Born in 1918 in Kalish, Poland, he participated in a Zionist student organization in his town up to the beginning of the WW2. He was then recruited to the Red Army and became an officer. After the war he became a member of the underground organization of Jewish officers called “Bar Kochba” and, in 1950, joined a group of officers who tried to hijack a light airplane to get to Israel through Turkey. The group was arrested, and Chaim was sentenced to 25 years imprisonment. He served his sentence in camps at Sverdlovsk, Tagil, Karaganda, Nizhnaya Tura, Magadan. Released in 1959, as a Polish subject, he managed to get to Israel in 1960.
