Shalom Kalfon (né Shalom Kalfon-Poney) was born in Sefrou, Morocco in 1927. He attended the Em Habanim schools in Sefrou and Fez and thereafter the Hebrew Teachers Seminar in Casablanca. He became a Zionist youth counselor and was active in clandestine Aliya (ʿAliya Bet – see Zionism Among Sephardi/Mizraḥi Jewry). In 1947, he attempted clandestine immigration to Palestine on the ship Yehuda ha-Levi which was intercepted by the British navy and was interned in Cyprus for three months. In 1948, he joined the Israel Defense Army and was seri…