockade with such doughty ships as the Exodus, the inspiration of the novel by Leon Uris. Today ZIM sails on as a firm worth an estimated $140 million; its six passenger ships and 34 freighters carry 41% of all Israel's imports and 26% of its exports. This year ZIM plans to add another 19 cargo ships, which will make it one of the world's dozen largest lines, comparing respectably with Cunard (whose gross tonnage is actually smaller than ZIM's) and U.S. Lines.

Last week, nearly 20 years after its founding as a refugee runner, ZIM added to its fleet a handsome new flagship. From St. Nazaire's Chantiers de 1'Atlantique, famed builder of the Normandie and France, it took delivery of the Shalom (Peace), a $20 million, 24,500-ton luxury liner that will make her maiden voyage to New York next month.

Though partially state-controlled, ZIM is run with the profit-consciousness of a private enterprise by its general manager, Naftali Wydra, a lawyer who fled Berlin in the '30s, managed to get to Palestine, and helped the Zionists set up kibbutzim right under British noses. On its 1963 revenues of $67 million, the line earned a modest $1,000,000. In directing a worldwide enterprise that employs 3,800 Israelis, Wydra, who has headed ZIM since its founding, faces some unique problems. Because ZIM cannot use the Arab-owned Suez Canal, it must divide its fleet between Israel's Mediterranean and Red Sea ports, thus cannot always have its ships where it needs them most. Wydra's plan to serve nonkosher as well as kosher food aboard the Shalom to broaden the ship's appeal brought on protests from Israel's vociferous orthodox party that forced him to back down. ZIM also faces a severe shortage of skilled seamen; it is so bad, in fact, that Wydra must allow ships' officers and some crew members to take their families to sea with them.

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