Barzilai Medical Center Ashkelon Traditional Cache

The hospital opened in July 1961, and was initially named Ashkelon Hospital. Construction was financed by the Ministry of Health with the assistance of the South African Zionist Federation, the Ashkelon municipality and Mifal HaPayis. The building was designed by the architect David Anatol Brutzkus, covering an area of 8,000m². In 1971, it was renamed after Minister of Health Yisrael Barzilai, who had laid the cornerstone of the building in the early 1960s, and who had died the previous year.