The Triumph of Military Zionism: Nationalism and the Origins of the Israeli Right by Colin Shindler

Author:Colin Shindler [Shindler, Colin]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, azw3, epub
Tags: Israel & Palestine, Political Ideologies, Nationalism & Patriotism, Middle East, Political Science, History
ISBN: 9781845110307
Publisher: I.B. Tauris
Published: 2005-11-25T00:00:00+00:00

Liberalism is good for other peoples who live in peace on their land…but for enslaved and oppressed peoples like us, there is another law of liberation. Our ideal and example is Aharon and Sarah Aharonson. The youth are going to a place where sacrifices will be demanded – to prison and to the gallows…we have lost two generations of the Jewish people to Zionism. We do not want to lose the third generation, and therefore we want the methods of Zionism to be those of a liberation movement which follows revolutionary paths. Zionism will be realized not by gentlemen but by sans-culottes, the ‘barefooted’ who are ready for any sacrifice.23

Several new journals were established to express the new activism. Ha’am, a daily which listed Jabotinsky as its editor-in-chief, had Yeivin as its responsible editor. This lasted only a few months during 1931 but attracted writers such as Achimeir, Uri Zvi Greenberg, Avigdor Hameiri, Yonatan Ratosh and Ben-Zion Netanyahu as contributors. At the beginning of 1932, Hazit Ha’am was launched as a weekly organ of the Revisionist movement and Betar in Palestine.

It soon became the stronghold of the Maximalists. Significantly Jabotinsky was not listed as its editor-in-chief this time, yet his articles appeared in most issues.

168

THE TRIUMPH OF MILITARY ZIONISM

He supported Hazit Ha’am over Doar Hayom which was no longer part of the Revisionist movement.24 His style became overtly populist in an attempt to maintain a foothold in the Maximalist camp. In an early edition, he warned that its contributors should utilize moderate language and a non-antagonistic style.

‘Criticism that appears in a velvet glove has double benefit.’ Moreover, Jabotinsky argued that the British administration had lost its moral justification to rule the Land of Israel – and that the confrontation was first and foremost with them:

Don’t allow the Jewish public to settle for a confrontation against the Sanbalatim (Jewish governors of Samaria during the Persian Empire). There is a danger that they will be satisfied with that since it is easier to attack Bentwich and Mr Magnes than an external opponent.25

This, of course, was an open criticism of Achimeir and the demonstration.

Hazit Ha’am also followed a clear anti-Communist line – especially in the midst of the bitter confrontation with the Labour movement. Thus Von Weisl could predict that the world was on the eve of a new war in 1932, but between Britain and Russia. Jewish youth – and especially Betar – should therefore be trained and mobilized to fight alongside Britain, ‘but only on receipt of secure and clear pledges, not cloudy empty promises’.26 Jabotinsky too followed this approach towards Britain – in such articles as ‘According to the Marxist Worldview’.27

Jabotinsky’s attention at this time was given to a plan for an international petition to the British Parliament to be signed by Diaspora Jews. Achimeir, bound by his distaste for diplomacy and England, suggested that breaking the windows of ‘a well-known embassy in Warsaw’ would be far more valuable than a petition.28 He further declared that the Maximalists would oppose the petition.

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