maternal uncle, Aron Levitan, had helped Kotler get emigration visas to the United States, but Shach, after consulting with Yitzchok Zev Soloveitchik and Grodzinski, decided instead to go to Mandatory Palestine, where Meltzer was serving as rosh yeshiva at Etz Chaim Yeshiva in Jerusalem. Shach would later serve as the rosh yeshiva there as well. His uncle helped him and his family get immigration certificates, and took them in after they arrived at his doorstep in a destitute condition. in the Lomzha Yeshivah in Petach Tikvah, was the main Talmudic lecturer, while Rabbi Moshe Shmuel and Rabbi Shmuel Rozovsky delivered other specialized lectures in the Talmud studies. Ponevezh yeshiva Several years after the re-establishment of the Ponevezh yeshiva in Bnei Brak, Shach was invited by Yosef Shlomo Kahaneman to become one of its deans, and, after discussing the proposal with Soloveitchik, he accepted the offer. Shach served in that capacity from 1954 until his death. At this yeshiva, Shach delivered a lecture on the Talmud every Tuesday, and also occasionally gave other classes to the student body of the yeshiva. Shach received semikhah (rabbinical ordination) from Isser Zalman Meltzer, and served as chairman of Chinuch Atzmai and Va'ad HaYeshivos. In the mid-1960s, Samuel Belkin offered Shach the position of senior rosh yeshivah at Yeshiva University in New York, which he politely declined. Shach's wife died in 1969 from complications connected to diabetes. From 1970 until his death, Shach was generally recognized by Lithuanian Haredim and some other Haredi circles as the Gadol Ha-Dor (great one of the generation). During his lifetime, Shach was a spiritual mentor to more than 100,000 Orthodox Jews. Political life During the years of his leadership, more than just secularism and Zionism, Shach waged bitter wars against anybody he suspected of deviation from the classical Haredi path. At the behest of Aharon Kotler, Shach joined the Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah. When Zalman Sorotzkin died in 1966, Shach became president of the Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah, before later resigning from the Moetzes after the other leading rabbis refused to follow him. Shach wrote strongly in support of every observant citizen voting. He felt that a vote not cast for the right party or candidate was effectively a vote for the wrong party and candidate. This theme is consistent in his writings from the time that the State of Israel was established. Shas ran for the 11th Knesset in 1984,