David Raziel was a fighter of the Jewish underground

Zionist political violence

Zionist political violence refers to acts of violence committed by Zionists in the British Mandate of Palestine for political reasons, mainly to advance the creation of Israel, a Jewish state....

 during the British mandate, and one of the founders of the Irgun

Irgun

The Irgun , or Irgun Zevai Leumi to give it its full title , was a Zionist paramilitary group that operated in Mandate Palestine between 1931 and 1948. It was an offshoot of the earlier and larger Jewish paramilitary organization haHaganah...

.
Born in Smarhoń

Smarhoń

Smarhoń is a city in Hrodna Voblast, Belarus. It is located at . It was the site of Smarhoń air base, now mostly abandoned. Smarhoń is located 107 km from the capital, Minsk....

 (now in Hrodna Voblast

Hrodna Voblast

Hrodna Voblast or Grodno Oblast is a voblast in northwestern Belarus.The capital - Grodno is the biggest city of the province. It lies on the Neman River. Grodno's existence is attested to from 1127. Two castles dating from the 14th - 18th centuries are located here on the steep right bank of...

, Belarus

Belarus

Belarus , officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, bordered clockwise by Russia to the northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Its capital is Minsk; other major cities include Brest, Grodno , Gomel ,...

), Vilna district in the Russian Empire

Russian Empire

The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...

, he immigrated with his family at the age of three to Palestine, where his father became a Hebrew teacher at a Tel-Aviv elementary school. When the 1929 Hebron massacre

1929 Hebron massacre

The Hebron massacre refers to the killing of sixty-seven Jews on 23 and 24 August 1929 in Hebron, then part of the British Mandate of Palestine, by Arabs incited to violence by rumors that Jews were massacring Arabs in Jerusalem and seizing control of Muslim holy places...

 broke out, he joined the Haganah

Haganah

Haganah was a Jewish paramilitary organization in what was then the British Mandate of Palestine from 1920 to 1948, which later became the core of the Israel Defense Forces.- Origins :...

 in Jerusalem, where he was studying philosophy and mathematics at the Hebrew University.