Chaim Weizmann the date of the alleged meeting but allows that he might have met Weizmann in early 1946 instead. Chaim Weizmann Chaim Azriel Weizmann ( "", "Khaim Veytsman"; 27 November 1874 – 9 November 1952) was a Zionist leader and Israeli statesman who served as President of the Zionist Organization and later as the first President of Israel. He was elected on 16 February 1949, and served until his death in 1952. Weizmann convinced the United States government to recognize the newly formed state of Israel. Weizmann was also a biochemist who developed the acetone–butanol–ethanol fermentation process, which produces acetone through
Chaim Weizmann Switzerland to complete his studies at the University of Fribourg. In 1898, he attended the Second Zionist Congres in Basel, and that year became engaged to Sophia Getzowa. In 1899, he was awarded a PhD in organic chemistry. That same year, he joined the Organic Chemistry Department at the University of Geneva. In 1901, he was appointed assistant lecturer at the University of Geneva. Getzowa and Weizmann were together for four years before Weizmann, who had begun also dating Vera Khatzman in 1900, confessed to Getzowa he was involved with two women. He would not tell his family that he