ewish emigration from Romania started during the 1880's. Between 1890-1914, some 70,000 Jews left Romania (Wallachia and Moldavia) mainly for USA, countries in South America or France. The emigration was strong also among the Jews of Transylvania and especially those of Bessarabia, who fled the persecutions and the pogroms of Czarist Russia. Many Bessarabian Jews emigrated to Argentina where they settled the agricultural farms established with the help of Baron Maurice de Hirsch, others went to the Land of Israel, the best known among them being Meir Dizengoff, a leader of the Hovevei Zion movement in Kishinev and later the first mayor of Tel Aviv.