Israel Polack

Israel Polack (Hebrew: ישראל פולק‎; 1909–1993) was an Austro-Hungarian-born Romanian, Chilean and Israeli textile industrialist. He is best known for creating and managing the Israel-based Polgat company.

Polack was born to a Jewish family in Borşa, Transylvania, and, in 1925, moved to Gura Humorului, Bukovina, and later to Cernăuţi. While in Cernăuţi, he studied at yeshiva and at a textile plant. In 1935, he founded an enterprise of its kind in the city.

After World War II, he emigrated to Chile where he founded a textile plant. In 1960, Pinhas Sapir, then Minister of Industry of Israel, invited Polack to establish a textile plant at Kiryat Gat. Polack's new company, Polgat, grew into the largest textile, clothing and knitwear company in Israel. It eventually became a public corporation whose shares were traded on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange.