Strips of 2 stamps connected by 2 gutters

"Tete-beche" is French for "Head-to-tail" because of the 180-degree printing arrangement.

For every 10 stamps that were printed, 2 of them formed a Tete-Beche pair.

Each sheet contained 12 plain-white-gutter tete-beche pairs like the set shown here.

Serialized Tete-Beche Pairs

For every 5 Tete-Beche pairs that were printed, only 1 of them had serial numbers.

Each margin of the set shown here bears a unique serial number from pane #1, except for the 65-mil specimen, which has an incomplete number (?3845).  Normally when the serial number is shifted into the perforation, the right side of it is truncated indicating that it's from pane #4 because of the rectangular slug used by the government printer.  However, this one is obviously from a misaligned government printing--a rare variety!

Square-Slug Tete-Beche Pairs

For every 15 Tete-Beche pairs that were printed, only 1 of them had the circle with a square slug.

Panes 1, 5, & 6 always had square slugs, & pane #3 always had a rectangle slug.

Some 3-mil sheets had an asterisk in pane #2, & some 20-mil & 65-mil sheets had either a square or a rectangle in pane #4.

Pane-Number Triangles

For every 30 Tete-Beche pairs that were printed, only 1 of them had a particular pane number (1-6).

3-mil (Scott #10) quarter-heart with double color-bar margins (Pane 1, circle/square, #109252)

3-mil (Scott #10) tete-beche vertical pair with plain white gutter

5-mil (Scott #11) 3x2 block of 6 stamps

20-mil (Scott #13) 7x1 strip with top color-bar margin

10-mil (Scott #12) 8x1 strip

10-mil (Scott #12) 4x2 block of 8 stamps with bottom color-bar margin

3-mil (Scott #10) tete-beche vertical pair with Pane #3 gutter

10-mil (Scott #12) tete-beche vertical pair of 4 stamps with top color-bar margin; panes 1 & 6 based on serial #115691; 2 Tel Aviv-Yafo postmarks dated "18.03.85"

10-mil (Scott #12) enlarged quarter-heart (Pane 2, circle/square, #69930)

5-mil (Scott #11) enlarged quarter-heart (Pane 5, circle/square, #54573) with top gutter

5-mil (Scott #11) strip-of-8 color-bar tabs

"Philatelic Services of the Postal Administration"

"The stamps bear the emblem of a flying scroll of the period of the Kings of Judea.  The inscription on the streamer : 'Joyous Festival'."

10 1/8" x 8 1/2" buff-colored cards with 5 blocks of 4 hinged LMLK stamps, most were postmarked commemorating the 10th Maccabi World Union Congress!

Rare specimen shown here with no postmarks!

Rare configuration with 5 Tel Aviv "Het" postmarks, 26-12-1948

Typical configuration with 6 Tel Aviv "Alef" postmarks, 31-12-1948

Rare configuration with 8 Tel Aviv "Alef" postmarks, 27-12-1948

Rare configuration for a complete set!

All 5 are from pane #6 based on stamp-orientation & the centered margin line (if they were from pane #3, the line would be much closer to the edge of the sheet)

This heart consists of 12 stamps including:

• 6 Tete-Beche pairs
• 2 Vertical Gutter pairs
• 2 Pane Number triangles
• 2 Colored control circles & square slugs
• 2 Serialized control numbers, 79504 & 100504 (note that these xx504 numbers are the current precedent for the lowest 20-mil numbers; probably the lowest 20-mil sheet was xx500 or xx501; the precedent for 5-mil sheets is currently xx493)

Each printed sheet of 300 stamps contained only 2 "hearts" making them very rare!

Strips of 2 stamps connected by 2 gutters containing a unique identification number; 4 of them have color-bar margins; 1 has a plain white perforated margin

For every 50 stamps that were printed, a unique number was stamped in the margin.

For every 300 stamps that were printed, only 8 of them formed Tete-Beche pairs with margins, & only 1 of those pairs had color bars!

The 3-mil block is from panes #1 & #6 of the supplementary printing, not panes #3 & #4 of the main printing, based on the control number & unbroken color bar (unlike the broken bar seen on the 20-mil & 65-mil blocks of this set)!

Strips of 2x3 stamps with margins & gutters representing 5 sequential pane numbers!

• 3-mil:  Pane #2, serial #65282, square slug, plain white margin
• 5-mil:  Pane #5, serial #58027, square slug, plain white margin
• 10-mil:  Pane #6, serial #90906, square slug, plain white margin
• 20-mil:  Pane #3, serial #38024, rectangle slug (non-perfed), plain white margin
• 65-mil:  Pane #4, serial #126279 (fragmented by perfs, but supplementary-printing value), rectangle slug (perfed), color-bar margin

Matching set of 3 tete-beche strips with outer margins of panes 3 & 4!

• 3-mil:  Pane #4, serial #02593, rectangle slug
• 5-mil:  Pane #4, serial #14012, rectangle slug
• 10-mil:  Pane #4, serial #08458, rectangle slug
• 20-mil:  Pane #4, serial #18345, rectangle slug
• 65-mil:  Pane #4, serial #20589 square slug (from main printing)

Matching set of 3 tete-beche strips with outer margins of panes 1 & 6!

• 3-mil:  Pane #1, serial #105440, square slug
• 5-mil:  Pane #1, serial #118928, square slug
• 10-mil:  Pane #1, serial #113586, square slug
• 20-mil:  Pane #1, serial #121947, square slug
• 65-mil:  Pane #1, serial #125744, square slug

Strips of 2 stamps connected by 1 gutter

For every 15 stamps that were printed, 2 of them formed a Vertical-Gutter pair.

Relative to Tete-Beche pairs, very few people saved Vertical-Gutter pairs, thereby making them a high-priced philatelic rarity!

Each printed sheet of 300 stamps contained only 2 "hearts" making them very rare!

Each heart consists of 12 stamps including:

• 6 Tete-Beche pairs
• 2 Vertical Gutter pairs
• 2 Pane Number triangles
• 1 Circle with square; 1 circle with rectangle
• 2 Serialized control numbers

Canceled 27-10-1948, Israel's first year of statehood!

Canceled at Kefar Ata, the northernmost LMLK excavation site--territory originally assigned by God to the tribe of Asher (Joshua 19:24-31)!

Each printed sheet of 300 stamps contained only 1 center strip making them very rare!

Center strip consists of 20 stamps including:

• 10 Tete-Beche pairs
• 2 Pane Number triangles (2 & 5)
• 1 Circle with square; 1 circle with rare asterisk
• 2 Serialized control numbers

Top specimen contains numbers 04663 & 13663

Bottom specimen contains numbers 04601 & 13601

Each printed sheet of 300 stamps contained only 2 "hearts" making them very rare!

This enlarged heart consists of 16 stamps including:

• 8 Tete-Beche pairs
• 2 Vertical Gutter pairs
• 2 Pane Number triangles
• 1 Circle with square; 1 circle with rare asterisk
• 2 Serialized control numbers (04960 & 10960)

Each printed sheet of 300 stamps contained 6 panes, rarely preserved in their entirety!

This corner consists of 50 stamps including:

• 25 Vertical pairs of stamps
• 5 Vertical pairs of tabs
• 1 Pane Number triangle
• 1 Circle with square slug
• 1 Serialized control number (10317)
• Overlapping corner color bars

Supplementary printing based on low serial number for pane #6!