In 1867 he was in Lviv a co-founder of the first Jewish-political association of Austria-Hungary, "Shomer Israel". As an opponent against Polish assimilation of the Jews he established for the 1873 elections of the Reichsrat a Jewish-ruthenian electoral alliance. In 1879 he separated from the "Shomer Israel" and went to Vienna for the purpose of medical studies where he – together with Peretz Smolenskin – found the Jewish-political association "Ahavath Zion" (for the reason of colonisation of the holy land).