From Binational Society to Jewish State: Federal Concepts in Zionist Political Thought, 1920-1990, and the Jewish People (Jewish Identities in a Changing World, V. 7)

From Binational Society to Jewish State

Jewish Identities in a Changing World General Editors

Eliezer Ben-Rafael and Yosef Gorny

VOLUME 7

From Binational Society to Jewish State Federal Concepts in Zionist Political Thought, 1920–1990, and the Jewish People

by

Yosef Gorny

BRILL LEIDEN • BOSTON 2006

This series brings together contributions to the question of the unity versus conflict entrenched in the infinite variety of collective identities illustrated by Jews in this era. The books of this series investigate the principles, narratives, visions and commands which constitute in different places the essentials of Jewishness. They ask whether or not one is still allowed to speak, at the beginning of this new century, of one—single and singular—Jewish People. These investigations should yield an understanding of how far Judaism is still one while Jewishness is multifarious. The perspectives offered may draw from sociology and the social sciences as well as from history and the humanities, in general. This book is printed on acid-free paper. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Apocalyptic representations of Jerusalem / by Maria Leppäkari. p. cm. — (Numen book series. Studies in the history of religions, ISSN 01698834; v. 111) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 90-04-14915-5 (alk. paper) 1. Apocalyptic literature—History and criticism. 2. Jerusalem in Judaism. 3. Jerusalem in Christianity. 4. Apocalyptic literature—History and criticism— Theory, etc. BS646.L47 2006 203/.509569442 22

ISSN 1570-7997 ISBN-10 90 04 15529 5 ISBN-13 978 90 04 15529 9 © Copyright 2006 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Hotei Publishers, IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, and VSP. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Brill provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. printed in the netherlands

To my grandchildren

CONTENTS

Preface to the English Edition ..................................................

ix

Introduction ................................................................................

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Chapter One The Federative Parliamentary Model ............

17

Chapter Two The Federative Autonomy Model ..................

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Chapter Three The Composite Federative Model ................

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Chapter Four The Binational Federative Model .................. 109 Chapter Five The New Federalism: Arie Eliav and Shimon Peres .......................................................................... 142 Epilogue ...................................................................................... 171 Selected Bibliography ................................................................ 183 Index ............................................................................................ 185

PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH EDITION

This book, in its original Hebrew edition, was titled Policy and Imagination: Federal Ideas in Zionist Political Thought. Several years after it appeared, Prof. Eliezer Ben-Rafael and I sponsored an advanced seminar for students of history and sociology under the heading “Klal Yisrael”—a term that denotes the Jewish people at large—for the discussion of changes in the identity of the Jewish collective in the past hundred years. As we and the students debated various aspects of the topic, I reached the conclusion that federative thinking in Zionism has a Klal Yisrael significance that transcends political arrangements in the Middle East. In other words, Zionist federal political proposals were, and remain, important for Jewry, which in greater part resides outside Israel and the Middle East—as I attempt to explain in the methodological introduction to this book. Thus, the focal point in this new edition has changed. The book now centers on an attempt to understand how Zionist policy, from the Balfour Declaration to the present day, has affirmed the rights of the Jewish people in Palestine/Israel in all the federal plans that it has bruited in its efforts to solve the Jewish–Arab political problem. The quests for such solutions, with their attendant hopes and disappointments, should have a direct or indirect influence on the Jewish collective identity in Israel and worldwide. The title of this book—From Binational Society to Jewish State—reflects the transition from an identity that was logical but politically impossible to one that has become possible but still lacks its neighbors’ consent. Be this as it may, precisely due to this lack of consent, i.e., non-recognition of Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state in the Middle East, Israel is becoming increasingly Jewish in its national identity. As such, it is also affecting the ethnic identity of Jews in the Diaspora, as I attempt to explain in my concluding remarks. Finally, I must acknowledge a second factor that prompted me to refocus this book: disillusionment with the belief that Israel and its neighbors, including the future Palestinian state, may be able to work out confederative political arrangements in various domains including, above all, the economic, the ecological, and the religious. I can

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only hope that the political and ideological gap between the panJewish federal perspective and the Middle Eastern outlook will narrow in the future. In a world led by two federative powers—the United States and the European Union—this hope, despite its Utopian imaginativeness, is realistic.

INTRODUCTION

In terms of world history, the twentieth century was a time of sweeping changes in policy, economics, social affairs, science, and culture, that will do much to determine the complexion of the millennium that has just begun. These changes transformed the collective identities of peoples in two different, if not clashing, ways. First, the political process that granted self-determination to the peoples of Asia and Africa caused their collective identity to jell despite their internal differences. Second, globalization has brought peoples closer, especially in respect to culture, technology, and economics. Thus, even as the particularistic collective identity has developed, the universal identity has also gathered strength, particularly in countries that affiliate with Western civilization. The Jewish people, situated mainly in Europe and the United States, was also susceptible to these changes. However, the objective processes that unfolded in the twentieth century and the special attitude that the Jews’ neighbors reserved for them—for better or worse— invested the changes with greater influence on the Jewish collective than on other peoples. The Jewish collective identity began its historical change in the late nineteenth century, when mass emigration to the U.S. began and the Zionist Movement was established. These two phenomena, despite their intrinsic contrast, caused the Jewish center to begin shifting from Europe to America and Palestine. Thus, one may state that, in terms of the importance of these two processes for Jewish life, the twentieth century in Jewish history began in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. The process was completed tragically in the Holocaust. Even before World War II, however, the Bolshevik Revolution separated about one-third of European Jewry from the rest of the Jewish people. These processes brought three new dynamic Jewish identities into being. One integrated vigorously into the American economy and democratic culture, another merged into the ruling initiative in SovietRussian culture, and the third, the autonomous identity in Palestine, laid the foundations for the establishment of a different Jewish national society. The Jews were not passive in these processes of change, of course. Their active role was manifested in political struggles in

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pre-Bolshevik Russia and in Poland for equality of civil rights. This struggle had partners—liberal bourgeois circles under the inspiration of the historian Simon Dubnow, the Marxist-Socialist Bund party, and the Zionist Movement in its various complexions. Even Agudath Israel, the ultra-Orthodox religious movement in Poland, cooperated with the modern Jewish movements in several political struggles in the parliament of interwar Poland. In the West, especially the U.S., this activism was reflected in changes in religious belief and practice in the forms of Reform and Conservatism, which ab initio were tailored to modern society at various levels. In addition to political and social activity, external processes—positive ones like the Emancipation and catastrophic ones such as the Holocaust—subjected the collective identity of Jewish society to sweeping change. The main indicators of this change were: 1) linguistic and cultural fragmentation, which accelerated due to emigration to the West and intensified greatly after the Holocaust and the obliteration of the Yiddish-speaking national center in Poland and Central Europe; 2) the cultural integration of Jews in their countries of residence, not only as “consumers” but also as “creators”; 3) the acceleration of Jewish activism in politics at large, especially in the West; 4) the normalization of Jewish nationhood with the advent of Zionism as a legitimate Jewish national movement that gained the recognition of international institutions after World War I, when it secured the right to establish a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine—in addition to the recognition of East European Jewry as a national minority entitled to cultural autonomy; 5) the emergence of Jewry as a collective that struggled for its political rights not only by political action but also by force of arms, be it in “self-defense” in Czarist Russia or in armed struggle in Palestine against the British regime and the Arab enemy for national and political self-determination. Although all modern Jewish movements took part in these identity-transformative processes and struggles, as stated, Zionism was the most radical of them all because it aimed to change the historical and political status the Jewish people. In this sense, it was distinct from the other movements in two main respects. First, it linked change in the historical status of the Jews as a member of the family of nations to returning to Eretz Israel. Even when it did not construe this as the return of every last Jew, or even most Jews, to the homeland, the very re-establishment of Jewish sovereignty in Palestine became a cause of change in the Jews’ collective status in modern

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society. The other modern movements, which also aspired to transform the Jews’ status, did not recognize the Zionist goal—in fact, they rejected it categorically—in the belief that the progress of humankind would enhance the status of Jews in general society and grant them civil if not national equality. Second, Zionism from its outset, according to its Weltanschauung and its political self-organization, aspired to represent the Jewish people at large and actually managed to do so, relatively speaking. The other movements, in contrast, were pronouncedly sectoral in ideology and, especially, in their political development and cultural milieu. The Reform and Conservative movements were products of the traditional and liberal Jewish bourgeoisie in Western Europe and the U.S.; Agudath Israel, which also displayed indications of modernity, especially in the political and organizational senses, was mostly representative of East European grassroots Orthodoxy. The Yiddishist Folkspartei belonged to the educated Jewish bourgeoisie in Poland. The Bund purported to represent the Jewish proletariat in Eastern Europe and elsewhere. Various cultural and linguistic superstructures were erected on the sociological and ideological foundations of each of these movements: Yiddishist in Eastern Europe, Central European in Germany and France, and Anglo-Saxon in Britain and the U.S. Zionism followed a different path. It was the largest of these movements, even though only some, perhaps a minority, of Jews supported it. It was also the most diverse in ideological and cultural terms and had a universal appeal. It enrolled religious and nonreligious Jews, Socialists and anti-Socialists, Eastern Europeans and Western Europeans, Ashkenazim, Sephardim, and Mizrahim ( Jews from Islamic countries); it had political parties, youth movements, and national organizations. As such, Zionism offered its comprehensive political nostrum, the establishment of a national entity in the Jews’ historical homeland, to the entire Jewish people. This solution was different from proposals in fin du siecle Eastern Europe for the establishment of Jewish national and cultural autonomy as part of an overall settlement of the national-minorities issue in Central and Eastern Europe in the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Czarist Russia. These proposals were purely regional; they excluded the Jews of Western Europe and Germany, not to speak of America. Zionism, in contrast, aspired to national autonomy even before it demanded a Jewish state as the national home of all Jews, in Palestine or elsewhere.

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In this sense, Zionism from its outset construed the Jewish people as an ethnicity and not as a territorial nation endowed with political sovereignty. Thus, it had to organize itself politically along federal lines. Indeed, membership in the Zionist Organization was voluntary from the outset and remains so to this day. In this sense, the situation did not change fundamentally even after the State of Israel came into being. Due to its pan-Jewish nature and its worldwide organizational grasp, the Zionist ideology moved in three concentric circles of ideological contrasts, political controversies and struggles, and cultural gaps. The first circle is internal. The pan-Jewishness of the Zionist Movement created internal strains among members of different persuasions: secular and religious, socialist and liberal, Palestino-centric vs. those who considered Zionism foremost a Diasporic national movement, etc. The second circle, in the middle, was the political dispute between Zionism and its Jewish opponent movements, from various shades of Orthodoxy to liberal and Socialist groups that accused Zionism of religious, democratic, social, and cultural false messianism. The third circle was political struggle with the British Government, holder of the international mandate for Palestine, over how to interpret Britain’s undertakings to the Zionist Movement and the violent confrontation with the Arab national movement for the right to sovereignty over Palestine. The political tussle with the British Government and the violent standoff with the Arab national movement centered on the Jewish people’s national rights in Palestine or—depending on the policies of the various Zionist currents—to Palestine. The practical political upshot of this national principle was expressed primarily in the Jews’ right to return to their homeland, i.e., to emigrate to Palestine from their countries of exile, and in the numerical extent of this immigration. Thus, the Zionist Movement, as a matter of ideological consciousness and political demands, became the representative of the interests of world Jewry. The letter that established Britain’s mandate for Palestine expressed this idea by recognizing the Zionist Organization as a “Jewish agency” that represents this interest vis-à-vis the Mandatory Government and the League of Nations. Because Zionism moved about in three circles of tension—within its own organization, among the Jews, and in international policy—as a

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voluntary movement that needed the help of non-Zionist Jewish circles and depended largely on the regional ruling power, it had to seek a political method that would correspond to its peculiar situation. The solution that it found may be called “comprehensive federalism.” In other words, the Zionist Organization, as a voluntary entity, was a federal organization of political, ideological, and cultural diversity. The same method was reflected in relations between the Zionist Organization and other Jewish organizations in their attempts to tackle various existential Jewish problems, e.g., cooperation among organizations in the World Jewish Congress for war on antisemitism, established in the 1930s, and between the Zionist Organization and the non-Zionist American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee in caring for Holocaust survivors in the DP camps in Germany after World War II. In the third circle—the political one, concerning relations among the Jews, Britain, and the Arabs—the federal principle played an important role in Zionist political thought for more than twenty years during the Mandate era and resurfaced in the 1970s, three decades later. Some of its basic ideas remain valid at the present writing— all of which, without the renunciation of Jewish national rights in Eretz Israel. To undertake the task of establishing a “national home” for all of Jewry in Palestine under the limiting conditions of the time, not only political resolve, spiritual idealism, personal self-sacrifice, and diplomatic sophistication were needed. Political imagination was necessary as well. This kind of imagination undoubtedly drew sustenance from the Utopian element in the mindset the leaders of Zionism. These leaders implanted this form of imagination in their political and social schemes and transplanted them into political entities such as the Zionist youth movements. These characteristics infused their political plans with Utopian spirit. This spirit arose bore a resemblance to reality and revealed traces of guilelessness among leaders who were basically realistic and experienced in political balances of power. Only such leaders, and the public that followed them trustingly, could believe in a political solution that would meet the existential needs of all of Jewry, in its historical homeland and in its Diaspora. Paradoxically, this Utopian guilelessness evolved into a powerful and resourceful political force. Only due to this force could these leaders, and the Zionist movement surmount objective difficulties that spawned many subjective doubts and make the impossible possible.

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Thus, on its lengthy path from Basel to Jerusalem, the Zionist Movement was characterized by a unique intermingling of Utopian imagination and political realism. The combination was unique in that movement’s social action, which contained Utopian elements in its early formative phases, was also of definitive political significance. Agricultural settlement helped to shape the country’s borders, a nexus of the kibbutz movement and national defense took form, and the General Federation of Labor in Palestine (the Histadrut) was designed to be a separate and distinct society that would become the mainstay of the political structure of the Yishuv, Israel’s pre-independence Jewish community. Furthermore, the vision of future society—Jewish society, in this case—had a greater influence on Zionist policy than was accepted in other national movements. Other movements had preexisting objective phenomena with which to deal, such as a cultural and linguistic identity, a demographic majority in a more-orless defined territory, and a traditional economic structure. Zionism, in contrast, had to create these elements in a protracted social process and to adjust the process continually in view of the future self-image to which it aspired. Therefore, national values such as return to the soil, Jewish labor, the renaissance of Hebrew culture, and the aspiration to a Jewish majority became political fundamentals in Zionism. Furthermore, the future image of Jewish society determined the horizons of political ambition and the limits of political compromise. For this reason, a direct connection came about between concern for the quality of Jewish society and willingness to make political compromise. This also explains why Utopian fundamentals and tendencies became part of the personalities of the great leaders and political trailblazers of Zionism. Zionist policy from Herzl’s time to the establishment of the State of Israel had three dimensions. The first, the international one, was manifested in an unrelenting diplomatic effort to create a relationship, based on shared political interests, with the dominant regional power. This intention was evident in Herzl’s disappointing negotiations with the Ottoman regime and Chaim Weizmann’s revolutionary political success, which led to the issue of the Balfour Declaration in the name of the British Government. The Zionist leadership pursued this goal without letup throughout the British Mandate era. Even the opposition in the Zionist movement, Vladimir (Zeev)

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Jabotinsky’s Revisionist Party, shared the goal until the middle of the 1940s. The Zionist leadership continued to seek this relationship even in the last phase of the struggle for statehood. Then, however, the political target of the effort changed: the hostile Great Britain was replaced by the United States. The Americans’ status as a global power, the nature of their democratic regime, and the weight of their Jewish community gave Zionism a special status in their policies. This trend in Zionist policy has been fulfilled almost completely at the present time, Israel having become the most important political and military ally of the United States in the Middle East arena. The second dimension, the intercommunal, included Jewish-Arab relations in Palestine in all their senses. In an attempt to work out joint arrangements, if only partial and provisional, that would allow them to coexist with the Arab population of the country, the Zionists aspired to cooperation in municipal government, an arrangement for relations between Jewish and Arab labor organizations, general agrarian reform, and other matters. The third dimension was reflected in the Zionist Movement’s political plans and its ideas for the shaping of fair and enlightened relations between Jews and Arabs, who were embroiled in struggle for the same piece of land. By the very fact of having such plans, the movement signaled its intention to replace side-by-side existence with coexistence. It is in this sense that Zionist policy was informed by a Utopian element tempered by political realism, a policy that recognized its limits as a national force and, usually, knew how to exploit political opportunities that the era created. At first glance, our remarks here point to a material clash between the Utopian inclination and the pragmatic consideration in Zionist policy. It is not so. The entire intent of this study is to note that the Utopian element in Zionist policy was neither a marginal and unimportant appendage nor an artificial embellishment with which politicians could adorn themselves. In fact, it was a structural and intrinsic feature of the policy. It was embedded in the policymakers’ personalities; it played a role in long-term plans for the regularization of Jewish-Arab relations; it influenced the aspiration to align the political solutions with Jews’ and Arabs’ national ideals and rights; and it served as a moral yardstick for use in distinguishing between permissible and forbidden ways and means of prosecuting

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the armed conflict. It was this characteristic that gave the movement and its leaders the strength to cling to a political vision that clashed with the existing conditions. Viewed from this perspective, the Zionist reality was charged with Utopian meaning. It is for this reason that I define the relationship between reality and vision as “Utopian realism.” This seeming oxymoron, in my opinion, is one of the keys to understanding Zionism as a national idea and as a social and political doctrine that fulfilled itself. In this context, it is worth distinguishing among three concepts: Utopianism, realistic Utopianism, and Utopian realism. Utopian thinking concerns itself with society as it should be. Realistic Utopian thinking relates to society as it is but presumes that the future ideal will come to pass as an outgrowth of the existing society. Marxist theory is an example.1 The Utopian-realism approach stresses the Utopian dimension of reality and considers it one of the keys to the understanding of reality.2 The difference between the two last-mentioned concepts, then, is not merely semantic but also material. In realistic Utopianism, the emphasis is on Utopia; from this standpoint, it offers an alternative to an existing reality. In Utopian realism, the emphasis is on realism and the Utopia serves merely as a correction of reality. The historiography on the triangle of political relations among Jews, British, and Arabs in regard to the Palestine question is copious, multifaceted, and packed with footnotes. It concerns itself, for obvious reasons, with the concrete aspects of this complex relationship, i.e., the political calculus and what underlies it, the diplomatic path, the practitioners of statecraft and the impact of their personalities on the way matters unfolded, and the military struggle that accompanied the entire effort. In contrast, the analyses of the sides’ political moves and descriptions of the diplomatic twists and turns have soft-pedaled the long-term political outlooks, i.e., the Utopias,

1 See A. Funkenstein, “The Historical and Messianic Outlook of Maimonides,” Image and Historical Consciousness in Judaism and Its Cultural Surroundings, Tel Aviv, 1989 (Hebrew), pp. 103–4, 154–56. (This book exists in English Maimonides: nature, history, and messianic beliefs (Engllish translation by Shmuel Himelstein, Tel Aviv, MOD Books, 1997). 2 See Y. Gorny, “Utopian Realism in Zionism,” Rina Shapira and A. Kasher (eds.), Reshafim (in Memory of Professor Shimon Reshef ), Tel Aviv, 1991 (Hebrew), pp. 37–49.

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as I call them. In fact, historiography to date has swept the Utopias into the neglected corner where the shards of the schemes/dreams of the political personalities are heaped. History, however, has treated these outlooks differently. History, after all, is sometimes powered by forces that aim for goals that transcend an existing reality. These forces are especially evident in revolutionary situations and at watersheds in the histories of peoples and societies—at what I call “historical junctions.” By saying this, I do not mean to imply that these plans influenced Zionist policy. Nor do I wish to argue that they were practical when formulated and would have been implemented had it not been for shortsighted or malevolent politicians. I wish only to say that the fact that they succeeded each other for some seventy years and that their champions belonged to the mainstreams of the Zionist Movement attests to the essence of the movement and the nature of its leaders and statebuilders. The plans were debated in the central institutions of the Zionist Organization, the Jewish Agency, and the political parties, and were discussed with British politicians. In the last twenty years of the century just past, they were discussed—either enthusiastically or skeptically—in Israel. This shows that they were a material part of Zionist thinking, which continually oscillated between the need to respond to changing requirements in the present and the need to find fundamental solutions for the future. In other words, even though these plans surfaced anew in response to each temporal distress, the Zionists did not settle for stop-gap, short-term solutions but sought to craft a comprehensive perception of future relations between Jews and Arabs at the local Palestinian level and in the regional, Middle Eastern sense, after the State of Israel was founded. I define the rationale behind the schemes discussed in this study as “federal thinking.” This concept deserves explanation because it dictates the methodological structure of the study. The concept of “federalism” is not identical with the conventional political terms “federation” and “confederation.” The constitutional and political meanings of these terms in international law are rather clear. Here, however, “federalism” is regarded as a broader and more flexible historical and political phenomenon. The main distinction between a federation and a confederation lies in the source of sovereign power. A federation is a sovereign state composed of autonomous political units that derive their power from one political center. Thus, in a federation the central regime devolves some of its sovereign powers

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to regional autonomies. A confederation, in contrast, is a regional alliance of sovereign states that maintain joint institutions in various domains. In a confederation, matters work the other way around: the sovereign states devolve some of their sovereign powers to the center without forfeiting their own basic sovereignty.3 In the concept of federalism that we use here, we stress the term foedus (alliance) that exists among various social units, i.e., states and societies. This term may serve us as a common denominator for forms of polities that, from the constitutional standpoint, are defined as federations or confederation, and for various “federal arrangements,” such as provisions between national or religious communities within a state; regional or personal solutions to the cultural problems of ethnic groups; agreements between trade unions that are national in nature; and far-reaching economic and/or military cooperation between independent states that are not bound to each other in a confederative pact. By implication, the broad framework of “federalism” includes various possibilities of political or social alliances. One may arrange them in declining order of the strength of their central sovereign authority. On the first and highest rung stands the sovereign state that recognizes religious and cultural pluralism and gives it an official public representative status. Examples are the religious millet of the Ottoman Empire and the cultural autonomy that East European national minorities were supposed to have received at the end of World War I. On the second rung is a federative state composed of local administrative or national autonomies, e.g., the United States as an administrative federation and the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia in the past as national federations. In this context, one may regard Canada and Switzerland as federations in which the administrative and the national principles are integrated. The third form is the confederation, to which most West and East European countries belong due to their membership in the European Union. Following this definition, the discussion of the federalist aspect of Zionist political thinking will include all plans that called for the establishment of shared living arrangements between the national

3 For a lucid theoretical explanation for the distinction between federal and confederal paradigms, see Y. Dinstein, “Federal and Confederal Multinational Arrangements,” Studies in Law 17, 2 (December 1993) (Hebrew).

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groups in Palestine, provided that they did not breach the limits of the Zionist consensus. I use the term “Zionist consensus” to denote the ideological common denominator among all Zionist Movement intellectual currents and political entities, which disagreed severely on all other topics. The consensus was made up of four basic principles: an unbreakable bond between the Jewish nation and the Eretz Israel; a Jewish majority in Eretz Israel; changing the socioeconomic structure of the Jewish people as part of a comprehensive national effort; and the revival of the Hebrew language and culture. Beyond these basic principles, there were several structural confrontations within the Zionist Movement: between religious and nonreligious members, socialists and anti-socialists, champions of “classical Zionism” and champions of “political Zionism,” and Weizmannists and anti-Weizmannists, to name only a few. Therefore, were it not for the conceptual and political framework that these four principles delimited, one doubts whether the Zionist Organization could have functioned as a political body and a settlement organization. Since the Zionist framework could maintain its integrity only due to its four principled boundaries, anyone who waived one of them excluded himself from the Zionist collective at large. Thus, the Territorialists excluded themselves from the Zionist Movement by renouncing the nation-and-homeland nexus. The Yiddishists, who rejected the revival of Hebrew as the Jewish national language, did not enter the fold. Even Po’alei Tsiyyon Left and the Josef Trumpeldor labor brigades, the most idealistic Socialist Zionist manifestations of pioneering idealism (among other manifestations), removed themselves from the consensus by objecting to the principle of building a new society as a natural national process in which all Jewish classes would take part. For the purposes of our discussion, the litmus test for affiliation with Zionist political thinking is composed of the first two principles: the Jews’ national entitlement to Eretz Israel and their unimpeachable and unlimited right to settle their homeland, i.e., to form a majority there. This litmus test excludes from our discussion the binational-state idea of the Brit Shalom4 society in 1925–1933, because Brit Shalom 4 Brit Shalom (Peace Alliance)—1926–1933—a group of Zionist intellectuals who proposed a binational political solution for the Jewish-Arab conflict in Palestine. In the 1940s, this group was reshaped under a new title, the “Ichud” (union).

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repudiated the principle of a Jewish majority in Palestine. Brit Shalom’s successor, the Ichud society, made a significant if not total correction to this outlook and therefore re-enters the field of our study. The binational scheme of Ha-shomer ha-Tsa’ir5 from the late 1930s to the late 1940s adhered to the principle of unrestricted Jewish immigration and, by extension, the principle of a Jewish majority. Accordingly, it remained within the Zionist consensus. Although Hashomer ha-Tsa’ir took strong political issue with the majority in the Zionist Executive, its leaders never considered the notion of seceding from the Zionist Organization even when they were politically marginalized within it.6 This example is instructive of the political and public significance of the four principles that demarcated the Zionist consensus and inhibited political moves among rival parties in the Zionist Organization. Thus, as stated, the Organization maintained its integrity despite disunity and retained its decision-making ability despite internal indecision. However, the four-principle framework amplified the political constraints that the Zionist leadership faced. The principle of Jewish immigration made the Zionist Movement crucially dependent on the British Government, which had the power to sustain, regulate, or curtail such immigration. The aspiration for a Jewish majority gave the Arab resistance movement a powerful symbol that pointed to Zionism’s intent of dispossessing the Arabs of Palestine of their homeland. In this respect, the direction in which things developed during Britain’s thirty-year tenure in Palestine was detrimental to Zionism. In the 1920s, the Zionist Movement, with the assistance of the Jewish people, was unable to establish a broad and solid demographic base in Palestine, thus dooming the Yishuv to minority status. The rise of resistance from the Arab national movement, which in the late 1930s shifted from rioting to organized uprising, underscored the problematic nature of the very existence of a Zionist entity in the Middle East. The deterioration in the status of Eastern and Central 5 Ha-shomer ha-Tsa’ir—a Zionist youth movement in Eastern Europe. In Palestine, it established in 1927 a kibbutz movement—Ha-kibbutz ha-Artsi—which in the 1930s became a left-wing Zionist political party. 6 Because the limits of the discussion were drawn in this manner, the plans of British personalities and mediators are not discussed on their merits, e.g. that of John Philby or the Chaimson-Newcombe plan, except where the Zionists’ response to them clarified the Zionist approach.

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European Jewry upon the Nazi accession to power, coupled with the ascendancy of antisemitism, proved that Zionism had no salvation to offer at a time of sweeping and immediate national distress. These developments tipped the Zionist policy into a “tragic paradox”: the weaker the Zionist Movement became at the objective level and the more emphatically the British Government tended to attenuate its commitment to the Jewish people, the more dependent on this government the movement became. The state of weakness was only partial, of course, since the Yishuv was growing and jelling at that very time. Despite the limitations imposed on it by the British Government’s policies, it evolved from a Jewish community into a national entity. This, however, does not refute our premise about Zionism’s dependency on the British Government. Even if one emphasizes the transformation of the Yishuv into a political power base, the Yishuv’s continued steady growth depended first and foremost on the Government’s policy on Jewish immigration. Thus, amidst the encroaching political distress, the Zionist Executive was forced to discuss political solutions that would seem equitable and workable to the three parties involved in the Palestine question, i.e., compatible with their basic political interests and national aspirations and, of course, applicable under existing circumstances according to its leaders’ worldview. Some of the proposals originated in the Government; others were created internally. The advisory council idea in the 1920s and the legislative council idea in the 1930s gestated in the office of the British High Commissioner. The Zionist Movement, in turn, bruited the idea of binational parity in governance and the idea of a Jewish state in a partitioned Palestine, which it drew as a last line of retreat against the 1939 White Paper policy that aimed to establish a Palestinian Arab state. The discussions also took up plans for comprehensive and farreaching federal arrangements in Palestine and the Middle East region. Although these schemes never developed to a point where they seemed attainable, they fomented debates and polemics in the Zionist Movement that were sometimes passionate and harsh. The intensity of the verbal sparring in these matters never equaled that surrounding the question of partitioning Palestine, but in response to the federal issues, as to the partition issue, attitudes of principle and political calculus merged and the disputants were divided not along party lines but within them. Their debates shed much light

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on the Zionist Movement’s political intentions and the personalities of its leaders as statecrafters. As a rule, these plans appeared at two junctures in time: (a) Federal plans always surfaced at times of political vagueness, when they became paths of escape, as it were, from impasses or preventive measures against possible political danger; (b) The extent of federal cooperation that was proposed at various times stood in inverse proportion to the status of Zionism in Palestine. The stronger Zionism became, the slacker the proposed federal framework. Therefore, there was a process of transition from the idea of national autonomies under the Mandate to a binational federation in Palestine and, finally, the idea of a Middle Eastern confederation to which the Jewish state would belong.7 This pattern of political thinking was revived in Israel in the last two decades of the twentieth century, as the last chapter of this book shows. Obviously, not all currents in the Zionist Movement subscribed to these plans. However, the central figure in the movement, Chaim Weizmann, and, above all, all segments of the Labor Movement dealt with them at various stages of the period between the world wars. This study tracks the development of the federal idea during the interwar years, and in the last two decades of the twentieth century in Israel, in its three aspects: autonomy, federative, and confederative. It is not my aim to describe the serpentine and sometimes fascinating diplomatic negotiations that took place in regard to these matters, mainly in the 1930s. Several studies describe these matters in painstaking detail from both the Zionist and the British perspectives.8 They show that people at the highest echelons among the Jews, the British, and even the Arabs dealt with the topic. Thus, instead of following the diplomatic track, the study will follow the Utopian path9 and concern itself more with the ideas of 7 Notably, today one hears more and more talk of “federative arrangements” in economic affairs, distribution of water, the environment, and the Jerusalem problem, as a way to resolve the issue of relations among Israel, the Palestinians, and the Arab countries. 8 See S. Dotan, The Struggle for the Land of Israel, Tel Aviv, 1981; Y. Heller, The Struggle for Statehood, Jerusalem, 1985; S. Teveth, Ben-Gurion and the Arabs of Palestine, Tel Aviv, 1985; Y. Porath, The Test of Political Action: Palestine, Arab Unity and British Policy, 1930 –1945, Jerusalem, 1985 (hereinafter: Porath, The Test of Political Action) (all in Hebrew). 9 Notably, several of these schemes are discussed briefly from the standpoint of political ideology in my book The Arab Question and the Jewish Problem, Tel Aviv, 1985

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statecrafters than with the political plans of a movement. This is because the Zionist Organization never adopted federalism, in any of its incarnations, as its consensual platform. However, its leaders carried it with them, convinced that a time might come when it would be one of several realistic political possibilities that the Zionist Movement would face. The study that follows is a comparative history. Each plan is examined relative to its time and in comparison with a corresponding or preceding plan. The study traces the similarities among the plans, as opposed to their interrelations, because it wishes explore a question that transcends disagreements among political rivals and ideological contrasts among movements and personalities in Zionism: Were there also basic premises concerning the image of future shared life between the peoples? The book is a comparative historical analysis; it comprises five chapters that correspond to five models of Zionist federal plans. Chapter 1 deals with the federal model, rooted in an integration of Anglo-Saxon parliamentarism and the national-autonomy principle as formulated in social-democratic and liberal thinking in Central and Eastern Europe. Chapter 2 discusses the idea of comprehensive national autonomy, a synthesis of sorts between two autonomistic principles: personal autonomy and territorial and regional autonomy. This model, too, was influenced by the general thinking but was more closely related to the social and political reality in Palestine. Chapter 3 traces the plans that sought to adjust the federal idea to the changing political realities in Palestine and the region by creating an integration between a federation in Palestine and a regional confederation. Chapter 4 focuses on the specific plan to establish a Jewish-Arab binational state in Palestine, within the framework of a Middle Eastern Arab federation. Chapter 5 traces federal thinking and planning in the last twenty years, as developed by Arye (Lova) Eliav and Shimon Peres, leaders of the second generation in the Zionist Labor Movement.

(Hebrew) (hereinafter Gorny, The Arab Question) in English: Zionism and the Arabs 1882–1948: A Study of Ideology, Clarendon Press, Oxford 1987. However, they have not been discussed in terms of their federal essence and the relationship between Utopianism and policy in the Zionist Movement.

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The chapters are arrayed in chronological order, corresponding to the appearance of the models for public and political debate. The first and second models belong to the 1920s, the third model to the 1930s, and the fourth model to the 1940s. The models are accredited to various personalities on the basis of their outlook on federalism, not their ideological or political identity. Thus, the Revisionist Zeev Jabotinsky and the Socialist Shelomo Kaplansky are associated with the first model and members of the Marxist-minded Ha-shomer ha-Tsa’ir movement collaborated with liberals from the Ichud in the fourth model. I conclude this Introduction by telling the reader frankly that my motive in dealing with this topic is the distress and the hopeful confusion of the present era. The study does not offer a magic formula of any kind. In fact, it is a story of failure. However, it also describes a process that is not clearly limited in time. At the end of the period at issue this study, the Jewish state, a Jewish and Zionist prerequisite for any regional settlement, had not yet been established. Today, Zionism’s distant dream of five million Jews in Israel has come true. Thus, today the principles on which the various plans were based seem more realistic than ever. Furthermore, it is very likely that we are approaching a “historical junction,” at which we will have to make a decision. At such a time, it is good for us to know that our predecessors wrestled with similar questions. Today, however, we are in a better position to determine the answers—in full awareness that some sovereign decisions of the State of Israel are also related to the concerns of the Jewish people in the Diaspora.

CHAPTER ONE

THE FEDERATIVE PARLIAMENTARY MODEL

The Arab’s culture is backward but his natural patriotism is just as pure and noble as our own; he cannot be bought, he may be restrained by the same force to which more progressive peoples are forced to succumb—force majeure. Zeev Jabotinsky, 1922

Preface: Political Background of the 1920s Federal Programs The quest for a legal-political form for the regularization of JewishArab relations in Palestine began in the early 1920s. Various public circles in the Yishuv (the pre-independence Jewish community of Palestine) began to debate the “Arab question” in the late Ottoman era, and especially in the years between the Young Turks revolution and World War I.1 The basic attitudes of the constructivist Left, the liberal Center, and the nationalist Right in regard to the attitude toward the Arabs of Palestine were shaped in these debates, and these approaches affected Zionist policy during the Mandate era and up to the establishment of the State of Israel. It is typical of these debates that they charted a political course but lacked programs for a shared Jewish-Arab political structure. There was only one exception, and it did not concern one of the most important schemes. This phenomenon should be traced not to a lack of political imagination on the part of the contemporaries but rather to the vague status of the Zionist Movement in the Ottoman Empire. After all, the Ottoman regime—before and after the revolution—acquiesced in the sluggish building of a Jewish national community in Palestine but denied the Zionist aspirations recognition and withheld official status from its representatives. What is more,

1

See Gorny, Zionism and the Arabs, Part 1: “The Overt Question—1882–1917”.

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until the end of World War I, notwithstanding the Young Turks revolution and the Balkan war, far-reaching changes in the structure of the Ottoman Empire were not observable. Upon the end of World War I, several changes—the regime changes in the Middle East, the partitioning of the area into British and French mandates, official recognition of the Arab peoples’ right to self-determination in preparation for self-rule, and the granting of legal status to the Jewish people’s national aspirations in Palestine— transformed a static situation into a dynamic one. This dynamic, in turn, inspired the Zionist Movement to formulate Utopian political schemes. Thus, too, the nexus of Utopianism and social or political distress was maintained. The distress that beset the Zionist Movement was structured partly in regional changes and partly in transitory political initiatives. The main structural distress was the rising tide of Arab anti-Zionism, which erupted into violence in 1920–1921. The Arabs’ resistance was also reflected politically, as the Higher Arab Committee for Palestine sent a delegation to London in 1922 to defeat the approval of the British Mandate—into which the Balfour Declaration was incorporated—by the League of Nations. In view of these pressures, the British Government had to spell out the political intentions that its commitments under the Balfour Declaration entailed. This necessity led that year to the issue of the Churchill White Paper, which explicitly limited the ambitions of Zionism both in the Jews’ right to all of Palestine and in the extent of Jewish immigration. The White Paper also delimited the geographical dimension of Mandatory Palestine by excluding Transjordan. There was also an internal problem that would beset the Zionist Movement at all times: the movement’s financial inability to carry out its settlement aims. In the first half of the 1920s, it became clear that the Jewish people was unable and unwilling to contribute large sums for the building of Palestine. At the very beginning of the decade, after the leadership struggle in 1920–1921 between Weizmann and Brandeis,2 the latter and his supporters, angry and offended, withdrew from activity in the Zionist Movement, to the detriment of fundraising for Palestine.3 2 Louis D. Brandeis (1856–1942), leader of the American Zionist movement, 1914–1921, and Justice of the US Supreme Court. 3 B. Halpern, A Clash of Heroes—Brandeis, Weizmann and American Zionism, New York, 1987.

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When we speak of passing or temporary distress, we mean the Higher Arab Committee delegation that went to London to talk the British Government out of presenting the Balfour Declaration to the League of Nations for its approval. Were this not enough, the Zionist Executive had to debate and respond to two political initiatives in the middle of 1922. Both initiatives spoke of federative arrangements. One originated in a proposal by the Emir Abdullah4 of Transjordan to unify the two portions of Palestine under his rule in return for far-reaching autonomy for the Jews. The other was linked to a proposal by the High Commissioner, Herbert Samuel,5 to organize Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Transjordan, and Palestine into an Arab confederation under the Hashemite family. Samuel considered this a useful arrangement for the entire region and a way to compensate the Arabs of Palestine for, and mitigate their opposition to, the Mandatory regime, which they deemed pro-Zionist.6 Importantly, Samuel’s proposal for the establishment of an advisory council representing the population of Palestine, which the Arabs ruled out, also evoked severe apprehension among members of the Zionist leadership and inspired the Zionists to seek alternatives. Two years later, a political event in England prompted some parts of the Zionist Labor Movement to discuss future relations with the Arabs of Palestine. In 1924, the British electorate crossed a watershed by voting the Labour Party into power for the first time. In view of the Labour Movement’s inbred anti-imperialist tradition, the Zionists feared that the new Government might lump Zionism together with white colonialism in Africa. The concern was not unfounded but the government proved short-lived.7 It was against this political background that parts of the Zionist leadership became convinced of the need to propose Jewish-Arab arrangements that would transcend the framework set forth for them in the Balfour Declaration and the Palestine Mandate. For this reason, two constitutional political outlooks were formulated that proposed to solve the problem within a federative construct. Both were inspired by the Austro-Hungarian 4

Emir Abdullah (1882–1951), emir of Transjordan, 1921–1951. Herbert Samuel (1870–1963), the first Jewish cabinet minister in the British Government (1909) and the first High Commissioner for Palestine, 1921–1925. 6 Y. Porath, The Test of Political Action: Palestine, Arab Unity and British Policy 1930 –1945, Jerusalem, 1985 (Hebrew), pp. 80–81. 7 See J. (Y.) Gorny, The British Labour Movement and Zionism 1917–1948, London 1983. 5

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tradition preceding World War I. One was especially influenced by the division of rule between the two peoples in the Austro-Hungarian Empire; the other was influenced by social democratic thinking on the national issue.

Jabotinsky’s Plan—1918 The first Zionist leader after World War I who broached the idea of a Jewish-Arab federative regime in Palestine was Vladimir (Zeev) Jabotinsky8—the same man who, by the mid-1920s, had expressed his belief in the inevitability of armed struggle between Jews and Arabs in Palestine and gave it a symbol in the concept of the “iron wall,” the man who derided any faith in the possibility of a JewishArab accord that was not preceded by an outcome predicated on force. It was this leader who realized, immediately after the end of the war, that in view of the complicated situation in Palestine and the crescendo of criticism of the Balfour Declaration, especially in British circles, the Zionist leadership had to propose an imaginative and magnanimous plan for the regularization of Jewish-Arab relations in Palestine. In 1918, shortly before the peace conference in Paris, Jabotinsky wrote a lengthy document—more than 100 pages—that he evidently wished to submit to the conferees. It was composed of three parts. First, Jabotinsky described the history of the Jews’ wanderings in exile. Second, he analyzed the economic situation and the political status of Eastern European Jewry in the aftermath of the war. Third, Jabotinsky set forth his vision of the future political regime in Palestine.9 The main characteristic of Jabotinsky’s document is its balanced political approach. At the beginning of the chapter on the desired future regime, the author addressed himself to the long-term goals 8 Vladimir (Ze’ev) Jabotinsky, (1880–1940), born in Russia. A Zionist intellectual, from 1925 the leader of the Revisionist Party in opposition to Chaim Weizmann’s leadership of the Zionist Movement. 9 The paper is kept in Jabotinsky’s personal archives (no. 3/5/18). He wrote it by hand, in English, in a military field notebook (hereinafter: “the notebook”). Although it is undated, its contents make it clear that it was written in 1919, near the end of the peace conference. To the best of my knowledge, it has never been published, nor did I find any reference to it in Jabotinsky’s biography by Joseph Schechtman, Rebel and Statesman: The Vladimir Jabotinsky Story, Vol. I. Tel Aviv, 1957 (Hebrew).

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of Zionism. He vehemently rejected two different and clashing views that, he said, were current both among enemies and friends of Zionism. Some in both camps are convinced, Jabotinsky said, that Zionism demands the immediate establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine. This is “emphatically” untrue, of course.10 The others lurch to the opposite extreme and claim that Zionism should settle for mention in the constitution that the inhabitants of Palestine will one day receive that the Jews have the right to immigrate to and settle in the country. Both approaches, Jabotinsky ruled, are mistaken. The Jewish state is still a “premature” idea; there is no point in even discussing it. However, the other view, too, settling for immigration rights, is but a “fiction” that does not deserve a moment’s thought. Instead of both outlooks, one premature and the other unworthy, Jabotinsky proposed a large-scale Jewish settlement program and comprehensive planning of the economy of Palestine—in agriculture, national resources, industry, and transport—so that the country would be able to absorb the incoming masses who would bring benefit to all inhabitants of the country.11 The rejection, but not the utter dismissal, of the Jewish statehood idea should not be attributed solely to Jabotinsky’s wish to appease the opponents of Zionism. He expressed a similar outlook in public at the second session of Keneset Yisrael in 1918,12 where the Zionist Movement’s demands to the peace conference were debated.13 In this document, however, Jabotinsky already noted that it had already been determined, in the Balfour Declaration and in the international consciousness, that Palestine would be the national home of the Jewish people. Accordingly, the country could no longer be considered as belonging solely to its inhabitants. It should be viewed as a “joint property” of two elements: its 700,000 present inhabitants, of their diverse confessions and beliefs, and the dispersed Jewish people, roughly 12,000,000 strong, for whom it would become a home.14 By juxtaposing hundreds of thousands to millions, Jabotinsky sought not only to dismiss the view of the anti-Zionists, who cited democratic 10

Notebook, p. 98. Ibid., p. 102. 12 Keneset Yisrael—the autonomous organization (est. 1920) of the Jews in Palestine during the British Mandate period. 13 The assembly convened on Dec. 19, 1918. Central Zionist Archives (hereinafter, CZA), J1/8861. 14 Notebook, p. 109. 11

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principles of majority and minority, but also to stress the principle of “generous parity” with which he tackled the problem of JewishArab relations. For this reason, he intended his proposals for the future political regime in Palestine to promise both peoples equality of status and cooperation. The main provisions of his plan follow: 1. Mandatory rule—responsibility for security and administration of life in Palestine shall be entrusted, by mandate, to a friendly power that would undertake the duty of helping to build the Jewish national home. The main powers of the mandatory government would be the maintenance of public order and rule of law, in accordance with the finest principles of democratic liberalism. 2. The respective people’s rights under this “guideness”—the function of rebuilding the country shall be entrusted “entirely” to the players that have a direct stake in it: the Jewish people and the local population.15 Thus, Jabotinsky distinguished between the Jewish nation and the local non-Jewish population, which lacks a uniform national definition. Accordingly, his proposal contains two standards of measurement for democratic representation. The first is extraterritorial, representing the globally dispersed Jewish people by means of the Zionist Organization, in which Jews who are not Zionists but who favor the idea of settling Jews in Palestine would be able to participate. The second is territorial, representing the local population, which is neither entirely Arab by nationality nor Muslim by confession. From his standpoint, the Zionist Organization would have not only a special status but also a special role to play. As the representative of the interests of the repatriate Jews, it would be vested with special powers for the economic development of Palestine. It would receive a charter to develop the country’s national resources, cultivate unsettled land, and build railroads and ports. It would also post a permanent representative to the government in order to coordinate actions in respect to economic affairs. 3. Binational administration—management of the state would be handed over to an executive entity to be appointed with the consent of the Zionist Organization. Jabotinsky insisted ab initio 15

Ibid.

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that the ministries of immigration, agriculture, industry, trade, transport, and public works be placed in the hands of these representatives. An advisory legislative council would serve alongside the appointed government as the first phase toward the establishment of parliamentary rule. This council, too, would be composed on the basis of the “joint property” principle. Half of its members would be appointed by the Zionist Organization and half elected by the local population. In this fashion, Jabotinsky believed, two elements would have equal shares in governance and influence. The mandatory power would retain supervisory powers.16 A “purely national” governing system would coexist with the binational central administration for exclusively national matters such as education and religion. Jabotinsky stressed the importance of preserving and nurturing the national languages. Paradoxically, he thought of linguistic segregation as a way to induce different peoples to cooperate. He had learned this from the negative experience of Europe’s multinational empires, in which the takeover of one culture by another had led to jealousy and tension between national groups. The example was especially relevant for Palestine, where both peoples, the Jewish and the Arab, were zealous about their respective languages and cultures. Each people’s national affairs would be run separately by an elected council and an executive body. The two main ruling systems would be Jewish and Arab, but a similar Christian system would be possible.17 Jabotinsky intended this triple-tiered governing structure—mandatory administration, national-level government, and national-religious autonomy—to be in effect for an interim period only, i.e., for the duration of the Jewish settlement enterprise in Palestine. He did not stipulate how long this period would last and did not deal with changes that the governing system would undergo in the transition from the interim period to a state of permanence. As for the plan itself, every honest man, he argued in his summarizing remarks, must admit that nothing about it would oppress the Arabs. Since the peoples have recognized Palestine as the national home of the Jewish people, the Jews naturally demand a fair share of rule, in order to 16 17

Ibid., pp. 114–15. Ibid.

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establish their national home and keep it accessible to those who will come. This influence, however, has to be “equitably balanced” with that of the local population. Furthermore, this method will enable the Zionist Organization to engage in wide-scale settlement activity “without encroaching on the legitimate interests of the local population.” In all purely national fields in which the “genius of a race” should not be restricted, Jews and Arabs would enjoy “complete autonomy equal to that of independent nations.”18 Jabotinsky’s program, as stated, made no ironclad assumptions about the nature of governance in Palestine during the interim period, in which the distinguishing feature would be massive Jewish settlement activity. However, it did contain one permanent element related to its author’s principled worldview: the national-cultural autonomy through which the “genius of a race” finds expression. Jabotinsky articulated this outlook of principle in his early writings, at the beginning of the twentieth century,19 and returned to it in his last book, shortly before his death in 1940.20 Hence, it stands to reason that Jabotinsky’s expression “equitable balance,” which I defined as “generous balance,” is much broader than political governance only; it also includes the nation’s intellectual and social life. In other words, even if we were convinced that Jabotinsky considered the binational parity regime not a permanent structure but only an interim arrangement until the Jewish majority in Palestine could come into being, the principle of binationalism or multinationalism in broadly defined cultural fields has a pronouncedly federalist element that even democratic rule, based on demographic balance of forces, does not impair.

18

Ibid., p. 122. See, for example, his speech at the All Russian Zionist Convention in Helsingfors in 1906: Z. Jabotinsky, “Zionism and the Jewish National Organization in Russia,” Ketavim (Writings), D, Speeches 1905–1926, Jerusalem, 1947 (Hebrew), pp. 23–28. As for the legal status of minorities and the powers of national autonomy, Jabotinsky wrote a thesis on the topic for his Masters degree in law in 1912. See “Self-Rule of a National Minority,” Nation and Society, Jerusalem, 1950 (Hebrew), especially pp. 70–71. 20 Z. Jabotinsky, “The Front of the Jewish People’s Struggle,” Jerusalem, 1941 (Hebrew). 19

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Jabotinsky’s Proposals, 1922 The extent to which federalism was a structural element in Jabotinsky’s political concept at the time is demonstrated by a political plan that he presented to the Zionist Executive in late 1922, calling for the establishment of a federative regime in Palestine as part of a Middle Eastern confederation.21 As stated, the convergence of three political developments that year prompted Jabotinsky to seek a fundamental political solution to the Palestine question: Churchill’s White Paper, in which Jabotinsky acquiesced with mixed emotions; Herbert Samuel’s plan for the establishment of an advisory council, a scheme that the Zionist Executive feared, and his proposal for the establishment of a Middle Eastern confederation; and, finally, Emir Abdullah’s initiative for the establishment of an Arab-Jewish federative emirate, headed by himself. Notably, that year, before his close friendship with Weizmann ended, Jabotinsky participated in Weizmann’s negotiations with Abdullah and even attended one of Weizmann’s meetings with the emir in London. Therefore, it is highly probable that the plan he submitted concurred with the views, or at least had the consent, of Weizmann. Jabotinsky’s scheme was composed of two elements: the establishment of a Transjordan-Cisjordan federation and inclusion of the federative state in a regional confederation. He regarded the two political forms as interrelated but complementary, i.e., the federation should precede the confederation. Although the federation would be the highest stage in the regularization of Jewish-Arab relations, it would stand on its own merits as well. In the first phase of the plan, Transjordan and Cisjordan would become a federative state under the British Mandate. It would be headed by the emir, with whom a Jewish prime minister would serve. True to the principle of balance in the division of rule during the transitional period, Jabotinsky stipulated a broadly empowered premier, much like the German chancellor during the period of Imperial Germany. The dual leadership would be sustained until the regional 21 Jabotinsky presented the Zionist Executive with three documents: (1) V. Jabotinsky, Explanatory note on terms of agreement with Arabs (Dec. 10, 1922); (2) Supplementary note etc. (Dec. 29, 1922); and (3) Terms of Agreement with Arabs (Dec. 29, 1922), CZA S25/27073.

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confederation could be established. Once that happened, the presidency would be turned over to the head of the confederation, seated in Damascus. When Palestine would become an autonomous state within the confederation, the presidency would go over to a Jew. The result would be a new balance: that between the Arabs of Palestine and the Jews would be replaced by a balance between the state under Jewish sovereignty and the confederation, in which Arab states would hold the decisive weight. From Jabotinsky’s standpoint, the first (federative) stage was more urgent and realistic; the second phase was a vision for the future. This may explain why, in this case, Jabotinsky the statesman allowed his imagination as a poet to run free. He envisaged a future confederation of Semitic peoples living in national-religious cantons: two Muslim cantons (Syria and Mesopotamia), a mixed Christian-Muslim canton (Lebanon), and a Jewish canton in Palestine. The overall political structure would be a United States of the Middle East, so to speak. However, there would be one basic difference: the states of the Middle Eastern confederation would have broader autonomous powers than those given to members of the American federation, although Jabotinsky did not say this explicitly. It is noteworthy that the Palestine canton would be Jewish and not binational, as opposed to the bireligional canton in Lebanon. Jabotinsky realized that this change would be detrimental on the Arabs of Palestine, who, over the years, would cease to be a majority. However, they would receive “solatium” (compensation) for this within the framework of the regional confederation by their very belonging to a political setting in which Arabs would hold a decisive majority, just as some Germans in Switzerland live as a minority in the French canton. The confederation plan was also meant to placate Zionist public opinion and leadership circles that vehemently opposed the rulership of an Arab emir in Palestine. However, the principled and political rationales in favor of the confederation were meant only to show how a political Utopia for the future could also be a political instrument in the present. However important it was to look ahead, Jabotinsky concerned himself mainly with reality and the present. The binational federation idea was designed to answer political questions of the here-and-now. The whole plan rested on the principle of national balance and control, making it in fact a more polished and sophisticated reiteration of ideas that he had expressed four years earlier. In the executive authority, for example, the head of state—the emir—and the Jewish

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prime minister would be balanced. According to the explanatory notes to his plan, which Jabotinsky presented to the Zionist Executive,22 powers in all matters related to Jewish vital interests, such as immigration and labor, would be held by the prime minister. Thus, the emir would be a mere figurehead from the Jewish standpoint. The government was based on a more delicate parity in this proposal than in its predecessor. Back then, Jabotinsky proposed the appointment of half the Jewish ministers by the Jewish Agency. Now he noted that this half would be elected with the consent of the Jewish Agency and that not all members of this group need be Jewish. As for the legislative authority, Jabotinsky no longer proposed an advisory council. The new plan prescribed the formation of a bicameral parliamentary institution, composed of a senate and a house of representatives. In the previous plan, half of the representatives were to be appointed by the Jewish Agency and the other half elected by the local population. Now he proposed a different method: The lower chamber would be elected in general and proportional elections, in which all Palestine citizens who were literate in any language might take part. The purpose of the restriction, of course, was to amplify the proportional electoral strength of the Jews. The upper chamber, in contrast, would be elected by the method of national and religious quriyas (communities), i.e., Arab Moslems and Arab Christians would be represented. The delegation of the Jewish quriya would be elected by two different standards. One would be territorial, applying to all Jewish citizens of the country, and the other national, reflecting the share of the Jewish people in Palestine. Thus, there would be four blocs of delegates in the senate: Muslim, Christian, Palestinian-Jewish, and Diaspora-Jewish. The last-mentioned would be arranged by means of the Zionist Movement or the Jewish Agency. In Jabotinsky’s opinion, the most important institution in the American method of parliamentary governance was the senate. Therefore, if a similar regime were adopted in Palestine, formally both chambers would be equal in status but the fact of an Arab majority in the house of representatives during the interim period would not be very important. Furthermore, according to his proposal, constitutional amendments would be require a majority of three-fourths of delegates to each chamber. 22

See n. 16, no. 3.

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The national-balance method would also apply to the defense forces. Since Jabotinsky defined the army as the real guarantor of Jewish rights in Palestine, he proposed that the parity principle also be invoked in building the military and the police, which would be under British control. However, three-fourths of the Jewish units would be stationed in Western Palestine and the same proportion of Arab units would be based in Transjordan. Here it deserves emphasis that Jabotinsky advocated the limiting of active involvement of the mandatory in state affairs to the irreducible minimum. The role of the government, he said, should be “negative,” i.e., it should prevent disruptions of sound life but should not initiate changes. A mandate meant for this purpose would be pleasing to British public opinion and compatible with the Arabs’ state of mind. Of course, the basis of this complex constitution, as in his plan four years earlier, was a binational society organized under autonomous settings. The separation of the two national groups, which he considered desirable but not truly essential, was rooted in the Ottoman millet and Central European autonomism. The separation he had in mind would be a synthesis of autonomous traditions of East and West. The separation of autonomous authorities would pertain to the fields of education, religious services, social assistance, and law. Here Jabotinsky proposed to establish two systems, much as had been done in the United States: national or local, and federal. The former would be administered in the national language of each autonomous entity; the latter would go about its affairs in English. In a nutshell, Jabotinsky’s scheme was a Utopian political structure that rested on his worldview of national autonomism and was built of two “stories”—that of the eve of the peace conference and that of 1922—that amounted to a maximalist interpretation of the Balfour Declaration and an attempt to circumvent the political premises set forth in Churchill’s White Paper.23 His national outlook had a federalist element in its acknowledgment of the right of each national group to develop its culture autonomously, without outside 23 Churchill’s White Paper (1922), an official document that restricted the Jewish national home to the area west of the River Jordan and emphasized that the Jewish people is entitled to build its national home “in Palestine,” i.e., Palestine is not “the” Jewish national home.

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intervention and irrespective of its being a majority or a minority of the country’s population. In this sense, Jews and Arabs would have equal rights in Palestine under any circumstances. At the political level, in contrast, according to his interpretation of the Balfour Declaration, there would be a material inequality in the status of the two peoples. Jabotinsky’s interpretation was inconsistent with the Balfour Declaration and contradictory to the White Paper. It depicted Palestine as the national home of the Jewish people, whereas both documents established the Jews’ right to build their national home in Palestine. By extension, Jabotinsky transformed the Jewish people, by means of the Zionist Movement institutions, into the holders of title to Palestine. Thus, the political balance that he proposed for the administration of the country, in the form of a binational parity ruling structure, was merely a stopgap solution that would pertain during the mass Jewish settlement of Palestine. It is for this reason that I define his proposals as a “generous balance.” How fervently did Jabotinsky believe in his political scheme? To answer this question, we should examine the combination of Utopianism and realism in his personality. The Zionist Executive in London gave the plan a chilly reception. All members of the Executive took exception to it.24 Some dismissed it on grounds of impracticality, others disapproved of the appointment of Abdullah as the Emir of Palestine, and all warned of the danger of a confrontation with the Government of Britain, which based its policies on the principles of the White Paper that the Zionist Executive had endorsed. All agreed that instead of seeking arrangements with the Arabs, the Zionist Organization should strengthen relations with the Government of Britain and make greater efforts in rural settlement and immigration. Jabotinsky’s response at the meeting of the Executive and the document of ratification that he presented suggest that he believed in the logic of the scheme but doubted its applicability. According to the minutes of the meeting, Jabotinsky explained that he did not consider a peace settlement with the Arabs politically possible but was confident that British rule in Palestine would last forever. 24 Minutes of the 25th Meeting, Dec. 12, 1922, CZA, 302/7214. Taking part in the meeting were Sokolow, Motzkin, Lichtheim, Soloveichik, Jabotinsky, Nidic, and Cohen (secretary). See n. 2.

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Just the same, he was also convinced that the Zionist Executive should prepare an alternative plan in case the government, or the political circumstances, would force them to negotiate toward a comprehensive understanding with the Arabs. This examination of future political situations created an opportunity for Utopian thinking. As for the internal logic of the scheme, Jabotinsky argued, the plan would safeguard the Jewish interest in three senses: the division of powers between the emir and the prime minister, the parity composition of the elected institutions, and the numerically balanced structure of police and military units. The Arabs would also gain from this sort of settlement, he believed. They would obtain half of the seats in the upper chamber, the possibility of attaining a majority in the lower chamber, and half of the ministerial posts in the executive authority. However, it would be erroneous to see an outright and conscious contradiction between Jabotinsky’s view of the logic of the plan and his assessment of its applicability. After the Executive debated his plan, he presented it with another document in which he countered his opponents passionately: From a general perspective, I must warn the Executive—as I have several times—against the naive assumption that measures such as subsidies, economic advantages, or bribery will stifle the Arabs’ aspiration to keep Palestine as their country. The contempt for the Arabs of Palestine that underlies such schemes is altogether unjustified. The Arab’s culture is backward but his natural patriotism is just as pure and noble as our own; he cannot be bought, he may be restrained by the same force to which more progressive peoples are forced to succumb—force majeure. In our case, the force majeure will be found in a special structure of executive authority, legislative, and military, a structure that will be assured and protected by means of the mandate.25

Generally speaking, Jabotinsky’s political federalism flowed from his principled national worldview. He had two aims at the time: to sketch a logical political plan that could be offered to the British at the right opportunity, and to fill it with such contents as would at least partly satisfy the Arabs’ self-evident and positive national aspirations.

25

See n. 4.

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Chaim Weizmann and Jabotinsky’s Plan Jabotinsky’s proposals and, in particular, the rumor about contacts between Weizmann and Emir Abdullah evoked concern and resistance in Palestine as well. In a meeting of the Va’ad Le’ummi (the National Council of the Jews of Palestine) in early 1923, with Weizmann in attendance, the exceptions expressed by members of the Zionist Executive in London were voiced again.26 The outcome of this debate, as well as others, shows that Weizmann and Jabotinsky not only agreed about the matter but even cooperated and worked out a division of labor. Weizmann conducted the diplomatic contacts with the High Commissioner, Herbert Samuel, and Emir Abdullah, whereas Jabotinsky drafted the plan and formulated its ideas. This division was well suited to the nature of both men. Weizmann, an eloquent charmer with a talent for establishing relationships, was the right man for diplomatic negotiations; Jabotinsky, with the brilliance of his lucid phrasings, was the man who could bind ideas into a comprehensive and cohesive concept. The division of labor was reflected in the focal points of the two leaders’ actions: the regional confederation issue for Weizmann, the federation in Palestine for Jabotinsky. From Weizmann’s perspective, the Middle East confederation idea gave the pact that he had signed with King Feisal in 1918 an extra opportunity to be fulfilled. His remarks at the Zionist Executive meeting in Palestine indicate that his Arab interlocutors had offered him the same political swap that he had signed with King Feisal27—support from the Zionist Movement for the regional Arab confederation idea in return for Arab recognition of the Jewish people’s right to Palestine and its right to establish there a state of its own, which would eventually join the regional organization as a member. He did not delude himself about the workability of the idea; he believed that “this whole thing may be a little imaginary, but it is the only possible way to solve the Arab problem.” These words show how similar the two men’s outlooks were in regard to future-oriented policy and the politics of the present. In his talks with Arab leaders, 26

Va’ad Le’ummi, Jan. 2–3, 1923, CZA, J1/7775. See meeting of Zionist Executive in Palestine, Nov. 30, 1922, CZA; and report from Weizmann to Colonial Office on Feb. 15, 1923, The Letters and Papers of Chaim Weizmann (Ser B), I, Jerusalem, 1983, pp. 369–70 (hereinafter: Weizmann, Letters). 27

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Weizmann used definitions and expressions that appear in Jabotinsky’s memoranda to the Executive in London. Several times, for example, he repeated the expression that Palestine would eventually be “quantitatively and qualitatively” Jewish.28 Weizmann spoke in this vein to the Lebanese statesman Riyadh al-Sulh when he revealed his vision of Palestine as a Switzerland of the Middle East, in which Muslim Arabs, Christian Arabs, and Jews would live in separate cantons incorporate into a Jewish-majority state.29 According to Weizmann’s remarks at the meeting of the Executive, the High Commissioner shared this vision and had even promised to communicate his view to the central government in London. Weizmann and Jabotinsky agreed not only about the plan for the long term but also about the political course of action to adopt in the present. The head of the Political Department in Jerusalem, Alfred Kisch,30 who would explain Weizmann’s steps, wrote to the Zionist Executive in London that the talks with the Arabs were creating an opportunity to persuade them that the Zionists’ ambitions were permanent and wholly specific. Therefore, the sides would have to coordinate their interests. It was Kisch’s impression that Arab circles already felt it impossible to combat the Zionist idea and realized that they must reach an accommodation.31 Kisch himself had reservations about the federation idea. In his letter to Weizmann, he explained that the national leadership in Palestine had rejected Abdullah’s initiative. He also expressed concern about Jabotinsky’s enthusiasm about the idea—and the hope that Jabotinsky would consider it sufficient to present the memorandum to the Zionist Executive in London. However, he urged Weizmann to establish relations with Arabs supporters of the idea and to make sure that this would not impair relations between the Zionist Movement and the British Government.32 In sum, Weizmann in his political contacts in the region reordered the phases of Jabotinsky’s plan. Jabotinsky viewed the federative arrangement as an initial phase. Weizmann, in contrast, postponed the vision of the Swiss model to some future time and attempted to 28 29 30 31 32

Kisch to Zionist Executive in London, Jan. 9, 1923, CZA, Z4/16049. Weizmann, Letters, A, p. 334. Col. Alfred Kisch (1888–1943), head of the Zionist office in Palestine, 1923–1929. Kisch to Executive, Jan. 5, 1923, Weizmann archives, Kisch files. Kisch to Weizmann, Jan. 10, 1923, Weizmann archives, ibid.

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advance the regional-confederation idea. He had two main reasons for doing so. First, Weizmann was not “wild,” to put it mildly, about the possibility of becoming a deputy, albeit a formal one, to Emir Abdullah. Second, Samuel’s support of the confederation idea gave that plan the appearance of greater applicability within a reasonable time frame. Weizmann had never dissociated himself from the political scheme that took form in the agreement that he had signed with King Feisal. Therefore, he continued to adhere to it even when the members of the Zionist Executive in Palestine and the heads of the Va’ad Le’ummi dismissed it categorically.33 Menahem Ussishkin34 warned against joining a confederation from a position of demographic and economic weakness. Dr. Yaakov Tehon35 warned against breaching British and French interests in the region. Finally, David Yellin36 argued that there was no guarantee that the Arabs of Palestine would accept an agreement signed by the rulers of neighboring Arab countries. Indeed, the Weizmann-Jabotinsky plan was so short-lived that it hardly survived its first year. In 1924, the political conditions changed and the two leaders relegated the confederation idea to an out-ofthe-way corner of the Middle East political consciousness. The ouster of the head of the Hashemite clan, Husayn of Mecca, dealt a death blow to the plan among Arab leaders, for the time being. From the Jewish standpoint, the onset of the Fourth Aliya heralded the emergence of the Zionist Movement from the crisis that had engulfed it at the end of the Third Aliya.37 The Jewish masses that began to reach Palestine instilled hope, for the first time after the Balfour Declaration, of the possibility of attaining a Jewish majority in Palestine. This hope, coupled with the absence of violent Arab protest to the new wave of immigration, rendered issues related to the future regime in Palestine non-urgent from the Jewish point of view—and unimportant from the pan-Arab standpoint. 33

Meeting of Zionist Executive, Dec. 20, 1922, CZA. Menahem Ussishkin (1863–1941). one of the founders of the Hibbat Zion (Lovers of Zion) movement in 1882 and the head of the Jewish National Fund ( JNF) from 1923 to 1943. 35 Dr. Yaakov Tehon (1880–1950), vice president of the Jewish National Assembly in Palestine in the 1920s. 36 David Yellin (1864–1942), an important personality in the revival of Hebrew national education in Palestine and president of the National Assembly (1920–1931). 37 Third Aliyah, 1919–1923—the third wave of Zionist immigration to Palestine, encompassing 30,000–35,000 people, mostly from Russia. 34

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Just then, the Zionist Movement recorded a political achievement that strengthened the status of the Yishuv as an autonomous national entity: the certification of the status of Keneset Yisrael by the Mandatory in 1927. Although the certification referred to Keneset Yisrael as a religious community, Zionism invested its activity with a pronouncedly national nature. This, plus the circumstances mentioned above, removed the topic of the future arrangement in Palestine from the Zionist Executive agenda. Another aspect worth bearing in mind was Jabotinsky’s resignation from the Zionist Executive in 1923 and his assumption of the leadership of the Revisionist opposition to Weizmann’s policies. From then on, Jabotinsky did not rediscuss federative and confederative solutions to the Palestine problem. Two years after his resignation, Jabotinsky explained in a personal letter to his friend Oscar Grusenberg why he had forsaken the idea of the Middle Eastern federation. Without relating to the fact that he had fought for the plan with the Zionist Executive only three years earlier, he stated, “I am not an enthusiast of an Arab-Hebrew federation.” The reasoning behind this statement flowed from a worldview that he never abandoned or repudiated: “We are Europe, not only the pupils but also the creators of European civilization. What have we got to do with the ‘East’? After all, everything ‘Eastern’ about it is doomed to extinction in any case.” To prove it, he mentioned the reforms of Ataturk, the national leader of the Turkish state, which he viewed as the dawn of the Westernization of the East. Eventually the situation in the East will change; “In another fifty years, one doubts whether there will be any further need for a federation with Syria or Egypt.” Instead of federative thinking, he expressed a Utopian vision of international unity: “I am passionately hopeful that by then the civilized world at large will have become a federation, in which even a small state will be able to live securely between Syria and Egypt.38 Jabotinsky and his movement, of course, chose a political path that was prepared to terminate the overt political confrontation with Britain but saw no way to resolve the Jewish-Arab conflict in any way but by force. Thus, the intriguing question for our purposes

38 Z. Jabotinsky to O. Grusenberg, Nov. 12, 1925, Letters, Tel Aviv, pp. 73–74. For his attitude toward Eastern culture, see Z. Jabotinsky, “The East,” Writings, Tel Aviv, pp. 273–84.

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is whether Jabotinsky had totally despaired of the federal principles. I discuss the matter later in this study. Even after Jabotinsky resigned from the Zionist Executive and dissociated himself from the thought of federal arrangements with the Arabs, such schemes continued to make inroads. In 1924, the banner of federalism was hoisted by Shelomo Kaplansky,39 a leader of Ahdut ha-’Avoda and the World Alliance of Po’alei Tsiyyon and secretary of the Zionist Organization Settlement Department.

The Federation According to Kaplansky Kaplansky had been familiar with the “Arab problem” since the period preceding World War I. As a person strongly associated with the Po’alei Tsiyyon party in Palestine and a frequent visitor to the country at the time, he was also well connected with the institutions of the international labor movement and maintained ties with several leaders of the British Labour Party. In 1924, as noted above, an electoral upheaval in Britain brought the Labour Party to power. For the first time in British history, a force that held a much more complex attitude toward Zionism than that of the Conservatives entered the political mainstream. Since 1917, when it had become a political party, Labour was mired in a contradiction between sympathy for the Jews’ suffering and identification with the constructivist socialist enterprise in Palestine, on the one hand, and opposition to what its leaders considered Zionist colonialism.40 Although Kaplansky believed that the political turnaround in Britain would shortly turn back again due to the balance of forces in Parliament, he thought of it as both an opportunity for and a menace to the Zionist enterprise. Therefore, like Jabotinsky two years previously, he prodded the Zionist leadership to respond to the new political situation by unfurling a political initiative of its own. The initiative, in his opinion, should be aimed at the attainment of a direct Jewish-Arab agreement with the mediation of the ruling Labour Party. Importantly, in contrast to the Tories, some of whom were 39 Shelomo Kaplansky (1884–1950), a founding father of the Po’alei Tsiyyon World Movement and head of the Haifa Technion (1932–1950). 40 See Gorny, The British Labour Movement and Zionism, 1917–1948, Part 1. London, 1983.

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pro-Zionist, the Labour Party expressed its support for the Jewish settlement enterprise in Palestine. Kaplansky’s scheme was debated by his party, Ahdut ha-’Avoda, and was presented to the Labour Party in a memorandum in his name.41 In his remarks, he presented three alternatives that Zionist policy might adopt in regard to the regime in Palestine. The first was to carry on with the method of governance conventionally applied in British crown colonies. Despite the large-scale Jewish immigration to Palestine that year, Kaplansky saw three drawbacks in the existing situation: the bureaucratic nature of the regime, the anti-Zionist bias of its officials, and the exclusion of the local population from running the country. The second alternative was to revert to the idea of an advisory legislative council to the commissioner. Although this alternative was more democratic than the previously mentioned arrangement, it was unacceptable to the Arabs and presented no few dangers to the Jews. Thus, Zionism had come to an ominous impasse. The way out, in Kaplansky’s thinking, was the third alternative: We should muster the courage to march together with the Arabs down the path of developing self-rule in Palestine and eliminating the bureaucratic broker. To accomplish this, adequate guarantees of equality for the two peoples should be given and Jewish immigration and settlement should continue undisturbed. Thus far, we have asked for equality without rights, whereas now it should be sought with equal national and political rights.

In other words, the future regime in Palestine should be based on the universal principle of recognition of all peoples’ equal national rights, as opposed to the imperial interests of the ruling powers in the region. This tenet was directed at the worldview of the British Socialists, and the entire plan sought to resolve the contradiction between democracy and the Mandatory rule under the protection of which Zionism had found shelter. The four main provisions of Kaplansky’s proposal follow: 1. Administration of the internal national affairs of the two peoples in Palestine—Jews and Arabs—shall be handed over to

41 S. Kaplansky, “Palestine Policy Program for a Labour Government,” Vision and Fulfillment, Tel Aviv, 1950 (Hebrew), pp. 260–67 (hereinafter: Kaplansky, Vision and Fulfillment).

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democratic institutions of their respective national autonomies, which are empowered to levy taxes. 2. The legislature of Palestine shall include a house of representatives and a senate. The house of representatives shall be chosen in democratic elections (and for this reason shall have an Arab majority, for the time being). The senate shall be made up of two numerically equal national delegations—Jewish and Arab—and shall serve as a conspicuous organ of equality in the rights and status of the two peoples (by preventing either side from attaining an outright victory over the other). The national delegations to the senate shall be elected by the national assemblies of the two peoples and shall vote in the senate as blocs. 3. The provisions of the Mandate in respect to the Jewish national home shall be included in the basic constitution (but in a more explicit and binding manner). The division of powers between the Mandatory and the parliament and the National Assembly shall be rearranged. This problem shall be treated separately and placidly. The Mandatory shall certainly retain some powers, such as command of the army and the police and protection of the Holy Places. 4. The agreement shall be complemented by an Arab-Jewish pact. The pact shall include an accord concerning the division of powers between Jews and Arabs in governance of the country, i.e., it shall prepare the ground for the gradual transfer of the government departments to people in whom Parliament trusts. Departments that are especially important for the cause of Jewish settlement, e.g., the Immigration Department and the Public Works Department, shall be handed over to the Jews, whereas in regard to the remaining departments each department director shall be assigned a deputy from the other people.42 Kaplansky also presumed that the Palestine federation could become a member of the Arab confederation—the Middle Eastern one—that would come into being in the distant future. In the meantime, his main concern was the future regime in Palestine on both sides of the Jordan River, which he considered a single political unit.

42

Ibid., pp. 265–66.

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Thus, there was an interesting similarity between the motives and the plans of the liberal, Jabotinsky, and the socialist, Kaplansky. This should come as no surprise, since as of the early 1920s Jabotinsky had not yet become the leader of the opposition in the Zionist Organization. Similarities between political liberalism and social democracy were an accepted phenomenon in Zionist politics and in Britain. Furthermore, in 1923, Ahdut ha-’Avoda43 still considered Jabotinsky an ally in the formation of an activist democratic political counterweight to Weizmann’s authoritative leadership. It is against this background that one should understand the importance that both men attributed to political initiatives under changing political conditions and their criticism of the passive policy of the Zionist Executive, which, in their view, preferred passivity over forward-looking conceptual political thought. Both leaders were noteworthy not only for their Utopian drive but also for political caution. Therefore, they believed that the path to a Jewish-Arab settlement should be compatible with Britain’s regional interests and should compensate the Arabs of Palestine for the possibility of eventually becoming a minority. Accordingly, they found the federative framework, among the political and constitutional alternatives, the one that could best satisfy the two national groups’ aspirations and the British interests under the existing conditions. As for the plans themselves, both men distinguished between the first phase, in which a federative society would be established in Palestine, and the second phase, in which the regional confederation would be established. The local federation would be based on the parity method—parity between two national autonomies; between two elected chambers (upper and lower); in division of powers; between representatives of the national groups in the executive authority; and between two systems of governance—the federal and the Mandatory. Furthermore, the authors of both plans proposed cooperation with the Arab ruling elites. This was more difficult for Kaplansky, the socialist, than for Jabotinsky, the liberal. Even in his case, however, political calculus outweighed ideological disapproval. Nevertheless, there was one important difference between them, a harbinger of the basic political differences between Revisionism

43 Ahdut ha-’Avoda—the major political party in the Zionist Labor movement in the 1919–1930 period.

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and the Zionist Labor Movement. According to Jabotinsky’s political outlook, a demonstration of principle is a political tool. True to this view, he insisted vehemently on the entitlement of the entire Jewish people to Palestine and, therefore, demanded that the Jews at large be represented in the parliament of Palestine. The Labor Movement, in contrast, strove to avoid any a priori principled confrontation in political negotiations, albeit without relinquishing the principles. The proof of this approach was seen in Kaplansky’s scheme. Kaplansky did not demand representation for the Jewish people, as Jabotinsky did, but refused to compromise on Jewish immigration to Palestine and the Jews’ right to become a majority there as the result of immigration. Weizmann and the leaders of the Labor Movement adopted this method as well. Although Weizmann had been somewhat influenced by Jabotinsky’s rhetorical style during the period when the two men cooperated, he weaned himself from it after their political and personal falling-out. Finally, one cannot end this chapter without noting that the fate of Kaplansky’s plan in Ahdut ha-’Avoda resembled that of Jabotinsky’s plan in the Zionist Executive. At the Ahdut ha-’Avoda convention in 1924, where Kaplansky lectured about his plan, the entire leadership in Palestine took him severely to task.44 Izhak Ben-Zvi45 saw no urgent need to present the plan to the new Government and disputed the argument that changes of government in London had anything to do with the fulfillment of Zionism. He warned of three latent dangers in Kaplansky’s plan: The proportionally composed house of representatives would undoubtedly disserve the main interests of Zionism, Jewish immigration and rural settlement; the parity composition of the executive authority might lead to governmental paralysis; and—here he expressed the deeply seated suspicions of Ben-Zvi and his colleagues about the Arab leaders’ intentions—the Arab leaders would regard the program as a point of departure for additional political achievements for themselves. Ben-Gurion repeated a claim that was commonly voiced in his party at the time: no negotiations should be held with the dominant Arab elite because this

44 See Y. Gorny, Ahdut ha-‘Avoda 1919–1930—The Ideological Foundations and the Political System, Tel Aviv, 1973 (Hebrew) (hereinafter: Gorny, Ahdut ha-‘Avoda). 45 Izhak Ben-Zvi (1884–1963), one of the senior leaders in the Zionist Labor Movement and the second president of the State of Israel (1952–1963).

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elite regarded the Jews as a national and class enemy. Such negotiations were doomed to fail from the outset. Berl Katznelson46 stressed that it would be a grave historical mistake if “we put together now a political program that will determine the country’s fate for generations to come, or even for the next ten years.” The connection between these matters and the onset of the Fourth Aliya was not coincidental. Additionally, however, Katznelson was deeply troubled about the possibility of entrusting the fate of national and social values to a formal democratic decision of majority vs. minority. His concern pertained not only to the question of the Jews’ status in the parliament of Palestine but also to the status of the Labor Movement in the Zionist Organization.47 He was also convinced that the cultural differences between the Jewish and Arab societies were so profound that in the short term it would be better for them to separate than to cooperate, since the failure of any such cooperation was preordained. Notably, in this debate Kaplansky was supported only by his comrades in the World Alliance of Po’alei Tsiyyon Executive, Zalman Rubashov (Shazar) and Berl Locker, who had come from Vienna for the Ahdut ha-’Avoda convention. They, like him, were more sensitive than their comrades in Palestine to the trends of thought in the international labor movement.

46 Berl Katznelson (1887–1944), one of the founders of the Zionist Labor Movement in Palestine, its spiritual leader, and the editor of its newspaper, Davar. 47 Ibid., pp. 169–76.

CHAPTER TWO

THE FEDERATIVE AUTONOMY MODEL

The National Autonomy Idea The Ahdut ha-’Avoda leadership opposed Kaplansky’s program partly due to suspicion about the intentions of its Arab counterparts, some distrust in the British Government, and, perhaps, an a priori aversion to “imported” political or social schemes. In the main, however, the Ahdut ha-’Avoda leaders opposed it because their party had adopted a different federative outlook during the 1920s: a nationalautonomy structure for the two peoples in Palestine. The idea of national autonomy within a federative state structure was related to the tradition of political liberalism and, especially, Eastern and Central European social democracy. They were brought to Palestine by members of Po’alei Tsiyyon who settled in the country during the Second Aliya years and found expression in the early writings of Ber (Dov) Borochov.1 However, the ideas had been publicized first in the Ottoman era, in a “Manifesto” put out by four socialist parties, including Po’alei Tsiyyon, during the first Balkan War (1912).2 The authors of the broadsheet cautioned against expansionist attempts by European imperialism to undermine the status of the Ottoman state by fomenting nationalist views there. Religious zealotry and ultranationalism, they warned, would cause the state to disintegrate and forces of reaction to ascend throughout the region. Following the traditional attitudes of social democracy on the eve of World War I, the authors expressed staunch opposition to the partitioning of the Ottoman Empire into independent nation-states. 1 Ber (Dov) Borochov (1881–1917), Socialist thinker and founder of the Russian Po’alei Tsiyyon party. Y. Gorny, “From the Autonomy Idea to the Statehood Idea,” Keshet, 39/10, 1969 (Hebrew), pp. 119–39. 2 “Manifesto,” Ha-ahdut, Autumn 1913; the broadsheet was signed by the Armenian Social Democrat Party, the Romanian Social Democrat Party, the Socialist Federation in Saloniki, and Po’alei Tsiyyon in Palestine.

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Instead, they proposed a federative political structure, based on national autonomy, that would preserve the integrity of the state and satisfy just national aspirations as well. In their opinion, then, for principled and political reasons the only way to solve the internal problems of the Ottoman state was: to grant all nations full home rule in their cultural affairs: schools, synagogues, and the like; to arrange systematic local government, counties and districts, together with provincial representatives of all racial elements and parties; and to equalize the rights of the languages.

This Utopian manifesto broke no new conceptual ground and carried no political importance. However, it is of interest to us as an initial illustration of the premise of this study: the relationship between federative plans and what seemed to members of that generation as a historical opportunity in the national sense and a political opportunity that might not recur—an opportunity that was consistent with the interests of the regional ruling power. The historical opportunity flowed from the proposition that the Balkan War might be another phase in the democratization process that had begun in the Ottoman Empire after the Young Turks revolution in 1908. Against the background of the multinational Ottoman society, this process was perceived solely as a way to assure selfdetermination by means of national autonomies within a federative state. The idea was considered realistic not due to an analysis of the state of affairs in the empire but also due to the traditional Ottoman recognition of the autonomy of religious communities—the millet system. Obviously, such development carried great hopes for the Zionist enterprise in Palestine. Alongside political programs for the future, the manifesto had some political utility to offer. By giving Po’alei Tsiyyon “equal billing” with other social democratic parties in the region, the document invested the party with international socialist recognition of sorts as a Jewish national labor party in Palestine. This achievement, albeit symbolic, should be judged in view of the principled opposition in the Second International to the ideology of Po’alei Tsiyyon, which defined the Jewish labor class as a national entity a even though it was dispersed in a multitude of countries. This opposition, evinced until the end of World War I, was reflected in the refusal of the leaders of the Socialist Federation of the Balkans, headquartered in Saloniki,

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to admit Po’alei Tsiyyon as a member—even though most of its leaders were of Jewish origin.3 The two factors—hope for the future and utility in the present— corresponded to the interests of the Ottoman power in the indivisibility of the empire. Therefore, they carried no risk of confrontation with the Ottoman government. In this sense, Ben-Gurion and Izhak Ben-Zvi, who represented Po’alei Tsiyyon vis-à-vis the Social Democratic Federation, deviated from Borochov’s political premises. In Borochov’s thinking, Jewish national autonomy in Palestine would be established in the aftermath of a class struggle in Jewish society that would evolve into a confrontation between Jews and the Ottoman authorities and end with the intervention of the European powers, which would have an interest in solving the problem by granting national autonomy to the Jews in Palestine.4 Ben-Gurion and BenZvi, in contrast, believed that national autonomy would be attained in the course of the democratization process that was sweeping the Ottoman Empire. In other words, they valued top-down changes, instigated by the regime, more highly than the bottom-up enterprise of class and national struggle. In another difference, Borochov spoke of a long-term process that would unfold once a Jewish society of class structure would come into being, whereas Ben-Gurion and BenZvi attempted to tailor their outlook to changing political circumstances.5 Notably, the political concept of Po’alei Tsiyyon in Palestine was the inverse of Borochov’s premises. Borochov considered national autonomy a consequence of social development; Po’alei Tsiyyon thought of national autonomy as an appropriate framework for the building of the Jewish national society under the leadership and the constructivist guidance of the working class.6

3 See S. Teveth, Kin’at David, Tel Aviv, 1977 (Hebrew), pp. 221–23. See also I. Ben-Zvi, Po’alei Tsiyyon in the Second Aliya, Tel Aviv, 1950 (Hebrew), pp. 109–45. According to Ben-Zvi, the Bulgarian socialist leader, Dmitri Volkov, was pro-Zionist. 4 B. Borochov, “Our Platform” (1906), in L. Levitas and D. Ben Nahum, eds., Writings, Tel Aviv, 1955 (Hebrew), pp. 103ff. 5 See Gorny, n. 1 above. 6 See Y. Gorny, “Between Continuity and Change,” in S. Yevin, ed., Rafael Mahler Book, Merhavia, 1974 (Hebrew), pp. 89–112. The autonomy idea was a deviation from the social-democratic outlook in the Zionist Movement. See A. Ruppin, Jewish Autonomy in Palestine (1907)—Thirty Years of Building in Palestine, Jerusalem, 1937 (Hebrew), pp. 1–9.

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The dramatic change in the state of affairs in Palestine after World War I, and in the status of the Zionist Movement there, ostensibly created many opportunities for the autonomist outlook that Po’alei Tsiyyon had developed during the Second Aliya.7 In 1919, nonaligned Labor Zionists merged with Po’alei Tsiyyon to form the Ahdut ha-’Avoda party, which made the autonomous-federalism idea a focal point in its political thinking. The leaders of the new party, Ben-Gurion in particular, sketched out a two-dimensional structure of federative autonomy. One dimension was national, composed of two organized societies; the other one was of class nature, built around two federations of labor, Jewish and Arab. The term for this was “the international organization.” The debate over the class aspect took place in the Histadrut, the General Federation of Jewish Labor. In the 1920s, the issue commanded particular attention in Ahdut ha-’Avoda, whose leaders were the standard-bearers of the idea of cooperation among both peoples’ workers. The national dimension, in contrast, was debated in the institutions of Keneset Yisrael and attracted less attention. This is not to say that Ahdut ha-’Avoda considered the idea of national federalism of lesser value. Since Ahdut ha-’Avoda regarded the labor society and the organization of the working class as an alternative to the existing bourgeois society, one may draw an analogy between its class federalist outlook and its national federalist outlook.

Ben-Gurion’s Doctrine of Autonomy The most energetic and vehement debater at both levels was BenGurion, who had just returned from a mission to Britain and had been named Secretary of the Histadrut. In 1922, in the Elected Assembly (Asefat ha-Nivharim) of the Yishuv, Ben-Gurion unveiled a program for the establishment of Jewish autonomy in Palestine.8

7 Second Aliyah (1904–1914)—the second wave of Zionist immigration from Russia to Palestine, encompassing 25,000–30,000 people, most notably the young pioneers who founded the Zionist Labor Movement in Palestine. David Ben-Gurion was a member of this group. 8 D. Ben-Gurion, “To Arrange ‘Hebrew Autonomy’,” Kuntress, February 1922 (Hebrew). The insert took place that month. See D. Ben-Gurion, Memoirs, a, Tel Aviv, 1971 (Hebrew), p. 193, (hereinafter, Ben-Gurion, Memoirs).

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As the Assembly debated the issue, the delegates were divided between proponents and opponents of the autonomy idea. The latter expressed concern that were the Yishuv to be granted some degree of independence, Britain would find it easier to renege gradually on its commitments in regard to the Jewish national home, as reflected foremost in its responsibility for the conduct of sound life in Palestine. Countering them, Ben-Gurion argued that “Even those who rely on England’s promise to help us to build our national home should be aware that if we do not build [it] by our own forces, no assistance will give us anything further.” What Ben-Gurion really wanted was to persuade the delegates of the Yishuv’s diverse political factions to accept the activist Zionist outlook of Ahdut ha-’Avoda. Since the end of World War I, in view of the political opportunity that the Balfour Declaration had given Zionism, Ben-Gurion wished to make the Zionist Organization a “leading contractor” in the construction of Jewish society in Palestine. Disillusioned since 1922 about the actions of the Zionist Organization under Weizmann, he sought to assign the constructive role to the Yishuv’s own autonomous organization. “We should build our Yishuv and also our culture, agriculture, industry, education, health, and national and political public life by ourselves; this is the idea of national autonomy,” he stated. The goals of autonomism at that time, in Ben-Gurion’s view, were two: gradual disengagement from British patronage and structural disengagement of Jewish society from Arab society. He traced the goal of disengagement to the period preceding the Balfour Declaration, when: Knowingly or not, it has been our aspiration from the first founding of the Jewish Yishuv in Palestine to organize our lives under our own authority, to liberate ourselves from the yoke of foreign rule to the extent possible. This aspiration has been embedded in us since the era of Turkish rule. . . . We should not resent the Arabs if they get a little more out of the national education budget than we do. On the contrary, we should be pleased and proud of this fact. We shall establish our own culture, like all other aspects of our lives, by means of our national resources and not by means of foreign helpers but with our own hands.9

Ben-Gurion’s separatist autonomism was based on the premise of centralized organization. The debate in the Elected Assembly took 9

Ibid., pp. 193–94.

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place between those who considered the communities the proper source of authority for the autonomy and those who demanded that a central assembly be given this prerogative. The first approach may be defined as confederative and the second one federative. Ben-Gurion was pro-federative, of course. Such a belief was consistent with his general worldview, as reflected in his approach toward every organizational structure from the Histadrut to the Zionist Organization and up to the Jewish state. On the basis of this outlook, he set forth the basic outlines of Jewish national autonomy, which I quote verbatim: (a) The Elected Assembly lays the foundations for an autonomous Jewish collective [knesset] in Palestine and demands that the Government give said collective its approval, its legal basis, and its legal agency to arrange and manage all internal affairs of the Hebrew collective in Palestine by its own authority. (b) The following fall within the sphere of activity of the Hebrew collective: (1) ensuring order and administration in Hebrew localities, districts, and communities; (2) children’s education, public schooling, and fostering of the Hebrew language and culture; (3) advancement of the Yishuv economy; (4) assistance for immigrants, provision of work to those in need of it, and protection of labor; (5) arranging relief and charity affairs; (6) protection of public health in the Jewish Yishuv; (7) establishing and running public administrations; (8) public works in Hebrew localities; (9) administering Jewish law; (10) maintaining security within Hebrew localities; (11) legal protection of the rights and interests of the Hebrew collective, Hebrew localities and communities, and their Jewish members. (c) The supreme institution of the Hebrew collective in Palestine is the committee of delegates of the collective (or the Elected Assembly) of the Jews of Palestine. This assembly is empowered to legislate and to levy taxes in all matters that fall within its agency and the sphere of action of the autonomous collective of the Jews of Palestine. (d) Every Jewish man and woman who dwells in Palestine is a member of the Hebrew collective and a participant in its rights and obligations, and [all such Jews] are organized locally in localities and communities. (e) Every place that belongs to and is wholly settled by Jews is a Jewish locality. Each locality is an autonomous administrative entity that participates in the Hebrew collective. . . . Jews who dwell near a locality but outside its confines join the locality as associate members. (f ) Jews who live in a place where there is no Jewish locality are incorporated into an autonomous Hebrew community that arranges and manages all its internal affairs by itself, in accordance with the community constitution set forth by the Elected Assembly.10 10

Ibid., pp. 195–96.

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Ben-Gurion’s scheme blends two ideas: Austrian socialism in regard to territorial and personal autonomy and the community autonomism of Simon Dubnow.11 Thus he fused the elements of locality (territory), membership on the basis of association (personal), and community organization that transcends locality and territory. Ben-Gurion probably intended to apply the autonomy method to all inhabitants of Palestine, thereby creating a federative multinational society, but he did not stress this principle in his remarks on that occasion. This may have been a function of the element in his worldview that he considered most important at the time. The matter of greatest urgency then was the quasi-governmental centralized autonomous organization of the Jewish collective. This was BenGurion’s paramount goal, and adding the Arab dimension to the internal debate in the Elected Assembly would certainly impede its attainment. Furthermore, it seems as though Ben-Gurion had not yet worked out, in final form, a comprehensive conception of federalist autonomy that would apply to both peoples. One may infer this from a proposal that he presented in 1920 to the Second Convention of Ahdut ha-’Avoda, to admit Arab workers to the Histadrut as associate members with equal rights.12

From Autonomism to Federalism Ben-Gurion changed his mind shortly thereafter. In 1924, he advertised his plan for the establishment of one federative labor organization for members of both peoples.13 The centralist principle was expressed in the first section of the constitution of the envisioned alliance: “The international labor alliance unites all federations of labor in Palestine irrespective of religion and nationality and manages all shared interests of the working class in Palestine.” In Section 2, which deals with the sphere of activity of the alliance, a comprehensive or total approach is stressed. The labor alliance is 11 Shimon Dubnow (1861–1941), historian and political ideologist. His main historical work was the ten-volume World History of the Jewish People, published in German in Berlin, 1925–1929. 12 Gorny, Ahdut ha-’Avoda, p. 141. 13 D. Ben-Gurion, “A Binational Labor Alliance in Palestine (Proposal for the General Convention of the Histadrut),” Our Neighbors and Us, Tel Aviv, 1931 (Hebrew), pp. 70–71.

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to organize all workers irrespective of religion or nationality; to wage the labor struggle; to ensure working conditions and arrange insurance for workers and working youth; to facilitate the immigration to Palestine of Jewish organized labor; to establish mutual-aid institutions such as health funds and strike funds; and to disseminate culture among workers. Thus, the transnational federative labor organization should undertake all functions typically discharged by the General Federation of Jewish Labor. Section 3 determines the Jewish-Arab balance in the organization. The federation shall be run in both languages, Hebrew and Arabic, which will have official parity of status. Section 4 sketches the triple-tiered federative nature of the alliance. The first tier is the binational sectoral trade union: “In every trade in which there are workers of different nationalities, the workers shall unionize as a transnational trade association.” The second tier is the national trade union: “Workers of each nationality within the transnational trade organization shall join an autonomous national chapter.” The third tier is the general national federation, which unifies “all the national chapters of each individual nationality,” and has “comprehensive [authority] and the prerogative of self-administration in all matters, provided that [said prerogative] not clash with the constitution and statutes of the alliance and its competent institutions.” The alliance shall be managed by a supreme institution, “the International Council of Labor, composed of representatives of the general [single-nationality] autonomous federations of the alliance on the basis of proportional election. This Council shall elect an Executive Committee from its membership.” Ben-Gurion also ruled that membership in the alliance should not be personally based but determined in view of the national unit. Therefore, “In every trade that has single-nationality chapters, a member may belong to the multi-nationality association only by means of his single-nationality chapter.” The difference between this scheme and its predecessor from two years earlier—in which Ben-Gurion offered Arab workers a form of associate membership in the Histadrut by joining its health fund and invited them to join contract labor groups as the Jews’ equals— attests to the transition in Ben-Gurion’s thinking from autonomism to federalism, initially with regard to the status of labor and thence to society at large. In his debate with Kaplansky, who proposed the establishment of a binational parliamentary regime in Palestine,

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Ben-Gurion mentioned his idea of creating a transnational Histadrut and explained: [In my plan] I attempted to note the federative organizational form that would make cooperation possible even though the difference in contents and phases of development will keep the Jewish and the Arab labor movements in this country separate for much to time to come. One may challenge this form as a whole or in regard to some of its details, but one thing is clear to me: we should seek an agreement with and the understanding of the Arab people solely by means of the Arab worker, and only thorough an alliance between Hebrew and Arab workers will it be possible to establish and sustain an alliance between the Hebrew and Arab peoples in Palestine.14

At this phase, then, Ben-Gurion still considered the fulfillment of the binational structure a two-phased sociopolitical process. At the level of principle, however, he was already willing to state, without being prompted and without hesitation, that “The Arab collective in Palestine is entitled to self-determination and self-rule. It is preposterous to deny or devalue this right.”15 It took another two years for Ben-Gurion’s federative outlook to crystallize. In a lengthy programmatic lecture at the first session of the Elected Assembly in late 1926, he set forth several basic premises. The first was sociocultural: autonomy is the structure best suited to society in Palestine, which is unparalleled in its national, religious, ethnic, and cultural diversity. Thus, the way the Jews organize their public affairs does not depend on the nature of the regime, “be it the Mandatory government or, at some future time, a government of the residents of Palestine.”16 In either case, autonomy is a consequence of the nature of the country’s society. This led Ben-Gurion to his second premise, a legal and political one: the pluralistic nature of the society also determines the decentralized structure of the regime under which it is organized. The central government should handle several functions without which the state framework cannot exist, e.g., a uniform monetary system, a transport system, and postal services. All other social and cultural functions should be entrusted to the national autonomies. By so stating, Ben-Gurion proposed a twotiered structure of governance: a decentralized framework, the state, and a centralized internal regime, the national autonomy. 14 15 16

Ibid., p. 75. Ibid., p. 73. “National Autonomy and Neighborly Relations,” ibid., pp. 110–30.

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The third premise, one of national morality, was meant to justify the two preceding premises and to counter those who believed that the regime of national autonomies would eventually endanger Zionism by perpetuating Jewish-Arab parity even after a Jewish majority were attained. To counter the critics, Ben-Gurion articulated the principle that “What we demand of ourselves we demand of others, and we are willing to give others what we want others to give us.” Thus, Ben-Gurion spoke of total reciprocity in Jewish-Arab relations, “for better or worse.” This moral principle led Ben-Gurion to a constitutional-state concept that signaled a value change in the theory and praxis of democratic governance in multinational states. As he viewed the matter, the formal relationship between majority and minority should be annulled reciprocally: There is no difference whatsoever whether we are a minority and others are the majority, or if we are the majority and others are the minority. Just relations between peoples cannot depend on whether one people is a minority and the other is a majority. This is the basic premise that guides and determines relations between ourselves and our Arab neighbors, and it is from this basic premise that we should draw all practical conclusions.

By expressing matters this way, Ben-Gurion established a rule of sorts. Therefore, he went on to say that “This premise guides everything we do in Palestine. This moral awareness conditions our entire existence on our work in Palestine; without this moral basis, we have no existence either in Palestine or anywhere else.” Ben-Gurion also invested this rule with universalistic meaning. “No regime or government in the world will endure for long by crude force alone, and no political claim will succeed for long unless it rests on large moral foundations.”17 We must note in this context that the rule was set at naught in the course of history, in view of the paradoxical if not tragic fate that visited Zionism precisely under Ben-Gurion’s leadership. Ben-Gurion’s moral premise, however farsighted it sounds in view of the collapse of Communist rule in Europe in the late twentieth century, is somewhat puzzling in regard to its essence and its time. After all, for the next twenty years Ben-Gurion was the leading figure in promoting federal ideas as ways of solving the Jewish-Arab conflict.

17

Ibid., pp. 122–23.

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One may argue, of course, that the remarks were nothing but an acquired façade that Ben-Gurion presented throughout his public career to mask his real political intentions. If one follows this serpentine trail, one may easily find evidence of the astonishing discrepancy between his rhetoric and his actions. One may, however, view the matter differently: The qualities of moralistic optimist and realistic statesman were inseparably integrated in Ben-Gurion’s personality. His Utopian yearnings were short-lived; they surfaced at “exalted historical moments.” His cold political calculus, in contrast, coupled with an element of Machiavellianism, accompanied him throughout his lengthy career as a leader.18 The debate over establishing territorial national autonomy with state powers in internal affairs, as a political framework for a new Jewish society that would be different from anything known in Diaspora life to that point, gave rise to such a moment.

Federalism as Viewed by Berl Katznelson19 Ben-Gurion’s centralized federative outlook at the class level—which, as stated, was the first phase of a more comprehensive concept— did not win full support among the leaders of Ahdut ha-’Avoda. In a party debate over the binational-federation issue, Izhak Ben-Zvi and Berl Katznelson presented a much more decentralized approach than Ben-Gurion’s. They opposed the establishment of a binational federation as an umbrella for two national federations. A better option, in their opinion, was a pair of parallel national federations that would cooperate in the protection of labor. Only at the level of central government did they believe in the necessity of a binational trade association.20 Thus, Katznelson’s approach was more confederative than federative in regard to cooperation between the two people’s labor organizations. Katznelson also applied this cautious approach to Jewish-Arab relations at the general national level. In a programmatic lecture at

18 Y. Gorny, “The Utopian Leap in the Social Thought of David Ben-Gurion,” Mibifnim, 49 (Winter 1987/88), pp. 257–71 (Hebrew). 19 Berl Katznelson (1887–1944)—the spiritual and political senior leader of the Zionist Labor Movement in Palestine since the Second Aliyah. 20 Gorny, Ahdut ha-’Avoda, pp. 152–57.

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the Mapai Council in early 1931, he explained cohesively his outlook on the binational-federation issue.21 The main intent of his remarks was to counter the binational philosophy of Brit Shalom and those who bandied about the “Jewish state” slogan. Both concepts, in his opinion, deviated from the true Zionist vision and ideal of building an autonomous Jewish national society that would not exert control over its counterpart. While he regarded the idea of establishing a Jewish state at once as inane, he viewed as highly dangerous a binationalism translated into practical terms in a democratic legislative council composed on a proportional demographic basis. In contrast to both concepts, Katznelson expressed his belief in “binationalism as a universal principle and a federative structure for both peoples in Palestine as a possibility.” Basically, Katznelson’s view of binationalism was not different from the one expressed by Ben-Gurion five years earlier. However, while Ben-Gurion invested it mainly with a moral dimension in JewishArab relations, Katznelson predicated it foremost on each people’s national entitlements in multinational systems. His basic postulate was that multinationalism, which exists in various states and societies, is not identical with true binationalism. A binational state, he said, is: one in which both national groups are equal in freedom and independence, in the extent of governance, and in rights of representation. . . . The whole term “binationalism” makes sense only if it is reflected in legal political norms that assure the principles of the national groups’ political equality. It is these [principles] that make the nationstate categorically different from the national state. The meaning of this is that a binational political regime recognizes . . . two national blocs, both of which are assured the same extent of participation in shaping the country’s governance, and both of which are equally entitled to determine its fate.

Katznelson dismissed the binational philosophy of Brit Shalom as anti-Zionist and ridiculed the demand to establish a Jewish state at once, in a canton of sorts in Palestine, claiming that such an entity would be meaningful only as an object of derision. The basis for a juridical political process that would allow Jewish-Arab society to advance from an agreed coexistence to an egalitarian federative 21 B. Katznelson, “On Issues of the Political Regime in Palestine,” Writings, B, Tel Aviv, 1946 (Hebrew), pp. 150–67.

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binationalism, he said, was in fact the British Mandate in its present form. The process he envisaged was a phased one: “municipal democracy, national autonomy, and giving the populations of the country an involvement in influencing the conduct of the country’s affairs—an involvement that will steadily increase—on the basis of national parity.”22 In Katznelson’s thinking, municipal democracy was the basis for the future binational federative structure—“a path toward class differentiation on the basis of vital interests.” The municipal authorities would be elected on the basis of universal suffrage and some of them would be mixed Arab-Jewish. In them, Katznelson believed, the Arab peasant and the Arab urban worker would learn to distinguish between “misleading exploiters and shunned comrades”— their current rulers, the lackeys of British bureaucrats, and even certain circles in the Jewish Yishuv—and the Jewish working class, the genuine ally of the Arab masses. The second phase is national autonomy, rooted in the Austrian social democratic political tradition, the Jewish liberal national outlook represented by Simon Dubnow, and the ideology of Socialist Zionism. One may infer what Katznelson had in mind in speaking of “national autonomy” from his criticism of the powers of Keneset Yisrael, which the Mandatory defined as a religious community and not a national one: The Keneset is like a corridor open at both ends: one who enters enters and one who leaves leaves. The individual need not be numbered among the national bloc into which he was born and in which he lives. One who wishes to evade its burden does not even need to swap it for a different national bloc; one simply leaves and is absolved from [its] obligations. The taxation power of the Keneset is limited due to various restrictions and the right of exit, which makes [the Keneset] ripe for anyone’s picking.

The Hebrew terms that Katznelson used—“corridor open at both ends,” “absolved from obligations,” “ripe for the picking”—were culled from the jargon of rabbinical law by which autonomous Jewish communities administered their affairs. Katznelson invoked them here to protest angrily the absence of state powers for the autonomous Jewish entity in Palestine.

22

Ibid., p. 162.

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The Arabs, Katznelson continued, are even worse off because they have “no institution to regulate their national life.” The Muslim majority does have the Higher Muslim Council, which owns much real estate and has handsome revenues. The Council, however, is “in controlled by a band of ‘dignitaries’ who lie beyond all public control.” This situation, in which Jews must settle for limited democratic powers and the Arabs for none, prompted Katznelson to conclude that the peoples’ respective needs are in equilibrium, so to speak. Both peoples “are interested in establishing democratic patterns for their national life. By invoking them, they will attain the following: satisfaction of their national needs by and under the authority of the nation itself, contraction of the domain of the foreign bureaucracy, internal class differentiation, and the creation of a democratic national agency.” On the basis of these two levels of autonomous governance, the municipal and the national, a process of Jewish-Arab cooperation would take shape in various fields, e.g., an “alliance of rural councils” or a regional “alliance of municipal councils” that have common economic and social interests. It was clear to Katznelson, however, that neither form of autonomy, even if shared by the two peoples, could serve “as a surrogate for the central government of Palestine.” This led Katznelson to the third phase in the development of federative rule in Palestine: “the democratization of governance at the countrywide level, the changeover from bureaucratic rule to self-rule. This is one of the country’s special political problems.” In contrast to Haim Arlosoroff ’s view, as I show below, Katznelson believed that the conventional process of bestowing self-rule in British crown colonies was unsuited to Palestine due, first of all, to “the sociocultural level of the Jewish Yishuv” and the international recognition of the Jewish people’s right to its national home in Palestine. Therefore, “All this makes it necessary to seek a solution in a form of governance that will prevent any takeover by one people of the other. Such a form will be found if the legislative institution is composed of the two national blocs in equal measure.”23

23

Ibid., pp. 164–65.

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In a Utopian spirit that disregarded nationalistic urges and interests, political intrigue, and personal ambitions, Katznelson interpreted the vision of federative parliamentarism on a parity basis. In his opinion, the parity structure of this institution, from which the Mandatory bureaucracy would be excluded, would by itself provide “guarantees against assaults, decree, and undercutting of the weaker national bloc.” In his opinion, the existence of national “equilibrium” in the representative chamber and the inability of the national blocs to call on representatives of the Mandatory for assistance would not paralyze the institution. Instead, it would educate “the elected officials of the two peoples to seek consensus and cooperation due to their vital interests.” Katznelson was not so naive as to presume that national blocs in the new legislature would not barricade themselves for some time. He assumed, however, that the nationalist urge would be countered by social logic, due to which everyone would realize that “without much likelihood of one national bloc defeating the other, since any attack would be deprived of its weapon . . . the national blocs will disintegrate into class blocs and opportunities will a rise for new combinations along social lines of partnership.” Notably, the autonomous federative regime that Katznelson had in mind was meant not to abolish the Mandatory but “to minimize [its] custodianship.”24 At the conceptual level, Katznelson’s plan for the phased establishment of the binational federation was identical to Ben-Gurion’s proposal for a transnational class federation. Thus, Katznelson’s municipal autonomy was parallel to Ben-Gurion’s Jewish and Arab labor associations in the national economies; the joint municipalities paralleled the binational trade unions in the central economy; the national autonomy paralleled the countrywide federation; and the binational parliamentary federation resembled the transnational umbrella organization for the two national federations. The two schemes were also identical at the level of principle. Both Katznelson and Ben-Gurion were enthusiasts of a realistic democracy that would take the place of formal democracy. According to this paradigm, each national group, irrespective of its size, is intrinsically equal to its counterpart in democratic rights and powers. Or, in Katznelson’s mellifluous paraphrase of Genesis 25:23, “One people shall not be mightier than the other.” 24

Ibid., p. 166.

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In view of the criticism that the two of them leveled against the proposals of their party colleague, Shelomo Kaplansky, the question to ask is how their outlook differed from his. If one may judge by the principle of total national equality in Jewish-Arab relations, their Utopian vision carried them farther than Kaplansky’s outlook. Kaplansky realized that it was out of the question to leave the majority of the population with no reflection of its status in parliament. Therefore, he was willing to risk proportional representation in the lower chamber and to counter this by structuring the upper chamber on an at-large basis. Furthermore, it was only due to the influence of his critical associates in Ahdut ha-’Avoda that he deferred the implementation of the plan for a ten-year interim period, during which only the “parity-based senate” would function.25 In another difference, both Ben-Gurion and Katznelson totally rejected, at that phase, any idea of cooperating with the existing Arab leadership in parliamentary affairs and in administration of the country, for all three reasons—national, class, and moral—combined. Kaplansky, in contrast, as a leader of the left wing of his party and a champion of the proletarian tradition of Po’alei Tsiyyon; did not flinch from such cooperation because he placed immediate political necessity over future ideological principle.26 In other words, Kaplansky reasoned that the path to a national settlement should begin with parliamentary federalism based on national autonomy; Ben-Gurion and Katznelson, in contrast, advocated national autonomies first of all, as a foundation on which comprehensive binational parliamentary federalism would be built. Additionally, since Kaplansky’s considerations were primarily political, he believed that the Zionist Movement would eventually have to pay for the desired settlement in Palestine by supporting the idea of the regional Arab confederation. For the time being, this matter lay outside Ben-Gurion and Katznelson’s political thinking. Notably, however, by early 1931, when Katznelson published his article, he and Ben-Gurion were no longer in total agreement about the political road to the binational federation. In the late 1920s, Ben-Gurion’s outlook moved closer to Kaplansky’s. We take this up in the next chapter. 25

Kaplansky, Vision and Fulfillment, Tel Aviv, 1950 (Hebrew), p. 266, note. S. Kaplansky, “The Question of the Constitution and Jewish-Arab Accord,” Vision and Fulfillment, pp. 268–74. 26

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The Arlosoroff Plan27 The debate within Zionist Labor Movement in the 1920s about the future political regime in Palestine did not concern itself only with the views cited above. In 1929, shortly before the Arab violence erupted, the Jewish Agency conducted a written plebiscite among a group of prominent personalities in regard to Jewish-Arab relations and the effect of this issue on the establishment of representative parliamentary institutions in Palestine.28 One of those who answered the plebiscite questions was Hayim (Victor) Arlosoroff. Arlosoroff ’s response, more than fifty pages long, was based on systematic study of the British colonial method of governance. His research on constitutional relations between the British rulers and the wide variety of peoples and tribes that made up the Empire, coupled with his knowledge of the multinational reality in Eastern Europe, led him to conclude that neither federative proposal—the parliamentary or the autonomistic—was suited to the social and political reality in Palestine. The balanced binational parliamentarism that Kaplansky proposed was, in Arlosoroff ’s opinion, a sure recipe for the effecting of reciprocal paralysis by the representatives of the two rival peoples. Thus, the arena of the hoped-for cooperation would become one of collision. He was even more critical of the national autonomy idea as broached by Ahdut ha-’Avoda, with which Po’alei Tsiyyon would merge within a few months. His argument against the Ahdut ha’Avoda autonomy plan was based mainly on principle. In his opinion, the whole point of establishing a regime of national autonomies was to protect cultural and ethnic minorities in countries where national minorities dwell. Consequently, in theory and in practice, autonomism perpetuates the status quo in relations between majority and minority, even though it improves these relations if adopted with the consent of both sides. Such a method is not only unacceptable to the Arabs but also clashes with the goals of Zionism, which aims to create a Jewish majority in Palestine. In addition to the aspect of principle, Arlosoroff found practical political drawbacks 27 Hayim (Victor) Arlosoroff (1899–1933)—an intellectual and political leader in the Zionist Labor Movement. 1931—head of the political department in the Jewish Agency. Assassinated in Tel Aviv in 1933. 28 “The Arab Question and Its Bearing on the Establishment of Representative Institutions in Palestine—June 10, 1929,” CZA, S25/4164.

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in the proposal. The autonomy proposed by Ahdut ha-’Avoda, he said, resembles an act of self-sequestering in a national ghetto, as Eastern European Jews used to do. This self-ghettoization, he continued, would endanger relations between the Mandatory and the Yishuv. It would raise a barrier between them and, by so doing, further weaken the political status of Palestine’s Jewish population. Furthermore, if the Mandatory government were to encounter two national autonomies, it would prefer the Arab one, which it would regard as “weak,” over the Jewish one in allocating subsidies and assistance from its budget. Finally, the autonomous system would not broaden the basis of Jewish-Arab cooperation in social fields; it would have the opposite effect. Thus, it would cast the communities into even a deeper abyss of estrangement. After dismissing both of his predecessors’ federal schemes, Arlosoroff proposed one of his own, for an interim period of indefinite length. His proposed federative regime would be made up of three levels: a regional council, a legislative council, and the Mandatory. The state would be divided into six districts, each run by a twelve-member council that would administer the district in all economic and social respects. A countrywide representative council would be composed of representatives of the councils. Chosen on the basis of a complicated method and suffrage conditioned on a certain level of schooling, the countrywide council would be comprised of eleven Arab members, six Jews, and officials of the Mandatory. In Arlosoroff ’s view, this method had several advantages: It categorically ruled out institutional segregation of Jews and Arabs at the countrywide level. It would sustain the Arabs’ majority status but would improve the situation of the Jewish minority in the legislative council. It would leave the Mandatory in the position of a regulator and limit its powers to the direct administration of the country.29 Arlosoroff ’s proposal was no more likely to be implemented than the proposals that he criticized. There is no doubt, however, that it was freer of ideological and moral rationales than its predecessors. It showed no interest in democratic values of Western socialism, as Kaplansky’s scheme did, or of national and universal morals, as in Ben-Gurion’s and Katznelson’s propositions. Its political pragmatism

29 Miriam Getter, Haim Arlosoroff, A Political Biography, Tel Aviv, 1978 (Hebrew), p. 81.

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cleansed it of Utopian limits. This, however, did not rid it of the basic problem: the Arabs’ unwillingness to cooperate with the Jews in any federative setting. In this respect, binational parliamentarism, Jewish-Arab autonomism, and Arlosoroff ’s district councils were equally doomed.

The Jacobson Plan—Cantonism in Palestine As we near the end of this chapter, we turn our attention to another plan that left its imprint on Zionist federal thinking: a proposal by Dr. Victor Jacobson30 in 1929 to partition Palestine into Jewish and Arab cantons. Jacobson was not a political leader but rather a senior official in the Zionist Organization and an intimate associate of Chaim Weizmann. His plan expressed the reflections and expectations in the Zionist leadership at the end of the third decade of the twentieth century. At that time, the leadership had the grim sensation that it had squandered the opportunity that the Zionist Movement had been given in the previous ten years. However, the agreement with the non-Zionist circles for the establishment of a “Jewish Agency” had rekindled its hopes. The proposal was written in a pronouncedly Weizmannian tenor.31 Inspired by his leader and friend, Jacobson regarded the idea itself as the beginning of a “noble and grand mission, that we, too, can present another example of the practical idealism that the Swiss confederation has shown the world in its history, life, and constitution.” Apart from sharing the realistic and Utopian vision, Jacobson regarded the historical situations of the two countries as similar, despite the distance in time between them. Switzerland’s past was Palestine’s present: We, too, cannot establish a state by achieving military victory or by conquering territory. We, too, like Switzerland, should begin with the basics by forming the basic cell [Virzelle], the centers of political decisionmaking, which by being unified will expand this structure by creating a central organ equipped with all functional possibilities of an autonomous, independent entity.

30 Victor Jacobson (1869–1934), a Zionist diplomat who represented the Zionist Movement in the League of Nations in 1925–1934. 31 Victor Jacobson, “Gedanken Über Palaestinensische Zukunftsfragen,” memorandum, CZA, A19/5.

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Thus, Jacobson spoke of a protracted political process made up of three phases: creating the “cells,” establishing the centers, and merging them into one organ. In practical terms, the process begins with the establishment of homogeneous national “local entities” at the district level. They would be invested with powers of internal autonomy. In the second phase, the districts within a certain area would merge into “majority centers” or national cantons. In the third and final phase, a Swiss-style union of cantons would come into being. There would be four types of cantons: two homogeneous national ones and two mixed cantons with a Jewish or an Arab majority. So much for the distant future. In the short run—the next ten to fifteen years—Jacobson sought to fine-tune the settlement policy in order to create basic cells and national majority centers in the appropriate places. He specified six settlement destinations, several of which were sparsely populated, such as the vicinity of Lake Huleh, the Jordan Valley, and the Negev, and others that already had a significant Jewish demographic base: Upper Galilee, the Jezreel Valley, and the coastal plain. Jacobson’s plan was plainly Weizmannian not only in its Swiss Utopian vision but also in its practical spirit and political caution. Instead of attributing a “final goal” to Zionism, it offered an action plan for an interim period. Thus, it left its options open in case of foreseen or unforeseen future developments. The creation of centers with a Jewish majority in various parts of Palestine might constitute a basis for a canton federation or for a Jewish state. This openoptions method of political navigation was typical of Weizmann’s leadership. The Weizmannian spirit of the plan was also reflected in its one and only target, the Mandatory; it totally disregarded the Arabs as a political factor in Palestine. In other words, the question of a Jewish-Arab federative regime did not concern Jacobson at this phase because, in his view, the cantonization process should precede the establishment of a federation. For this reason, Zionism needed the support of the British and not the consent of the Arabs. The Zionist institutions did not debate Jacobson’s plan. The Arab riots in 1929, the royal commission that was sent to Palestine in their aftermath, and the tumult that developed around the Passfield White Paper marginalized it in the political consciousness of the Zionist Movement. In terms of the issue discussed here, however, it is important in two senses: (a) Jacobson’s plan expressed inclinations and trends in Weizmann’s political thinking and (b) it inserted the

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concept of “national canton” into the lexicon of Zionist political thought, and this became the kernel of the federative plans in the 1930s.32 Let us sum up. In the 1920s, the notion of a Jewish-Arab federal arrangement was the topic of internal debate in the Zionist Movement and not of dialogue between the peoples. With the exception of Weizmann’s noncommittal talks with Abdullah, no attempt was made to translate the political ideas into political reality. The gulf between the Arabs and Jews of Palestine was so deep and wide that the federal ideas brought up by various personalities were indeed Utopian in the traditional sense of the term. However, the support or opposition that the ideas attracted helped their progenitors to explain their stances and crystallize their principles on the issue of JewishArab coexistence in Palestine. The best example is Jabotinsky, who in the middle of the 1920s abandoned the outlook that he had espoused at the beginning of the decade. His despair of the possibility of a federally based accommodation with the Arabs was one of the political bones of contention between him and the leaders of the Zionist Labor Movement and Chaim Weizmann, especially in the 1930s, when the confrontation between the Jewish and the Arab national movements ceased to be a matter of doubt and became a fateful political phenomenon. Thus, the tension between Utopianism and policy in the tumultuous 1930s is the theme of the next chapter.

32 Notably, Jacobson was not the first thinker to have mentioned of the idea of cantons. He was not even the first; he was preceded in the early 1920s by Itamar Ben-Avi and the jurist P. Dickenstein who published a similar plan concurrently, in 1930. Nevertheless, those who concerned themselves with the concept attributed it to Jacobson. See P. Dickenstein, “The Cantons Plan,” Ha-‘Olam, February 14 and 18, 1930, Ben-Avi, At the Dawn of Our Independence, Tel Aviv, 1961 (Hebrew), pp. 414–18.

CHAPTER THREE

THE COMPOSITE FEDERATIVE MODEL

The federation idea . . . is really a vital necessity. Moshe Shertok (Sharett), 1936

Political Background of the Federal Plans of the 1930s The fourth decade of the twentieth century in Palestine began with the Arab violence in 1929 and ended with the eruption of World War II in 1939. During the period bracketed by these two events, the history of the Zionist Movement and the building of the Yishuv crossed a watershed. The mass nature of the blood-drenched violence in 1929, the organized violent protest against Mandatory rule in 1933—including the myth of the heroism, suffering, sacrifice that grew around the personality of the leader of the terror group, Sheikh Az a Din el-Kassam, whom the British killed—and, finally, the Arab uprising in 1936–1939 all proved that the Palestinian Arabs’ opposition to Zionism originated not solely in the initiative of a corrupt feudal leadership but also from an extensive grassroots movement that had a national ideology, organizational prowess, fighting ability, and charismatic leadership under Haj Amin al-Husayni. Prompted by the Arab resistance and the pressure of regional and international political circumstances, the British Government sought a way to downscale, if not to transform fundamentally, its undertaking to Zionism. During the decade, this intent evolved into a three-phase process. First, in response to the 1929 violence, a new political slant took shape that was manifested in the 1930 White Paper. The British Government’s intention was to grant Jews and Arabs in Palestine equal status behind a democratic formula phrased by the Socialist thinker and Colonial Secretary, Sidney Webb (Lord Passfield). The ulterior aim of the formula was to revoke the special status that the Balfour Declaration had given the Jewish people in

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Palestine.1 It is true that this aim was set aside, for all practical purposes, by Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald in his letter to Weizmann in 1931, under the combined pressure of public opinion and political players. Just the same, the idea of taking less responsibility for the Jewish National Home continued to make headway. The next phase of the process took place in 1937, in the midst of the Arab uprising, when the Peel Commission proposed the partitioning of Palestine into two nation-states—a proposal that the Government accepted at the level of principle. This scheme was in no way adverse to Zionism, at least in the eyes of those who accepted it willingly if not enthusiastically. Had it come to pass, however, it would have terminated the British commitment to Zionism. This plan, too, of course, did not last for more than a year. In February–March 1939, the looming menace of world war and the preparations for it elevated the Palestine question to the agenda of a round-table conference at St. James’ Palace in London. Participating in the conference were representatives of Britain, the Arab states, the Arabs of Palestine, the Jewish Agency, and world Jewish organizations. The White Paper that emerged from this conference augured the British Government’s final renunciation of its commitment and responsibility to Zionism and its support for the establishment of a democratic Palestinian-Arab state in Palestine, with firm guarantees in its constitution for the country’s Jewish minority. In the meantime, the situation of the Jews in Central and Eastern Europe was deteriorating as antisemitism in these countries surged and the fascist Nazi regime in Germany was on the ascent. This thrust the Zionist Movement into a paradoxical political plight: the more inclined the British were to weaken their commitment, the more dependent the Zionist Movement was on Britain. The problem originated not in the internal weakness of the Zionist Movement relative to the previous decade but in the international circumstances alluded to above. The Fifth Aliya had just delivered more than a quarter of a million Jews to Palestine, transforming the Yishuv from a national community of 170,000 into a national entity verging on half a million. It was this circumstance, with its social, cultural, 1 See J. (Y.) Gorny, The British Labour Movement and Zionism 1917–1948. London 1983, pp. 51–110.

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and organizational implications, that influenced the Peel Commission to recommend the partitioning of Palestine into Jewish and Arab states. In other words, Zionism tumbled into a contradiction between the Jews’ national need for statehood and their weakness on the international stage. The latter problem affected the Zionist Movement’s ability to solve, even partly, the distress at the national level—especially in regard to the main question, the extent of Jewish immigration to Palestine, which the British Government had been limiting commensurate with the upturn in the Arabs’ opposition and Britain’s rising need for Arab support. In this state of affairs, the Zionist leadership needed more than ever to take a political initiative that would allow the Yishuv to continue developing and that would not clash with Britain’s regional interests. The Zionist leadership changed in the 1930s. Weizmann resigned the presidency at the Seventeenth Zionist Congress in 1931, and although he was considered the true leader of the movement even while out of office, he never regained the status that he had commanded in the 1920s. He recaptured the presidency in 1935 with the support of the Zionist Labor Movement, which by then had become the main political force in the Zionist Organization and the Yishuv.2 The ascendancy of the Labor Movement to leadership status did not weaken the Weizmannic trend in Zionist policy; in fact, it strengthened it. Thus, the movement searched continually for ways of cooperating with the British Government and took a favorable attitude toward any possibility of a Jewish-Arab settlement. The first part of this formula was related to Weizmann’s personality as a statesman; the second part stemmed from the tradition in the Labor Movement, which devoted greater attention to this matter than any other movement or party in Zionism. The prime mover in this respect, as shown in the previous chapter, was David Ben-Gurion. Therefore, when Ben-Gurion’s party, Mapai, joined the Zionist Organization coalition and he was appointed to the Zionist Executive in 1933, and when he became its chair in 1935, it was but natural that Ben-Gurion would attempt to catapult his federative ideas from the class level—the “binational labor organization”—to the national level, which one may define as a “joint state.” 2 See Y. Gorny, Partnership and Struggle—Chaim Weizmann and the Labor Movement, Tel Aviv, 1976 (hereinafter called Gorny, Partnership and Struggle).

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Thus, one may say that Ben-Gurion did in the early 1930s what Ze’ev Jabotinsky did at the beginning of the 1920s. Both political initiatives were driven by similar immediate political motives. Both followed an eruption of Arab violence, in 1920–1921 and in 1929, respectively. Both leaders were concerned about the British Government’s long-term political intentions. And each intended his program to be available at the moment of necessity. Thus, both conceived and proposed their schemes at a time when Zionism was in a political and social down phase, as reflected in the crisis that befell the Third and Fourth Aliyot. The difference between them, however, was that Jabotinsky abandoned his plan when the surge phase of the Fourth Aliya began, whereas Ben-Gurion expanded his plan at the onset of the Fifth Aliya. Here, I would say, lies one of the basic differences between the two personalities. For Jabotinsky, the upbuilding and empowerment of the Yishuv were ways to break the Arabs’ opposition. He shaped his “iron wall” doctrine during the Fourth Aliya, which was larger than any preceding wave of immigration. For Ben-Gurion, in contrast, the Fifth Aliya—which infused Zionism with new hope and made the Jewish majority a realistic goal—was a basis for a broad-based federal settlement between Jews and Arabs at both the local and the regional levels. In 1936, in the midst of the Arab uprising, Ben-Gurion wrote the following to the Zionist Executive in response to one of Magnes’3 initiatives for the mediation of a Jewish-Arab settlement: Two types of agreements should be discussed: a comprehensive agreement for the final goal and a provisional agreement. A comprehensive agreement is certainly out of the question now. Only after the Arabs totally despair, which they will do not only after the riots and the attempts at uprising fail but also in response to our growth in the country, may they make peace with a Hebrew Palestine.4

Thus, the crystallization and culmination of Ben-Gurion’s plan reflects the development and growth of the Yishuv, as manifested in the transformation of the scheme from federative to confederative thinking.

3 Judah Leib Magnes (1887–1948), born in the U.S., Reform rabbai and Zionist leader. Since 1922 in Palestine and a leading figure in the Hebrew University; from 1935 to 1948 president of the University and head of the Brith Shalom organization. 4 D. Ben-Gurion, Meetings with Arab Leaders, Tel Aviv, 1975 (Hebrew), p. 85 (hereinafter called Ben-Gurion, Meetings).

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In November 1929, shortly after the severe Arab violence, BenGurion delivered a programmatic political lecture to the joint secretariat of the Ahdut ha-’Avoda and Ha-Po’el ha-Tsa’ir parties, which were about to consummate the merger that would become official in January 1930. He divided his remarks into two sections: basic premises in Zionist policy and their moral and utilitarian bases, and a two-phased plan for the establishment of a binational federation in Palestine. The first section offered nothing new, in principle, as against remarks he had made three years earlier in a debate over the essence of the regime of national autonomies in Palestine. BenGurion did, however, adjust the premises to the political situation, which had changed due to the Arab violence and the return of the Labour Party to power in Britain. In regard to political and utilitarian morality, Ben-Gurion, indirectly taking up the cudgels with Jabotinsky, asked: To what extent is it permissible and useful for Zionism to attempt to force its will on the other people that dwells in Palestine? History, in his opinion, is paved with examples of brutal forcing of issues in relations between peoples. Thus, the Turks had exterminated masses of Armenians, Greeks and Turks had carried out imposed population exchanges, and even Indian tribes in the United States had been wiped out by the national army. However, he stressed, “All this is possible when a political instrument that can accomplish it by physical force exists. Zionism has not got this force. Not only will the world not allow the Jewish people to grab its state by theft and force, but [the Jewish people] lacks the ability to do this.” This statement deserves contemplation on its own merits and in view of its implications. Its proposition, conscious or not, is slightly different from that expressed in Ben-Gurion’s 1926 “autonomy speech.” Back then, Ben-Gurion ruled out any regime based on force and presumed that no such regime could last for long. Now, in contrast, he admitted that force could succeed under certain circumstances. After all, Greece and Turkey continued to exist and the United States had become the greatest and strongest democracy in the world. Thus, political utility and political morality do not always overlap, just as they do not eternally clash. The condition of the Zionist Movement is a case in point: Zionism lacks the political strength to impose its will on the other side. However, Ben-Gurion stated:

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Even if we could, let us say, arm some military bands that would occupy Palestine for us—we could not possibly marshal the tremendous psychological strength needed to carry out the idea of building the country unless we were confident and convinced that what we are doing is sacred and unblemished. In such a case, we could not infuse thousands of young people with the strength needed to build the country, obtain resources for the Jewish people, and enlist the moral and political assistance of the enlightened world.

In the previous chapter, we explained the moral flights—“exalted historical moment,” etc.—that sometimes characterized Ben-Gurion’s rhetoric. In the foregoing excerpt, the outlook was somewhat different. Ben-Gurion acknowledged, de facto, the long-term historical meaning of violent force. It disgusted him but he did not dismiss its political importance. All he said was that its use in Zionism was impossible not only due to the movement’s objective weakness but also, and mainly, because it clashed with the moral and value worldview of the pioneering generation, which was making Zionism into a reality by dint of its efforts and its willingness to make self-sacrifice. He regarded this moral attribute of the movement as a source of strength that might also deliver political utility, i.e., mobilize the support of enlightened Jewish and non-Jewish circles. Thus, Zionism derives utility from its morality. The immediate political application of this approach should be reflected in the attitude toward the new Socialist government in Britain. Ben-Gurion and his comrades never had illusions about the British Labour Party, which had just come to power for the second time in its history. Ben-Gurion was discomfited by the menace that concerned Kaplansky in 1924: the general anti-imperialist inclinations of this party, which might cause it to identify Zionism with colonialism. Ben-Gurion’s anxiety was heightened by his realization that the violence in Palestine might tip the scale to the Arab side. His suspicions in this matter were aggravated by reports from his party’s emissary in London, Dov Hoz,5 about the upturn in disapproval, if not loathing, of Zionism among leaders of the British Labour Party.6 He noted that the anti-imperialist intentions in regard to Palestine were falsified if not warped in terms of democracy. The idea of establishing elected institutions on the basis of the existing balance

5 6

Dov Hoz (1894–1941), a leading figure in the Labor Movement. See Gorny, The British Labour Movement and Zionism, pp. 54–55.

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of forces would be a falsification of democracy, since the Arab masses would be represented by the ruling elite. It would also, of course, be a menace to Zionism. Ben-Gurion also rejected the idea of establishing an upper chamber on the basis of the parity principle. Like Arlosoroff, he regarded parity as a recipe for mutual paralysis and the intensification of the Jewish-Arab clash. Basing himself on the principle of national and utilitarian morality and his reading of the political situation, Ben-Gurion developed an ideological formula on which future Jewish-Arab relations in Palestine would be predicated, an educational device that could, by its very nature, be “solely moral”—“The Arabs receive full citizenship rights; we must uphold everything that flows from this in our political influence and in negotiations with England. However, the Arabs have no proprietary rights in Palestine and shall not be able to obtain them.” This, in his opinion, was a basic premise in the moral and political outlook of Zionism, “first, because there is no proprietorship in a country at all—this is a basic human assumption—and second, because the Arabs have no right to more than what they have and what they have created.” By implication, the Jews, too, have no proprietary right to Palestine. However, their situation is fundamentally different from that of the Arabs of Palestine. The Arabs’ national existence is not at risk; their problem is one of “building a land.” The Jewish people, in contrast, needs the “building of a homeland” for its continued existence. The differentiation between land and homeland is important in understanding the subsequent development of Ben-Gurion’s thinking in this regard. At the time, however, the nuance was not self-evident; only after his comrades criticized his proposals vehemently did Ben-Gurion phrase the distinction clearly. In the meantime, in his characteristic way at turning points in political thinking—leaping into the political unknown in the presence of his surprised and astonished friends and comrades—BenGurion prefaced his political plan with Utopian remarks that contained a great deal of truth even though their passion evoked suspicion about a political creature like him: It will be a disaster for the world if Palestine becomes a killing field. This is the country that symbolizes the most exalted in human creative endeavor. The question of security and political justice in Palestine is a question that touches upon all of humanity. This country, which knows no parallel in the world in terms of its problems, its historical

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importance, its settlement, and its future, should not be treated by conventional standards. It needs special standards that are appropriate for it. In their absence, a just solution will not be found.

It was in these terms Ben-Gurion attempted to blaze his special trail to the just solution in Jewish-Arab relations.

The Crystallization of Ben-Gurion’s Plan The underlying proposition in Ben-Gurion’s plan was that Palestine is intended for mass aliya, Jewish immigration. Aliya is a lengthy historical process; its future magnitudes cannot be estimated. Accordingly, the debates over the issue of the Jewish majority in Palestine—accompanied with statistical data that compare the Arabs’ birth rate with the extent of Jewish immigration—are superfluous. After all, even after the Jews become a majority, be it in the current generation or in the one to follow, they will not settle for this achievement only. The historical process will continue and will do so with even greater momentum as the Yishuv grows in numbers and strength. Aware that his prediction caused profound fear among the Arabs of the country, Ben-Gurion asked, “How will we assure the Arabs that we will not become their rulers, that they will have their own masters while we have ours?” The purpose of his plan was to answer this question. The scheme presumes a three-phased process of historical development, in which Palestine ceases to be a Mandate territory and becomes an independent state under the supervision of the League of Nations. Each phase would have a parallel phase in the development of internal governance in Palestine—from municipal autonomy to national cantons to the establishment of elected institutions for the governance of the federal state. Ben-Gurion’s proposal embodies elements of all previous federal plans. As an initial basis, it contains Berl Katznelson’s municipal autonomy. Following Jacobson, it presents the concept of national or religious cantons. Like Jabotinsky’s and Kaplansky’s plans, it envisages a federal system “based on the proportional electoral method and national equality,” both of which, coupled with the agency of the League of Nations—as a high commissioner.” It is this phase that makes the plan novel and important because it brings Palestine to the verge of being a “federal [state] of cantons

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settled by religious or other groups.” In this stage, unlike Jabotinsky’s and Kaplansky’s proposals, Ben-Gurion ruled out the idea of a joint parliament. Instead, he proposed “two parliaments, one Arab and one Jewish, the sole function of which is to manage each people’s affairs that are not related to the other people’s affairs”—in other words, “full self-rule in national, cultural, and religious affairs.” The powers of the parliaments would not be limited to national affairs; they would also apply to countrywide matters pertaining to the population at large. Every law at the government level would need the approval of both chambers, “and if both accept the law, it goes into effect automatically. If one objects—the decision is made by the central government.” The central government has a unique status; this may be the most original idea in Ben-Gurion’s plan. It plays two roles: executive and legislative. It would be composed of three Jews, three Arabs, and three Britons; both peoples’ ministers would be elected by their respective national parliaments. Thus, “in any case of disagreement between the two parliaments,” the three appointed British ministers would decide. If so, there would be four basic tiers of governing institutions, as Ben-Gurion tallied them: “a commissioner (who controls the army), a joint government, national parliaments with full advisory powers, and municipal autonomies.” “Theoretically,” in Ben-Gurion’s judgment, this form of regime is not only possible but also “ideal.” Each section would look after its people’s legitimate interests and the British would “have to be loyal to honesty and to the two peoples’ interests.” At this phase of constitutional development, the British would retain the status of a supervisory political power that maintains balance and makes decisions, by means of the High Commissioner, who doubles as commander of the army and the official in charge of the police, and the executive authority, in which representatives of the government would serve. They would render the decision in any dispute between the Jews’ and the Arabs’ ministers. When Ben-Gurion lectured about the plan to his comrades, he had not cast it in final form and admitted that it was susceptible to change. Several of its basic premises were impenetrable and vague. For example, Ben-Gurion divided the future development process into two periods: after the establishment of the National Home and before the consummation of the National Home. However, he did not explain the difference between establishment and consummation.

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Was it related to the proportions of Jews and Arabs in the population of Palestine or the formation of the Jewish majority? It was also not clear how the three phases in the growth of self-rule—municipal, canton, and executive-federal—would be distributed between the two periods. Finally, it was not clear whether the development of the federal regime would be completed in the second period or whether there might be a third period or an additional and higher phase. The debate over Ben-Gurion’s lecture—which, he said, lasted about two and a half hours—took place two weeks later and spanned two meetings.7 Between the lecture and the debate, Ben-Gurion heard echoes of the responses of Secretariat members. Most of the responses were reserved; a few were negative. Those who had reservations about the plan did not reject the idea itself but were deterred by its Utopian nature. They feared that such a nature, amidst changing realities, might evolve into a one-size-fits-all approach toward settling diverse future developments, due to which it would do more harm than good. These respondents—Katznelson, Ben-Zvi, Golomb,8 etc.—stressed that the joint structure of the two national groups should be built from the ground up, floor by floor, and not from the roof down, as Ben-Gurion proposed. Other discussants dismissed the whole plan but thought it was good enough to be shown to the British Labour Party. Two participants in the debate, Haim Arlosoroff and Moshe Beilinson,9 objected to the plan vehemently. Arlosoroff ’s objection was political: he considered the proposal an aberration relative to the British colonial way of thinking. The Labour people, he noted, found it difficult to grasp the national-autonomy concept that BenGurion presented to them. Therefore, “It is unimaginable that in an Oriental country, of all places, they would make this move in one leap, all the way to a parliamentary government in charge. It would be an act of unjustified aesthetic snobbism.” He did not believe that the demographic balance of forces in Palestine would change significantly in the current generation or in the next fifteen to twenty years. Therefore, he basically repeated the proposal that he had 7

See note 5. Eliyahu Golomb (1893–1945), leading personality in the Zionist Labor Movement and founder of the Haganah, the underground military defense organization of the Yishuv. 9 Moshe Beilinson (1890–1936), a journalist and a major poliltical thinker in the Labor Movement. 8

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broached before the 1929 Arab violence: to reduce the democratic expression of the local population within the construct of the 1922 British proposal, as a general framework for “limited representative governance”— mutatis mutandis, of course. Beilinson’s opposition was primarily principled. Influenced by BenGurion’s remarks, he explained that he could not accept “the declaration of Eretz Israel as a place that belongs to no one on earth and in which, for this reason, not only Arabs and Jews but others as well, the League of Nations, participate in running it. For my part, I have not yet made peace with the idea of relinquishing Palestine as a Jewish state.” His reasoning in favor of Jewish proprietorship in Palestine was no different from that expressed by Jabotinsky at the beginning of the decade in his plan for the establishment of a Jewish-Arab federation. After the 1929 Arab violence, however, Beilinson became much more extreme in his political conclusions. “The existential right of the Hebrew people to its homeland and its history,” he ruled, “supersedes the right of ‘self-determination’ of the Arabs of Palestine, and for this reason I do not feel obligated to self-rule in this country.” The Arab question should be solved, he said, at the socioeconomic level and not at the political level. The views of Beilinson—a quintessential Jewish-Russian intellectual, a revolutionary Socialist who had made “repentence” in the national sense and became one of the most important constructive Socialist thinkers in the Zionist Labor Movement—carried much weight in various matters of principle. Thus, in regard to the future political regime in Palestine, too, Beilinson persuaded Ben-Gurion to revise the first and determining underlying premise of his plan.

Ben-Gurion’s Plan in Final Form—1931 Ahead of the debate in the joint secretariat of Ahdut ha-’Avoda and Ha-Po’el Ha-Tsair Ben-Gurion prepared a cohesive document that he called “Premises for the Establishment of a State Regime in Palestine.” Although based on his lecture, it different from the lecture in several principles and proposals.10 10 D. Ben-Gurion, “Premises for the Establishment of a State Regime in Palestine,” Nov. 23, 1929. The document was published in the journal Ha-Po’el ha-Tsa’ir in 1931. See D. Ben-Gurion, Our Neighbors and Us, Tel Aviv 1931, pp. 188–96.

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The principal change was in the opening statement in the premises: “Palestine is for the Hebrew people and for the Arabs who dwell there.” The sentence distinguishes between the Jews as a collectivity and the Arabs as individuals, or between national status and civil status. Thus, it establishes Jewish ownership of Palestine and does not recognize the Arab people that inhabits the country. This sentence is materially different from what its author had said in his lecture. In the lecture, Ben-Gurion did stress that the negation of Arab ownership of Palestine despite the duration of their settled presence there and their majority status is a basic premise in the moral and political outlook of Socialist Zionism. He explained at once, however, that this principle flows “first, because there is no proprietorship in a country at all—this is a basic human assumption.” This item is treated much differently in “Premises.” In the lecture, Ben-Gurion spoke of Arabs as having equal civil rights, whereas “Premises” invokes the concept of “inhabitants of the country,” irrespective of religion or nationality, “either as collectives or as a complete settlement bloc.” As for the proprietary right, he wrote only that “The inhabitants of a country do not have the right to own and control the country.” He omitted the rest of the sentence: “first, because there is no proprietorship in a country at all— this is a basic human assumption.” This might be interpreted as meaning that the Jews, too, do not own the country. This change, coupled with the introductory sentence about those for whom Palestine exists, was meant to appease Beilinson and his supporters. “Premises” also amends the lecture in its remarks about the political process that would turn Mandatory Palestine into a binational federation of sorts. As against the vague definition of the two periods of time—that following the establishment of the National Home and that preceding its culmination—“Premises” presents a clear three-phased development plan, conditioned on the proportions of the population groups in the country. The first phase (“Foundation”) was the current situation of the Yishuv; it would last for five to ten years. The second phase (“Stronghold”) would end when the proportion of Jews in Palestine would climb to 40–50 percent of the population. The third phase (“Culmination”) would arrive when the share of Jews in the country would be no less than 50 percent. Thus, it could as well be much greater. The phases also reflect change in Jewish-Arab relations, which would shift from violent hostility to acquiescence amidst compromise and would culminate in cooperation and alliance.

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The political and demographic process was to be accompanied by gradual constitutional development. In the first period, the foundation would be laid for self-rule in local affairs (municipal and rural), ethno-communal affairs (religious and national), and joint countrywide affairs. The Mandatory Government, however, would retain the power to make decisions in the event of deadlock. In the second period, the self-rule institutions would mature, their spheres of authority and action would widen, and the decision-making prerogatives of the Mandatory Government would contract. In the third period, full self-rule would be ordained. The structure of governance during the first period would be threetiered. Concurring with Katznelson and Ben-Zvi, Ben-Gurion stated, “The first level of self-rule in Palestine, for all inhabitants irrespective of race, peoplehood, religion, class, and sex, is based on rural and urban autonomy.” Above municipal autonomy comes national autonomy, as Ben-Gurion had proposed several years earlier, in the form of an “autonomous Knesset.” The powers of this chamber in culture, religion, and law should be as broad as possible. The only novelty here was Ben-Gurion’s proposal that just as a Jewish Agency had come into being, so should an “Arab Agency” be established. The central regime would be run by a governing council composed of nine ministers and eighteen deputies, equally apportioned among Jews, Arabs, and British. The Commissioner would appoint ministers and deputies in consultation with the national agencies. The governing council would be both an executive and a legislative authority. Ben-Gurion, ever the centralist, saw nothing amiss about this during the interim period: “Every bill proposed by the governing council shall be presented for study to the Hebrew and the Arab agencies, which may propose amendments and changes. The proposal is vested with the force of law by decision of a simple majority of the governing council and the approval of the Commissioner.” The supreme authority in the governing structure is the High Commissioner, appointed by the British Government. “The Commissioner is responsible for upholding the Mandate, defending the borders, maintaining domestic security, supervising the holy places, and conducting foreign affairs.” The High Commissioner may veto decisions of the council and the council may appeal to the Mandatory Government. By making these proposals, Ben-Gurion moved closer to the views of Arlosoroff, who objected to a parliament and favored a legislative

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council with limited powers, and to those of Beilinson, who insisted that Britain honor its undertakings as the Mandatory Government. From the standpoint of the Jewish interest, he preferred the rule of the British Commissioner over an ostensibly democratic Jewish-Arab governance. In the second period, about fifteen years later, the following changes would go into effect: 1. Municipal self-rule, under which residents would be educated in democratic public administration, would become district selfrule. Each district would have its own elected council, to which the district governor would be partly answerable. 2. The Jewish and Arab national agencies would be given broader powers and would appoint the Jewish and Arab members of the governing council. 3. The powers of the Commissioner would be cut back and those of the governing council would be broadened. This phase was the crux of Ben-Gurion’s proposal as set forth in the lecture. In “Premises,” however, the second period became an interim period followed by a third period, in which Palestine would become a dominion in the British Commonwealth of Nations. After the Mandatory Government and the League of Nations approved the constitution, the Mandate would expire. “Instead of a High Commissioner, a British emissary would remain in the country as the agent of the League of Nations; his powers would be akin to those of the governor-general of a British dominion. . . . Protection of the Holy Places would be his sole remaining purview.” Under the new constitution, “Palestine will become a federal state made up of the following units of government: (1) rural and municipal government, totally freely standing; (2) cantons, constituting autonomous states within the federal state of Palestine . . .; (3) national autonomy, invested with absolute powers in all matters of education, culture, and language. . . . Religious affairs shall be handed over to the religious communities. . . .” (4) The institutions of joint governance in Palestine shall be based on the principle that “Just relations between Jews and Arabs are not dependent on majority-minority ratios.” Accordingly, the “Federal Alliance Council” would be composed of two chambers: “(1) a House of Peoples, in which Jews and Arabs shall participate in equal numbers; (2) a House of Residents, in which electees of the cantons shall participate in proportion to the cantons’

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populations. . . . Every federal law and every amendment to the federal constitution is adopted solely with the consent of both houses.” (3) The Federal Executive is elected for three years by both houses, by an absolute majority in each, and may not legally be dismissed during its legal term in office.” [Finally], “The international status of the State of Palestine shall be determined by mutual consent of the Federal Alliance Council, on the one hand, and the Mandatory Government and the League of Nations, on the other.” Ben-Gurion said nothing explicit about how the two basic problems in Jewish-Arab relations, Jewish immigration and land acquisition, would be solved within this governmental structure. One can only presume that it would fall within the sovereign power of the Jewish cantons to receive immigration. Furthermore, since no canton would be allowed to enact legislation adverse to the rights of inhabitants of other cantons, the Jews would not be denied the right to acquire land even outside their national cantons. Obviously, the representative chambers would not be able to adopt anti-Zionist resolutions due to their composition. As stated, Ben-Gurion’s plan was published in 1931 and thereby became one of the official expressions of the political outlook of Mapai. It underlay the political settlement proposal that Ben-Gurion broached as a member and, afterwards, as Chairman of the Jewish Agency Executive in his talks with Arab personalities and British Government officials. At the time the scheme was advertised, however, it was not yet complete. It focused on a local federative arrangement and totally disregarded the regional, i.e., the Middle Eastern, aspect. In early 1932, even though Arab leaders in the region again took up the idea of the Arab federation much as they had in the early 1920s, Ben-Gurion informed his party’s central committee that “The Arab federation is not yet a fact and does not seem poised to become a fact in the near future.” Thus, “we should not rush to embrace such an orientation and should not neglect political activity and the resumption of negotiations with the British Government.”11 Beilinson took issue with Ben-Gurion’s outlook. This time, however, the roles were reversed relative to their previous debate. Beilinson, having begun to despair of the British Government’s actions, now

11 Central Committee meeting, Feb. 6, 1932, Israel Labor Party Archives, Beit Berl, Central Committee.

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proposed a pro-Arab orientation that would, among other things, bring pressure on the British. In his view, We should not define our goal as a binational state—I cannot imagine anyone defining it that way. We should say that we think of Palestine as a member of an Arab federation. None of our explanations will work unless we can offer the Arab world something real, and this “real” is our membership in the Arab federation.12

What Beilinson had in mind, of course, was a Jewish state as part of an Arab confederation. In this respect, he preceded Ben-Gurion’s thinking by two years.

Ben-Gurion—from Federation to Confederation The disagreements between Ben-Gurion and Beilinson, in both debates, shed some light on Ben-Gurion’s motives. In late 1929, BenGurion was profoundly concerned about the intentions of the British Government. Therefore, he wished to induce cooperation with Britain by means of a constructive political plan while signaling the possibility of disengagement from it by means of a Jewish-Arab settlement and the replacement of British patronage with direct international patronage. Ben-Gurion’s suspicions about the intentions of the British Government evolved into enraged worry after the 1930 White Paper was published. At the second Mapai Council, held toward the end of that year, he expressed his feelings by threatening an uprising against Britain.13 His bellicosity, however, was short-lived; Ben-Gurion changed his mind soon afterwards and began to devote time to Zionist political action. In 1931, at Weizmann’s behest, he met with the British Prime Minister, Ramsey Macdonald. Ben-Gurion came away from the meeting with the impression that Macdonald was inclined to favor the idea of a federal parity arrangement between Jews and Arabs in Palestine.14 MacDonald’s letter, which virtually annulled the Passfield White Paper, also inspired hope that Britain and the 12 Ibid.: See also Y. Goldstein, “The Regional Federation Idea in the Thinking of Mapai in the 1930s,” J. Nedava (ed.), Issues in Zionism, 1918–1948, Haifa 1979 (Hebrew). 13 Mapai Council, Oct. 25, 1930, Labor Party Archives. 14 Ben-Gurion, Memoirs, pp. 482–84.

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Zionist Movement would find a way to cooperate. Thus, Ben-Gurion warned his disillusioned comrades about the behavior of the Labour Government in particular and remained skeptical even after this Government was no longer in existence: “We should not . . . neglect political activity and the resumption of negotiations with the British Government.” Less than two years later, Ben-Gurion embraced Beilinson’s outlook again, but under different conditions and for different motives. In 1933, the mass immigration of Jews known as the Fifth Aliya began. The distress of European Jewry after Hitler’s accession to power and the refusal of Western countries, foremost the United States, to allow Jewish immigration heralded the possibility that masses of Jews would emigrate to Palestine. Anti-British riots broke out in Haifa that year, and Ben-Gurion found in them indications of an Arab national movement. Beyond the two contrasting long-term leanings in Ben-Gurion’s thinking —toward the possibility of cooperation with Britain and toward cooperation with the Arab national movement, coupled with disengagement from Britain—there was an immediate political concern influenced by Arab national ferment. Prompted by the same concern, the High Commissioner, Sir Arthur Wauchope, renewed his initiative for the establishment of a legislative council that would represent the country’s inhabitants. Ben-Gurion met with Wauchope in the summer of 1934 to talk him out of the idea but came away convinced that Wauchope was firmly resolved to move ahead with it.15 In other words, the situation that had given rise to the federation ideas had come about again. At this point in time, as in the early 1920s, the concern arose that Arab opposition to the Zionist endeavor would force the Government to strike a compromise with the Arabs’ national aspirations at the expense of its undertakings to Zionism. Now as before, the question of the legislative council sent shivers down the Zionist leaders’ spines. This led to the rebirth of the “redeeming” federalist formula in political thinking—the formula that would lead to mutual recognition of both people’s national aspirations or, as Ben-Gurion put it, “an agreement on the basis of grand Zionism on the one hand and Arab national unity on the other.”16 15 See Ben-Gurion to Chaim Weizmann, meeting of Political Committee, Aug. 5, 1943, Labor Party Archives. 16 Ibid.

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Ben-Gurion discussed this formula at length in early 1934, in a political lecture to his Mapai associates.17 One of the main questions he put forth was, “How do we envision the constitutional development of the country provided that it not impede our growth, not interfere with the total fulfillment of our final goal, and concurrently treat the Arabs’ political demands justly at every point in time?” This question was aimed directly at the Zionist enterprise, but now it was coupled with an indirect question that did not pertain directly to the Zionists at that time: the idea of the regional Arab federation. Even though it seemed to be the Zionist Movement’s concern, the movement did not have to take it up just then “because we see no possible way of engaging the Arabs in political negotiations and concluding any accord with them unless we determine our stand on this question, which may be the key to the Arabs’ stand on the whole issue.” The key, Ben-Gurion continued, was “a federal state of cantons” that would assure “non-dominance of Jews over Arabs and non-dominance of Arabs over Jews.” Such a state, in his opinion, would not come into being not in one stroke; instead, it would evolve in a lengthy process, in which Jewish territorial concentrations would form alongside the Arab ones. This process, geared to its future goal, would serve as an alternative to the immediate proposal of establishing a legislative council, an idea that Ben-Gurion rejected categorically and that the Arabs also disfavored because, as it was presented, “The foreign government would hold all legislative and executive power.” The immediate alternative to Ben-Gurion’s proposed legislative council was a Jewish-Arab agreement, sponsored by the Government, for the establishment of a regime as he had proposed three years earlier in “Premises for the Establishment of a State Regime in Palestine.” In this plan, in lieu of the legislative council he proposed a “Jewish-Arab-British governing council” that would wield combined legislative and executive powers. The members of this body— the Jewish, Arab, and British ministers—would be appointed in equal numbers by the Commissioner, who would possess supervisory and veto powers over its actions. This plan was obviously advantageous to the Jews. Ben-Gurion, however, like Jabotinsky more than a decade earlier, believed that

17

Ben-Gurion, Memoirs, pp. 42–43.

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it also gave the Arabs more powers than the Government was offering them. The practical and principled advantage of his proposal, he believed, was its nullification of the total separation of the executive authority—the Mandatory Government, headed by the Commissioner—from the legislative authority that ostensibly represented the population of the country, as had been proposed in the Government’s plan. He regarded the provisional governing council in his own proposal, in contrast, as an initial step toward the development of British-style parliamentary democratic rule. “Any real government,” he opined, “should be both legislative and executive, like the British state . . . This is the whole secret of the validity and stability of [Britain]; wherever it does not exist, democracy collapses.”18 Ben-Gurion’s argument deserves critical inspection. After all, it sounds “hypocritical” in terms of the distribution of government between majority and minority. Democracy is based on majority rule, but Ben-Gurion proposed equal distribution of rule between majority and minority. From Ben-Gurion’s perspective, however, the foundation of democratic governance in Palestine is the proposition that “Palestine is for the Hebrew people and for the Arabs who dwell there.” Therefore, the democratic principles in the Commissioner’s proposal are formal only, reflecting a status quo, whereas those in Ben-Gurion’s plan are realistic, sincere, and geared toward a future reality, one historically assured to the Jews by their special condition as a people without a homeland and by international law. Now, however, Ben-Gurion noticed something that had not occurred to him in the past: the proportional arrangement between Jews and Arabs in Palestine was umbilically connected with the unification of the Arab nation within a regional federation. However, it would be possible to view this federation favorably and help to bring it into being only “provided that a Jewish state be established in all parts of the territory of Eretz Israel.” In his aforementioned letter to Weizmann, he hurriedly added after outlining his scheme, “I am not so gullible as to think that this agreement will come to pass tomorrow or the day after, but I believe that our strength in this country, the pace of Jewish immigration, and the extent of our progress create the possibility of negotiations—and we should not squander it.”

18

Ibid., p. 44.

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It is exactly as we said. In Ben-Gurion’s view, the growth of the Yishuv carries the seeds of the Yishuv’s own strength and the likelihood of weakening the Arab resistance. According to Jabotinsky’s outlook, in contrast, the strength of the Yishuv has nothing to do with its growth and is itself a condition for said growth. Therefore, just as Zionism slumped after the 1929 violence, the British Government’s reserved policy, and the trough in Jewish immigration, Jabotinsky demanded the instigation of an overt political struggle for the end goal of Zionism, the Jewish state. Concurrently, Weizmann and the rest of the Labor Movement leadership insisted that the inhabitants of the country be given parity representation in the elected institution that the Government intended to establish. As noted above, when they met in London in 1934, according to Ben-Gurion’s testimony, he and Jabotinsky came to a consensus on all political issues except for the regional federation, which Jabotinsky opposed. Thus, both leaders favored the idea of a federative Jewish state as set forth by Ben-Gurion. This agreement between such extreme political rivals further underscores the importance of consensus as a framework for policymaking in the Zionist Movement. Ben-Gurion’s letter to Weizmann marked the beginning of the implicit fourth and final phase in the development of the federal idea in Ben-Gurion’s thought. The first phase occurred on the eve of World War I, when he proposed cultural autonomy within the Ottoman Empire. The second phase followed the Balfour Declaration, as Ben-Gurion struggled to transform the Yishuv into a autonomous national entity with territorial elements. In the third phase, in the late 1920s, he proposed constituting Palestine as a binational federation. In the fourth phase, he became a supporter of the idea of an Arab regional-federation to which a Jewish state would belong. Armed with these propositions, Ben-Gurion initiated a series of meetings with leaders of the Arab national movement in 1934–1936. Among them were Musa Alami, the state attorney of the Mandatory Government and a confidant of the Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin al-Husayni; Aouni Bey Abdel Hadi, head of the Istiqlal (Independence) Party, which championed Arab national unity above all; and George Antonius, the Christian Arab intellectual. He also met with Arab leaders from neighboring countries, such as Riyadh al-Sulh, the senior Lebanese statesman, and the two leaders of the Syrian national movement, Ahsayn Bey Ja’abri and the Druze Emir Shakib a-Ghaslan,

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who were living in exile in Europe, and spoke with them in Geneva.19 He said nothing new in these talks relative to the ideas he had presented to his Mapai and the Zionist Executive colleagues; his remarks are important only in their contribution to understanding Ben-Gurion as a statesman and the seriousness of his intentions in regard to the regional federation idea. In all the meetings, Ben-Gurion appeared as a statesman who spoke the Zionist truth. His candor, unusual in terms of the norm in Zionist argumentation, made a favorable impression on his interlocutors, as Alami’s biography shows.20 Ben-Gurion’s remarks also illuminate a strategy of sorts: Ben-Gurion attempted to circumvent the intricate and intractable problem of Jewish-Arab relations in Palestine not only by concluding political arrangements with neighboring Arab countries but also, and primarily, by broaching a Utopian political vision. The grander the scale of this vision and the more exalted its meaning, the more the internal contrasts among its intended partners were blunted. Therefore, the Utopian vision was also the path to political compromise. In this sense, Ben-Gurion’s most interesting talks were with George Antonius. Although the least practical in the political sense, they were unique in the intellectual attempt to clarify concepts that the two peoples contested. Since the whole series of political talks was doomed to failure ab initio, the exploration of concepts and the understanding of the political approach are the only matters of importance that remain from that period. The exchange between Antonius and Ben-Gurion shows that the former focused on the question of relations between Palestinian Arabs and Zionists and the latter attempted to remove the problem from the plane of relations between the Jewish people, in its global sense, and the Arab people in its regional sense. Thus, the confederation idea became a political framework for a comprehensive settlement between Arabs and Jews. Only within such a framework might one assume with a measure of honesty that “Even if Jewish immigration makes Palestine into a country that is mainly Jewish, Arab culture and freedom are in no way endangered.” So much for the Arab

19 See Ben-Gurion, Meetings, pp. 19–66; S. Teveth, Ben-Gurion and the Palestinian Arabs, From Peace to War, Cambridge: Oxford University Press, 1985, chapter 10, pp. 129–48. 20 See G. Furlonge, Palestine is My Country—The Story of Musa Alami, London, 1968, pp. 102–3.

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nation at large. Furthermore, “The Arabs of Palestine, too, once they become a minority in the cramped territory of Palestine, will not be a minority as members of the Arab people at large because the Arabs will be dominant and independent in the wider area, and the Jews’ aspirations, even when fulfilled totally, will neither endanger nor in any way undermine the future of the Arab nation.”21 Here, Ben-Gurion repeated Weizmann’s and Jabotinsky’s arguments in the early 1920s almost verbatim. However, he replaced the phrase that they used, to the effect that Palestine would be quantitatively and qualitatively Jewish, with the expression “mainly Jewish.” The second argument, that the Arab federation would compensate the Palestinian Arabs for their loss of majority status, was phrased in absolutely identical terms by all three leaders. Ben-Gurion’s candor was not limited to the disclosure of the political goals of Zionism. It proved itself by stressing the fundamental political alignment between Zionism and Britain and by emphasizing the cultural singularity of the Zionist enterprise. Explaining to his interlocutors why Zionism needed so badly to establish autonomous status in the region, he stated: Although we are an Eastern people, we have become a European people. We wish to return to Palestine in the geographical sense only; our goal is to establish a European culture here and we are connected with the great cultural force in the world, in any case for as long as all the cultural fundamentals in this corner of the world do not change and for as long as the entire world political order does not change.22

Here, Ben-Gurion was so frank that he gave Arab propaganda proof that Zionism was indeed an imperialistic force and a foreign cultural implant in the region. However, the remarks were made in response to Antonius’ surprising resurrection of the idea of establishing a “Greater Syria” by merging Syria and Palestine, and not in regard to a federation of independent states. Nevertheless, it was precisely in view of Antonius’ old-new proposal, which seemed totally contradictory to Ben-Gurion’s political outlook, that Ben-Gurion, the Utopianist, showed himself to be a practical statesman. When Antonius, countering Ben-Gurion, argued that the real meaning of the Jewish statehood idea was the subjugation of the Arabs of Palestine to Jewish

21 22

Ben-Gurion, Meetings, pp. 4–8. Ibid., p. 55.

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rule, Ben-Gurion replied, “If this is how you define the Jews’ aim and this aim thwarts the possibility of an understanding, I am willing to consider changing the definition.” It was this that prompted Antonius to bruit the idea of a “Greater Syria” with a Jewish “establishment.” Although Ben-Gurion foresaw the political difficulties that such a plan would engender, he did not reject it categorically. He was willing to consider such a possibility provided that the Jewish “establishment” in Palestine, on both sides of the Jordan River, be totally autonomous in all internal affairs, foremost Jewish immigration. He expressed his explicit hope that the Jewish population of Palestine would eventually tally four million. Antonius, of course, rejected Ben-Gurion’s maximalist aims in regard to the territory of Palestine and its Jewish population. Therefore, Ben-Gurion, at this phase of the talks, leaned toward another compromise. In his summarizing remarks, he stated that he was willing to leave the question of Transjordan open. Still, however, he vehemently affirmed the principle of Jewish immigration that would be limited only by the country’s economic carrying capacity. In contrast to these points at issue, the two discussants agreed that the political structure of Palestine should resemble the United States federation or the Swiss confederation. Ben-Gurion stressed his preference for the Swiss canton structure because “[the Swiss canton] it is more independent than the American ‘state.’” What this meant for him, however, was not the partitioning of Palestine into two totally independent national districts, each a partner in the Greater Syrian state. Such a solution might limit Jewish immigration and settlement to part of Palestine only. From Ben-Gurion’s standpoint, the possibility of large-scale Jewish immigration took priority over the question of the constitutional structure of Palestine. Therefore, he could be flexible about political arrangements as long as they allowed unlimited Jewish immigration in return for Arab national or political achievements. Ben-Gurion explained this in so many words to Antonius and to Judah Magnes, who had mediated between the two and set up their meeting.23 Ben-Gurion’s talks with Arab personalities were discontinued by ongoing events and rendered impossible by the eruption of the Arab uprising. However, even had the hostilities not erupted, one doubts

23

Ibid., p. 64.

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that the talks could have continued constructively because the Arabs, at that juncture and in view of their balance of forces with the Jews, had no interest whatsoever in yielding to the Jews’ far-reaching ambitions. In the Zionist Executive and, especially, in Ben-Gurion’s party, his new plan for the establishment of a Jewish state as a member of a regional confederation met the same mixture of vehement disapproval and cautious concern that Ben-Gurion had encountered five years earlier when he came out with the idea of binational federation in Palestine. Some of the opponents considered the new scheme a flight of fancy on Ben-Gurion’s part, divorced from regional political realities. A few explained that Arab history contradicted the very idea of Arab unity; after all, the Arabs had never considered themselves a unified nation but rather a set of separate collectives. Some suggested ominously that the idea of joining an Arab federation pointed to an excessive inclination to integrate into the East; such an inclination, they said, might harm relations with the West. In contrast, the cautious supporters, while not accepting the plan en bloc, were willing to support its first phase—the parity regime in Palestine—and to leave the regional-federation idea for favorable consideration in the future. Only Beilinson lent Ben-Gurion’s plan full if not enthusiastic support. In 1929, as we recall, Beilinson had opposed Ben-Gurion’s binational-federation proposal on the grounds of unwillingness to forgo Jewish statehood. Now, the regional-federation plan as phrased by Ben-Gurion seemed to meet his wish: In regard to the federation, I can envision a Jewish state on both sides of the Jordan as a Hebrew canton in an Arab federation, and the Arabs in Palestine would have the status of a minority protected by the federation within the Hebrew canton, like Ulster in Ireland or the French in the canton of Zurich.24

Thus, Beilinson intended to duplicate the Swiss confederation model in the form of a Middle Eastern federation. He would accept some restriction of the sovereignty that the Jewish canton or state would enjoy. In return, however, he sought to banish the very thought of parity in the federative structure of governance in Palestine, for such an arrangement might make the country ungovernable. The Arab minority would have to rely on the power of the federation for its protection. 24 See Goldstein (n. 12), pp. 54–57; Gorny, Zionism and the Arabs 1882–1948, A Study of Ideology, Oxford 1987, pp. 201–33.

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Nevertheless, there was a meaningful difference between Beilinson’s outlook and Ben-Gurion’s. Both agreed about the end goal: a Jewish state within an Arab federation. Both also ruled out the idea of the parity legislative council for similar reasons. However, they disagreed about the process that would lead to the establishment of the state and about the essence of its constitution. Ben-Gurion spoke of a transition period, during which an executive council with governing powers, composed of Jewish and Arab ministers on a parity basis, would be formed. Since he considered this institution clearly advantageous to the Arabs, he believed that the Arabs would be more likely to accept it than the idea of a parity-based legislative council that would legitimize the equal status of the Jewish minority but would not vest the Arab majority with ruling powers. As for the essence of the constitution of the Jewish state, the two politicians were far apart. Beilinson intended to grant the Arabs of Palestine the rights of a national minority under the patronage of the federal constitution. Ben-Gurion had something else in mind: In accordance with the nature of the country and of the Jews, the Jewish masses will settle [only] in certain parts of the country. Jews will not settle in the mountains, except for the vicinity of Jerusalem, but millions of Jews will concentrate in the cities, in Tel Aviv and Haifa. Clearly, then, the future regime will be a canton regime. There will be a grand autonomy of cantons and a territorial concentration. . . . The vast areas in the south, which are still unsettled, may become a Jewish domain. This will be a regime of autonomous cantons within one state that has relations with the Arab federation and the British Empire. These are general contours of the concept for negotiation.25

Thus, according to the concepts set forth in the introduction to this study, Beilinson had an Arab federation in mind while the cautious Ben-Gurion was willing to accept a regional confederation only. In this context, it is also noteworthy that in the same discussion in the political committee in early August, Ben-Gurion expressed the hope that the Istiqlal Party would accept the plan since it aspired to Arab national unity. The Mufti, he presumed, would surely oppose it. About three weeks later, however, on August 31, 1934, in his second talk with Musa Alami, the latter informed Ben-Gurion that when he had told the Mufti about the contents of their first talk, the Mufti 25

Berl.

See meeting of Political Committee, Aug. 5, 1934, Labor Party Archives, Beit

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was dumbstruck. “He never imagined that there were Jews who sincerely wanted to find an understanding and reach an agreement with the Arabs. There had been no such thing to that point.” Therefore, “[The Mufti], in turn, did not object, provided that it be possible to assure the religious, economic, and political interests of the Arabs of Palestine.” The Mufti, according to Ben-Gurion, asked for time to peruse the program but stressed from the outset that Arab public opinion would not accept it without thorough and lengthy preparation.26 The veracity of Ben-Gurion’s account should not be called into question. His biographer, Shabtai Teveth, adds that on the Mufti’s counsel, the two of them, Ben-Gurion and Alami, drafted a joint statement that spoke in general terms about the regularization of relations between the Arab nation and the Jewish people, and it was forwarded to the Mufti for his review. In addition to the meaning of this story as an oddity of little historical importance, it attests to the behavior of Ben-Gurion the statesman in his serpentine handling of the “Arab question.” The Mufti was the devil incarnate in the consciousness of the Jewish Yishuv, which held him accountable for the massacre of dozens of Jews, including women and children, in the 1929 riots in Hebron. BenGurion’s willingness to meet and work out an agreement with him was a “noble end that sanctifies harsh means.” By taking this path of action, he earned the moral blessings of Berl Katznelson, who saw neither an immoral blemish nor a national humiliation in these negotiations.27 The Arab uprising that broke out in April 1936 became, from the standpoint of its contemporaries, the most severe armed clash and political test in the history of Jewish-Arab relations. However, it did not change Ben-Gurion’s mind about a federally based agreement with the Arabs. In contrast to the views of many members of the Zionist Executive and several comrades in his party’s Central Committee, who, in view of the violence, had despaired of the possibility of any settlement between the peoples in the foreseeable future, Ben-Gurion claimed confidently, “I have been dealing with these matters for two years in the Executive and I see one answer to this question: a Jewish state associated with an Arab federation. Insofar as I am familiar with these matters, it is a political question that 26 27

Ben-Gurion, Meetings, pp. 36–37; See also Teveth (above), n. 16, p. 234. Teveth, ibid., p. 232.

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remains current.”28 He explained this statement—that the federal arrangement was a current political question precisely during those tumultuous days—in a lengthy letter from London to the Mapai Central Committee.29 The purpose of the letter was to persuade the committee members of the necessity of negotiating with the Arabs and the strong likelihood that such negotiations would lead to a regional political settlement. He based his view on optimistic political assessments concerning the response of British policy to the rising strength of Fascist Italy in the Mediterranean Basin and in Africa. He thought that an increase in Britain’s regional strength would be good for Zionism. His based this belief on remarks by the Colonial Secretary, William Ormsby-Gore, to the effect that Britain had no intention of submitting to Arab pressure and reneging on its promises to Zionism. Then, however, came the “but” that was so common in Ben-Gurion’s argumentation: Nevertheless, despite the friendship of O.G., despite the crystallization of the international situation in our favor, despite the British interest in standing firmly and immediately against the Arab uprising in this country—we have to seek a path of understanding and accord with the Arabs if there is only one chance in a thousand that our searches will succeed.

An agreement, he said, was needed primarily in respect to the extent of Jewish immigration. Ben-Gurion made these remarks shortly before the arrival of the Royal Commission under Lord Peel. He was concerned that the commission would recommend a cutback in Jewish immigration, as indeed it would in its conclusions a year later. Therefore, he leaned in favor of an interim agreement with the Arabs, for only five years, during which an immigration quota would be set at the level of immigration in the peak year, 1935, i.e., more than 60,000. The willingness of Ben-Gurion, Weizmann, and Shertok to compromise on Jewish immigration temporarily sparked a controversy in the Zionist Executive and the Mapai Central Committee. Accordingly, Ben-Gurion hurriedly stated that he strongly doubted that the Arabs would be willing to conclude any agreement about the extent of

28

Zionist Executive, May 19, 1936, CZA. “Letter to Mapai Central Committee, June 18, 1936,” Memoirs, C, Tel Aviv, 1973 (Hebrew), pp. 278–84. 29

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Jewish immigration only. In his opinion, “From the Arab perspective . . . the constitutional question is no less important, and no serious negotiations should be undertaken in the absence of an answer to the question of governance.” By so stating, he returned to the main provisions of his proposal, which he now reduced to two clauses: “a. For the future—an Arab federation with which Palestine shall be associated under certain conditions. b. Parity in rule, immediately.” Then he added a sentence that summed up all his twists and turns in bruiting the plan: “During the past few years, I have considered the arguments that our comrades and others have expressed against this proposal—and despite all my cerebral exertions I cannot understand the thinking of those who oppose its acceptance.” Furthermore, not only did Ben-Gurion wish to persuade his comrades that a parity-based executive authority presented no danger, but he was willing, for the sake of a political accord, “to take another step—and to propose to the Arabs . . . the establishment of two national councils, Arab and Jewish (national committees) that shall determine the two peoples’ representatives in the government and serve as a national-level representative political entity . . . in all local and ethno-communal affairs.” Thus, Jewish and Arab national autonomy would already be established in the transitional period. At this opportunity, in the passion of his attempt to persuade his comrades that hope for a settlement with the Arabs still existed despite the current troubles, Ben-Gurion admitted for the first time that he had changed his mind since his collision with Kaplansky at the Ahdut ha-’Avoda convention in 1924: In Ein Harod, I said that there is no way we can go with Arab effendis. I won’t say that now. Now, as before, I believe in cooperative action with the Arab workers and with the peasants as well. However, I will accept the representation of the Arab people as-is. . . . Like Jephtha in his time, like Samuel in his time, and every people and public has at any time the leaders that it deserves at that time.

To show how far he had come in his conviction that the federal arrangement was the path to follow and in his pragmatic political approach, he mentioned an oddity related to Emir Abdullah. Like Jabotinsky fifteen years earlier, Ben-Gurion toyed with the idea of coronating Abdullah as the supreme leader of all of Palestine in return for carte blanche in the growth of the Jewish Yishuv. He entertained no real hope in this matter and was even willing to agree with Shertok that the whole idea was unrealistic. However, he added:

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chapter three Nevertheless, it seems to me that the matter is not as untenable as Moshe thinks. I know that Abdullah is absolutely powerless, but even a fiction has value in political life. A title, a lineage, a formal position has value. Despite everything, it would definitely seem possible that by giving Emir Abdullah a title we would be giving the Arabs something that would do us no harm. It is worth our while to try it, if it will bring us closer to an entrance to Transjordan.30

It would be mistaken to assume that Ben-Gurion viewed the federal arrangement merely as a bait for the dominant Arab elite and a way to maintain his movement’s essential cooperation with England, which he regarded as “the definitive player at this time.” Furthermore, he was thoroughly aware that the Arab uprising had occasioned a fundamental and material change in the Middle East. It had given rise to the Palestinian national movement, including its symbols and sine qua nons, and to pan-Arab consciousness. “All at once they became very deeply aware of it.” The Zionist Movement might manage to defeat all kinds of interventions that Arab rulers might perpetrate in Palestine in the name of Arab unity, such as that concocted by the Prime Minister of Iraq, Nuri Said. However, he added, Whether formal intervention takes place or not—there is intervention “in the heart,” and it may be the most important. There are factors that enter even without a passport and cannot be stopped by any border. It is an inner state of mind, and the Arabs have made the panArab state of mind their own. The question of an Arab federation has become more urgent now.

Ben-Gurion was convinced that the federation issue was inseparably related to the pan-Arab idea, the Arab national awakening, and the Palestinian Arabs’ understandable concern about the loss of their majority status in Palestine. Therefore, he stated, “The question would exist even had the recent events not occurred and, in my opinion, no agreement will be possible unless the federation issue is taken into account.”31 30 Ben-Gurion was probably referring to Emir Abdullah’s renewed initiative for the establishment of an Arab federation under his leadership, which would include Transjordan and Syria first of all. See Porath, The Test of Political Action, p. 30. 31 D. Ben-Gurion, “Meeting of Mapai Central Committee, Sept. 29, 1936,” Memoirs, C, Tel Aviv, 1973 (Hebrew), pp. 442–43.

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Statehood as a Phase en Route to Confederation In discussions such as these, which took up the principled question of the rights of minority and national majority to fulfill their aspirations, Ben-Gurion returned to the question of the right to use force. As we showed above, in the 1920s he ruled out the use of force by citing concepts of universal morality in international relations. Later, while frowning on the use of force, he acknowledged its practical historical efficacy. Sometimes, he admitted, its results were not exclusively negative, e.g., in the population exchanges between Turkey and Greece and the occupation of North America by European settlers. Now he placed the issues in the mouths of British officials who disapproved of any attempt by one people to dominate another and expressed the fear that “If the Jews had power, they might do it, too. Joshua did it.” Ben-Gurion knew how to solve this recurrent conundrum: the way to keep Jews and Arabs from dominating each other is to establish a parity-based federation in Palestine and a regional confederation. Instead of relating to Joshua’s moral right to take over the country; he merely found it correct to remark that Joshua had not done exactly what these people claimed that he had done, “since the Jews did not occupy all of Eretz Israel.” By so stating, Ben-Gurion verged on a clear admission that, under certain conditions, a situation might come about in which the Jews would have to defeat the Arabs by force. On October 5, 1937, in the midst of the debate in the Zionist Movement about the partitioning of Palestine and the establishment of a Jewish state in one sector, he wrote to his son, Amos: We will bring to the state as many Jews as can be brought in. We are profoundly convinced that more than two million can be brought in. We will establish a varied Jewish economy—agricultural, industrial, and maritime. We will organize an efficient defense force, a select army—I have no doubt that our army will be among the choicest in the world—and then I am confident that we will be able to settle in all the rest of the country, either with the consent of our Arab neighbors and in mutual understanding or in some other way.

Furthermore, if the Arabs object to Jewish settlement in the desolate expanses of the Negev, “Then we will have to speak with them

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in a different language, and then we will also have a different language—not the language of statelessness.”32 These remarks, in their historical, political, and value context, were different from what he had said a year earlier, of course. In BenGurion’s thinking, the idea of Jewish statehood in part of Palestine would be from then on an overture, so to speak, to the grand symphony, the regional confederation. “In general, I regard the state,” he wrote to the Mapai Central Committee, “as a temporary instrument only, a social instrument for the attainment of collective goals for as long as humankind is separated into state units.” Although the state is merely an instrument for the fulfillment of Zionism, “it is the most exalted, efficient, and powerful instrument for the attainment of a collective goal, and there is no instrument more important for the fulfillment of Zionism than a Jewish state.”33 Since he viewed Jewish statehood as a temporary instrumentality, Ben-Gurion could argue almost simultaneously, in regard to relations with the Arabs, that “There will be no contradiction among us in the future.” This situation will come to pass after a society of one million Jews is created in Palestine. Then, and after “a maximum of Jewish independence is established, an independent Jewish state will come into being within an Arab federation. As long as states exist, this is the solution that will satisfy all our desires and all of theirs.” Admittedly, “It’s only for the distant future . . . but we must have historical perspective.” A Jewish state is not an ideal in itself but the result of realistic analysis of the regional situation. “Even a Jewish state in part of the country, most of the country, or all of the country will not solve the problem, for we will face the Arab problem. . . . A Jewish state on both sides of the Jordan will not solve the problem because Arabs will remain in and around the country. . . . [Even] if a transfer takes place—I can envision a volitional transfer of the Arabs in this country—the question is still unresolved.” After all, on top of the Palestine problem is the Arab-unity problem, and this, in Ben-Gurion’s opinion, would not be solved unless the Jewish-Arab conflict were put to rest. Accordingly, the “historical solution,” as he put it—or the Utopian solution, as I put it—is rooted in the 32 D. Ben-Gurion, Letters to Paula and the Children, Tel Aviv, 1968 (Hebrew), pp. 210–13. 33 “Letter to Mapai Central Committee, July 1, 1937,” Memoirs, D, Tel Aviv, 1971 (Hebrew), p. 65.

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political formula of an Arab federation and a Jewish state. “This is the last stop and the goal in our relations with ourselves and with the Arabs. We should keep the goal in sight and strive continually to solve the problem in a way that moves toward this goal,” i.e., eliminating the contradiction between the Jews’ and the Arabs’ aspirations. Here, however, in his dialectic way of thinking, Ben-Gurion the realistic statesman immediately stood up alongside Ben-Gurion the Utopian visionary. Thus, he added at once, “It is not enough just to think about the last stop. We have to know at every moment how to move one stop ahead. The closest stop, given the state of affairs in our country and our situation in the world, can only be Jewish statehood in part of Palestine.”34 How did Ben-Gurion propose to resolve the contradiction between the Jewish state that the Arabs were opposing by force, which alone would have the strength to enforce continued Jewish settlement in desolate areas outside its borders, and the regional federative arrangement? After all, his remarks, made repeatedly and passionately during those days of bloodshed, straddled the narrow line between the ridiculous and the credit. The answer lies partly in Ben-Gurion’s dialectic approach to historical processes, but this attests only to his political way of thinking and does not explain his personality as a statesman. These questions also evidently troubled Moshe Shertok,35 who accompanied Ben-Gurion during his serpentine career and was his closest associate in all of his political endeavors. Addressing members of the Mapai Central Committee who also entertained such reflections, Shertok explained that there was a difference between his assessment of the situation and Ben-Gurion’s. He, Shertok, was severely skeptical about the likelihood of an accord with the Arabs. Ben-Gurion, in contrast—he claimed—was a man who argued that “You have to believe and act as though there will be an accord with the Arabs tomorrow.”36 This tomorrow, in Ben-Gurion’s opinion, sometimes seems close and at other times is visible only from afar, somewhere out there in the future, but it exists in any case. And if it is a matter 34

“Council of the World Alliance of Tse’irei Tsiyyon–Hitahdut, April 26, 1938,” Memoirs, F, Tel Aviv, 1987 (Hebrew), p. 277. 35 Moshe Shertok (Sharett) (1894–1965)—head of the Jewish Agency Political Department (1933–1948), foreign minister of the State of Israel (1948–1956), and prime minister (1953–1955). 36 Mapai Central Committee, June 9, 1936, p. 13, Labor Party Archives.

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of creed, then there is no absolute contradiction between the goal and the path to it; instead, there is dialectic tension. Accordingly, the Jewish state, to be established against the Arabs’ will, will ultimately form the basis for a federal regional arrangement between the Jewish people and the Arab people. Armed with this creed, BenGurion could appear before his comrades in the Central Committee— who had often been stunned by his Utopian outbursts and surprised by his political turnarounds—without attracting their derision. Ben-Gurion had a partner in the idea of the regional federal arrangement: Chaim Weizmann, who, by nature and praxis, was one of those optimists who could not tell realism and wishful thinking apart. In 1938, Weizmann met with Prince Muhammad Ali of Egypt, who had pan-Arab aspirations at the time and was caught up with the idea of the Arab federation. In Weizmann’s view, the ambitions of the prince restored the historic situation that had led to the Faisal-Weizmann agreement twenty years earlier, except that now Egypt stood in the shoes of the Hashemite dynasty. As for the issue itself, the two leaders agreed that any political settlement should be coordinated with Britain and France. On this basis, Ali was willing to accept a Jewish state with a Jewish population of two million in a partitioned Palestine and Weizmann agreed to favor the establishment of an Arab federation led by Egypt.37

Federative Proposals during World War II In the buildup to World War II, the British Government’s retreat from its willingness to adopt the Peel Commission conclusions led to the famous St. James Conference in 1939. At this conference, held shortly before the White Paper was issued—by which time it had become clear that the idea of the Jewish state was no longer realistic—some members of the Zionist leadership again took up the federative scheme as an alternative to the partitioning of Palestine and the establishment of a Jewish state.38 This time, however, the federative plan was no longer a hope-inspiring vision but a life raft 37 “Talk between Professor Chaim Weizmann and Prince Muhammad Ali, Feb. 7, 1938,” Weizmann Archives. 38 See Weizmann to MacDonald, March 10, 1939, The Letters and Papers of Chaim Weizmann (Ser. A), XIX, London, 1968.

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that the politicians might use to escape confusing and troubling situations. Indeed, the proposal demonstrates the correlation between the political standing of the Zionist Movement and the form of federal governance proposed. Under the political circumstances of 1939, as Zionism and the Jewish people found themselves isolated and abandoned, Zionist leaders proposed a federal solution to the Palestine problem that would assure Jewish control of immigration, the allocation of areas for settlement, and the establishment of a joint governing authority based on parity. The regional federation was not mentioned at all. When World War II broke out, the political state of mind among members of the Zionist leadership also changed. Everyone was gripped with the feeling —which tragically proved to be correct—that the war, like the one that preceded it, would transform the status of the Jewish people and Zionism. Now, as in World War I, the most important political action to take was to strengthen relations between Britain and the Zionist Movement by contributing to the war effort. This reduced the aspiration for a political settlement with the Arabs to secondary importance. Ben-Gurion reflected the change in an especially perceptible way. In 1940, in a letter sent from London to his wife, he addressed himself to a rumor about attempts at the British Foreign Office to resurrect the Arab federation plan. He replied, “[Even though] . . . for many years I have basically considered this idea a path to a solution, I do not have the heart for it now”—mainly because he doubted “whether it’s the right time for final arrangements at all.”39 By then, Ben-Gurion had begun to suspect the British federation initiative as nothing but an effort to placate the Arabs, especially Iraq, and a possible source of harm to Jewish interests. Therefore, he demanded a halt to the Zionist initiative in this matter. Still, he left the path open to an Arab or British initiative: “If they speak about a federation, we should not turn it down no matter what,” he explained at a meeting of the Zionist Executive. The positive response should be the following: “We are willing to talk provided that you accept a Jewish state as a fundamental.” This stance was flexible in an additional way:

39 “Letters to Paula,” July 15, 1940, Ben-Gurion Research Center Archives, Sede Boqer.

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chapter three If they are speaking about Palestine (about a local and not a regional settlement—Y. G.) then the state may not necessarily be the solution, but Jewish immigration. But if they are speaking about a federation, then we have to insist that they accept the Jewish state beforehand. Otherwise, there is nothing to talk about in regard to a federation.40

In the same spirit and with Ben-Gurion’s consent, M. Shertok responded to Haim Kalvariski,41 who circulated among Arab personalities and the Zionist Executive at the time: There is no ab initio objection to the idea of an alliance between Palestine and the neighboring countries, or to the idea of Palestine joining these countries in a federation. On the contrary: there is a willingness to embark wholeheartedly on an exploration of this possibility of regularizing relations between Palestine and its neighbors and solving the Jewish-Arab problem in Palestine. However, there is no competent Arab entity that regards a federation as part of a plan that would recognize the vital interests of the Jewish people in Palestine. . . . The proposed name of the federation—the “Arab-Semitic Federation”— should not be accepted. Are the Arabs not Semites? If so, why emphasize its Arab nature without mentioning the Jews concurrently? The logical name is a Semitic federation or a Jewish-Arab federation.42

The renaming of the proposed federation was more than semantic; it was material. The idea was to express regional equality between the Jewish and the Arab peoples. Ben-Gurion gave Shertok’s letter a comprehensive interpretation in a paper titled “Outlines for Zionist Policy” that he presented to the Zionist Executive.43 In this document, Ben-Gurion listed several policy alternatives that might be invoked to resolve the JewishArab issue after the war. All were basically federal: a Jewish state in which Arabs would enjoy full civil and national rights; Palestine as a dominion in the British Commonwealth of Nations; and a federation or alliance of Near Eastern states in which all internal affairs in Palestine, especially Jewish immigration and settlement, would be under the Jews’ authority—a Middle Eastern commonwealth of sorts. Weizmann gave these ideas international publicity in an article that he contributed to the prestigious American journal Foreign Affairs in

40 41 42 43

Zionist Executive, July 27, 1940, CZA. Haim Kalvariski (1868–1947), a founding member of Brith Shalom. Ibid., Aug. 17, 1941. Ibid., March 23, 1941.

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January 1942.44 Notably, the leader of the right flank of the Zionist Movement, Menahem Ussishkin, also subscribed to the federal outlook now even though he had opposed it in the past. Ussishkin even preferred to see the Jewish state as part of a Middle Eastern federation than as a dominion in the British Commonwealth.45 From 1941 on, however, the Zionist Executive no longer debated the possibility of federating with the Arabs. Even Ben-Gurion, in his personal initiatives and pathbreaking thoughts, did not bring it up again. After the Biltmore Conference in 1942, the issue of establishing the Jewish state stood at the forefront of the desiderata and efforts of the Zionist Movement.

Jabotinsky Takes Up the Federal Idea Again The renunciation the regional-federation plan, however, did not mean the renunciation of the federal idea as a way to govern the Jewish state itself. Ben-Gurion never repudiated federal ideas, but it was Vladimir Ze’ev Jabotinsky, of all people, who resorted to them after the war began. This takes us back to the question that we asked in Chapter 1: Did Jabotinsky’s despairing of federative schemes in the mid-1920s also prompt him to change his federalist outlook? The answer is no! In fact, the more insistent he became in his call for Jewish statehood and the more firmly he opposed the Arab federation idea, the more he sought to stress his liberal federalist approach toward the essence of the constitution of the Jewish state. In 1934, the two great rivals, Ben-Gurion and Jabotinsky, met in London for a series of talks and hammered out an agreement meant to create a framework for arrangements between the Zionist Labor Movement and the Revisionist Movement in labor relations in Palestine and matters related to the Zionist Organization. The two personalities also discussed issues of state. According to the report that BenGurion presented his party after he updated Jabotinsky about his latest political moves, including his meeting with the High Commissioner and the program that he had presented to him, Jabotinsky accepted all of Ben-Gurion’s political positions with one exception: 44 See “Palestine’s Role in Solution of the Jewish Problem,” Weizmann, Letters, B., p. 461. 45 See n. 40 above.

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the relationship between Palestine and the Arab federation.46 Thus, he agreed to the establishment of a parity-based executive council during the transitional phase, as Ben-Gurion had proposed, and to the formation of a quasi-federation of national autonomies in the second phase, after a Jewish majority would come about and the independent state would be established, as had arisen in Ben-Gurion’s talks with Arab and Jewish leaders. First indications of an outlook that bases the constitution of the Jewish state on national federalism may be found in Jabotinsky’s testimony to the Peel Commission in 1937.47 Referring the national essence of states generally and the Jewish state particularly, Jabotinsky went out of his way to stress: I do not believe it desirable for the constitution of any state to contain special sections that explicitly assure its national character. I believe it is a good sign for a constitution if we find few clauses of that kind. The natural and the best way is that the national complexion of the state be assured by the very fact that the state has a particular majority. If the majority is English, then the state is English and there is no need for any special guarantees. Accordingly, when I say the words “Hebrew state,” I mean a community or a country that enjoys sufficient selfrule in its internal and external affairs and that has a Jewish majority.48

Jabotinsky’s distinction between a de facto nation-state and a de jure nation-state is important in the issue at hand. A state that stipulates its national essence in its constitution has no room for federal principles. Such a stipulation predetermines the identity of the nation that holds absolute proprietorship. Where no such stipulation is made, the ethnic identity of minorities has more breathing room even though the national essence of the state is determined by its majority. The best example, one that Jabotinsky loved dearly, was the United States. One cannot construe his remarks as a pretense and an attempt to conceal his true intentions from the members of the commission, since he told them frankly that the Jews aimed become a majority and admitted that this would change the Arabs’ situation for the worse.49 46

Memoirs, B, p. 207. See Jabotinsky, “Keep Your Promise . . . Testimony before the Royal Commission, February 1937,” Writings, H: Speeches 1927–1940, Jerusalem, 1947 (Hebrew), pp. 221–72. 48 Ibid., p. 224. 49 Ibid., p. 229. 47

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Indeed, four years later—at the beginning of World War II and several months before his death—Jabotinsky resorted again to the federalist idea as a fundamental in the constitution of the Jewish state and as a way to regularize Jewish-Arab relations. His 1940 book, The Jewish War Front, was largely an updated edition of the work he had written in 1918, on the eve of the peace conference. It resembles the earlier work not only in contents but in structure. However, in the chapter on the status of the Arabs in Palestine, there is a political difference, although not a material one. The arrangements in the structure of governance, as he had set forth in his earlier work, were meant for the interim phase, in which the Jews clearly would remain a minority in Palestine. In War Front, in contrast, Jabotinsky set forth a permanent constitution that was compatible with the reality of a Jewish majority in Palestine. Furthermore, in this work Jabotinsky totally ignored the regionalconfederation idea that he had embraced in the early 1920s. Jabotinsky sketched the main provisions of the constitution in an condensed outline form that I present below in a close paraphrase: A. Civil Equality 1. All citizens of all races, religions, languages, and classes will have equal rights, without restriction, in all areas of public life—provided that nothing be done to interfere with the right of any Jew in any other country to return to his homeland, Palestine. and thereby to become a citizen of Palestine automatically. 2. In every cabinet in which a Jew serves as Prime Minister, there shall be an Arab Deputy Prime Minister, and vice versa. 3. Jews and Arabs shall share, proportionally, both the obligations that the state imposes and the benefits that the state bestows. This rule shall hold in regard to parliamentary elections, civil and military service, and budget allocations. 4. This rule shall also be applied in regard to mixed municipalities or regional councils. B. Languages 1. The Hebrew language and the Arabic language shall be equal in rights and legal force.

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2. No law of state, manifesto, or ordinance, no coin or banknote, no stamp of the state, no publication or address that is issued at state expense shall be considered legally valid unless issued in both languages, Hebrew and Arabic, equally. 3. Arabic and Hebrew may be used on an equal legal basis in parliament, the courts, schools, any office or institution of state, and all schools at all levels. 4. All offices of state shall reply to any person who contacts them orally or in writing in Hebrew or Arabic. C. Cultural Autonomy 1. The Jewish and Arab ethno-communities shall be considered autonomous public entities of equal legal status. If Christian Arabs or any other group of citizens who have just grounds for a claim to autonomy demand that they, too, be recognized as a separate public to whatever extent, the parliament may to honor their request. 2. The state shall delegate the following matters to the authority of each ethno-community vis-à-vis members of said community: (a) religion and personal status; (b) education in all sectors and levels, especially the initial phases of compulsory primary education; (c) public assistance, including social assistance of all kinds; (d) adjudication of ordinary legal claims related to the aforementioned affairs. 3. Each ethno-community shall elect its own national representative assembly, which may issue ordinances and impose taxes in its autonomous areas and to appoint a national executive that shall be answerable to said representative assembly. 4. A minister at the rank of a cabinet member who is not affiliated with any political party shall represent each ethno-community in the Government of Palestine at all times. D. Holy Places 1. The important areas within the Old City of Jerusalem, the boundaries of which shall be determined as the League of Nations sees

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fit, shall benefit from extraterritorial status at the extent that is accepted around the world in regard to legations of states. 2. Each of these areas shall be considered a special municipal territory and shall be run by a council to be appointed per agreement among the religious authorities that have an interest in the issue. 3. A regime similar to the foregoing shall be determined, mutatis mutandis in respect to the traditions of the location, in the other holy places in Palestine. 4. Pilgrim entry visas, of an adequately long term, shall be given at no cost to citizens of all countries except in wartime, provided that said pilgrims do not violate regulations related to the requirements of hygiene, sanitation, or public security; and provided that the needs of indigent pilgrims be met at the expense of the competent religious institution and that such pilgrims be returned to their homeland at the expense of said institution at the appropriate time. E. Land 1. A Palestine Court for Land Affairs shall be established, its members including, inter alia, agricultural judges and experts from both ethno-communities. 2. All uncultivated and undercultivated land, as determined in the opinion of the Court, shall be confiscated (with fair compensation for its owners in the latter case) and shall constitute the land reserve of the state. 3. After said land is improved at the expense of the state, the agricultural reserve territories shall be apportioned into parcels that shall be handed over at equal prices to every person and under convenient terms of credit to individuals or groups that wish to receive them. 4. The parcels shall be handed over, under the inspection of the Court for Land Affairs, to all comers, Jewish or Arab, or to groups that request land, without discrimination. 5. Every applicant for land shall have to prove to the Land Court that (a) he holds title to no other land; (b) he has the minimum quantity of capital or equipment needed to cultivate the land,

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whether the equipment is his own or whether it is presented to him by supporters; and (c) he will cultivate the land with his own hands.50 In his background remarks to the proposal, Jabotinsky based himself solely on examples of federative regimes that had passed the test of political durability and met human and social moral standards. He disputed the argument that the Arabs of Palestine would become a nationally oppressed group after they became a minority of two million amid five million Jews, as his proposal envisaged. To refute this claim, he based himself on the status of minorities in three federally structured countries: Canada, Czechoslovakia, and the Soviet Union. In regard to the last-mentioned, he stated with his characteristic fairness, “Soviet Russia has committed much inequity and misdeed, but no one may deny that its national minorities enjoy a great deal of equality.” He then continued with his characteristic sarcasm: “insofar as human beings are capable of ‘enjoying’ anything in that political climate.”51 Then, to show that his scheme was not a haphazard figment of his political imagination, he informed his readers that it was based on a draft constitution that a Revisionist Movement research team had prepared in 1934. The authors of the draft, he said, investigated a vast number of precedents in various faraway areas and consulted documents that had attracted a great deal of respect in their time—a time when the Eastern European intelligentsia . . . was enthused by the theories of the Austrian Socialists about the “state of nations.” They examined Rudolph Springer’s books, the minutes of the Social Democratic Party congress in Brno, the case of Hungary . . . and even the noteworthy laws of old Turkey concerning the autonomy of the national-religious ethnicities that are officially known as millets—nations.52

To convince his readers that his plan had a toehold in the Middle Eastern reality, he suggested that the federally structured Jewish state might be suitable for membership in the British Commonwealth of Nations as a dominion. He discussed these matters at greater length in his aforementioned testimony to the Peel Commission. When he touched upon the concept of Hebrew “state,” he wished to explain that the term “state” 50 51 52

Z. Jabotinsky, The Jewish War Front, Jerusalem, 1941, pp. 186–89. Ibid., p. 183. Ibid., p. 185.

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had no unequivocal meaning per se: “France is a state and Kentucky is a state.” Therefore, he believed, “It would suffice for me to inform the Commission that when I speak about a state, I am not actually interested, in my testimony, in the exact extent or scope of its independence. I believe that the crucial minimum status of statehood is enough self-rule to administer internal affairs.”53 In other words, Jabotinsky assumed when he spoke about the Hebrew state that it would be part of a federal framework. When Jabotinsky expressed his opposition to the Arab federation idea in his talks with Ben-Gurion, the latter reminded him that Jabotinsky and Weizmann had been the only members of the Zionist Executive who had favored the plan in 1923. “I change my mind every week.” Jabotinsky replied with “grudging irony,” as Ben-Gurion remarked. Indeed, he had changed his mind about the regional federation. However, he had not replaced his federalist worldview with an alternative and adhered to it from the beginning of the century until his dying day. His Utopian leanings were embedded in this worldview—and it was these that he attempted to translate into practical political programs.

Ben-Gurion and Jabotinsky—a Comparison of Views Here, I believe, is the place to compare the views of the two main champions of the federal idea, David Ben-Gurion and Vladimir Ze’ev Jabotinsky. My intention here is not to undertake a comprehensive comparison of Ben-Gurion and Jabotinsky as national leaders, of course, but to compare the parallelism of their outlooks, in terms of similarities and dissimilarities, on federalism as a way to enable Jews and Arabs to coexist in Palestine. As a preface, it is proper to note that both had a predisposition to conceptual political thinking. Therefore, unlike Chaim Weizmann, in whose company both men operated and who agreed with each of them at some point in time, both Jabotinsky and Ben-Gurion phrased constitutional schemes while Weizmann contented himself with airy ideas. For them, the approach was essentially systematic; for him, political improvisation was supreme.

53

Jabotinsky (n. 43 above), p. 223.

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The national-autonomy worldview on which they based their confederative plans originated in the political culture of Eastern Europe. Therefore, in both plans—Ben-Gurion’s in the early 1920s and Jabotinsky’s in 1940—the structure of national autonomies would continue to exist even after the Jews attained a majority and established their state. Both men agreed that powers related to culture, education, social welfare, and additional matters of direct concern to each ethno-community should be delegated to the autonomy. In this context, both placed special emphasis on the equal status of the Hebrew and Arabic languages. Under both plans, the autonomies were to be run by national councils or elected chambers. They also agreed about the central administration. At first—Jabotinsky in his 1922 program and Ben-Gurion in the first and second phases of his statehood plan—both advocated parity-based national representation in the legislative and executive authorities. Later on, once the Jewish majority would be in place, the matter of parity in the executive authority was no longer mentioned. It was stressed, however, that every minister of a given nationality, and the prime minister, would have a deputy of the other nationality. As for the legislative authority, both advocated a bicameral system: a lower chamber chosen in proportional elections and an upper chamber in which both peoples would be represented equally. Both were willing to expand the federal principle to the Jewish state and to accept a supranational political structure such as membership in the British Commonwealth—provided, of course, that the Jewish state be totally sovereign in all internal affairs, especially in anything related to the extent of Jewish immigration. In this context, they often indicated their view of the state not as a goal in itself but as an essential instrument for the fulfillment of Zionism. Finally, both stated that, as long as states existed in the world, it was imperative to demand the establishment of a state for the Jewish people. Both leaders were also similar in their guile and their political approach. At various times, both were willing to apply the same stratagem in regard to Emir Abdullah, i.e., to award him the formal headship of the federal state. This oddity aside, they took the same approach toward the idea of transferring the Arabs of Palestine out of the country. Both belonged to a generation that saw nothing morally illegitimate about a voluntary and mutually agreed transfer. Both, however, admitted that transfer was impractical under existing political conditions.

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If so, in what respects were they different? On several occasions in this study, we showed clearly that they had different senses of “historical time.” By saying this, we digress from the theme of federalism and address ourselves to the totality of their political and social views. Our remarks in this context pertain not to the correctness of the outlooks themselves—whether they were “right” or “wrong” in retrospect, but to their correspondence to their Zeitgeist. Jabotinsky, for example, did not understand the decisive national roles that the nation-building enterprise played, even in the 1920s and 1930s, in the Socialist spirit of the Zionist Labor Movement and, particularly, the pioneering movements. He also failed to grasp the latent revolutionary significance of the establishment of a Jewish state, even if only in part of Palestine. Ben-Gurion, in contrast, was always attentive to the political currents of the time. His proposals and schemes were not always practical; many were prompted by Utopian urges. All, however, were fathomable in terms of the logic of their time. Therefore, when World War II broke out and both men came to the same conclusion about the Jewish state—that it should be established at once—it was ultimately Ben-Gurion who took what was available for the taking—a Jewish state in part of Palestine—whereas Jabotinsky, had he still been alive, probably would have rejected the compromise categorically. May one assume that this distinction also exists in regard to the differences in their views on federalism, which, even in Ben-Gurion’s opinion, were anachronistic? It seems that their different perception of historical time existed in regard to federalism, too. Jabotinsky a consistent champion of the rights of national minorities to his dying day. His political federalism was tailored to fit these fundamental premises, provided that absolute Jewish sovereignty over Palestine be recognized. Ben-Gurion’s approach was much more flexible due to his wish to adjust it to the logic of changes in historical situations. The federation plan that Jabotinsky presented in the early 1920s clashed with the spirit of the Churchill White Paper that was released in 1922 and accepted by the Zionist Movement, including by Jabotinsky. His plan also contrasted with the attitude of the British Labour Party toward the Palestine problem. Ben-Gurion’s autonomistic federalism, while not compatible with the interests of the ruling power in the region, was not contradictory to them. The Mandate Government provided evidence of this by allowing the Yishuv to develop a de facto national autonomy.

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In the late 1920s and the early 1930s, after the 1929 Arab violence and in view of the Passfield White Paper, Jabotinsky demanded that the end goal of Zionism, Jewish statehood, be declared. BenGurion, in contrast, was aware of the weakness of Zionism and released his plan for the establishment of a parity-based binational regime in Palestine under British sponsorship. Four years later, in the mid-1930s, as large-scale immigration presaged the attainment of a Jewish majority in Palestine, Ben-Gurion set forth his composite plan for the establishment of a Jewish state throughout Palestine and the enrollment of this state in an Arab federation. Jabotinsky agreed with him about the first part of his plan but emphatically ruled out the idea of a Middle Eastern federation. This is not to say that history has shown Ben-Gurion’s proposals to be more practical than Jabotinsky’s. However, they did not have the characteristic of ignoring realities in Palestine and the region. Ben-Gurion took special pains to avoid a clash with the political interests of the British Government. However, to pique the Arab national interest, he offered the Arabs of Palestine an autonomous organization and parity in governance and offered the Arab nation a regional federation. Apart from their different understandings of historical time, BenGurion and Jabotinsky had different historical perspectives on JewishArab relations. Jabotinsky’s political outlook was rooted in cultural and political relations with the West. Therefore, true to his Western liberal principles, he wished to maximize the entitlements of the Arab national minority in the Jewish state. However, he rejected enlistment in the Arab federation, not only because he did not believe in it but also because it meant dissociation from the West. Ben-Gurion, the Eastern European Zionist revolutionary, the man of the Second Aliya and the leader of the Yishuv, was less connected with the West in the cultural sense. His relationship with this world was mainly one of political interest—vis-à-vis Britain in the 1930s and the United States in the 1940s. Eastern culture was another matter; it had fired his curiosity even before World War I, when he studied law in Constantinople, and he would continue to be attracted to the culture of the Far East in the 1950s while serving as Prime Minister of Israel. Accordingly, his considerations in regard to the regional confederation lacked Jabotinsky’s cultural inhibition and concerned national political interest only. He understood the object of this interest, in the long term, as a comprehensive regional political settlement

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between Jews and Arabs. Jabotinsky viewed the matter on a more limited scale—in a local, Palestine-level arrangement between the Palestinian Arab minority and the Jewish majority. An additional source of this difference is that Jabotinsky, by the 1920s, already recognized the existence of a Palestinian Arab national entity and no longer concerned himself with the unity of the Arab nation (umma). Ben-Gurion, in contrast, believed that the Arab national movement in Palestine and in all countries of the region aspired to the unity of the umma. He viewed this intention favorably because the existence of a regional federative organization would make it possible to compensate the Arabs of Palestine for the minority status that would eventually be theirs. Jabotinsky was willing to offer them compensation, too—not in the coin of political affiliation with the Arab umma but in their receipt of a respectable political and cultural status as a national minority. From the same “historical perspective,” in 1943, after he had cut the Gordian knot between the Arab federation and the Jewish state, Ben-Gurion remained aware of the crucial nexus of Jewish Palestine and the surrounding Arab countries. His reasoning in this matter was twofold. First, Arab countries would continue to have Jewish populations even after the Jewish state would come into being and Ben-Gurion felt responsible for their fate. For this reason, he said— not only for reasons of Jewish and Zionist morality—he wished to treat the Arab minority in the Jewish state in an exemplary fashion. The second rationale flowed from his belief that Palestine would need to maintain economic relations with the neighboring countries. Here, as before, his fit the traditional Utopian Zionist vision into his remarks: “When the Jewish people with its immense latent capabilities—economic, scientific—will be here, then not only will we discover what we are able to give them, but the neighboring countries will find out as well.”54 These remarks are redolent of paternalism, as were his remarks at all times, but this was all the Zionist Movement could offer the Arabs just then. Accordingly, even when the political conditions changed, Ben-Gurion believed that the Zionist state would adopt a wait-and-see policy in response to any Arab or British initiative to establish an Arab federation. As long as such a federation has not been formed and the Jewish state has not been invited to

54

Zionist General Council, July 5, 1943, p. 11.

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join it, “the time for us to take a stand, pro or con, has not yet come.” Ben-Gurion did not release his remarks into a political void. He made them in connection with a characteristic that the leaders of Arab countries displayed after British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden said in 1943 that Britain would take a favorable view toward the establishment of an Arab federation.55 Ben-Gurion was aware that Arab leaders were floating various federative initiatives. His open-mindedness toward the initiatives may give further evidence of the differences between his attitude and Jabotinsky’s. Be this as it may, Ben-Gurion’s tortuous dealings with the federative idea cannot be summed up in terms of identity and difference between his outlook and Jabotinsky’s. It was precisely in his debate with the left flank of the Zionist Movement, and especially Ha-shomer ha-Tsa’ir, that Ben-Gurion’s views on the federal issue surfaced in their full clarity and power. His dramatic confrontation with Ha-shomer haTsa’ir is discussed the next chapter.

55

Porath, The Test of Political Action, p. 268ff.

CHAPTER FOUR

THE BINATIONAL FEDERATIVE MODEL

[ Jacob] had a dream; a stairway was set on the ground and its top reached the sky. . . . (Gen. 28:12 )

The Kaplansky and Bentov Committees At the point where Ben-Gurion called off his quest for a federal solution to the Palestine problem in the early 1940s, personalities on the left flank of the Zionist Labor Movement and the Liberal Zionist center carried on, continuing to contemplate and formulate plans in this regard. The standard-bearers this time were Shelomo Kaplansky, who had been developing and refining his ideas since the 1920s, and Mordekhai Bentov, a leading figure in the Ha-Kibbutz ha-Artsi organization of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir. Each of these men was appointed to head a committee of investigation on behalf of various public entities. The Kaplansky committee was established by the Jewish Agency Executive in early 1940 on the basis of a resolution by the XXI Zionist Congress, which convened in 1939 on the eve of World War II. The resolution stressed the need for a detailed plan for Zionist policy on the Arab question—a plan that would ordain cooperative relations between the peoples. The committee was instructed to present its proposals to the competent institutions of the Zionist Movement. The Bentov committee, operating on behalf of the League for Jewish-Arab Rapprochement and Cooperation, was tasked with preparing material, writing up a memorandum, and presenting these documents to a Jewish Agency committee. The League had been established in 1939 by former prominent members of Brit Shalom and the Kedma Mizraha association, which largely shared the Brit Shalom worldview. Several leading figures in Po’alei Tsiyyon Left and Ha-Kibbutz ha-Artsi also took part in League activities.

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The different public statuses of the committees—the Kaplansky committee, appointed officially by the Jewish Agency Executive, and the Bentov committee, appointed by a political body—hardly influenced their composition in terms of their members’ political affiliation.1 The two chairmen were not far apart in their worldviews. Kaplansky was a notable in the oppositionist left flank of Mapai and in 1948 joined Mapam, a party founded by Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir, Ahdut ha’Avoda, and Po’alei Tsiyyon-Left. Importantly, membership in both committees was on a personal basis; neither chair represented his movement. Zionist historiography has discussed the conclusions of the committees at length, mainly from the political and conceptual standpoints. Susan Lee Hattis regards them as part of the assortment of binational ideas that were bruited in the 1930s and 1940s as ways to solve the Palestine problem. Moshe Gabbai links them to the history of the League. Shmuel Dotan emphasizes their political aspect. Elkana Margalit places them in the center of the Labor Party’s debate over binationalism. Finally, David Zayit emphasizes the internal indecision in Ha-Kibbutz ha-Artsi about the conclusions of the Bentov committee.2 Due to the emphases in these studies, scholars have done little to probe the Utopian essence of the regimes that the Kaplansky and Bentov committees proposed and have not compared Ben-Gurion’s plan in the 1930s with the schemes bruited by the Left in the 1940s. The crux of this chapter, then, is twofold: constitutional Utopianism and historical comparison.

1 The Kaplansky committee was composed of three members of Mapai (Michael Assaf, Dr. Jacob Tehon, and Kaplansky); two members of the Alliance of General Zionists, (Daniel Auster and Hayyim Kalvariski, an affiliate of Brit Shalom (Dr. Judah Magnes), and a close associate of the Mizrahi movement (Rabbi Ben-Zion Meir Hai Ouziel). The members of the Bentov committee, apart from the chairman, were Dr. Moritz Bielski and Felix Rosenblitt (subsequently Rosen), leading figures among the organization of immigrants from Germany; Dr. Nachum RafaelkesNir, a leader of Po’alei Tsiyyon-Left, and Dr. Peretz Naphtali, a member of Mapai and a noted personality among the immigrants from Germany. 2 See Susan Lee Hattis, The Bi-National Idea in Palestine, Tel Aviv, 1970, Chapter IV; M. Gabai, In Search for a Solution: “The League for Jewish-Arab Rapprochement and Cooperation”, 1939–1948, M.A. thesis, Tel Aviv University, 1989 (Hebrew); S. Dotan, The Struggle for Palestine, Tel Aviv, 1981 (Hebrew), pp. 155–201; E. Margalit, “The Debate in the Palestine Labor Movement over the Binational State Idea,” Zionism D (1976) (Hebrew), pp. 183–258; D. Zayit, Zionism and Peace, Tel Aviv, 1985 (Hebrew), pp. 233–94.

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The Kaplansky and Bentov Plans The plans of the Socialist wing and the liberal-radical wing were undoubtedly much more Utopian than the previous constitutional plans. This assessment refers to the way the plans clashed with reality, in two senses: misunderstanding of reality and the wish to transform reality from the ground up. After all, at the time the plans were debated, phrased, and formulated, the Jewish masses for whom they were intended were on their way to the crematoria. Furthermore, Utopian hopes that are typical of any war blossomed in view of the tragic unawareness of what was happening to European Jewry.3 People predisposed to radical outlooks are the most liable to be caught up in states of mind and thought such as these. The Left, too, regarded the war years—especially after the Soviet Union joined the war against Nazi Germany—as the gestation period of a new world of which a peaceable and internationally grounded solution to the Jewish-Arab conflict would be a part. The grand Utopian characteristic of these plans also traces to the fact that their sires were primarily intellectuals and only afterwards statesmen or public figures. They often tended to underestimate the importance or the intensity of current difficulties and pledged themselves to rational solutions for the future. The earlier schemes, in contrast, were conceived by statecrafter-intellectuals who, above all, were inclined to seize the historical opportunity that, in their opinion, had come their way in the present. This applies foremost to Ben-Gurion but also to Jabotinsky at the end of World War I and in the early 1920s. One of the two plans, that of the Bentov committee—which touched off a public controversy—is notable for its Utopian detail and its studious intellectual approach toward matters related to constitutional law. The authors of the previous plans had no such inclination; they considered it sufficient to sketch the general outlines of the desired federal regime.

3

Notably, in the disputation that erupted around these plans in October 1942 between Ben-Gurion and Meir Yaari, both disputants were convinced that millions of Jews would remain in Eastern Europe, mainly in Poland, after the war. This is why both men agreed that two million Jews would relocate to Palestine after the war—within three years according to Ben-Gurion and within ten years according to Yaari.

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Here a paradoxical phenomenon deserves our attention. As stated, some of these plans, upon their semi-official publication, touched off acute ideological polemics and severe political controversy4 despite their pronouncedly Utopian nature and the absence of meaningful political power behind them. Kaplansky was isolated in his party, Mapai, and was not backed by any public force outside the party. The Ha-Kibbutz ha-Artsi organization of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir, in turn, had not yet mobilized overtly as a political entity that would support of Bentov’s scheme. The tumult that erupted owed some of its origins to the underlying political circumstances and the psychological climate of the time. This, however, is not the whole explanation. The background was the Biltmore plan, which aimed to transform Palestine into a “Jewish commonwealth,” i.e., a state, at the end of the war. Ben-Gurion became the champion of the Biltmore plan in the Zionist Movement, and to promote it he set out on a campaign of persuasion among American Jewish leaders and a struggle of political ideology within the Movement, the Histadrut, and his party, Mapai. On the one hand, Ben-Gurion had to change the minds of American non-Zionists and induce them to support the idea of Jewish statehood. They had opposed this solution until then because they considered this method of consolidating Jewish nationhood a menace to the social status of many American Jews, who might find their civil loyalty and their national loyalty in a state of contradiction. By the same token, he had to convince anti-partition comrades in his party and the Zionist Organization that the demand for a Jewish state would not necessarily lead to the resurrection of the idea of partitioning Palestine into two nation-states. This state of affairs toppled Ben-Gurion into the sort of psychological stress that often caused him to overreact to his political rivals. Thus, he went into a frenzy about Bentov’s having submitted a secret draft of his plan to some 100 prominent American public personalities

4 See (a) Committee on Constitutional Development in Palestine, Jerusalem, 1941 (hereinafter: Bentov Committee report). This is the first version of the Bentov Committee conclusions; it was written in English and the quotations in this work are paraphrased from it; (b) S. Kaplansky, “Thoughts on Sovereignty, Autonomy, and Federation,” Ahdut ha-’Avoda, B, 1943 (Vision and Fulfillment, pp. 348–76). Since the Kaplansky Committee did not reach a consensus, Kaplansky published the majority conclusions in his own name.

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( Jewish ones, in Ben-Gurion’s estimation) for their opinion. Ben-Gurion considered Bentov’s step a malicious attempt to sabotage his political and informational efforts and a flagrant breach of Zionist discipline. Even so, his response is puzzling. Why did Ben-Gurion flay the Bentov plan again and again with unflagging intensity for two straight years, 1942–1944, instead of leaving it alone? And why did he distinguish between it and the Kaplansky plan, which he also opposed but spared from his rhetorical fury? The Kaplansky plan, after all, had the stamp of a political platform, whereas the Bentov scheme more closely resembled the conclusions of an investigative committee that offered statecrafters and the public two alternatives ways to settle the Jewish-Arab conflict, “regional federalism” or “community federalism.” The answer to these questions lies somewhere on the boundary between the overt and the covert levels of Ben-Gurion’s personality, and I will try to answer the questions as I explore the essence of the two plans and compare them with Ben-Gurion’s outlook at that time and in the more distant past. Indeed, his disputants missed no opportunity to note the seeming identity of their plan to the scheme that Ben-Gurion had bruited ten years earlier. At the outset of the discussion, we should note a material difference in the respective points of departure of the two plans. Bentov and his associates, aiming for the endgoal5 in Jewish-Arab relations, crafted two complete structured alternatives of federal binational governance. Kaplansky, in contrast, stated explicitly that “The Jewish-Arab accord cannot pertain to the so-called endgoals of the two national movements.”6 Thus, the matter of secondary concern in the Bentov plan— the interim arrangement—was of primary concern for Kaplansky, and vice versa: the central idea in the Bentov plan was, for Kaplansky, still not ripe for discussion. Thus, Kaplansky avoided principled questions of the right of national sovereignty in Palestine and its implications for the structure of governance or the essence of the constitution that would regulate Jewish-Arab relations once and for all. He did not ask, for example, whether the parity structure of the governing institutions

5 The English source text uses the term “final solution,” which I prefer to avoid due to its current connotation. 6 Kaplansky, Vision and Fulfillment, p. 351.

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would be permanent or interim only. The Bentov plan, in contrast— or the “Bentov book,” as contemporaries called it—accepted as a basic premise that one nation could not possibly have title to Palestine and that, therefore, sovereignty could come about only “jointly and equally.” This, in the opinion of the authors of the “Bentov book,” was the “core and substance” of binationalism.7 Apart from the universal principle, the authors of the report found internal justification for their premise in remarks by Berl Katznelson in 1931 about binational rule in Palestine. Katznelson spoke about the principle of Jewish-Arab equality in designing the regime in Palestine and pointing the state in the direction of true binational governance.8 By basing themselves on Katznelson in this fashion, they inadvertently determined, as it were, that time was standing still as far as they were concerned. Kaplansky was also fixated in the past; his views had hardly changed since the late 1920s. Accordingly, apart from the theoretical and practical importance of the different points of departure, the difference between the two plans in respect to the constitutional structure of the binational regime narrowed steadily. If the issue at hand was a transitional period that would last for twenty or twenty-five years, as Kaplansky presumed, then the two plans were very similar in several basic premises. The first premise, as Kaplansky phrased it, was “parity federalism,” i.e., cooperative relations between the peoples and non-domination—an expression that recurs in the Bentov plan—of one people over the other. Only on the basis of political parity could such cooperation come about.9 The second premise was the necessity, during the interim period, of a third party as a partner in and a guarantor of the Jewish-Arab accord. The plans disagreed only about of the identity of the guarantor. The authors of the “Bentov book” preferred provisional international patronage whereas Kaplansky, for practical political reasons, remained loyal to Britain, provided that it change its status from Mandatory Government to a guarantor amenable to both sides. The third premise was that both forms of federalism—“territorial” and “personal” in Kaplansky’s terminology, “regional” and “community” in Bentov’s—were compatible with the national situation in 7 8 9

Bentov committee report, p. 75. See Chapter 2, n. 19. Kaplansky, Vision and Fulfillment, p. 354.

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Palestine. The difference between them was largely semantic. For example, “personal federalism” and “community federalism” were based on individuals’ affiliation with the national entity of their choice. The difference lay not in principle but in political and social praxis. Kaplansky presumed that as the two national communities developed in tandem, each would naturally concentrate in certain parts of the country. Therefore, he foresaw a dynamic model of governance that would evolve from “personal federalism” to “territorial federalism.” The Bentov committee, in contrast, proposed two alternative static models: “regional federalism” and “community federalism.” As for the structure of governance in the federative state, Kaplansky, basing himself (without significant changes) on his proposals from 1924 along with ideas culled from the plans of Chaim Arlosoroff and Victor (Avigdor) Jacobson, devised a three-tiered governing structure for all of Palestine: 1. Personal national autonomy, administered by a national council elected in general direct elections, irrespective of the elector’s place of residence. The national council appoints the executive authority of the autonomy, which, in turn, posts delegates to the federal council. 2. A federal government based on a bicameral legislature: an upper chamber or federal council with “numerically equal representation for the Arab Yishuv and the Jewish Yishuv” and an elected assembly with nationally balanced representation, its representatives democratically elected on a general proportional basis. Here, however, as in the past, Kaplansky added a very significant restriction: During the first ten years of implementation of the accord, or until numerical parity between the national groups in Palestine is achieved, the legislative institution has only one chamber, the federal council. The elected assembly is established only at the end of the first phase of the accord.10 The plan had nothing new to offer in regard to the apportionment of ruling powers between the autonomy and the federal system, except that the Jewish autonomy would be responsible for immigrant absorption.

10

Ibid., p. 358.

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3. The third dimension was the administrative partitioning of the country into districts. Here Kaplansky adopted Jacobson’s idea of districts as the basis for the establishment of national cantons and Arlosoroff ’s intention of developing Jewish-Arab cooperation in district administration. The assumption here was that each national district would have a minority of the other people. Overall, one may say that the regional federal model. as proposed by Kaplansky, did not overstep the principles of Zionist policy on the eve of the World War. In a letter to Malcolm Macdonald shortly before the release of the White Paper, Weizmann, representing the views of the Zionist Executive, said that the Executive was willing to consider three alternatives as solutions to the Palestine problem: a parity regime under the British Mandate; termination of the Mandate and partitioning of Palestine into two states; and the establishment of a federative framework in which the Jews would exercise full control of immigration in the portion of Palestine that would constitute the Jewish region.11 Therefore, Kaplansky’s plan included the first and third alternatives in full. It rejected partition in theory but implemented it in practice, especially in respect to the main problem, control of Jewish immigration. The Bentov plan lacked the process that blended two methods and drew a distinction ab initio between “regional federalism” and “community” or ethnic federalism, in full awareness that the former configuration was less complex and would be more acceptable abroad. In other words, the form of governance that Kaplansky prescribed at the end of the process would, for Bentov, come about at the beginning of the process. As for the form of governance proposed, whether it came about at the beginning or at the end of the process of the Jewish-Arab settlement, the plans are indistinguishable. They share not only the same basic premises but also the same practical proposals, such as federal status for the Negev district and the city of Jerusalem. Consequently, Jerusalem as the capital of the federation would have a status similar to that of Washington, D.C., and the wastelands of the Negev would be open to settlement by both peoples. The “Bentov

11

Weizmann (Chapter 3 above, n. 34), pp. 24–27.

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book” even accepts Kaplansky’s idea that only the parity-based upper chamber would function during an agreed-upon transition period.12 The plans emphasize different things, of course. For example, Kaplansky hardly discussed the executive authority but implied that the parity principle would apply to it as well as to the entire federative structure. The Bentov plan, in contrast, devotes much attention to the executive authority. Its authors preferred an American- or Swiss-style presidential regime over a parliamentary one, i.e., the president would be not only the head of state but also the head of the executive authority. It is true that Switzerland also has an office of the prime minister, but it, like the entire government, is answerable to the president and not to parliament. The president also chairs the upper chamber and the president and vice president are installed in general countrywide elections. Since the proposal spoke of exact constitutional parity, each national group was to elect, for each term of the presidency, a president and vice-president who would serve alternately—a Jewish president and an Arab vice-president, and vice versa. The committee did not prescribe a rigid parity apportionment of ministerial portfolios in the federal government; instead, it recommended that their numbers be more or less equal. To reinforce the constitutional balances, the committee believed that while a prime minister of one nationality was serving the elected assembly should be chaired by a member of the other national group.13 The second alternative proposed by the Bentov committee, “community federalism,” was, in the opinion of its authors, much more complex than the first proposal, “regional federalism.” Both plans adopted the principles of national autonomy for both peoples, division of rule between autonomous authorities and a central authority; a bicameral legislature that would maintain balance between the national groups, and parity in the executive authority. However, the regional plan and the community scheme were different in important ways. The committee members’ beginning premise was that Palestine would need more forceful and authoritarian constitution in the absence of the territorial demarcation of the areas of national autonomy. All citizens of Palestine, for example, would have to

12 13

Bentov Committee report, p. 112. Ibid., pp. 111–12.

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affiliate with one of the autonomous national groups. This community affiliation would be handed down by “inheritance,” as it were; to change it, heirs would have to go through some formal process. Furthermore, since national affiliation would be obligatory for all, no other autonomous community organization, even on a religious basis, would be allowed. Agudath Israel, for example, would be granted autonomy in matters of religious ritual, but only within the general Jewish autonomy. The authors of the plan justified this constitutional rigidity by citing the Swiss precedent, in which all aspiring citizens must join one of the canton communities. The authors of the proposal were afraid that the principle of strengthening the power of the community autonomies might lead to an undesired degree of decentralization in a federal state. Thus, they sought to balance community decentralism with federal centralism and found the solution in the Canadian federalism method, in which the constitution gives the central government more powers than it gives provincial governments. It stands to reason, the Bentov report said, that citizens in separate territories would be subject to different laws but not that people in neighboring towns or districts in a modern state would be subject to different laws. Accordingly, they ceded only a few matters to the sole administration of the communities, and even in these cases the central government would retain the right to supervise and intervene. By implication, the structure of the executive authority that the Bentov committee proposed in its “regional” plan was unsuited to the “community” plan. Instead of the general election of two presidents and two vice-presidents who would serve alternately, the Swiss method was proposed. In this method, the executive authority would be elected by an electoral body made up of both chambers of parliament and both national councils. A four-member executive team— a small cabinet or Government—would be chosen: two Jews and two Arabs. Each of the four would head this entity for one year, during which time he or she would also be president of the state. During this year in office, the president would hold the deciding vote in the event that the members of the Government could not make a decision. The members of the executive team would also hold the most important ministerial portfolios, such as foreign affairs, finance, defense, and the interior. The team would be empowered to appoint additional ministers who would not be members of the

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small cabinet. Each minister could appoint a deputy minister of the other nationality.14 Thus, the Bentov committee proposed a constitution that combined “federal centralism” with the Swiss canton method. Finally and importantly, since the constitution lay at the core of both forms of federalism, regional and community, any amendment to it would require a two-thirds majority of both federal houses and both national councils. The Bentov committee also wished to impose the local federative model on the area abutting Palestine, with the intention of founding a regional federation in the future. Bentov himself, more enthusiastic than his comrades about the regional arrangement idea, stated at the beginning of his committee’s deliberations, “What we have in mind is a federation, not a confederation.” He was the first and only discussant of federal arrangements who noticed the distinction between these two political models. In his opinion, a confederation, which leaves full sovereign powers in the hands of the states participating in the regional arrangement, “will merely create an opportunity for conflict and disintegration.” A regional federation shaped by a binding constitution and run by central authorities, in contrast, would induce the peoples of the region to cooperate. This would happen, of course, only if a formula were found to strike a balance between the autonomous sovereignty of the constituent states of the federation and the status of the central administration, which should be given limited but real powers. Kaplansky, although agreeing with Bentov that postwar economic development in the region would lead to more cooperation among the independent states, did not favor the establishment of a federation, evidently for two reasons. First, his own plan spoke of an interim settlement and made no commitment to any aspect of the desired final nature of the Jewish-Arab accord. Second, several members of his committee expressed serious doubt about the Arabs’ willingness to enter into any settlement with the Zionist movement. Accordingly, as was his wont, Kaplansky proposed a minimalistic plan for regional cooperation: mutual phaseout of customs tariffs, establishment of a joint authority for regional development, equitable apportionment of

14

Ibid., p. 171.

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water sources, and Jewish financial and technological aid for the peoples of the region. Notably, the regional federal arrangement was important for both Kaplansky and Bentov because they assumed that it would facilitate the settlement of hundreds of thousands of Jews outside the borders of Mandatory Palestine. For reasons of economics and national interests, both disapproved of the idea of a Semitic federation that would embrace the entire region from the Nile to the Euphrates and the Tigris, preferring less grandiose political settings. Kaplansky envisioned two confederative structures in the region: one comprised of the Mediterranean countries (apart from Egypt)—Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, and Transjordan (the last-mentioned with access to the Mediterranean—and one comprised of the oil countries: Iraq, Iran, and the Caucasus. For some reason, he omitted Saudi Arabia in his remarks. Bentov expanded the first setting by including Iraq in it. He based himself on the assumption that, under the appropriate conditions, an economically, culturally, and politically advanced federation of fifteen million Arabs and five to six million Jews (mainly in Palestine and Transjordan) could form over a generation or two. These, then, were the basic premises on which Kaplansky and Bentov based their confederation and federation ideas, respectively. Bentov, however, true to his theory of a federation with an authoritarian central regime, added several ideas about the constitution of the regional federation. He envisaged the regional organization much as he envisaged the internal governance of Palestine: the constitution as the basis and framework of the existence of the federative arrangement. Furthermore, just as the constitution was meant to assure the autonomous and democratic existence of the national groups in Palestine, so should the existence of the autonomous states in the region rest on similar principles. The federal constitution should provide three additional assurances: it should demarcate spheres of activity under the federal authority; guarantee the constitutions of the member states of the federation— including the power to intervene in their internal affairs when the danger of breach of their constitutions is observed; and prevent national, racial, or religious incitement. Bentov applied his proposals for Palestine to the entire region in respect to the structure of the federative government as well. The legislative authority would be bicameral: an elected assembly

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representing the population of the federation at large, and a senate representing the constituent states. The assembly would be chosen in proportional elections, but to strengthen the representation of sparsely populated states and assure political justice, Bentov proposed a complementary amendment that would allow small states to send more delegates than the proportion due them and to force large states to send fewer. This could be determined in various ways, e.g., by stipulating that the first million people in any state receive more delegates than the second million. The federal senate would be paritybased—sixty delegates, twelve from each country in the alliance— and would vote on the basis of nation-state blocs. The federation would be run by a collective presidency—a five-member executive authority (Government), one member from each state— and a premiership rotated among the members of the Government. Inhabitants of the federation would hold dual citizenship: national and federal. This duality would also apply to the defense forces; the armies would be national but under federal command. To sustain so complex a constitution in a political structure of nationally unbalanced forces, it was determined that any constitutional amendment would require a two-thirds majority in each of the two federal legislatures and would go into effect only after endorsed by a simple majority in each parliament in the federation. To enhance the confidence of the individual states, in the event that an amendment were to be endorsed by all the states save one, the federal directorate (government) would be empowered to call new elections or a referendum in the state at issue. Thus, the member states of the federation would be able to block federal decisions pertaining to the constitution but not to veto decisions of the majority. The result was a two-tiered federal structure: a binational federation in Palestine and a regional multinational federation as the Bentov committee conceived of it. However, the people involved, including Kaplansky, knew that their plan would be nothing but a constitutional variation on a federal theme unless preceded by a Jewish-Arab agreement on Jewish immigration to Palestine and its extent. The Bentov plan expresses this awareness clearly and firmly in the preamble to the section on Jewish immigration (paraphrase follows): We now come to the focal point of this report. In all our discussions and deliberations, we did not let ourselves forget, even for a moment,

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chapter four that the Jewish immigration problem and, to a lesser extent, the question of land acquisition in the present overshadow every other consideration among Jews and Arabs.15

Aware of the tremendous tension between the Jewish masses’ need to emigrate to Palestine and the Arab masses’ fear of mass Jewish immigration, the authors of the report reached the conclusion that only a formula placing some limit on Jewish immigration would be a realistic compromise between the peoples, at least for an agreed period of time. The manner of limitation, in turn, should correspond to the form of federal regime chosen, regional or community. Accordingly, two kinds of limitations were plausible: territorial or quota. In the regional federalism method, the Jews would decide how many immigrants might enter their autonomous territory and the Arabs could bar Jewish immigrants from their territory. By means of this division of power, decisions on the extent of Jewish immigration (apart from the formality of issuing federal entrance visas and responsibility for absorbing the immigrants) would be made by the Jewish autonomous authority in full cooperation with the Jewish Agency. To forestall suspicion and friction between the two national districts, the authors of the report recommended some degree of federal review and control of the immigration process, from issuing immigration visas to determining ports of entry and overland crossing routes for the masses of immigrants. Consequently, the regional federal structure effectively partitioned the country into two sovereign states in regard to the issue of greatest importance to both peoples. This method, of course, was wholly unsuitable to the alternative structure, community federalism. In the absence of a territorial limit, the authors had to limit Jewish immigration in a different way. The only method they found was the one that the Mandatory Government had considered acceptable since the early 1920s—economic carrying capacity. The authors believed that, for all of its limitations, this was a more objective way of estimating society’s ability to absorb immigrants. It was also, in their opinion, flexible enough to meet changing economic needs. Above all, it offered an opportunity to create mechanisms of Jewish-Arab cooperation under the influence of continual negotiations for the setting of immigration quotas. They frowned

15

Bentov Committee report, p. 130.

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upon the alternative of setting annual immigration quotas for an unlimited period of time. At the most, they agreed to accept it during the interim period, i.e., until federal rule would replace Mandatory rule. Representatives of the two peoples were to conduct political negotiations over the economic carrying capacity during the transition period only. As for permanent arrangements, the authors affirmed the principle of shifting all important issues between Arabs and Jews from the level of practical ongoing political negotiations to the principled constitutional level. From their perspective, then, the best and sturdiest guarantee of continued Jewish immigration should be found in the constitution, which would invest the principle of economic carrying capacity with legal force. Thus the conventional political practice in relations between the Jewish Agency and the Mandatory Government in regard to the number of “certificates” (immigration visas) that the Government would give the Jewish Agency each year would cease to exist. An effective way to determine economic carrying capacity as precisely as possible, amidst a changing reality, would of course be needed. In keeping with their rule of separating politics from principle, the authors of the report insisted on denying the federal parliament the power to set immigration quotas in accordance with economic carrying capacity. This power would be exercised by a special entity: the State Committee for Immigration Affairs, which in the constitutional system would have a status similar to that of the Supreme Court, i.e., non-dependency on the other two branches of government. It is true that the Government would appoint the four-member committee, two members from each national group, but the members’ term in office would be unlimited, like that of United States Supreme Court justices, or would be predetermined for a lengthy period. To keep the committee from becoming sclerotic, one member would be replaced every three years. The Immigration Committee would be aided by two entities: a social research institute to provide it with economic and statistical data and an advisory public council to bring the various national or religious groups’ special interests to its knowledge. In this council, the Jewish Agency would have the special status of representative of the interests of world Jewry, as set forth in the Mandate for Palestine. The committee would have to consult with it before setting annual quotas of Jewish immigration.

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The authors of the Bentov report also considered the possibility of disagreements between the Jewish and the Arab delegates to the Immigration Committee that might plunge the committee into a paralytic impasse. In this case, the cabinet would have to make the decision. If this body, too, could not decide, then the president would make the decision by casting his extra vote. Since the presidency would be rotated on personal and national basis each year among the four members of the Government, a decision made by a president from one national group in a given year could be repealed by his/her successor a year later if not sooner. This constitutional arrangement would cause the members of the Immigration Committee and the cabinet ministers to weigh their decisions carefully before triggering a constitutional tussle that would have temporary and shortlived results only. The officials’ sense of responsibility and willingness to compromise, the authors of the report thought, would overcome their urge to play national tug-of-war. Kaplansky, true to his method of thinking, proposed that the extent of Jewish immigration be determined on a composite sliding basis. Much like Bentov, Kaplansky ruled that immigration should not be subject to political bargaining but, unlike Bentov, wanted this exclusion to be in effect during the interim period as well. Where Bentov envisaged a Jewish-Arab consensus about the number of Jewish immigrants, Kaplansky proposed a yardstick that was appropriate for its time: enough immigration in the first phase to lead to numerical parity between Arabs and Jews. Thus, immigration quotas would be set in accordance with the demographic goal, irrespective of economic capacity.16 At the end of the transition period, said Kaplansky, “The Federal Council shall regulate Jewish immigration by law on the basis of the economic carrying capacity of the country at the time.” This presumes that the peoples could reach an agreement in view of the principles stipulated. Otherwise, they would have to agree ab initio on an immigration method that would be under the authority of the national autonomous districts or districts that would come into being during the interim period. In this respect, Kaplansky’s views resembled those of Bentov’s, but with one basic difference: Bentov empowered the Arabs, in principle, to bar Jewish immigrants from their

16

Kaplansky, Vision and Fulfillment, p. 363.

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national area, whereas Kaplansky’s scheme gave the Jews’ right to immigrate preference over the Arabs’ right of refusal. At the most, it accepted a temporary arrangement, for a predetermined period of time, in which Jews would not be allowed to settle in Arab areas.

Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir and Its Attitude toward the Bentov Book These Utopian binational plans were destined for different fates in the public arena. Kaplansky’s scheme burst into the political light under his own name, not that of the committee that he headed.17 Although the other plan came out in the name of the committee, the public so closely associated it with the chairman, Mordekhai Bentov, that it even called the committee’s report the “Bentov book.” This itself is not exceptional. In public life, it is customary to name committees for their chairpersons. In this case, however, Bentov’s name became emblematic of the political and ideological attitude of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir and the Ha-Kibbutz ha-Artsi movement toward the document, especially among its opponents. To no avail did their leaders argue that their movements had nothing to do with the document and that it was not Bentov’s brainchild but the product of a five-person committee, among whom only the chair was affiliated with Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir. In the public mind, the document was and remains Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir’s binational federal plan. Accordingly, Kaplansky’s proposal elicited mild criticism only and was even published in 1943 in the Mapai journal Ahdut ha-’Avoda, whereas the Bentov book touched off two years of public tumult (1942–1944) in the institutions of the Zionist Organization and the Histadrut. Were the ideas expressed in the Bentov book acceptable to HaShomer ha-Tsa’ir at the time the debate surrounding the document erupted? The main importance of this question from our standpoint concerns the role of Utopianism in policy. By tracing the development of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir’s Socialist Zionist outlook on the Arab question from the late 1920s to the early 1940s, one may prove that the Bentov plan was an inseparable part of this outlook. The federalism of the Bentov plan was based on principles that had crystallized in Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir during

17

See n. 3 above.

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the 1930s: from cooperation on a class basis in the “joint organization” that would be composed of national blocs; to the idea of a binational Socialist state in an unpartitioned Palestine, in which millions of Jews would live alongside Arabs; up to the integration of binational federalism in Palestine into a multinational regional federation, as expressed in the Bentov plan. It is true that Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir did not accept the last-mentioned phase, the confederative one, at the time the Bentov plan came to light. In the General Council/Sixth Convention of Ha-Kibbutz ha-Artsi,18 held at Mishmar ha-‘Emeq in April 1942, this question became the topic of a stormy and even dramatic debate. The discussants’ remarks show that the debate was preceded by exploratory talks and discussions on various kibbutzim with the participation of movement leaders. The disagreements at the Council were between those who favored the regional-federalism idea as an essential condition for a Jewish-Arab settlement and those who opposed the idea on the grounds that the problem could be solved only on a Socialist class basis and not at the level of nationalities. The federation idea, as Bentov presented it, was turned down by a plurality of delegates—sixty-three nays, fifty-five ayes, and twenty-one abstentions. Afterwards, a compromise motion passed by a vote of 83:54:23. One word made all the difference: “perspective,” i.e., an intent as opposed to a goal such as the one that Bentov had proposed. The resolution follows: The political program of the Zionist Organization shall include the willingness to establish a binational regime in Palestine, based on the undisturbed advancement of the Zionist enterprise and on parity in rule irrespective of the numerical ratio between the peoples. The Zionist Organization shall also take a favorable view toward the perspective of the establishment of a federative relationship between Palestine and the neighboring countries.

This intent, of course, was circumscribed by opposition to joining an “Arab federation” composed of the regimes that existed at the time. It was assumed that the desired federation would come about in a gradual process and “insofar as the Arab national movement

18 Ha-Kibbutz ha-Artsi, the organization of collective settlements founded by the Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir movement (1927). Mishmar Ha-’Emeq was one of these settlements.

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advances until it becomes a manifestation of the aspiration to Socialist liberation of the working masses.”19 The debate concerned federating with Arab countries as opposed to the crux of the Bentov committee plan in regard to the binational federation in Palestine, in both of its alternatives. This was not just for political reasons, such as willingness to make a public commitment to the scheme at that phase, but also because HaShomer ha-Tsa’ir found the federative principles acceptable, as reflected in the Council’s resolution. Furthermore, four years later, in 1946, Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir officially adopted the community or ethno-community federative version of the Bentov plan, in a memorandum that it submitted to the Anglo-American commission of inquiry, as a possibility of binational solution of the Palestine problem.20 The alternative chosen, as stated, was the complex federative one; as such, it was also the more Utopian of the two. However, Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir preferred it because the regional federation plan, by its very essence, verged on partition and might even lead to the creation of two nation-states. In a community federation, in contrast, citizens of different nationalities would intermingle in terms of areas of residence and a government with centralized powers would be in charge. Such a federation, in HaShomer ha-Tsa’ir’s reckoning, would forestall the possibility of partition in the future. Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir’s belief in the justice of this political program—its conviction that both peoples would benefit from it— convinced the movement that the goal warranted even the use of international force. After all, “Force and justice should walk handin-hand. The closer the solution is to justice and the more firmly the decision to implement it by force is adopted, the less necessary force will be and the willingness to acquiesce in the binational solution will surface.”21 Thus, Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir did not evade the tragic decision that every idealistic group faces when it attempts to

19 See minutes of Sixth General Council, Mishmar ha-’Emeq, April 10–17, 1942— Resolutions, Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir Archives at Givat Haviva, 2.20.5 (Hebrew). See also Zayit, Zionism and Peace, pp. 250–58. 20 Binational Solution to the Palestine Problem—memorandum prepared by the HaShomer ha-Tsa’ir Palestine Labor Party, Tel Aviv, March 1946 (Hebrew). 21 “Virtues of the Binational Solution,” ibid., p. 113.

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squeeze a tumultuous and bulky reality into the mold of its Utopian values. In this case, allowing the goal to sanctify the means was the fate of Utopianism in policy. The authors of the memorandum to the Anglo-American commission consoled themselves with the thought that “There may be no need whatsoever to resort to force to carry out the program that we propose. And if force is needed, it will be in the smallest measure and for the briefest time.” Indeed, they admitted, force alone would not lead to a Jewish-Arab accord; a lengthy process of mutual compromise would be needed. However, force could “set the process of rapprochement in motion begin and bring about conditions under which it may be completed successfully.” These remarks were aimed at members of the Anglo-American commission who were predisposed to being deterred by the Arab leaders’ threats to use force. In essence, however, the remarks pertained to all violent opposition to the equitable plan, even if it were to emanate from players in the Yishuv. To reinforce this premise, the authors of the memorandum claimed that, under the circumstances, both sides were leaning toward extreme political stances. “It is [therefore] clear . . . that no side will be the first to accept a political compromise when it does not know whether the compromise will be amenable to the other side and will be carried out efficiently.” Efficiency, including the use of force against those on both sides who oppose the imposed compromise, proves that the resolution “means business.” By justifying the use of force in political action, Ha-Shomer haTsa’ir, paradoxically, embraced in principle the outlook of its great rival, Ben-Gurion. Both sides had reached the conclusion that the use of force was inevitable and even correct in certain situations. Ben-Gurion, however, linked this justification to a current political reality; Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir associated it with a future political Utopia. Thus, Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir again revealed itself as a servile elite that had not yet allowed reality to erode the innocence and passion of its youth. This was the secret of its appeal as a pioneering movement, the source of its strength as a collective of doers, and the reason for its errors in statecraft as a political party. This brings us to the gist of the dispute between Ben-Gurion and Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir—a dispute that sheds light on the problem of “Utopianism in policy.”

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Ben-Gurion’s Polemic with the “Bentov Book” and Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir The Ben-Gurion–Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir polemic took place as the Zionist Organization institutions debated the Biltmore program22— the scheme that heralded the Zionist Movement’s demand for the constitution of Palestine as a Jewish commonwealth after the war and the assignment of responsibility for Jewish immigration and the development of wastelands to the Jewish Agency. The Biltmore plan awakened the old controversy that surrounded the 1937 Peel Commission partition plan. Some opposed the Biltmore program due to the reasonable fear that the demand for the Jewish statehood would lead to the partitioning of Palestine. Others rejected it because they favored a binational state as a matter of principle. Still others, of course—headed by Ben-Gurion—considered Biltmore a lever for a Zionist breakthrough that would be reflected, above all, in the immigration of two million European Jewish refugees at the end of the war. The binational political outlook and the federalist programs of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir were at total odds with the policy initiative that Ben-Gurion had launched. The dispute may be divided into two parts: political jousting and principled polemics. The political aspect of the dispute was passionate if not blustery. Ben-Gurion flagellated his rivals in Ha-Shomer haTsa’ir with all the polemic power that he possessed. His style was reminiscent of his attacks in the 1920s against the Labor Brigade people, his rage at the Revisionists in the 1930s, and his subsequent criticism of Mapam in the 1950s. Here, as in those cases, Ben-Gurion vehemently upheld the principle of the supremacy of the Zionist Organization’s elected institutions and construed the weakness of his rivals’ argumentation as proof of their intent to abandon Zionism. The man who indiscriminately accused the Labor Brigade of undermining the Histadrut and transformed the Revisionists into Fascists who intended to smash the Zionist Organization now labeled as “Quislings” those who wished to conclude an accord with the Arabs in regard to Jewish immigration.23 However, the hyperbole that BenGurion employed in his pitched battles was not solely a political 22 See Zionist General Council, Oct. 25, 1942; Nov. 10, 1942, S 25/293–94. The Biltmore program demanded Palestine as a Jewish commonwealth in Palestine after the end of the war. 23 Zionist General Council, Oct. 25, 1942, ibid., p. 11.

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artifice. In my opinion, it also flowed from the deepest layers of his personality as a political leader. Throughout his career in leadership, he was possessed by the fear that the authority of elected institutions would be undermined by groups that were unwilling to accept the yoke of public discipline. He valued public discipline highly, if not supremely, due the very lack of a state that could impose the yoke of state authority on its citizens. Furthermore, as we noted above, Ben-Gurion experienced “exalted historical moments” in which his rhetoric carried him into the realms of moral bombast. However, he also had times of “historical anxiety” when he sensed a moment of “historical opportunity” that must not be squandered. On such occasions, he lost his patience with his rivals and his style became offensive, inconsiderate, and ruthless. This particular political debate has already been thoroughly described and analyzed in Zionist historiography, especially that of Dotan, Margalit, and Zayit.24 Here, then, we will mention only the gist of Ben-Gurion’s arguments against the Bentov plan and focus on the principled questions that underlay them. Ben-Gurion stressed three matters in his frothing remarks. First, the plan had been given wide publicity in the United States, severely undermining his efforts as the Chairman of the Jewish Agency Executive to persuade nonZionist Jewish leaders to support the Biltmore plan. Second, the Bentov plan subjected Jewish immigration to an accord with the Arabs and even limited immigration in order to create a binational regime in Palestine. Finally, the plan imposed ridiculous limits on the territory in Palestine where Jewish masses might eventually settle. Those who spoke in the name of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir, Bentov and Yaari, responded that the plan as disseminated was merely a draft that the committee had submitted to public personalities for their opinion and remarks. Thus, it was not a political program at all, let alone one of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir. As for the immigration issue, they claimed that Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir had not renounced the principle of a Jewish majority in Palestine but did not believe that two million Jews would immigrate within two or three years after the end of the war; instead, this would occur during a transition period of ten to fifteen years. They responded to the third accusation by saying that every version of the federative arrangement

24

See n. 1 above.

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stressed the need for an extensive allocation of unsettled land for Jewish settlement. In regard to the first claim, Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir’s political intentions were of dubious purity. Bentov was undoubtedly interested in examining, on behalf of his movement, the views of American Jewish public figures about the idea of binationalism and federalism in both versions. From this standpoint, Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir’s behavior certainly did not help Ben-Gurion in his campaign to “sell” a totally contradictory idea to the same American Jews. As for the areas of Jewish settlement, the members of the Bentov committee did not swerve from the accepted principles of the Zionist Movement, i.e., Jews should refrain from settling in areas densely populated by Arabs and should instead turn to desolate parts of the country. This is why Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir wished to nail down the status of the Negev as a federal district, so that it could serve as an area for Jewish settlement in the future. As for regional federalism, the Bentov committee did not draw boundaries for the Jewish-settlement area but noted explicitly that even though it knew that the matter was subject to tough negotiations, “Suffice it to say from the outset that only such boundaries as would permit continued Jewish settlement and immigrant absorption will be acceptable from the Jews’ standpoint. Absent this, the goals of Zionism and the entire settlement enterprise would be devoid of logic.”25 In the other federal form, that based on ethnic communities, the committee proposed for the transfer of title to land a method similar to that proposed in respect to immigration—removal of the land issue from the political system. A parity-based committee of experts, with the status of Supreme Court justices, should be appointed to make agrarian policy and authorize large-scale transfer of land. In the case of an impasse in the committee’s discussions, the cabinet would make the decision.26 Just the same, even though the method seemed of questionable viability under the circumstances, there is no doubt that Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir did not intend to renounce its condition for support of regional federalism—the possibility of attaining the goals of Zionism. The Jewish immigration issue demands painstaking study because it lay at the very core of the dispute. First, it is worth clarifying the issues on which no dispute existed. The sides did not disagree about 25 26

Bentov Committee report, p. 102. Ibid., pp. 189–90.

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the supreme importance of immigration for the future of Zionism and about the national and human right of the war-refugee Jewish masses to immigrate. Furthermore, both sides strenuously affirmed the principle of a Jewish majority in Palestine. In this regard, HaShomer ha-Tsa’ir exerted itself to change the attitude of its partner in Ihud, the League for Jewish-Arab Rapprochement and Cooperation.27 Much to Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir’s credit, the leaders of Ihud gradually abandoned their outlook from the Brit Shalom era, which accepted, in principle, the Jews’ status as a national minority in Palestine. In 1942, the Ihud leaders endorsed a process that would lead to demographic parity.28 They refused to commit to more because they had not finalized their views and reached a consensus on this question. Judah Magnes, for example, objected to the very aspiration to a Jewish majority. Bentov appealed to Magnes in writing, adopting the tone of a friendly advice-giver and the caressing rhetoric of a master of phrasing, and decried Magnes’ having made a public appearance in which he had ruled out the aspiration to a Jewish majority in Palestine. Bentov suggested that Magnes limit this stance to a transition period only and not turn his current view into a matter of principle.29 Martin Buber, unlike Magnes, was willing to accept a more malleable phrasing that replaced the concept of “majority” with that of “many.” A “majority,” he explained, is not the political goal of the Zionist Movement but cannot be totally ruled out in the distant future.30 The shared affirmation of the Jewish-majority principle lessens the importance of the disagreements about the extent and pace of postwar Jewish immigration. Ben-Gurion believed in a “catastrophic aliya” of two to three million Jewish refugees from Europe over a three-year period. Few of his colleagues in the Zionist leadership concurred. Arthur Ruppin considered his remarks the figments of an uninhibited imagination. Chaim Weizmann opposed them outright, instead envisaging two million immigrants over a period of ten

27 Ihud—a broader version of the Brith Shalom organization, founded in 1942. Most of its members belonged to the League for Jewish-Arab Rapprochement. 28 See meeting between Presidium of the Zionist General Council and Jewish Agency Executive with representatives of Ihud (Feb. 29, 1942), CZA S25/3104. 29 Bentov to Magnes, April 7, 1943, Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir Archives, Givat Haviva. 30 Gorny, Zionism and the Arabs, p. 284.

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to fifteen years.31 Meir Yaari and Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir shared this view.32 Nevertheless, Ben-Gurion vented his rage only against Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir; he spared the others from his wrath both publicly and in meetings of the Zionist Executive. The reason for this, too, is rooted not only in his penchant for political polemics but also in a question of principle. In “Against Bentov,” Ben-Gurion defined the problem in the following words: “. . . The practical goal of practical Zionism at this time is twofold: to establish a Jewish regime that will hold the keys to immigration and settlement, and for this purpose all the keys may be needed.”33 Here lay the crux of the dispute. The Bentov plan, in both of its forms, did not hand all the “keys” to Jewish immigration and settlement to the Jews. Several keys, or duplicates of keys as in the community-federalism plan, would remain in Arab hands as well. Therefore, the members of the Bentov committee expressed the concepts of concern in this chapter in the opposite order of importance: “policy in Utopia” instead of “Utopia in policy.” Moreover, in view of the reality of Jewish distress and Arab rejectionism, they took the Utopian ideas to the brink of absurdity. The Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir 31

Gorny, Partnership and Struggle, pp. 130–31. See Zionist Executive, Nov. 10, 1942. Yaari’s remarks signaled a psychological failure that originated, on the one hand, in a fixation on concepts of the past, i.e., the mid-1920s and the 1930s, when the Zionist Labor Movement wavered in its attitude toward mass Jewish immigration, and, on the other hand, ignorance about the true plight of Eastern European Jewry in late 1942. Yaari spoke about gradual immigration of two million Jews over ten to fifteen years due to concern that a mass “transfer,” of the sort that Ben-Gurion proposed, would lead to “speculation, exploitation of the masses, and a frenzy of purchases of land yard by yard.” In such a case, instead of building a productive and pioneering society, “we will have set ourselves up for a catastrophe.” As he continued, he made a tragic slip of the tongue: “Ben-Gurion hasn’t yet negotiated with a European government like the Poles. Why not demand repatriation of what was stolen? Why shouldn’t we demand after the war restitution of the communities and homes for the refugees from Poland? Why should we bring them here, frail, shattered, and indigent? I’m not giving up on repatriation for the Jews. I don’t want to leave centuries of Jewish labor in Polish hands. Whoever wants to come home and can do, be my guest. As for the millions, they should immigrate to Palestine in an organized fashion over ten years.” Later on, Yaari spoke about twelve million Jews in need of “Zionist redemption.” They should be given room to settle in Palestine, he said, by making the Negev blossom and, in the surroundings of Palestine, by concluding a federative agreement with the countries of the region (Zionist General Council, Nov. 10, 1942, CZA S25/294). 33 Zionist General Council (n. 23 above). 32

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leadership was aware of the “weakness” of this plank in the community-federation plan and did not try to defend it in its polemic with Ben-Gurion. Four years later, in 1946—after the implications of the Holocaust were known—it totally revamped the problematic clause of the binational scheme that it proposed to the Anglo-American commission. This was done with Bentov’s consent. The rephrased clause stated: In addition to the right of the state to make ordinary immigration rules for itself and as it sees fit, the constitution shall recognize the Jewish Agency as its agent for the issuance of immigration visas to Jewish immigrants as it sees fit, it being presumed that its function shall be to ensure that the immigrants who come on the basis of these visas not become a burden to the public. [This is because] the very essence of the Jewish national home is rooted in the assurance of Jewish immigration, “by right and not by kindness,” and unprecedented factors make unprecedented arrangements necessary.34

Thus the immigration “keys,” as Ben-Gurion put it, would revert to total Jewish sovereignty. The purpose of these remarks is to explain that the real dispute between Ben-Gurion and Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir, in terms of historical importance, concerned not the right to immigrate or permission to settle the countryside but a change in Ben-Gurion’s political outlook and the paradoxical adherence of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir to the outlook that had been Ben-Gurion’s ten years earlier.

The Bentov Plan and Ben-Gurion’s 1931 “Premises”—a Comparison In one of the strongest segments of his “prosecution” of Bentov, BenGurion stated, “The question we face is not how this country will be governed—this is of no concern to me—but how we are to bring here all the Jews who wish to come and can objectively be brought. That alone.”35 This was the essence of their dispute. Ben-Gurion, the sober statesman of the early 1940s, had dissociated himself from the Utopianist

34 The document was written by Yaakov Chazan, Mordekhai Bentov, Yitzhak Lurie, Baruch Linn, and Alexander Prague, see n. 14. 35 Zionist General Council, Oct. 25, 1942, p. 10.

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Ben-Gurion of the early 1930s. Ben-Gurion in the past, like HaShomer ha-Tsa’ir in the present (the 1940s), believed that determining the nature of the country’s system of governance (what Bentov called the “constitution”) was a condition for the continued rapid growth of the Yishuv. Now he abandoned this view and reversed the priorities. Henceforth, Jewish immigration took precedence over political and constitutional arrangements with the Arabs. The successor to Ben-Gurion of the early 1930s, paradoxically, was Bentov of the 1940s. A comparison of a plan that Bentov put together in 1929 with the Bentov committee proposals shows that they are similar if not identical in all matters pertaining to the constitutional level and the political process. Both plans rested on the principle that Jewish-Arab relations in Palestine must not hinge on the question of demographic majority and minority. Both plans translated this principle into comprehensive parity, from national autonomy to the legislative authority and up to with the executive authority. Both schemes presumed that the Mandate regime would expire within the foreseeable future and that Palestine would attain internationally backed self-rule. Both plans provided for a transition period of ten to fifteen years, during which demographic parity between Jews and Arabs would be attained. All of which held true, as stated, until 1933, when Ben-Gurion changed his mind and demanded the establishment of a Jewish state as part of an Arab federation. Ben-Gurion did find it convenient in the passion of the debate to blur the boundary between these two phases in the development of his federal worldview. To debunk the principled outlook of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir, he argued: If a binational state means that there will be millions of Jews in Palestine and that the Arabs will benefit not only from political rights but also as a nation, with the Arabic language, Arab autonomy, and equal political rights, I doubt that any Zionist will say no. That, however, is not called a binational state. If [the term “binational state”] refers . . . to parity in which the state of Palestine will be run half by Jews and half by Arabs—that’s absurd; there’s no state like that in the world.

Ben-Gurion was certainly right. Therefore, he owed the Ben-Gurion of the past an explanation: I favored parity under Mandatory rule, when there was a third party to make decisions. Then we said it would be preposterous for us to be a minority; we said that the entitlement would be one of national

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chapter four blocs. But a state run on the basis of parity—nothing like that has ever existed, nor will it ever exist, especially if it is a parity of two peoples that are divided on the main issue.36

As stated, Ben-Gurion was vague about the distinction between his two plans. Furthermore, in the document at issue—“Premises for the Establishment of a State Regime in Palestine”—he stressed explicitly that the British Mandate for Palestine would expire only “provided that total political equality of Jews and Arabs in the country be assured.” This statement, as Ben-Gurion construed it, was not far from the idea of parity in governance. According to his proposal, the upper chamber would be composed of an equal number of delegates from the two peoples. Although the lower chamber would be elected by the proportional method, “Every federal law and every amendment to the federal constitution [would be] accepted only with both houses’ consent.” Additionally, to strengthen the balance between the peoples, the executive authority would be elected for three years by a absolute majority in each of the two houses and could not be dismissed during its term in office.” Therefore, Ben-Gurion was susceptible to the very claim that he leveled against Bentov—that no such regime had ever existed and would ever exist, especially where the two peoples in question were divided on the “main issue.” Just the same, Bentov’s federalism—which, four years later, became an integral part of the Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir binational plan—should not be considered totally identical to Ben-Gurion’s 1931 scheme. Ben-Gurion and Bentov disagreed about the basic premise, the one that underlay their dispute. This largely explains, on the one hand, the ease with which Ben-Gurion changed his mind and, on the other hand, Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir’s stubborn adherence to his ideas. For Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir and Ha-Kibbutz ha-’Artsi, as David Zayit states, “Binationalism was . . . a conceptual value and not a political plan.”37 The upshot of this conceptual value was the equal entitlement of Jews and Arabs to Palestine. For Ben-Gurion, in contrast, binationalism was a political plan that derived its values from the opening sentence of “Premises”: “Palestine is for the Hebrew people and for the Arabs who dwell there.” Thus, even back then

36 37

Ibid. Zayit, Zionism and Peace, p. 257.

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Ben-Gurion spoke about equality in the apportionment of rule between Jews and Arabs and not about equality in ownership of the country. In this context, there are no two peoples but rather one people—the Jewish people—and an Arab collectivity. From Ben-Gurion’s standpoint, the transition in his thinking from binational federalism to a Jewish state that gives the Arab national minority extensive autonomous rights reflects not a change in principles but a political turnaround meant solely to align political behavior with changes in the political situation. According to Dan Horowitz and Moshe Lissak, the difference between Ben-Gurion and Bentov was: . . . a distinction between two dimensions that are typical of any ideological system—the fundamental dimension and the operative dimension. The fundamental dimension pertains to the final goals and the broad horizons of the fulfillment of the ideology; the operative dimension deals with the principles that guide politics in practice. . . . The operative dimension is also ideological because it pertains to organized social action and the array of ideas that affects it.38

Thus, it is incorrect to define Ben-Gurion’s approach as pragmatic and flexible and that of the Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir leaders as ideological and rigid. Both sides subscribed to fundamentalist principles. However, Ben-Gurion’s fundamentalism, in this case, did not clash with the operative dimension of his actions as a leader and a national statesman. This may not be said about Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir, whose binational fundamentalism swathed it, as a political movement, in a Utopian coat of many colors. So firmly did the Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir spokespeople and leadership cling to their binational fundamentalism that they never ceased to remind Ben-Gurion of his binational “sins” of the past—without acknowledging that times had changed and without giving thought to the basic difference between his point of departure, which assigned Palestine to the Jewish people and the Arabs who lived there, and theirs, which recognized the “inalienable right of the Jewish people to return to its homeland, which is also the homeland of the Arab people that dwells in Palestine.”39 This blindness on the part of the Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir leaders traced not only to their lust for political combat and their intent to show up

38 39

D. Horowitz, M. Lissak, From Yishuv to State, Jerusalem, 1977 (Hebrew), p. 181. 51st Histadrut Council, March 21–24, April 3–7, 1944.

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their rival but also, and rather, to an Utopian inner conviction that regards what is impossible in the present as possible in the future. In the throes of this belief, the Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir leaders stopped the clock. What happened between Bentov and Ben-Gurion in regard to federalism and Palestine recurred in respect to the regional-federation plan. As we recall, it was Ben-Gurion’s idea that the regional settlement would compensate the Arabs of Palestine for their loss of majority status. He considered this a “key question” in Jewish-Arab relations. In 1942, however, after Ben-Gurion had abandoned the idea, Mordekhai Bentov adopted it and made it a principal rationale in his arguments, to his hesitant comrades at the Mishmar ha’Emeq Council, in favor of a regional federation: Some comrades say the Arabs should content themselves with improving their standard of living and with the slogan of binationalism. If what this really means is a Jewish majority and parity without rule and only cultural autonomy for the Arabs, it follows that we want the Arabs to solve their national problem as the Bundist program [believes the Jews should solve theirs in the Diaspora]—that they not recognize the national relationship between the Arabs of Palestine and the Arabs of the neighboring countries.

Bentov argued repeatedly that Zionism, including Ha-Shomer haTsa’ir, had always rejected this Bundist theory. Despite the objective conditions of global dispersion and linguistic and cultural differences among various Jewish centers, “We [ Jews] want others, including the Arabs, to think of us as one people that has solidarity of fate, and we say they must agree to Jewish immigration because we are one people.” If so, how could the Arabs of Palestine be told “not to feel that they are one people . . . to feel divorced of any relationship with the entire Arab world in a country where they are the majority?” Following this trend of thought, an “integral solution” must be sought that would reflect the awareness of Ha-Shomer haTsa’ir “that there is no basic contradiction between the Arabs’ justified national aspirations and the Jews’ aspirations in the same vein.” Only a regional federative settlement would provide a broad political framework “that will leave room both for millions of Jews and for social integration and the national aspirations of the Arab people.”40

40

Minutes of General Council at Mishmar ha-’Emeq (n. 19, above), pp. 3–4.

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This was precisely the Zionist augury that Ben-Gurion delivered to the Arab leaders with whom he met in 1934–1936. Now, in view of the war—a threatening reality that also inspired hope as to its results—he changed his mind. In his polemic speech against Bentov, he argued: This federation thing—it isn’t the concern of millions of Jews in Europe or of the half a million Jews here and it’s not the concern of Zionism. . . . We need Palestine for Jews, for those who dwell in its midst, so that they may lead dignified, proper lives, and for the millions of Jews who are elsewhere.

Thus, the Jews are no longer concerned about the problem of the Arabs of Palestine and of the entire region. This is their own internal affair; it is theirs to solve. “The Arab problem is not a problem of Jews and Arabs [but rather]”—he added sarcastically—“a problem between Zionists and Zionists.”41 One should not infer from this, however, that Ben-Gurion was totally indifferent to the problem of the Arabs of Palestine. He merely abandoned the “integrative” approach that Bentov had adopted and proposed in its stead the ungluing of two formerly attached entities, the Arabs of Palestine and the Arab federation. In the series of debates about the Biltmore program, Ben-Gurion tabled a counterproposal to the Jewish-Arab “integrative” approach: a broad Zionist consensus in regard to the Arabs of Palestine. The proposal included four points of principle: 1. democratic governance based on total and unmitigated equality for all inhabitants, as practiced all over the world; 2. full autonomy for all ethnicities in all internal affairs—religion, education, etc.; 3. rural and urban self-rule in municipal affairs; 4. gradual equalization of the economic, social, and cultural standard of living of all inhabitants of the country. This provision should be attached to the Jewish commonwealth program.42 In his subsequent remarks, as I showed in the previous chapter, BenGurion spoke about the need to maintain strong relations between the Jewish state and the surrounding Arab countries. For this reason,

41 42

Zionist General Council (n. 32, above), p. 9. Zionist General Council, July 5, 1943, p. 11.

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he thought the possibility of joining a Middle-Eastern federation in the future should be left open.43 Be this as it may, the separate-and-wait policy that Ben-Gurion prescribed in regard to the regional federation removed the issue from the public agenda. This approach, which preached the focusing of effort on establishing a Jewish state without trying to compensate the Arab nation in Palestine and the region, was aided by political developments in the Arab countries. In 1944, the commotion in the preceding year concerning the establishment of an Arab federation evolved into an intent to set up the Arab League, which, in 1945, became a loosely composed framework for inter-Arab cooperation.44 Accordingly, the matter was totally overlooked in the passionate debate between the leaders of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir and Ben-Gurion at the Histadrut Council in 1944. Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir did not totally abandon its “integrative” outlook on the regularization of Jewish-Arab relations. The memorandum that it presented to the Anglo-American commission in 1946 spoke of the unification of a Jewish-majority binational Palestine with the neighboring Arab countries, as part of a federation in which the Arabs would be a majority. The movement, however, considered this proposal only a possibility that might become real in some indeterminate future. This marked the end of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir’s tortuous flirtation with, and political struggles on behalf of, the binational federalism idea. The notion was defeated by a stronger force, history. During 1947, the movement came around to the realization, after much hesitation and severe indecision, that the political circumstances that had evolved left no choice but to favor the partitioning of Palestine into two nation-states.45 Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir’s turnaround on the partition issue, from vehement opposition to de facto support, points to a transition from a fundamentalist outlook to an operative one. Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir made the changeover with no internal trauma. It did so not only due to political necessity, as its leaders explained, but also because the principles of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir’s fundamentalist ideology were scaled like a ladder, its base planted in reality and its top in a future 43 44 45

See Chapter 3, n. 51. Porath, The Test of Political Action, Chapter 5. Zayit, Zionism and Peace, pp. 310–16.

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Utopia. The most important rungs of this ladder, the ones that bore the movement’s weight, were ways to solve the problem of the Jewish people by way of Zionism. Therefore, even if one may understand Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir as a social and political entity that functioned in a reality that had been deprived of its Utopian dimension, whenever the ideology clashed with national needs, the decision was always in favor of the immediate national needs of the Jewish people. Thus Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir behaved at all times, moving from policy in Utopia to Utopia in policy.

CHAPTER FIVE

THE NEW FEDERALISM: ARIE ELIAV AND SHIMON PERES

Paradoxically, the great Utopians have been great realists. They have discovered truths that other men have only vaguely sensed or have refused to recognize. The Utopian often emerges as a man with a deeper understanding of the drift of his society than the hardheaded problem-solvers with their noses to the grindstone of the present, blind to potentiality. [F. & F. Manuel, Utopian Thought in the Western World ]

Introduction Almost forty years after David Ben-Gurion abandoned his regionalconfederation scheme after the eruption of World War II, the subsequent establishment of the Jewish state, and the Arab countries’ onslaught against this state, the federal baton was picked up by two of his disciples and successors, Arie Eliav and Shimon Peres, in the mid-1970s. For the next generation, these two statesmen would champion various manifestations of the federal idea as a path toward a political solution of the Jewish-Arab conflict in the Middle East. The plans of these two men extended the lifespan of federal ideas in Zionist political thought to more than eighty years, from the eve of World War I to the last decade of the twentieth century. This recurrence of federal ideas and the adjustment of these ideas to changing political realities in the historical process are one of the characteristics that distinguishes the political thought of the Zionist Movement from that of European national movements in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This continuity in the revision of federal ideas as ways to bring the Middle East conflict to a political resolution is noteworthy not only because of its durability but also due to its clash with historical reality. In the era between the world

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wars, after all, the federal arrangements that were supposed to give the national minorities a special status in the new states of Eastern Europe were largely observed in the breach. In Mandatory Palestine, too, where Jewish national autonomy was established in accordance with the finest ideas of European federal autonomism, the federative partnership between the Jewish and Arab national groups failed totally during the interwar years. This is what makes Eliav and Peres unique among the champions of federalism. The failure of all confederative ideas during the two men’s early adulthood under the Mandate, coupled with the Arabs’ uncompromising hostility toward the Jewish state in the 1950s and 1960s—by which time both Eliav and Peres had joined the ranks of young leadership in Israel’s ruling party, Mapai—might have dissuaded them from any federal thinking. Paradoxically, however, it was precisely after the 1967 SixDay War, when Israel emerged as the strongest military power in the Middle East and imposed its control on an Arab population that was stunned by its defeat and rendered submissive due to its leaders—just as the Jews had ceased to be a minority and had become being the majority that held the Palestinian people’s fate in its hand— that they unveiled their ideas. The long-term and future schemes of both men, who were foremost statesmen and realistic politicians, were unquestionably affected by their Utopian leanings. Their Utopian realism was set against the background of the federal process that had created the European Economic Union. The fact that this development clashed with the European political tradition that had led to two world wars allowed them to hope that a settlement in the Middle East could be concluded. From this standpoint, the universal Utopian vision of their predecessors—such as Jabotinsky and Ben-Gurion—became a dynamic social and political process in their time. In other words, the erstwhile “Utopia” evolved into what I call “Utopian realism.” Just the same, the difference between the European process and the Middle East plans deserves emphasis. The European confederation is a “post-war” solution, i.e., an outcome of bloody wars that happened and ended. In the Middle East, in contrast, federative or confederative thinking has evolved in the midst of war, in the belief that it offers a way to terminate the bloodshed even before the two warring peoples begin to cooperate. Eliav and Peres presented their federal schemes in books published six years apart: The Land of the Hart (1972) and This Time Tomorrow

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(1978), respectively. The ideas that took form in the books must have germinated before the books were published, shortly after the 1967 war. However, the timing of their appearance in public has symbolic political importance. When Eliav’s book came out in 1972, the Labor Party was still in power. The Yom Kippur War, probably unforeseen by any of the party leaders, was still a year away. Peres’ book, in contrast, appeared after the national trauma of the Yom Kippur War. Four years after the war, in 1977, the Zionist Right under Menachem Begin came to power for the first time, marking the end of thirty years of unbroken Mapai rule, not to mention almost fifteen years of Labor Movement leadership of the Yishuv. Against this background—the Egyptians’ sense of victory and the Israeli admission of failure, both wholly unjustified—came the historic visit of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to Jerusalem, which after lengthy political negotiations culminated in the Egypt-Israel peace treaty. This encouraging development must have filled the sails of the historical federal plans with new hope. Amidst this political climate in Israel—contrasting senses of disaster in the aftermath of the war and euphoria in view of Sadat’s visit—Eliav’s and Peres’ books were doomed to a paradoxical fate. The public received them well—Eliav’s book was reprinted seven times between 1972 and 1980—but the political establishment turned them down flat. The Labor Party did not welcome Eliav’s ideas and the incumbent right-wing Government was unwilling to address itself to the political proposals of Peres, who had headed the Labor Party in 1977. In this state of affairs, these men had to marshal more intellectual audacity and political courage than their pre-state predecessors in proposing Utopian-tinted programs. Their predecessors had been active, and had conceived their plans, in a reality that had made far-reaching political schemes in terms of time and contents largely theoretical, since Zionism lacked the strength to bring about a comprehensive solution in Palestine. Since the political future was vague, they adhered to Utopian ideas that offered hopeful quasi-solutions in a hopeless reality. After the 1967 war, in contrast, the political reality augured Utopian solutions from opposing directions: that of the Right, which believed in the possibility of imposing the Jewish national will on the Palestinian Arabs, and that of the other side, which sought a compromise between the two peoples’ political and territorial aspirations. The difference between the approaches reflected

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the difference between the “Utopia” of the Right and the “Utopian realism” of the Labor Movement. The version of the Right, like every Utopia, attempted to impose its will on historical reality. That of the Left, in contrast, due to the synthesis of pragmatism and Utopianism in its worldview, realized that a compromise with historical reality must be concluded. The compromise I have in mind is of the “promotive” or dynamic type; i.e., one that changes and makes adjustments in response to changing conditions of reality. This is why those who harbored Utopian leanings needed exceptional public courage and the imagination of “statesmen-poets,” as their predecessors had been, to bruit federal plans amidst a political reality that smacked them down. This courage stemmed not only from Eliav’s and Peres’ personal characteristics but also from the credic tradition in the political culture of the Labor Movement, in which both men had been raised and were active. This movement had always been typified by social and political originality, from cooperative settlement to the establishment of the Histadrut as an alternative socialist confraternity and political schemes that culminated with the partitioning of Palestine and the establishment of the State of Israel. The most important federal idea that the Labor Movement had was the insinuation of universal socioeconomic ideas in national-level political solutions. The combination of the two reflects the movement’s intrinsic optimism, in which social and economic reforms and projects were always means toward the goals of attaining political solutions and finding ways to assure their long-term existence. From this standpoint, Eliav and Peres are more than pronounced Utopian realists. They are also prominent disciples of David BenGurion, who was concurrently the greatest realist and the most passionate Utopianist among the Zionist statecrafters. They, like him, were endowed with creative imagination and flexible pragmatism that enabled them to compromise with the march of history without losing sight of their principal goal. These characteristics gave them the public “courage” to let themselves be identified with Utopian ideas even though, as savvy politicians par excellence, they knew that their political surroundings would treat their ideas with derision or, in the best case, pity. In this sense, too, they resembled Ben-Gurion and even outdid him in their overt pronouncements. Both men represent the last type of the “leader-poets” in the Zionist Movement, as I define them. They are political leaders, especially

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in the Labor Movement, who enriched their political language with the moral idealism of literature and poetry and enriched their political plans with indefatigable imagination and Utopian optimism.

Arie (Lova) Eliav The first to seize the federal baton was Arie Eliav, the perennial Zionist “adventurer” who has been moving from one pioneering mission to another since the mid-1930s, when he was fifteen years old. Eliav fought in World War II; commanded a clandestine immigrant vessel shortly before the establishment of the State of Israel; managed rural settlement in the Lakhish area; was in charge of establishing the town of Arad in the Negev; undertook the rescue of the Jews of Port Said in 1956; served as secretary of the Israel Embassy in Moscow, secretary of the Mapai Party, Member of Knesset, and Deputy Minister of Immigrant Absorption; and founded the rural settlement educational community of Nitzana (southern Negev), which today is attended mainly by recently arrived young immigrants. In the midst of his covert and overt political activity and his management of regional rehabilitation and construction projects in Israel and Iran, he has also been a prolific author, much like his mentors in the Zionist Movement—Berl Katznelson, David Ben-Gurion, Chaim Arlosoroff, and Moshe Sharett, to name only a few. Eliav is aware of his Utopian leanings, as these earlier leaders were, and does not hesitate to proclaim them openly. In the introduction to his book Land of the Hart, a publication replete with Utopian yearnings, he explained the title: the Jewish prophets, wishing to describe the lovely and splendid Land of Israel, chose the hart as a symbol of the country that they wished to glorify. In the exegetics and homiletics of the Sages and in the Jewish mystic literature, he continued, this metaphor took on wondrous significance as the goodly and perfect characteristics of the Land were likened to the unique traits of this light-footed animal. Can we, he asked, in the Jewish year 5730 (1970), nearing the end of the Gregorian century, after 100 years of return to Zion and one generation into statehood, envision, hope, and take action to make our country into the Land of the Hart?1 1

Arie Lova Eliav, Land of the Hart—Israelis, Arabs, The Territories and a Vision of the

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Eliav is more than a Romanticist who bases himself on, and derives encouragement from, the ancient sources. Like all Utopians, he is also an optimist. Therefore, he believes in man’s ability to change “here and now” reality and, accordingly, determines in regard to the Jewish-Arab conflict that Israel can set the detonator on “safety” and, by deliberate action, possibly neutralize and dismantle, slowly and carefully, the explosives that have accumulated in the region and free the world of one of its greatest hazards.2 A year after the Six-Day War, as most of Israeli Jews were gripped with Greater Israel euphoria, Eliav took a lengthy field trip to Judea, Samaria, and Gaza, visited the refugee camps and towns of these areas, returned with conclusions that were “revolutionary” from the standpoint of the leadership of his party, and phrased them in a pamphlet titled “New Goals for Israel”. His first conclusion was that “We have to state clearly that we are holding the territories as a guarantee for security and peace and not as something to annex” (emphasis in the original—Y. G.)—after the Palestinian Arabs demonstrate their willingness to make peace, of course. This proviso led him to his second conclusion, politically farther-reaching than the first. Assuming that the Arabs will be willing to conclude contractual peace with Israel, “[and] with appropriate guarantees, we will be willing to relinquish ‘territories.’” He believed it important to inform the Arab peoples that “We will never repress the Palestinians’ entitlement to self-determination and . . . are willing to help them to establish the state in which they will find a basis and outlet for their national desires” (emphasis in the original—Y. G.).3 Eliav’s political outlook originated in his historical realization, exceptional at the political level at the time, that Zionism had stimulated the consolidation of the Palestinians’ weakly rooted national consciousness. “The Palestinian people today possesses all indicators of identity that attest to peoplehood,” such as territorial continuity, a Palestinian history that, while not lengthy, is decades old, and recollections of struggles and wars. The Palestinians also have several identifying markers that are almost “Jewish,” if one may define them

Future, Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1974. All the citations are from the Hebrew version: Land of the Hart, Tel Aviv, 1982 (Seventh Edition). 2 Ibid. 3 Arie Eliav, “New Goals for Israel,” Tel Aviv: 1969 (Hebrew), p. 11.

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as such: “[They have] an exile and a Diaspora that maintains relations with the Palestinian homeland; this people carries a consciousness of shared disaster, victims, agonies, heroes. This people has vision, literature, and poetry of its own.”4 However, Eliav, like most of his comrades in the Mapai leadership, remained a practical and cautious statesman. He feared a Palestinian state that, while small in territory, would seethe with feelings of national vengeance that would make it Israel’s staunch enemy. Therefore, he preferred a conjunction between the Kingdom of Jordan, most of whose population is Palestinian, and the future Palestinian state. Thus, he hoped that “When terms of peace are discussed, we shall also consider the possibility of reunifying the two parts of the Palestinian people” (emphasis in the original—Y. G.).5 The establishment of a Jordanian-Palestinian state, he believed, would make it easier to determine the status of Jerusalem and solve the Palestinian refugee problem. In regard to Jerusalem, the epicenter of the Jews’ yearnings for Eretz Israel, “Everyone understands that our capital city can no longer be partitioned and immiserated” (emphasis in the original—Y. G.). Hence the need to find a way to give Islam and Christianity a special status in Jerusalem. Thus, “It is incumbent upon us to find an international institutional solution for the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, perhaps, for other Christian sites in its vicinity, and for the area of the Temple Mount and the mosques on it” (emphasis in the original—Y. G.).6 As for the refugee problem, Eliav knows that the hands of the historical clock cannot be turned back. The refugees’ places of residence and agricultural sources of livelihood cannot be reclaimed. Accordingly, he stresses, “The solution to the problem of hundreds of thousands of refugees will be mainly one of urbanization and industrialization. It will involve the construction of new towns and the expansion of existing ones in the West and East banks, projects in industry and tourism, and increasing the percent of workers in services and trade.” Eliav realizes that solving the refugee problem will be an international task in which Israel and the neighboring 4 5 6

Ibid., p. 8. Ibid., p. 9. Ibid., p. 12.

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Arab countries should take part. However, until the appropriate conditions for this enterprise, i.e., “the peace we all long for,” come about, “the State of Israel cannot adopt a policy of benign neglect” (emphasis in the original—Y. G.).7 Therefore, Eliav, the man of action and a pronounced Utopian realist of the “here and now,” calls for immediate action that lies within Israel’s possibilities. “A beginning should be made, in accordance with the general contours of the plan, to carry out such initial projects as are within our grasp, in the territories that we hold today” (emphasis in the original—Y. G.), such as the establishment of a vocational education system for refugees’ children and the beginnings of urbanization and industrialization. In Eliav’s opinion, such a policy, including recognition of the Palestinian people, the partitioning of Eretz Israel, regularization of the status of the religions in Jerusalem, and a solution for the refugee problem—“is consistent with the real aims and goals of Zionism and of Israel. Israel does not have, and cannot have, a policy that does not strive for peace with the neighbors” (emphasis in the original—Y. G.).8 In his summary, Eliav states that Israel has to prove itself by passing two tests. The first test is “solving its conflict with the Arabs. Israel has to undertake something that no people in history has undertaken: to build peace by itself.”9 The second test, in his opinion, will be “to show what a small nation and state are capable of in today’s world,” i.e., to demonstrate Israel’s ability to contribute to science, economics, the arts, education, and so on. For this purpose, “We need to develop a model of an ‘intensive state,’” i.e., “What we manage to accomplish by seeing to Israel’s intensive development may serve as an example and paragon not only for small and medium states but also for great powers. We will draw the boundaries of social and political ability in today’s world” (emphasis in the original—Y. G.).10 This was the closing chord in a pronouncedly Ben-Gurionic rendition of the “light unto the nations” symphony. It was this and

7 8 9 10

Ibid., Ibid., Ibid., Ibid.,

p. p. p. p.

13. 15. 35. 36.

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more. As I show below, Eliav followed Ben-Gurion’s lead in all matters related to a combined political and social settlement for the Palestinians. This induced him to take a paternalistic attitude toward the rehabilitation of the refugees in the first phase of the plan. According to this mindset, which originates in the constructivist political culture of the Zionist Labor Movement, Israel should start to rehabilitate the refugees by itself, irrespective of the consent of, or a peace settlement with, the Palestinians and Arab states such as Jordan that have a direct stake in the matter. The three characteristics that accompanied Eliav in all his public activity—constructive activism, Utopian tendencies, and rooted optimism—also led him to frequent schisms with the party leadership and to an audacious but naïve, if not quixotic, attempt to conduct secret negotiations with a senior representative of the PLO, Dr. Issam Sartawi.11 This encounter between two opposing fighters, which evolved into a personal friendship, is a worthy topic of research in itself but one that does not pertain directly to the theme of this chapter. Our concern here is Eliav’s federal political worldview—the view that led to his resignation from party secretariat, his defection from the party in 1975, and the establishment of the Public Council for Peace, on behalf of which Eliav conducted his clandestine negotiations with Sartawi. What matters for the purposes of our discussion is Eliav’s book Land of the Hart, published in 1972, four years after he wrote the aforementioned pamphlet “New Goals for Israel.” Paradoxically, this book, which underscored the political schism between himself and the Labor Party leadership (and especially with the triumvirate— Golda Meir, Yisrael Galili, and Shimon Peres) does not swerve from the basic federal political principles of several members of the party’s historical leadership, foremost Ben-Gurion. Eliav, like his predecessors, acknowledged in principle the existence of a Palestinian national movement since the end of World War I and after the Balfour Declaration. Politically, he accepted the verdict of history, i.e., the partitioning of Palestine into two nation-states. Recognition of the Palestinians’ right to self-determination, in his opinion, flows not only from the requirements of political realism

11 Arie Eliav, Rings of Testimony, Tel Aviv, 1998 (Hebrew), Jubilee Edition, “Sartawi, a Bolt in a Locked Gate,” p. 233.

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but also from the conceptual and moral principles of Zionism. “The Zionism movement was and remains fundamentally an ideological movement.” Although the Zionists went about matters in a very pragmatic way, he writes, they did not adhere to abstract appeals alone but underlined their enterprise with principle,12 i.e., doing justice with both peoples by giving each a sovereign nation-state. The value principle in politics, however, must hinge on a political solution that both sides to the conflict may find desirable or tolerable. Since Eliav as a cautious statesman was concerned about the prospect of an independent Palestinian state on the West Bank, he proposed the establishment of an expanded Palestinian state that would include most Palestinians on both sides of the Jordan River.13 The result, instead of two Palestinian states—Jordan and Palestine—would be only one, a monarchy or a democracy, and relations between its two segments would be resolved within the sphere of the Palestinian Arabs’ internal interests. Thus, Eliav viewed the Jordan-Palestinian federation as an Arab and an Israeli interest alike. For the Arabs, it would provide a state as populous as Israel, a matter of vast political and economic significance. Israel, in turn, would actually gain political and defense stability due to the resulting demographic equilibrium. One may, of course, claim that this, too, is a “patronizing” approach that tells the Arabs what is good for them. Undoubtedly, however, the intentions of this patronization—which was so typical of the Utopian realism of Labor Zionism in all its actions in the Zionist Movement—were largely quite propitious. This is because the process of creating a new society could not exist without it. However, under conditions of tension between two nations, one beset by the sense of insult of the defeated and under occupation—which causes personal and national humiliation, irrespective of its nature—even good and rational intentions are construed as negative paternalism. Furthermore, Eliav states explicitly that the establishment of a Palestinian-Jordanian state might serve Israel’s defense interests. The establishment of a Palestinian Arab state entity on both sides of the Jordan, in his opinion, would make it possible to establish demilitarized zones along Israel’s borders, provisional Israeli military strongholds in the West Bank, and even a joint political settlement 12 13

Arie Eliav, Land of the Hart, p. 158. Ibid., pp. 145, 153.

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for the continued existence of Jewish localities in the West Bank under Palestinian Arab sovereignty—provided that all issues under the comprehensive peace arrangements be open to negotiations, of course. This may include the transfer of some territories that contain blocs of settlements (e.g., the Etsiyyon Bloc) to Israel sovereignty, mutually agreed defense outposts, and tens of thousands of Jews living under Arab sovereignty. The establishment of a Palestinian Arab state would give the Arab minority in Israel proper a better feeling—one of an equal among equals vis-a-vis the Jewish majority. On this point, Eliav is plainly the successor to the previous generation in federalist thinking in Zionism, especially in respect to those on the left flank of the Labor Movement, as explained in the previous chapters. Like every Utopian realist of the here-and-now, Eliav is also a believer in comprehensive planning. He envisages the establishment of a commission of planners and implementers in all fields of life and technology and expects this board, within a short period of time, to be able to present programs and proposals for solutions “in housing, social and psychological care, education, health, and employment pertaining to the refugees”14—even before the peace negotiations end and the Palestinian Arab entity is established. The plan includes, obviously and foremost, a solution for the status of Jerusalem, a city that no Zionist leader from Herzl to BenGurion could ignore. Aware that Jerusalem must remain the capital of Israel, Eliav seeks a “quasi-Vaticanization” solution—a specific and territorially small holy place within a secular city. Although the city provides this enclave with municipal services, the defined area is symbolically “sovereign” and is run autonomously by clergy.15 Within this framework, Eliav admits, several complex solutions would be needed to maintain the essential nexus of Jerusalem, Ramallah, and Bethlehem. Once peace comes, Jerusalem—a Jewish spiritual center and an Israeli political center—international political institutions will make it their home, Eliav predicts. As for the essential partnership between Jerusalem and the surrounding Arab towns, he continues, even though the inhabitants of this special conurbation will belong to different nationalities and hold the citizenship and passports of two different states, vote for two different parliaments, use two different currencies, 14 15

Ibid., p. 176. Ibid., p. 186.

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and speak two or more different languages, reality will force them to find ways to cooperate at the political and municipal levels. All of this may happen provided that Israel approaches “every ‘do’ and ‘don’t’ in Jerusalem” with trepidation—swiftly but not hastily; firmly but not rashly; boldly but not insolently, proudly but not pretentiously. Israel should treat Jerusalem with a sense that it belongs to Israel but must avoid any trace of contempt for its holiness to others. Humility is the watchword. In regard to Jerusalem, Israel should act very generously but without any self-abnegation, “out of the box” but without risking unity, and always in willingness to make Jerusalem a city of peace for the peoples who inhabit it and its environs.16 Eliav’s ultimate vision is a confederative regional arrangement between “two states relatively small in area but large in human reserves, coexisting in peace, that by the end of the century will be able to populate, like the Netherlands and Belgium, millions of inhabitants, and to cooperate in development, economy, trade, culture, and science, and together to form a bridge toward a much broader regional political alliance abutting regional alliances in Europe, Asia, and Africa.”17 Eliav knows that the broader his vision of regional peace is, the more the public will perceive him as a dreamer who has mistakenly stumbled into the domain of political reality—a castle-builder whose views need not be taken seriously but rather treated, in the best case, with fond tolerance. Therefore, he prefaces his plans by asking, “What is easier than to say, ‘The man is tilting at windmills’? Aren’t these really windmills? . . . That is a fundamentally pessimistic and barren approach. There have been conflicts among peoples . . . that lasted longer than the conflict in our region. . . . If so, why shouldn’t we believe that the ‘great sulha’ (conciliation) between ourselves and the Arabs will eventually come to pass and the angel of destruction will be told that enough is enough?”18 Ten years later, in the introduction to the seventh edition of his book, Eliav broadened the incidence of the federal arrangement. He had not changed his mind during the intervening years. He continued to believe that “the fulfillment of the Land of the Hart [vision], even if it entails much additional agony, will bring closer the vision 16 17 18

Ibid., pp. 397–98. Ibid., p. 187. Ibid.

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of an Israel living in peace with all its neighbors and with itself, an Israel that fits into a tripartite Israeli-Palestinian-Jordanian confederation. I called this confederation, which will transform and advance the Middle East, Is-fal-ur” (emphasis mine—Y. G.).19 All Zionist leaders from Herzl to Weizmann, Jabotinsky, BenGurion, the leaders of the kibbutz movements, and Eliav and Peres combined their quest for a federal settlement with the Arabs with a social vision. It is not by chance that the relationship between the two elements—solving the conflict and social vision—was closer among the intellectual leaders of the Labor Movement before and after the establishment of statehood. They perceived the existence of an ab initio nexus of political and social affairs because they saw Zionism, as a national liberation movement, as a movement of social and of personal revolution concurrently. Thus, their constructivist outlook not only prescribed the creation of a labor economy but also influenced the political attitudes of the Labor Movement. It softened these attitudes because it always sought to preserve what had already been attained and was willing to settle for inferior political achievements provided that the building of the Yishuv continue. By the same token, the Labor Movement’s role in agricultural rural settlement placed it at the forefront of the Jewish-Arab national struggle. Consequently, during its forty years at the helm of the Zionist Movement—from the mid-1930s until the electoral reversal in 1977—the Labor Movement displayed practical willingness to make political compromises but did not renounce the settlement drive that created obstacles to an arrangement. The Labor Movement’s political tradition was such, however, that this drive would not have kept it from concluding a political settlement if the other side was willing to do the same. Eliav’s book, reprinted many times over between 1972 and 1982, appeared as the baton of rural settlement was going over from the Labor Movement to Gush Emunim.20 Thus, the movement abandoned its previous front of struggle against the Arabs. This made it easier to wave the banner of social progress as an additional dimension in the federal solution to the Jewish-Arab confrontation.

19

Ibid., Introduction to the Seventh Edition. Gush Emunim (The Bloc of the Faithful)—a religious settlers’ organization founded in 1973. 20

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All the great Utopias—from that of Thomas More in the sixteenth century to those of the Utopian socialists in the nineteenth century and Herzl’s Altneuland and the Utopianist thinkers of the kibbutz in the twentieth century—set forth a new economy that is organized for the benefit of the individual. Eliav envisions a sweeping revision in the order of importance of economic activities. He places five future basic industries over the traditional ones—agriculture, manufacturing, and services—on which the Jewish economy in Palestine was based. The purpose of these five is endeavor (Hebrew: ‘asiyya) on the behalf of individual and society. He speaks of ‘asiyya, endeavor, and not of ta’asiyya, industry, because, he says, the concept of ta’asiya comes with a special label that limits it to industry of materials, tools, and instruments only. His five proposed fields of endeavor, taken collectively, will constitute the complete structure of Israel’s future economy: the food and water ‘asiyya, the health and medicine ‘asiyya, the education and science ‘asiyya; the instruments and tools ‘asiyya; and the recreation and leisure ‘asiyya.21 The first ‘asiyya, in mariculture and hydroponics, will render the problem of land that is “fit” and “unfit” for cultivation, in the conventional sense, wholly unimportant. Eliav, like every Utopian, has a vision of universal significance: “I believe that an Israel that is limited in land area but that inhabits coastal areas of two vast seas and that has top-notch brain-power and people-power in science, research, and food and water endeavor can become one of the prime entrepreneurs in this unconventional endeavor. We cannot be the first on the moon—we’ve already been beaten there—but our people can be the first, or among the first, to provide humankind with an answer to the problem of its physical existence—that of its bread and water— in the next century.”22 The second ‘asiyya is in medicine. The Jews’ natural tendency to be involved in medicine and the possibility that thousands of Jewish doctors will come from the Soviet Union (!) led him to his next idea: “It should be our grand goal to make Israel a world center of endeavor in health and medicine. Israel should be a place of study, research, teaching, healing, and convalescence, so that it can serve a population of tens of millions. Only then will we have room to absorb the

21 22

Ibid., p. 350. Ibid., p. 357.

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myriads of immigrants who practice these occupations and, concurrently, to open up for our offspring all the broad channels in this entire field of human endeavor.”23 Reading these words thirty years after they were written, after thousands of Jewish doctors from the Soviet Union have indeed settled in Israel, we cannot avoid the encouraging thought that “Utopianists” of Eliav’s mold are realists above all. The third ‘asiyya is education. As in the food ‘asiyya and the medical ‘asiyya, Israel can market complete education and teaching systems, such as school planning and “engineering,” accessories and instruments, to other countries. It can also provide teachers who are tailored to demand in different countries and teacher-emissaries and educator-emissaries to foreign countries and Diaspora Jewry. Driven by his Utopian passion, Eliav also preaches an innovative gospel in education, aimed not only at Jews but also at other peoples who seek it out. Therefore, he states explicitly that “I believe that if Israel offers both Diaspora Jewry and the non-Jewish nations grand, innovative programs with impetus in this field of endeavor [‘asiyya] of education and information, it will be able more easily to raise the immense sums needed to implement them.”24 These are the three most original and innovative fields of endeavor in Eliav’s fruitful imagination. Beyond them lie ‘asiyyas in homebuilding technology, production of nuclear energy, clothing manufacture, and the development of mass tourism recreation industries. All of these are primarily of regional significance. After all, “Peace with Israel and the cooperation that will eventually follow it can transform the Fertile Crescent, including Israel and Egypt, into one of the world’s greatest centers of tourism, if not the very greatest.”25 The reader of these remarks cannot but pause for a paradoxical reflection: Eliav’s economic and social programs for Israel might place the country at even a greater distance from its surrounding culture. His vision does include regional cooperation in irrigation and tourism development, but these are traditional industries. In the development of innovative technologies for economics, welfare, and education, in contrast, his schemes would only widen the gap between Israel and the surrounding countries. One may assume, of course, 23 24 25

Ibid., p. 362. Ibid., p. 372. Ibid., p. 390.

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that Arab society would also make progress in these respects, following the lead of Jewish society. Eliav should have devoted attention to the widening of technological and economic gaps between two societies in a state of national tension and political struggle. The nature of Utopian passion, however, is such that even when it originates in reality it quickly disregards it. This is the source of its shortterm strength and long-term weakness. If we are aware of this, as Eliav was—he repeatedly warned against haste and advocated a gradual political and social process in respect to the Jewish-Arab reconciliation—then the Utopian imagination may evolve into Utopian realism. Thus, Eliav’s book may be considered the comprehensive and definitive expression of a century of Utopian thinking in Zionism. It contains everything that flourished in its precursors’ imagination: a Jewish nation of millions in Palestine, a society built on foundations of social justice; regional development by means of sophisticated technologies, especially in the Negev desert and the Arava, e.g., the construction of a Med-Red-Dead Canal, which would transform the country’s landscape; Jerusalem as a national capital and a universal cultural and political center; the development of new industries that would cement the Israel–Diaspora nexus; a Labor Movement leadership of a Socialist-humanistic mindset; and, especially but not lastly, the crucial pioneering class of the kibbutz movement. However, the factor that makes this book special, that called public attention to it, and that touched off a political tempest that affected Eliav’s standing in his party and prompted him to abandon the party and dissociate himself from its leadership was his proposed solution to the Jewish-Arab conflict. The Jewish-Arab problem in The Land of the Hart pertains to, and is rooted in, each of the dimensions of building that Eliav set forth. In fact, one may say that the building of the Land of the Hart hinges on Jewish-Arab peace. Here Eliav makes a noteworthy innovation in Zionist thinking. In the history of Zionism until then, conventional wisdom had it that the Jews were building their goodly nation or society by their own forces, independently of the surrounding Arab society. Now, Eliav argues to the contrary: the ideal future structure—the Land of the Hart—ultimately depends on contractual political peace and fraternal social and cultural relations between the Jewish-Israeli people and the Arab-Palestinian people. This is why I choose to focus on this point in regard to Eliav, since

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it marks the most comprehensive intellectual and practical attempt to date to search for a solution. More than twenty-five years later, in the eighth printing of the Hebrew edition of The Land of the Hart, marking Israel’s jubilee and following the cataclysmic and tragic political events that had occurred in the previous five years—the Oslo accords with the Palestinians, the peace treaty with Jordan, and, at the other extreme, the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin—Eliav revised his political outlook. On the verge of the new millennium, Eliav proposed, instead of a federation among Israel, the Palestinian state, and the Kingdom of Jordan—Is-fal-ur—the establishment of a common market along Western European lines. We take up this matter again in the conclusion to this chapter.

Shimon Peres Peres, a senior political leader in contemporary Israel, is a pronounced Zionist pragmatist where a peaceful settlement between Israel and the Palestinians is concerned. Save Eliav, no one has followed the federal track as long as Peres has. Peres has been swapping one confederative plan for another for more than thirty years, since the early 1970s, and in this sense he, like Eliav, is a successor to Ben-Gurion. However, Peres has surpassed Ben-Gurion in this respect. For Ben-Gurion, the architect of Jewish statehood and the leader who propelled the Yishuv toward it, the question of a settlement with the Palestinians or with Arab countries was secondary at the time. In contrast, a local and regional Jewish-Arab political settlement has been the main theme of Peres’ historically most important political action. Peres’ federal schemes have moved outward in three concentric circles. The first and innermost circle, based on the original Mandatory Palestine (Cisjordan and Transjordan), comprised the Kingdom of Jordan, the Palestinian Authority territory, and the State of Israel. Peres termed this settlement a “functional compromise.” The second and middle circle envisioned a confederative regional Middle Eastern compromise settlement. The outermost circle applies the federal idea in the global arena, foremost in cooperation among high-tech megafirms that would set aside some of their revenue for the advancement of society at large, in the general sense but also, and especially,

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in education. One may say that at this stage, in respect to the JewishArab-Palestinian confrontation, Peres concluded that the way to solve the regional problem lay in global development, as his three books on the topic imply.26 Peres, like most people with Utopian leanings, chose a realistic and penetrating view of reality as the point of departure for political and social plans. In his opinion, Israel faced three “Arab problems”: that of the country’s Arab citizens, that of the populations in the “occupied territories,” and that of the Arab countries. It is not by chance that Peres defined the Israeli-held areas in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza as “occupied territories.” He realized that the ideologies of Arab national movements throughout the Middle East would not acquiesce in Israeli control of all parts of Eretz Israel and that the leaders of these movements did not expect Zionism ever to acquiesce in Palestinian Arab sovereignty in any part of Eretz Israel. However, Peres’ coinage—“populations in the occupied territories”— had a reverse side. He termed the Arab inhabitants of the territories not “Palestinians” but “populations.” At that time, the early 1970s, the leadership of his movement, the Labor Movement, had not yet recognized the existence of a Palestinian nation, as Peres’ rift with Arie Eliav proved. This led Peres to a harsh and, in his opinion, inescapable conclusion about the likelihood of a final Israeli-Palestinian settlement in the near future: “It is hard to believe that even moderate Arab players will agree to make peace in return for partial territorial compromises; for them, that would mean accepting the verdict of the “historical stain” of renouncing the national hope and faith.”27 The Arabs’ non-acquiescence in the existence of a Zionist Jewish political entity in Palestine, even in part of the country, is the source of the Israel’s lack of security amidst Arab countries. The establishment of an independent Palestinian state in Judea and Samaria might exacerbate this justified sense of insecurity. Accordingly, Peres resorted to two alternative political options that had been debated in the political discourse of the 1950s: 1) a JordanianPalestinian federation that would conclude a political and defense 26 See Shimon Peres, a) This Time Tomorrow (with Haggai Eshed), Tel Aviv, 1978; b) The New Middle East—Framework and Processes for the Era of Peace, Tel Aviv, 1993; c) New Genesis, Tel Aviv, 1998 (all in Hebrew). 27 This Time Tomorrow, p. 252.

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settlement with Israel; 2) an Israel-Arab federation or confederation including “a Palestinian district-state in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza,” i.e., a Palestinian canton in Israel. He considered the first scheme a distant and, therefore, impractical vision, and judged the second to be dubious ab initio and, therefore, totally impractical. After all, restructuring Israel as a canton-based federation, as Peres’ book suggests, would entail a change of Israel’s political regime, all of which exclusive of the Palestinians’ opposition. In lieu of these proposals, Peres preferred “a gradual process not necessarily related to either of the two possibilities that we have described”: the establishment of a political entity in Judea-Samaria on the basis of an arrangement that he defined as a “functional compromise.” Such a compromise, he presumed, “is possible as a longterm interim settlement and not necessarily as a peace settlement” (emphasis in the original—Y. G.). This provisional functional arrangement, Peres wrote, should rest on two political principles: Israel military and security control of the Palestinian areas and Jordanian administrative and political cooptation in the management of governance in the Judea-Samaria-Gaza districts, without obviating the possibility of “full participation by the inhabitants of the West Bank in Jordan’s political life.” In other words, Peres had in mind the establishment not of a Jewish-Palestinian “Swiss federation” in Israel but of a quasi-federation of this sort between Palestine and Jordan. This conclusion, although not expressed in the same conceptual terms, surfaced explicitly in his remarks to the effect that “The political logic of a functional compromise may lead us, within the framework of peace, to the concept of a confederation between a ‘Jewish Israel ’ and a ‘Palestinian Jordan.’” The Jewish settlements in Judea–Samaria would be given a special status within the Jordanian ambit. Although the scheme excludes the Gaza Strip from the Jordanian-Palestinian state construct, Gaza City itself would receive a special political status. Jerusalem would remain undivided under Israel sovereignty but would be designated the capital not only of Israel but also of the confederation between “Jewish Israel” and “Palestinian Jordan,” with Amman as the capital of the Palestinian-Jordanian federation. This political recipe certainly reflected a “paternalistic” attitude on the part of Israel, which holds the political and military reins but lacks the political power to establish full Jewish sovereign control over the Palestinians. Since Israel is aware of this, its “paternalism”

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also originates in weakness or in profound concern about the buildup of Palestinian national strength that will at some future time evolve into a political entity. Thus, the purpose of the “functional compromise” was to thwart the establishment of a Palestinian state by begetting a Jordanian-Palestinian state that would be closely associated with Israel. Since the European example was crucial for Peres, he stressed, “I can imagine a ‘Jordanian market’ and an ‘Israeli market’ and a ‘common (Israeli-Jordanian) market,’ and I can also imagine a Jordanian army and a joint Israel–Jordanian army; I can imagine political borders drawn on the map, with unrestricted movement and unrestricted settlement across them.” Despite this federal vision, however, Peres was strongly convinced that Israel could not, for defense reasons, return to its previous frontiers. Therefore, “In what cannot be partitioned, it is best to cooperate. Cooperative frameworks—military, economic, and political—with federal, autonomist, and community elements will allow us all to extricate ourselves from the grave contradiction that has ensnared us and to ordain peaceful coexistence” (emphasis in the original—Y. G.).28 What Peres had in mind were open borders; an Israeli and even a mixed Israeli-Jordanian-Palestinian military presence; a shared infrastructure in transport, energy, and water; assurance of the interests of all faiths in the holy places; self-management of the cities of JudeaSamaria and Gaza; the right to dual or special citizenship, e.g., for Arabs or citizens of the Jordanian-Palestinian state; and a special status for Jewish settlers in the Palestinian areas of Judea-Samaria. Fifteen years later, in his book The New Middle East, Peres widened the federal circle from a local settlement—the functional compromise—to a regional structure that one may term a “confederational compromise.”29 Unlike Eliav, whose federal proposals, as enunciated in his book Land of the Hart, were turned down by the Labor Party leadership, Shimon Peres in the 1990s was the party leader who, in concert with Yitzhak Rabin (assassinated in 1995), had steered the country to the Oslo accords with the Palestinians. Thus, while Eliav meant his ideas to drive the process toward a peace settlement, Peres intended his to make a provisional political settlement permanent. 28

All quotations are from This Time Tomorrow, pp. 256–59. Shimon Peres, The New Middle East—Framework and Processes for the Era of Peace, Tel Aviv, 1993 (Hebrew). 29

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Eliav’s ideas were greeted enthusiastically in Israeli and European Liberal-Left circles as well as by Palestinian intellectuals; Peres’ were borne on waves of political euphoria in Israeli and world public opinion. This definitely explains why Peres, as a pragmatic politician, had the “courage” to put himself forward as a statesman with a pronounced Utopian vision, something that no Zionist leader—or world leader, for that matter—had dared to do. This outcome evidently stemmed from Peres’ conviction that he had played a major role in making the impossible possible. The Israeli domestic climate at the time encouraged this belief. Accordingly, Peres, basing himself on Thomas More and his Utopia, commented about the immorality of any military occupation, however justified. This point of departure led him to the firm conclusion that although “Zionism came into being in order to demand the exercise of the Jew’s human rights, the constraints of dominating another people [. . .] are affecting the performance of governing authorities not only in the territories but also in Israel proper—just as More said.”30 Therefore, one may follow Peres’ thinking by adding, in the spirit of Lord Acton’s famous aphorism, that occupation corrupts and absolute occupation corrupts absolutely. Peres then shifted from the sixteenth-century political analyses of Thomas More to a soaring appraisal of Herzl’s constructivist imagination in regard to the future economic development of Palestine. “Even one who does not accept the Zionist doctrine,” Peres wrote, “cannot but be amazed at Herzl’s vision of the MedDead Canal in his Utopian book Altneuland.” After describing Herzl’s imaginative scheme that would pipe Mediterranean seawater toward the Dead Sea and drop it in from a height of 300 meters, thereby generating large quantities of electricity for regional industrial development, Peres concludes with two sentences about the matter of concern in his book, the Jewish-Arab and Middle Eastern problem at large: “At the end of the nineteenth century, one could dream. At the end of the twentieth century, it is possible to transform the most innocent dreams of the past into stunning reality.”31 Thus, the Utopian concept that Eliav, in the finest tradition of most Labor Movement leaders over the generations, invoked cautiously, is expressed overtly by Shimon Peres. However, like Eliav twenty years earlier, Peres is not afraid to adopt the public posture 30 31

Ibid., pp. 58–59. Ibid., pp. 126–27.

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of a naïve soul who tilts at windmills as he walks about. This is because the situation changed between the 1970s and the 1980s, making an overt Utopian drive a concrete necessity and a real phenomenon. Accordingly, “innocent dreams” could become “stunning reality.” It was this reality, the object of future hope, that prompted him to unfurl his political scheme, powered by Utopian imagination, for the public’s inspection. Unlike Eliav, who championed gradual development from a regional agreement between Israel and a Palestinian-Jordanian state to the tripartite Israel-Palestine-Jordan confederation idea, Peres uses a comprehensive, multifaceted regional settlement as his point of departure. “The key to the solution, to the establishment of stable peace, the maintenance of security, democratization and economic development, national prosperity and individual wellbeing, lies in regional organization,” he states unequivocally. To accomplish this, he admits, a complicated intellectual revolution will be needed.32 Peres’ regional framework concept rests on four pillars. The first is regional cooperation in education that will counterbalance the fundamentalists’ messages by giving the masses a different and new hope for improvement of their status in lieu of that foisted on them by the fundamentalist organizations. The second pillar—a condition for successful dissemination of the educational political message—is an improvement in the standard of living of the masses in the region. Only the establishment of broader economic settings can engineer such an improvement. “Therefore, the only concrete answer to fundamentalism is a cooperative regional organization among states and transnational activity.”33 To Peres’ mind, the Middle East faces two existential menaces: the ascendancy of fanatic religious fundamentalism and the spread of the desert. Fundamentalism murders people; the desert starves them. The way to fight both phenomena is by launching an immense regional water project that will enhance individuals’ economic wellbeing and, perforce, stanch the violence of the fundamentalist groups. In other words, in contrast to Western Europe, where the federal process began with the establishment of the Coal and Steel Authority, the Middle East will start the process by establishing a regional water

32 33

Ibid., p. 61. Ibid., p. 62.

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authority. The third pillar concerns national security. The introduction of nuclear weapons and missile delivery systems in the Middle East endangers the existence of all peoples in the region. To surmount the menace, the rational example of the great powers should be adopted. The great powers did not settle for the creation of a balance of terror; “They also understood the need for a shared framework that would reduce the risk of mutual extermination. The same should be done in the Middle East.” Thus, it is not enough to create a regional setting —the water authority—to invigorate regional life; the formation of an overarching political setting to thwart the destruction of this life is also necessary. The fourth pillar is democracy: “The Middle East needs democratization as an individual needs air to breathe,” not only due to the value dimension of democratization as a process that assures human freedom and civil liberties but also as a way to maintain peace and eradicate the sources of fundamentalist ferment. Peres finds an objective regional difficulty in establishing democratic rule in Middle East countries that are controlled by tyrants and fundamentalist movements. Therefore, instead of trying to develop democracy in each country independently of the others, “A regional community setup,” of all things, “will cancel out some of the causes of military tension and facilitate democratization processes in matters including interregional cooperation.” Then he shifts his focus from the regional to the local: “The regional-framework idea hinges on the success of the Israel-Arab peace process. To be more precise, the regional framework will eventuate at a phase parallel to a two-stage peace process. The first stage of the process is an interim or transitional stage, in which security is perceived as the dominant factor.” At this stage, Palestinian autonomy would be established on the basis “not of a permanent map but of a timetable. The idea is to conduct a journey from one climate to a new and different climate.” Here the poet hiding inside the sober statesman surfaces. Peres likens the political situation to the depiction of a dock, which he described as having been crafted by an American poet, as a “frustrated bridge.” “So far, there has been an Israeli dock and a Palestinian dock. The idea this time is to build a bridge” that will connect the two docks by a predetermined deadline. From the standpoint of Peres the realist, however, the span to be built is a military pontoon bridge, the sort that can surmount water obstacles. Only at the end of the state of war will the permanent bridge be built. Therefore, “Over the

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time-bridge of autonomy,” as Peres defines it, “the two sides will be able to advance toward the hoped-for permanent settlement.” The next phase in the peace process is the decisive one. Now the substance of peace is the dominant factor. The main considerations at this stage are three: “the development of a stable system of good neighborly relations, the maintenance of peace and security, and harvesting the fruits of peace—prosperity, development, welfare, tranquility for every individual, every people, and the entire region.”34 The first “pontoon” in the “bridge” of provisional arrangement is an attempt to solve the Palestinian refugee problem. Absent this, no progress toward the construction of the permanent peace bridge between the sides’ just and reasonable interests can take place. Justice and reasonability are inseparably related; justice for one side must not inflict injustice and further suffering on the other. Here Peres refers to the Arab demand for the right of return for refugees, which the Jews reject on grounds of justice, existential national logic, and political logic as well. The main difficulty from this standpoint, in accordance with the principle of reciprocal justice, is that the refugee problem dictates the possibilities of policy to both sides. Practically, Peres envisages a three-phase course of action to accomplish this. First, the quality of life of the inhabitants of refugee camps is improved. Second, action is taken to rehabilitate refugee concentrations and equip them with an economic infrastructure. Third, new neighborhoods and cities should be built in lieu of camps. Thus, Peres assumes from the outset that an overall solution to the refugee problem will come about in the future Jordanian-Palestinian state entity. However, “In advance of the permanent-settlement stage, there is room to discuss and work out an agreed policy on family reunification on both sides of the line.”35 To wit, reciprocity should apply in regard to the movement of Arab citizens; some should cross into Israel and others should move in the opposite direction. The phased solution of the refugee problem is linked to the establishment of a Jordanian-Palestinian constitutional state setting. Peres, like his predecessors in Zionist political thinking, serves up the Swiss federative structure as an example for the Jordanians and the Palestinians. Aware that the Palestinians aspire to political sovereignty,

34 35

Ibid., pp. 63–65. Ibid., p. 164.

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he quickly draws a distinction between federation and confederation. In the former, sovereign authority originates in the center of the federal structure; in the second, it originates with the constituents. Thus, “regional units have more autonomy [in a confederation] than they would have in a conventional federation, but national security and foreign affairs are deposited with the central government only, as in a federation.” To prove the point, Peres, like most Utopian-minded statesmen in the Zionist Movement, cites Switzerland. Furthermore, since the 1970s Peres has believed that the inevitable process of European unification would culminate in the establishment of a common economic and political community that nevertheless preserves the ethnic and cultural historical group identities of diverse European peoples that are politically united within a confederative framework.36 The confederative structure replaces the idea of an independent Palestinian state, which Peres fears for well-known security reasons. He opposes the drawing of rigid permanent borders between political units before the final settlement. Accordingly, in his opinion, the region needs “soft borders,” i.e., borders open to traffic. For mundane and religious reasons alike, the inhabitants of the Holy Land— Jordanians, Palestinians, and Israelis—must allow people, ideas, and materials to circulate. “From the economic standpoint . . . this is the only way to overcome the problem of water and its production and equitable distribution among all sides.” This, in Peres’ opinion, is the right and essential way to develop sophisticated and globally competitive agriculture and industry.37 Economic development and political structure are interdependent. The desired political settlement, in Peres’ opinion, should be based on “soft borders” that will allow goods, finance, and ideas to flow among the states bidirectionally and dynamically. To establish these conditions, a two-tiered regional federal political structure will be needed. “A political Jordanian-Palestinian confederation and an economic Jordanian-Palestinian-Israeli ‘Benelux.’”38 Peres, the indefatigable optimist, believed like Eliav that most Palestinians would accept the establishment of a small independent Palestinian state by the territorially vast Jordanian-Palestinian federation after they could internalize and become “sold” on the idea. 36 37 38

Ibid., p. 158. Ibid., p. 148. Ibid., pp. 150–51.

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He was confident that most Israelis, too, would accept such a solution because it would totally reject the frightening possibility of the establishment of a Palestinian state. Peres circulated with these plans in the late 1980s and early 1990s. That, however, did not mark the end of his political compromise with historical reality. In the late 1990s, in view of the ascendancy of the Palestinian national movement, he crossed into the third phase of his campaign to find a solution to the Jewish-Arab conflict. The first was “functional compromise”; the second was the regional confederation. The third and current phase is the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state. Peres’ courage in changing his political mind and accepting a solution that he had previously deemed severely hazardous, such as a Palestinian state, stems from his Utopian optimism, deeply rooted in the social heritage of his political cradle, the Zionist Labor Movement. In other words, Peres, like Eliav, believes that economic development and social welfare will make the entire region flourish and, ultimately, ease the tensions between the peoples and induce them to make peace. If so, one may regard Peres’ three books—This Time Tomorrow (1978), The New Middle East (1993), and New Genesis (1998)—as a Utopian political plan or program, so to speak, that evolves in expanding concentric circles—from a local problem to a regional issue and thence to the global vision that appears in the last book in the trilogy. Intertwined in the book are philosophical and poetic reflections that aim to step away from the past and focus totally on the future. Peres concludes his opus with a sentence that speaks for itself and encapsulates the entire message of the book: “We need a new ideology or, at least, a new Utopia.”39 It is not my interest here to discuss Peres’ economically and technologically ultra-sophisticated vision and its postmodern essence. I do wish to remark, however, that although the book does not address itself directly to the national conflict in the Middle East, it does touch upon the federal idea. In fact, it does so more emphatically than Peres’ previous writings did. This is due to Peres’ exhortation to the multinational megafirms to lead society to the new era by means of their stunning technological innovations and the possibilities of greater schooling for young people. These massive firms are 39

Ibid., pp. 202–3.

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basically federal institutions that gather diverse fields of knowledge and endeavor. This manner of thinking has propelled Shimon Peres to another turning point in his quest to settle the Middle East conflict. The globalistic economic vision, with its federal attributes, led Peres to a new conclusion about how to settle the Middle East conflict: economic arrangements should precede political accords. Today, then, he proposes a contemporary new federalism of sorts, a paradigm that, in my opinion, may be termed an “indirect functional accord”40 on a global scale. According to this idea, since Israel alone cannot shoulder the economic burden of revitalizing the Palestinian refugees and funding regional development projects, the European Economic Community, with U.S. support, will have to undertake this task. Thus, Peres proposes that the EEC gather Israel, the State of Palestine, and the Kingdom of Jordan under its umbrella. Peres is convinced that such an arrangement would do much to facilitate territorial partitioning between the Palestinian state and Israel and would significantly crimp the military spending of countries in the region. The result would be the establishment of a vast Middle Eastern zone in which these countries could go about their economic pursuits. Peres’ new idea should not be treated as a global “virtual Utopia.” Since he has expressed his views in public, he must have discussed them with some European leaders who did not reject them categorically. This brings us back to Utopian realism, at least as manifested in Zionist political thinking.41

Conclusion In sum, the federal outlooks of Arie Eliav and Shimon Peres demonstrate the lasting power of federal political thinking in the Labor Movement as compared with any other faction of the Zionist Movement. Ze’ev Jabotinsky’s 1940 federal plan, for example, which gave 40 Conversation with Shimon Peres, Feb. 1, 2004. See also Shimon Peres, The Imaginary Voyage: With Theodor Herzl in Israel, New York, 1999. 41 In this matter, see Amnon Rubinstein, “What Does ‘Integrating into the Region’ Mean?” Ha’aretz, Feb. 24, 2004. The article reviews discussions held at a conference in January 2004 on integrating Israel into the European Economic Community. According to the article, the foreign ministers of Germany, Belgium, Italy, and Spain favored the idea in various ways.

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the Arab minority far reaching cultural rights and national political status in the Jewish state, was not carried forward by his ideological successors in Israel, whereas Ben-Gurion’s successors, Eliav and Peres, continued to develop the ideas of the “Old Man.” This is not by chance. The discontinuity and continuity of federal thinking, respectively, flow from the ideological complexion and the two movements’ political culture. Revisionism had a Utopian worldview that believed in the ability to impose the national will on reality from a given point on. The Labor Movement, in contrast, followed the path of Utopian realism by recognizing that there is no choice but to compromise with the reality of the “here and now.” The intensity of the political sense of “here and now” also explains Eliav’s and Peres’ different points of departure when they joined the federal “relay race.” Eliav took up this conceptual baton three or four years before Peres did. The reason, in my opinion, had to do not only with their different personalities but also with the ways in which they operated and advanced in the Labor Movement. Peres, after a short stint on a kibbutz, quickly became a political establishmentarian who started out by organizing a youth movement and wound up by shaping the policies of the State of Israel. Eliav, although never a participant in cooperative settlement, devoted most of his public life to society-building from the ground up, as in the settlement projects that he headed, and in the re-establishment of a society, as in the rehabilitation enterprises that he administered in foreign countries. In other words, Eliav’s constructive inclinations and practical experience surpass those of Peres, whereas Peres outperforms Eliav in political aptitude and experience. This is why Eliav preceded Peres in adopting federal ideas. My remarks here pertain solely to the differences between their points of departure; farther down the line, the difference between the federal approaches of the two men became increasingly blurry. Eliav’s proposal of a “gradual” settlement among Israel, the Palestinians, and Jordan did not differ greatly from Peres’ “functional settlement” idea. Both thinkers aspired to a regionally based economic and political confederative arrangement. Furthermore, both eventually came to the conclusion that there is no choice but to establish an independent Palestinian state, a solution that both approached with trepidation and had attempted to thwart by means of their political schemes at the outset of their federal “relay race” thirty years earlier.

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Both introduced greater flexibility in their programs and restrained their previous hopes about a permanent regional settlement. Today, Peres proposes an “indirect federalism” of sorts—a Middle Eastern common market as an extension of the European Economic Community, which Israel, Palestine, and Jordan would join in a special arrangement. Eliav, in contrast, has retreated from his initial Utopian political plans. In his opinion, the rivaling forces in the region will not settle their conflict until destructive Islamic fundamentalism is defeated by the only force that can defeat it: a global coalition of advanced and rational great powers—the United States, united Europe, Russia, China, India, and Japan. As the war on fundamentalism is being waged, technology will gradually liberate human society from its dependency on fossil energy and replace it with solar energy. This will mitigate the political clout of the Muslim oil-producing states and, by so doing, will ease these countries’ opposition to the very existence of Israel in the Middle East. In his opinion, these longterm processes—the eradication of Islamic fundamentalism and the change in energy sources—will eventually induce Israel, the Palestinians, and Jordan to conclude a confederative settlement of economic and, later, of political nature. Eliav does not even totally rule out the possibility of the future establishment of a Palestinian-Jordanian federation, as he proposed thirty years earlier. Thus, in my opinion, one may say, that where Peres speaks of “indirect federalism” Eliav proposes “suspended federalism.”42 To sum up, the changes that occurred in the political thinking of these two personalities during the past thirty years provide strong evidence of the bivalent potency of the political upheavals that caused each to experience political disillusionment. For the very reason of these upheavals, however, neither Eliav nor Peres has despaired of the possibility of future fulfillment of their respective realistic-Utopian political and economic visions.

42

Conversation with Arie Eliav, Jan. 20, 2004.

EPILOGUE

Utopias have a practical role to play insofar as they integrate into social movements as a means of orientation. Jörgen Habermas

The history of the Zionist Movement’s dalliance with the federal idea, between the early 1920s and the early 1990s, is like a relay race. Jabotinsky took the first lap with his parliamentary federalism idea. He was followed by the leaders of Ahdut ha-’Avoda, who waved the banner of autonomous federalism. They were succeeded by BenGurion and his parity federalism, and the last lap was run by the leaders of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir with their vision of binational federalism. Thirty years later, in Israel after the Six-Day War, two second-generation leaders of the Labor Movement, Arie (Lova) Eliav and Shimon Peres, attempted to pick up the federal relay baton again. It was a strange race, its goal foreseen but not seen. Its path seemed politically logical but its time horizon was undefined. Furthermore, the baton was not handed from runner to runner but was placed on the ground and left unclaimed until the next runner came along and hoisted it. The bearers of the idea were wracked by profound ideological contrasts and severe political disputes. If so, is it at all justified to view the progression of federalism in Zionist thinking as an unbroken line? We answer in the affirmative, for two reasons. The first reason, the formal one, is the very cyclicality of the appearance of plans such as these. Each of the plans reviewed in this study endured for roughly the same amount of time, four to five years.1 The second reason is one of substance: since these plans fell within the framework of the Zionist consensus, they had common principles, most importantly the national right of the Jewish people to Palestine, i.e., Eretz Israel. From this standpoint, Ben-Gurion’s well known 1 Jabotinsky’s plan—1918–1922; that of Ahdut ha-’Avoda—1922–1927; BenGurion’s first plan—1929–1933; his expanded plan—1934–1939; and the Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir plan—1941–1946. The Eliav-Peres plans, however, held on for about twenty years—1972–1992.

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statement—“Palestine is for the Hebrew people and for the Arabs who dwell there”—also expressed the worldview of Kaplansky to his Left and of Jabotinsky to his Right. It is true that Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir did not accept the exclusivity of the Jewish national right to Palestine and contended that the proprietary entitlement belonged to both peoples equally. Practically, however, in view of the special condition of the Jewish people, dispersed around the globe and in need of its homeland in Palestine, even Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir “granted” the Jewish people a superior entitlement there. This marked the origin of another principle that everyone accepted unreservedly—a Jewish majority in Palestine. The only difference among the advocates of the various plans was in their assessments of the amount of time needed to attain the goal and the pace at which it would take place. The Revisionists and Ha-Shomer haTsa’ir shared the goal itself. The champions of federalism had several common general principles in addition to these two national fundamentals. One principle flowed from a product of East and Central European thought: the right of national minorities to self-determination within the construct of cultural autonomy. The other, parliamentary democracy, stemmed from the political culture of the West. Accordingly, all the plans combined the basis of national autonomies, effected in fields much broader than culture, and a parliamentary governing structure along Swiss or American lines. By means of this integration, the authors of all the plans wished to resolve an issue that seemed to contain an internal contradiction: particularistic national rights and democratic parliamentary principles. They sought to balance the two by establishing two elected assemblies, one representing the respective national groups and the other the democratic whole. Each of the plans proposed this method. The federal fundamental was so strongly embedded in the worldview of the personalities and movements at issue that even when Jabotinsky, shortly before his death in 1940, and Ben-Gurion, in the early 1940s, insisted on the establishment of a Jewish state, they went out of their way to affirm the Arab minority’s right to generous national autonomy. The programs were also similar at the practical political plane. All of them contained an underlying political paradox. Their authors, earlier and later alike, were willing to negotiate even with a semifeudal Arab leadership for the establishment of regular democratic

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governance in Palestine and the region. Jabotinsky and Kaplansky were the first to come to terms with this political reality, Ben-Gurion did so several years later, and even Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir, after vacillations, was ultimately willing to accept the idea. Furthermore, all the plans rested on the premise that the final Jewish-Arab settlement would hinge on a transitional period, during which methods of cooperation would be examined. All the plans also reflected the dominant belief that the final form of the regime depended on the attainment of a Jewish majority in Palestine. Until then, all the propounders of the plans agreed to deposit overarching responsibility for the provisional settlement with a third party, be it the Mandatory Government or a representative of the international institutions. The authors of the plans even shared a basic consensus about how the fundamental of the right to Jewish immigration should be translated into a practical demand concerning the extent of immigration. The criterion of economic carrying capacity was accepted, of course, on the basis of the operative premise that the Zionist Movement would eventually marshal the economic resources to expand the basic carrying capacity of the Jewish economy.2 Finally, all the authors regarded an Arab or Semitic regional federation or confederation, as long as they championed this idea, as the political framework that could compensate the Arabs of Palestine for the loss of their majority status. So far as to the Zionist political common denominator. But at the same time a deep division existed between the fundamentalistic approach of Jabotinsky and Ha-Somer Ha-Tsair and the operative one of Ben-Gurion and Weizmann. The fundamentalist ideologies of Jabotinsky and Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir originated in clashing and contradictory principles. All his life, Jabotinsky believed that Zionism should be fulfilled within the setting of a Jewish state. The leaders of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir, convinced that Jewish statehood would thwart the attainment of Zionism’s goals, countered the nation-state idea with their binational-state plan. What they had in common, however, was a one-dimensional fundamentalism. 2 In the 1930s, the Zionist Executive under Ben-Gurion was willing to hold immigration during a ten-year period to a level that would bring the Jewish population up to 40–49 percent of the total population. This extent of immigration would amount to 60,000–90,000 per year.

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Their uncompromising adherence to their basic principles induced them to separate Utopia from policy. Thus, as if history were mocking them, the more convinced they were about the realism of their schemes, the more imaginary the schemes actually became. This was the fate of the binational vision of Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir in the 1940s and of Jabotinsky’s ideal of a Jewish state in an unpartitioned Palestine that would treat its Arab national minority in an exemplary fashion. The operative approach, in contrast, was multidimensional. Paradoxically, despite its practical flexibility, it sustained the integration of Utopia and policy. Weizmann and Ben-Gurion, who represented this approach separately and jointly, were attentive to every historical change in their quest for appropriate answers to new situations. It was their Utopian predisposition that gave them the confidence to peer through every crack of political opportunity; the encouragement to cope with their frustrations, not to despair, and to return to their ideas again and again; and their long-term historical perspective. The most conspicuous and consistent exponent of this approach, for more than a generation, was David Ben-Gurion. It was he, more than any other Zionist statesperson, who fashioned the federal idea into a political instrument with which he hoped to break a political impasse that endangered Zionism. His thinking fulfilled the rule about the inverse relationship between the status of the Zionist Movement and the strength of the federal arrangement that the movement would propose. Thus, a centralized federal regime was bruited when the movement was in down phase, and vice versa. Despite its instrumental political nature, however, Ben-Gurion’s federalism carried the fundamentals and principles of a comprehensive plan for the regularization of Jewish-Arab relations. Thus, it always kept the immediate and the desired goals in sight. Even before World War I, between the Young Turks revolution and the Balkan war, Ben-Gurion propounded the idea of establishing a Jewish millet that would fit all the Jews in Palestine—Old Yishuv and New Yishuv alike—into the mosaic of national religious autonomies of which the Ottoman Empire was composed.3 After World War I and the issuance of the Balfour Declaration, the status of the Zionist Movement in Palestine and abroad underwent

3 See Y. Gorny, “Dualism in Ben-Gurion’s Attitude toward Zionism,” Zionism and Its Jewish Opponents, Jerusalem, 1990 (Hebrew), pp. 384–87, 447.

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a revolutionary change. For this reason and due to the optimistic outlook on large-scale Jewish immigration, Zionism needed an interim national arrangement that would allow the nascent Jewish national society to take shape and create a framework for cooperation with the Arab national entity. Ben-Gurion and his party colleagues, foremost Berl Katznelson, found the solution in the 1920s in the idea of a national autonomy that would combine the principles of personal membership and territorial determination. The two national autonomies—the Jewish and the Arab—were to develop federal relations in a graduated process: first in labor organizations, later in municipal government, and ultimately at the parliamentary level. In the late 1920s and the early 1930s, after the shock of the 1929 Arab violence and the accession of a Labour Government in Britain that was unsympathetic to the aspirations of the Zionist Movement, a dangerous political impasse came about. Therefore, Ben-Gurion unveiled his plan for a federative governing structure in Palestine based on binational parity. The parity model was materially different from the autonomy model. The autonomy scheme left all options open, including the possibility of a Jewish state; the latter predetermined the Jewish right to Palestine but subjected Jewish sovereignty to significant constraints due to the parity structure of governance. The binational federation idea definitely amounted to the renunciation of Zionism’s maximalist aspirations—due to the weakness of the movement at the time, of course. The program did, however, express exemplary elements of relations between two peoples inhabiting one country. Following the inverse-relationship rule, Ben-Gurion’s federal plan metamorphosed when the waves of the Fifth Aliyah began to come ashore and the establishment of a Jewish majority in Palestine became a visible goal instead of a distant vision. Now, instead of a binational federation in Palestine, Ben-Gurion proposed a Jewish state that would join a regional Arab confederation. His purpose was to strike a balance between the Jews’ just and logical aspirations and those of the Arabs. Therefore, he repeatedly stressed the compensation that the confederation would give the Arabs of Palestine for an eventuality that was about to become real, the loss of their majority status. In 1939, at the time of the round-table conference and shortly before the issue of the White Paper that sought to revoke the Mandate and renege on Britain’s undertakings to Zionism in the Balfour

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Declaration, the Zionist Executive, under Weizmann and Ben-Gurion, again proposed a parity-based federal regime as one possible way of solving the Palestine problem. After World War II erupted, as Zionism again hoped for a breakthrough of the sort that it had achieved in the previous world war, the political trend of thought took on an aspect of semantic symbolism. From then on, the proponents of a regional federative organization, if one were to come into being, insisted that it be called a Jewish-Arab or a Semitic federation or confederation. Even when Ben-Gurion despaired of this scheme, however, he did not renounce the federal elements that were, in his opinion, needed to regulate relations between the Jewish majority and the Arab minority in the Jewish state and between the state and the neighboring Arab countries. Thus, when World War II ended and the political status of the Zionist Movement changed, Ben-Gurion returned to the idea of a federally based political settlement. In the summer of 1946, he distributed among members of the Zionist Executive—Chaim Weizmann, Abba Hillel Silver, Nahum Goldmann, etc.—a plan for the establishment of a loose binational federal setting in the Mandate area on both sides of the Jordan River.4 The proposal included the following elements: 1. Two sovereign states in the Mandate area: Judea and Abdullaiya. The Arab state would include densely Arab-populated parts of central Western Palestine; the Jewish state would receive unsettled areas in Transjordan. 2. Partnership between both states in several economic spheres such as development of agriculture, apportionment of water sources, and inspection of quotas. 3. Continual international supervision of both states. Their external security would be assured by the international organization and disagreements between them that they could not resolve on their own would be entrusted to an international arbitrating entity composed of several small countries that had no direct interest in the region. The holy places of the three religions would receive international status and protection.

4 See D. Ben-Gurion, “Political Premises, 20 Tammuz, July 19, 1946,” in M. Avizohar (ed.), Toward the End of the Mandate, Tel Aviv, 1993 (Hebrew), pp. 81–83.

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The fresh Utopian sparkle was amazingly compatible with the method we described above. Its realistic basis was the hope that an era of international cooperation would ensue after the war. In 1946, a year after the establishment of the United Nations Organization and less than two years before the eruption of the Cold War, international supervision of focal points of international conflicts seemed to be a plausible option. Concurrently, Zionist policy needed a way to break out of its impasse. Therefore, the idea of partitioning Palestine and establishing a Jewish state needed further justification and a JewishArab arrangement would provide it. Accordingly, the rule of an inverse relationship between the political strength of the Zionist Movement and the strength of the proposed federal arrangement between Jews and Arabs was evinced again. In 1946, as the international status of Zionism advanced strongly in the aftermath of the Holocaust, in view of the struggle of the Yishuv and the reasonable likelihood of the establishment of a Jewish state, the idea of a federal settlement as both a means and an end of policy became slack and pliable. At all the junctions that we have described in this book, then, Utopianism and policy were intertwined in Zionism because the movement treated historical perspective and Utopian aspirations as complementary. Thus, political Utopias and social Utopias commingled in Zionist thinking. Recognition of historical experience and understanding of current reality were merged in an effort to transcend both and soar into a future of the imagination. This is why the “Utopian energies,” to use Jörgen Habermas’ telling expression, nourished social and political schemes alike. Consequently, in addition to their political considerations, the federal plans were also associated with socionational value expectations. It was not by chance that both the political and the social Utopias belonged mainly to the Zionist Labor Movement, which maintained the causal relationship between the extent of social radicalism and the Utopian nature of the plans. Therefore, Kaplansky ranged farther than Ben-Gurion and Bentov went farther still. This also explains why Jabotinsky, who did not share the Labor Movement’s social vision, was the first to distance himself from these plans despite his liberal Utopian leanings on the national issue. It was also the Utopian leanings of these personalities, one may say, that determined the uniqueness of the plans. All were far from political reality. The idea of transforming the Ottoman Empire into a federation of enhanced millets by adding the dimension of national

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autonomy had a basis in the structure of the Ottoman state. The personal-territorial autonomy plan, bruited in the early Mandate years, was anchored in the universal principles of the right of selfdetermination for national minorities and flowed from the contents of the Balfour Declaration, even if it was no longer compatible with the policy of the British Government. In contrast, Ben-Gurion’s parity-federative plan, which had no parallel in other countries, was seriously unrealistic. Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa’ir’s binational perspective was the most unrealistic of all; although based on the Swiss and Canadian models, it collided with the political situation that had come about after World War II. In contrast, the regional confederation idea, based on economic and scientific cooperation, was logical in terms of its time. However, the importance of this last political “Utopian energy,” from our point of view, is not its failure but its late appearance, which proves that federal ideas were deeply rooted in the Zionist political concept. The federal plans of Eliav and Peres show that a last faint flicker of that energy remained, until it spent itself at the end of the last century. However, the historical process did not proceed in view of the logic of “Utopian realism,” which was crowded out of Zionist political thought for some thirty years. Crowded out, yes, but not obliterated. It resurfaced in the federal schemes of Arie Eliav and Shimon Peres, heirs to the progenitors of political “Utopian realism” in Zionism, especially David Ben-Gurion. That these two personalities entered the federal relay race under materially different historical conditions from those experienced by their political forebears shows how deeply rooted the federal element was in Zionist political thinking—especially that of the Labor Movement, which had always linked political federalism with social progress, economic growth, and technological development for the peoples throughout the region, foremost the Palestinians. Thus, a pair of conceptual “Siamese twins,” one political and one social, hovered over the “federal relay race” that lasted for more than seventy years, from the 1920s almost to the end of the century just past. As stated, the last lap of the race also ended in disappointment. The runners, Eliav and Peres, like their mentor, Ben-Gurion, did not reach the finish line. After political hurdles stopped them in midstride; they renounced the Utopian vision and remained realists only. The author of this study, after dealing with the issue from various perspectives over a twenty-year period in the belief that Utopian

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realism is a matter of historical significance, reached a similar conclusion. The “disillusionment syndrome” that beset Zionist policy in the years from the Balfour Declaration (1917) to the Six-Day War (1967), when the illusion that the Jewish people had found the solution to its national continuity was also born, has repeated itself at this point. Now it seems that despite the immense historical achievements of Zionism—in which only a few Utopian statesmen such as Herzl, Ben-Gurion, and Jabotinsky believed in the past—the path to the normalization of relations among the peoples of the Middle East is still so lengthy that even the Utopian imagination hesitates to propose or even search for ways to reach it. One of the most daunting impediments to the resolution of the conflict, without a doubt, is the Zionist principle of the State of Israel as the possession of world Jewry, as manifested in the Law of Return. This is demonstrated not only by opposition to the law at the level of values but also by the clash of political ideologies, in Israel’s Jewish society, between the radical non-Zionist or anti-Zionist minority, which demands that Israel be transformed into “the state of all its citizens,” and the large majority that defends the country’s Jewishness. The importance of the principle of Israel as the state of all Jews is also reflected in the struggle by the Reform and the Conservative movements, in the Diaspora and in Israel, for equal status under the Law of Return for persons converted to Judaism by rabbis from these denominations, whose authority in matters of personal status is not recognized by Israel’s dominant Orthodox establishment. This also relates to the inferior status of Reform and Conservative congregations, including their rabbis, in Israel’s political arena. One may, it is true, argue that the struggle of most Diaspora Jews who affiliate with these religious streams originates mainly in their liberal and democratic egalitarian civic worldview. This, however, is not the last word. The state at issue, after all, is not just any state but one that defines itself as Jewish. Hence Diaspora Jews have a supreme interest in the future Jewish complexion of this state. Thus, world Jewry, which manifests this interest by voicing criticism and even by applying political pressure, will undoubtedly have an influence on shaping the nature of Israel as a Jewish state after Israel’s relations with its neighbors stabilize somewhat. The dialectical relationship between Diaspora Jewry and Israel— the link that generates criticism and the criticism that generates the

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link—is surely one of the results of the changes in Jewish identity in modern society over the past hundred years. Due to these changes, two Jewish societies—one national-sovereign and the other liberaldemocratic—coexist in one of two ways: shoulder-to-shoulder or shoulder-against-shoulder. Their relations will certainly become more complex in the future, as the centrifugal and centripetal characteristics of the nexus act concurrently. This may lead to a paradoxical reflection: precisely because the various federal political arrangements between the Zionist Movement/ Israel and the Palestinian national movement/the Arab countries remains unrealistic for the time being, federal ideas are becoming more important in the society of world Jewry, even though this society is prone to continual changes of pronouncedly postmodern nature, e.g., the decline of Zionist ideology, the devaluation of Israel as the center of the Diaspora communities, the replacement of the national or religious collective ethos with a universalistic ethos, etc. This is because the ongoing tension between Israel and its neighbors, ranging from cold peace (with Egypt) to protracted armed conflict (with the Palestinians), strengthens bilateral relations between Israel and the large and active segment of Diaspora Jewry. Thus, the center of gravity in the Jewish-Arab conflict will presumably change from this point on. In the past—until the State of Israel was established, during the Mandate era—the focus was on ’aliya ( Jewish immigration to Palestine). For the past fifty years, ’aliya has been the country’s demographic lifeline. In the future, it will probably become a phenomenon of the few instead of the many. Therefore, the Law of Return, instead of opening the country’s gates for the persecuted masses, will largely express the Israel–Diaspora relationship at the level of principle. A similar situation will evolve in relations between the Palestinian state, which will surely come into being, and the Palestinian diaspora, most of which will be a short distance from its borders—in Jordan and Lebanon—and only a small portion overseas, in Europe and America. If so, from then on the conflict will take place largely between two sovereign national societies that have ethnic diasporas. Each of these national entities, however, will relate differently to its diaspora, and the difference deserves emphasis. For the Palestinians, the large diaspora nearby inhabits the same (Arab) cultural and linguistic region. The Jewish diaspora, in contrast, is scattered among many countries in Europe and America and has no common language

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and culture. Therefore, to preserve its global ethnic framework, the Jewish people needs an identified and specific center more than the Palestinians do. This necessity excludes Israel, materially and culturally, from the Middle East and pulls it toward historical Diaspora settings such as Europe and the United States. Here, I believe, is where Zionism is beginning its second historical journey—back to its culture of origin, the one whose core values it carries. Theodor Herzl, although eager to rid Europe of its Jewish masses, wished to establish a society based on European cultural values and, by so doing, to bring the Jews back to Europe as an equally empowered nation among the nations. The social-democratic Zionist Labor Movement, which spearheaded the national struggle in Palestine and governed Israel during its first three decades, followed his lead. The leader of the Zionist opposition, Zeev Jabotinsky, a great admirer of European culture, had the same aspiration. The new Europe, composed of ethnically and culturally autonomous units, is better suited than any other setting to accommodate the State of Israel. From Israel’s standpoint, this is more than an option that responds to political and economic interests; it is also a historical and moral duty to the Jews who set out on their political journey armed with the finest European values. By returning to Europe, Zionism would close, symbolically and practically, the historical circle that began with the exodus from Europe. Such a step may dovetail with an attempt by the Jewish organizations in united Europe to reestablish create a European Jewish center. Such an attempt, it is true, cannot restore Jewish history to what it had been, especially since more than two-thirds of Jews live not in Europe but in the U.S. and Israel. However, a third-largest Jewish center, in terms of population and of influence, may well come into being. In view of the distribution of Jews across Europe, such a center would be both multilingual and multicultural. Within such a framework, the cultural diversity of Israeli Jewish society would no longer be exceptional. The admission of Israel into the broad setting of Europe, then, would increase the likelihood of the formation of a multilingual Jewish “confederation” in which American Jewry could also take part. And the underpinning of the confederation would be the federative Zionist idea of klal Yisrael, the commonwealth of Jewish communities. This may resolve another paradox in Jewish and Zionist history: precisely because Israel’s full integration into the Middle East is so

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unlikely, Diaspora Jewry and Israel will become more attractive to each other and may be inclined to establish a federative relationship. Such a relationship, which was typical among Jewish political organizations in the twentieth century, has become a recognized global phenomenon as transnational diasporas establish relations among each other and with their countries of origin. For the Jews, an element of “historical cunning” may be at work, i.e., the failure of federalism in the Middle East may create a basis for the federal continuity of world Jewry. This possibly is pregnant with Zionist significance since it is aimed, above all, at the Jewish people at large and designs the relationship among its segments along the lines of Western political principles. By implication, the death of the Middle Eastern federal idea, which proved to be a Utopia, may give birth to the world Jewish federal idea, as a possibility of Utopian realism.

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Assaf, M., History of the Arabs in Palestine, 1860–1948, Tel Aviv, 1970 (Hebrew). Ben-Gurion, D., Memoirs, C. Tel Aviv, 1973 (Hebrew). Ben-Shahar, H., Fishelson, G., and Hirsch, S., Economic Cooperation and Middle East Peace, London, 1989. Dinstein, Y., “Federal and Confederal Multinational Arrangements”, Studies in Law 17, 2 (December 1993) (Hebrew). Dotan, S., The Struggle for the Land of Israel, Tel Aviv, 1981 (Hebrew). Eliav, A. L., Land of the Hart: Israelis, Arabs, The Territories and a Vision of the Future, Philadelphia, 1974. In Hebrew: Tel Aviv, 1982 (Seventh Edition). ——, New Goals for Israel, Tel Aviv, 1969 (Hebrew). ——, Rings of Testimony, Tel Aviv, 1998 (Hebrew). Funkenstein, A., Maimonides: Nature, History, and Messianic Beliefs, English translation by Shmuel Himelstein, Tel Aviv, 1997. Furlonge, G., Palestine is My Country: The Story of Musa Alami, London, 1968. Gabai, M., In Search for a Solution: “The League for Jewish Arab Rapprochement and Cooperation”, 1939–1948, Tel Aviv, 1989 (Hebrew). Getter, M., Haim Arlosoroff, A Political Biography, Tel Aviv, 1978 (Hebrew). Gorny, Y., Partnership and Struggle: Chaim Weizmann and the Labor Movement, Tel Aviv, 1976 (Hebrew). Gorny, J. (Y.), The British Labour Movement and Zionism, 1917–1948, London, 1983. Gorny, Y., Zionism and the Arabs, 1882–1948: A Study of Ideology, Oxford, 1987. ——, The State of Israel in Jewish Public Thought: The Quest for Collective Identity, New York/London, 1994. ——, Between Auschwitz and Jerusalem, London, 2003. ——, Achdut Ha-‘Avoda, 1919–1930: The Ideological Principles and the Political System, Tel Aviv, 1973 (Hebrew). Halpern, B., A Clash of Heroes—Brandeis, Weizmann and American Zionism, New York, 1987. Hattis, S. L., the Bi-National Idea in Palestine, Tel Aviv, 1970. Heller, Y., The Struggle for Statehood, Jerusalem, 1985 (Hebrew). Horowitz D. and M. Lissak, From Yishuv to State, Jerusalem, 1977 (Hebrew). Jabotinsky, Z., The Front of the Jewish People’s Struggle, Jerusalem, 1941 (Hebrew). ——, Ketavim (Writings), D, Speeches 1905–1926, Jerusalem, 1947 (Hebrew). ——, Writings, H: Speeches 1927–1940, Jerusalem, 1947 (Hebrew). Kaplansky, S., Vision and Fulfillment, Tel Aviv, 1950 (Hebrew). Katz, S., Jabo—A Biography, Vols. I–II, Tel Aviv, 1993 (Hebrew). Katznelson, B., Writings, B, Tel Aviv, 1946 (Hebrew). Peres, S., This Time Tomorrow, Tel Aviv, 1978 (Hebrew). ——, The New Middle East: Framework and Processes for the Era of Peace, Tel Aviv, 1993 (Hebrew). Peres, S., New Genesis. Tel Aviv, 1998 (Hebrew). Porath, Y., The Test of Political Action: Palestine, Arab Unity and British Policy, 1930–1945, Jerusalem, 1985 (Hebrew). Sandler, S., and Frisch, H., Israel, the Palestinians, and the West bank, Lexington/Toronto, 1985. Schechtman, J., Rebel and Statesman: The Vladimir Jabotinsky Story, Vols. I–III, Tel Aviv, 1957–1959 (Hebrew).

184

selected bibliography

Stein, K. W., The Land Question in Palestine, 1917–1939, London, 1946. Tessler, M., A History of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Bloomington and Indianapolis, 1994. Teveth, S., Kinat David, Tel Aviv, 1977 (Hebrew). ——, Ben-Gurion and the Arabs of Palestine, Tel Aviv, 1985 (Hebrew). Weizmann, Ch., The Letters and Papers of Chaim Weizmann (Ser. B), I, Jerusalem, 1983 (Hebrew). ——, The Letters and Papers of Chaim Weizmann, (Ser. A), XIX, London, 1968. Zayit, D., Zionism and Peace, Tel Aviv, 1985 (Hebrew).

INDEX

Abdel Hadi, Aouni Bey 81 Abdullah, Emir 19, 25, 29, 31–33, 61, 89–90, 104, 171 Agudath Israel 2–3, 118 Ahdut ha-Avoda, party 35–36, 38–41, 44–45, 47, 51, 56–57, 66, 72, 89, 110, 112 Ahdut ha-Avoda, Journal 125 Ahsayn Bey Ja"abri 81 Alami, Musa 81–82, 86–87 Aliyyah—second 44, 51; third 33; fifth 175 Altneuland 155, 162 American Jews 5, 112–31, 181 Anglo-American Commission (1946) 127–28, 134, 140 Antonius, George 81–84 Arab League 140 Arab national movement 4, 12, 61, 78, 81, 107, 126, 159 Arab riots (1920–1921; 1929) 18, 57, 60, 62, 65–66, 72, 81, 87, 106, 175 Arab uprising (1936–1939) 62–63, 65, 84, 87–88, 90 Arlosoroff, Hayim (Haim) 54, 57–59, 68, 71, 74, 115–16, 146 Armenia 41, 66 Assaf, Michael 110 Ataturk 34 Auster, Daniel 110 Austro-Hungarian Empire 3, 20 autonomy (national, cultural, religious, territorial) 2–3, 10, 14–15, 19, 23–24, 41–47, 49, 51, 53–58, 60, 66, 69, 71, 74–75, 81, 86, 89, 100, 102–105, 112, 115, 117–18, 135, 138–39, 143, 164–66, 172, 175, 178 Balfour Declaration vii, 6, 18–21, 28–29, 33, 45, 62, 81, 150, 174–75, 178–79 Balkan war 18, 41–42, 174 Basel 6 Begin, Menachem 144 Beilinson, Moshe 71–73, 75–78, 85–86 Belgium 168

Ben-Avi, Itamar 61 Ben-Gurion, David 14, 39, 43–52, 55–58, 64–98, 103–13, 128–40, 142–43, 145–46, 149–50, 158, 169, 171–79 Bentov, Modechai 109–22, 124–27, 129–39, 177 Ben-Zvi, Izhak 39, 43, 51, 71, 74 Biltmore Conference, 1942 97, 112, 129–30, 139 Binational (plan, regime) vii, 11–15, 22–24, 26, 28–29, 47–49, 51–53, 55–57, 59, 64, 66, 73, 77, 81, 85, 106, 109–10, 113–14, 121, 125–27, 129–30, 134–37, 140, 171, 173–76, 178 Bolshevik Revolution 1–2 Borochov, Dov Ber 41, 43–44 Brandeis, Louis D. 18 Brit Shalom 11, 12, 65, 96, 110, 132 Britain 3–5, 7, 12, 29, 34–36, 38, 44–45, 63–64, 66–67, 75, 77–78, 80, 83, 88, 94–95, 106, 108, 114, 175 British Commonwealth 75, 96–97, 102, 104 British empire 57, 86 British government 4, 6, 12–13, 18–19, 32, 41, 62–65, 74, 76–78, 81, 94, 106, 178 British High Commissioner 13 British Labour Party 19, 35–36, 63, 67, 71, 105, 175 British Mandate 4–6, 14, 17–19, 21–22, 25, 28, 30, 37, 53, 69, 74–75, 110, 116, 123, 136, 143, 175–76, 178, 180; Mandatory government 105, 135 Buber, Martin 132 Canada 10, 102 Cantons 26, 32, 52, 59–61, 69, 71, 75–76, 79, 84–86, 116, 118–19, 160 Caucasus 120 Chaimson-Newcombe 12 Charter 22

186

index

Confederation (Middle Eastern, Palestinian-Jordanian, Israel-Arab) 9–10, 14–15, 19, 25–26, 31, 33, 37, 56, 59, 77, 82, 84–86, 91–92, 99, 106, 119–20, 142–43, 154, 160–61, 163, 166–67, 173, 175–76, 178, 181 Conservative Movement 3, 179 Constantinople 106 Constitution 21, 27–28, 37–38, 46–48, 50, 56, 59, 63, 75–76, 86, 97–99, 102, 113, 117–21, 123–24, 129, 134–36, 165 Czechoslovakia 102 Damascus 26 Diaspora Jewry 156, 179–80, 182 Diasporas (ethnic, transnational) 180–82; Palestinian Diaspora 148, 180 Dotan, Shmuel 14, 110, 130 Dubnow, Simon 2, 47, 53 Eretz Israel 2, 5, 11, 72, 80, 91, 146, 148–49, 159, 171 Eden, Anthony 108 Egypt 34, 94, 120, 144, 156, 180 Elected Assembly (Asefat ha-Nivharim) 44–49, 115, 117, 120 Eliav, Arie (Lova) 15, 142–59, 161–63, 166–71, 178 Etsiyyon Block 152 Euphrates & Tigris 120 Europe viii, 1, 3, 10, 12, 15, 23, 34, 41, 43, 50, 57, 63, 82–83, 91, 102, 104, 106, 132–33, 139, 142–43, 153, 158, 161–63, 166, 168, 170, 172, 180–81 European Jewry 1–3, 13, 20, 58, 78, 111, 129, 133, 181 European Union viii, 10, 143, 166, 168, 170, 181; EEC 168 Faisal-Weizmann Agreement 94 Federal council 115, 124 Federation (Middle Eastern, Arab, Jewish-Arab) 9–10, 25–26, 32, 34–35, 37–38, 42, 51, 55, 60, 62, 72, 76–83, 85–87, 89, 90–92, 94–98, 103, 105–108, 112, 116, 119–21, 126–27, 134–35, 138–40, 151, 158–60, 166, 170, 173, 175–77 France 3, 94, 103 Fundamentalist ideology 137, 140, 163–64, 173

Gabbai, Moshe 110 Galilee 60 Galili, Yisrael 150 Gaza 147, 159–61 General Zionists, Alliance of 110 Geneva 82 Germany 3, 5, 25, 63, 110–11, 168 Goldmann, Nahum 176 Golomb, Eliyahu 71 Greece, Greeks 66, 91 Grusenberg, Oscar 34 Habermas, Jorgen 171, 177 Haifa 78, 86 Ha-Kibbutz ha-Artsi 12, 109–10, 112, 125–26, 136 Halpern, Ben 18 Hashemite, family (dynasty) 19, 33, 94 Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa"ir 12, 16, 108–10, 112, 125–38, 140–41, 171–74, 178 Hattis, Susan Lee 110 Hazan, Yaakov 134 Hebrew language and culture 6, 11, 34, 46, 48–49, 65, 72–74, 99–100, 104, 158 Hebron 87 Helsingfors, convention 24 Herzl, Theodor 6, 152, 154–55, 162, 168, 179, 181 Higher Arab Committee for Palestine 18–19 Histadrut 6, 14, 44, 46–49, 112, 125, 129, 137, 140, 145 Hitler 78 Holocaust 1–2, 5, 134, 177 Holy Sepulcher 148 Horowitz, Dan 137 House of Representatives 27, 37 Hoz, Dov 67 Hungary 102 Huseyni, Haj Amin el- 62, 81 Ichud 11–12, 16, 132 Iran 120, 146 Iraq 19, 90, 95, 120 Ireland 85 Iron Wall 20, 65 Is-fal-ur (Israeli-Palestinian-Jordanian) 154, 158 Istiqlal, party 81, 86 Italy 88, 168 immigration visas (certificates) 122–23, 134; quota of 88, 122–24

index Jabotinsky, Ze"ev (Vladimir) 7, 16–17, 20–35, 38–39, 61, 65–66, 69–70, 72, 79, 81, 83, 89, 97–99, 102–108, 111, 143, 154, 168, 171–74, 177, 179, 181 Jacobson, Victor Dr. 59–61, 69, 115–16 Jerusalem 6, 14, 32, 81, 86, 100, 116, 144, 148–49, 152–53, 157, 160 Jewish Agency 9, 27, 57, 59, 63, 74, 76, 110, 122–23, 129–30, 132, 134 Jewish immigration 4, 12–13, 18, 21, 23, 27, 29, 33, 36–37, 39, 44, 48, 64–65, 69, 76, 78, 80–82, 84, 88–89, 95–96, 104, 106, 116, 121–24, 129–35, 138, 173, 175, 180 Jewish majority 11–12, 24, 32–33, 50, 57, 60, 65, 69, 71, 98–99, 104, 106–107, 130, 132, 138, 140, 152, 172–73, 175–76 Jewish National home 2–3, 5, 21–24, 28–29, 37, 45, 54, 63, 70, 73, 134 Jewish State vii, 3, 13–14, 16, 21, 46, 52, 60, 72, 77, 80–81, 83, 85–87, 91–99, 102–107, 112, 129, 135, 137, 139–40, 142–43, 158, 169, 172–77, 179 Jewish settlement 12, 16, 18, 21, 23–24, 29, 35–37, 39, 56, 60, 73, 84, 91, 93, 95–96, 116, 120, 126, 131, 133, 145–46, 152, 154, 160, 169 “Jewish Commonwealth” 112, 129, 139, 181 Jordan, Kingdom 148, 150–51, 158, 160, 169–70, 180 Jordanian-Palestinian State 148, 151, 159–61, 163, 165–66, 168, 170 Jordan, river 37, 84, 85, 92, 151, 176 Jordan Valley 37 Judea—Samaria—Gaza 147, 159–61 Kalvariski, Haim 96, 110 Kaplansky, Shelomo 16, 35–41, 48, 56–58, 67, 69–70, 89, 109–17, 119–21, 124–25, 172–73, 177 Kassem, Sheikh, Az el din el- 62 Katznelson, Berl 40, 51–56, 58, 69, 71, 74, 87, 114, 146, 175 Kedma Mizraha 109 Kenesset Israel 46, 74, 146 Kisch, Alfred 32 Klal Yisrael vii, 181

187

languages, national 23, 27–28, 42, 48, 75, 92, 99–100, 104, 135, 153, 180 Law of Return 179–80 League for Jewish-Arab Rapprochement 109–10, 132 League of Nations 4, 18–19, 59, 69, 72, 75–76, 100 Lebanon 26, 120, 180 Lissak, Moshe 137 Locker, Berl 40 London 18–19, 25, 29, 31–32, 39, 63, 67, 81–82, 88, 94–95, 97 MacDonald, Malcolm 116 MacDonald, Ramsay 63, 77, 94 Magnes, Judah Leib 65, 84, 110, 132 majority—minority 22, 26–27, 29–30, 37, 39–40, 50, 69, 73–76, 80, 83, 86, 90–91, 98, 119, 121, 132, 135–36, 138, 140, 143, 173, 175, 179 Mapai, party 52, 64, 76–77, 79, 82, 88, 90, 92–93, 110, 112, 125, 143–44, 146, 148, 152 Mapam, party 110, 129 Margalit, Elkana 110, 130 Mediterranean 88, 120, 162 Meir, Golda 150 Mesopotamia 26 Millet 10, 28, 42, 102, 174, 177 Mishmar ha-Emeq, council 126–27, 138 Mizrahi, movement 110 More, Thomas 155, 162 Motzkin, Arie (Leo) 29 Mufti of Jerusalem 81, 86–87 Muhammad Ali 94 Negev district 60, 91, 116, 131, 133, 146, 157 Nile 120 Nitzana 146 Nuri Said 90 Nazi regime 13, 63, 111 Ormsby-Gore, William 88 Ottoman Empire 10, 17–18, 41–43, 81, 174, 177 Ouziel, Ben-Zion Meir Hai, Rabbi 110 P.L.O. 150 Palestinian State vii, 148, 151, 158–61, 165–69, 180

188

index

Paris, Peace Conference (1919) 20 parity 13, 22, 24, 27–30, 38–39, 48, 50, 53, 55–56, 68, 77, 81, 85–86, 89, 91, 95, 98, 104, 106, 113–17, 121, 124, 126, 131–32, 135–36, 138, 171, 175–76, 178 partition plan 129 Peel Commission (1937) 63–64, 94, 102, 129 Peres, Shimon 15, 141–45, 150, 154, 158–71, 178 Philby, John 12 Pilgrims 101 Po"alei Tsiyyon 11, 35, 40, 42–44, 56, 109, 110, Poland 2–3, 111, 133 Port Said 146 Rabin, Yitzhak 158, 161 Reform Movement 6, 179 Revisionist party 7, 20 Rubashov (Shazar), Zalman 40 Ruppin, Arthur 43, 132 Russia 1–3, 20, 24, 33, 44, 170 Sadat, Anwar 144 Saloniki 42 Samuel, Herbert 19, 25, 31, 33 Sartawi, Issam, Dr. 150 Saudi Arabia 19, 120 Second International 42 Semitic peoples 26 Senate 27, 37, 56, 121 Shakib a-Ghaslan, Emir 81 Shertok (Sharrett), Moshe 62, 88–89, 93, 96 Silver, Abba Hillel 176 Six-Day War 147 Social-Democratic Federation 43 Sokolov, Nahum 29 Soviet Union, Soviet Russia 1, 10, 102, 111, 155–56, 170 State of Israel vii, 4, 6–7, 9, 14, 16–17, 39, 93, 106, 143–71, 179–82 St. James Conference (1939) 63, 94 Sulh, Riyadh el 32, 81 Switzerland 10; Swiss confederation 59, 84–85 Syria 26, 34, 81, 90, 120; “Greater Syria” 83–84 Tehon, Ya"akov 33, 100, 110 Tel Aviv 86

Temple Mount 148 transfer 37, 92, 104, 131, 133, 152 Transjordan—Cisjordan 18–19, 25, 28, 84, 90, 120, 158, 176 Trumpeldor, Yosef 11 Turkey, Turkish State 34, 66, 91, 102 Ulster 85 Umma (Arab nation) 107 United States viii, 1–3, 7, 10, 26, 28, 65–66, 78, 84, 98, 106, 123, 130, 168, 170, 181 United Nations Organization 177 Upper Chamber 27, 30, 56, 68, 104, 115, 117, 136 Ussishkin, Menahem 33, 97 Utopia, Utopian elements 5–9, 14–15, 18, 26, 28–30, 34, 38, 42, 51, 55–56, 59–61, 68, 71, 82–83, 92–94, 103, 105, 107, 110–12, 124–25, 127–28, 133, 137–38, 141–46, 149–52, 155–57, 159, 162–63, 166–71, 174, 177–79, 182 Utopian Realism & Realistic Utopianism 8–9, 143, 145, 155, 177–78, 182 Va"ad Le"ummi 31, 33 Washington, D.C. 116 Wauchope, Sir Arthur 78 Webb, Sidney (Lord Passfield) 62 Weizmann, Chaim 6, 11, 14, 18, 20, 25, 31–34, 38–39, 45, 59–61, 63–64, 77, 80–81, 83, 88, 94, 96–97, 103, 116, 132, 154, 173–74, 176 West Bank 151–52, 160 White Paper (Churchill 1922; Passfield 1930; and in 1939) 13, 18, 25, 28–29, 60, 62–63, 77, 94, 105–106, 116, 175 World Jewish congress 5 World War I 2, 10, 16, 18, 20, 35, 41–42, 44–45, 62, 81, 95, 106, 111, 142, 150, 174 World War II 1, 5, 94–95, 99, 105, 109, 116, 142, 146, 176, 178 Yaari, Meir 111, 130, 133 Yellin, David 33 Yiddish, Yiddishists 2–3, 11

index Yom Kippur War 144 Young Turks 17–18, 42, 174 Yugoslavia 10 Zayit, David 110, 127, 130, 136, 140 Zionist Congress, XVII (1931), XXI (1939) 64, 109 Zionist Executive 12–13, 19, 25, 27, 29–35, 38–39, 64–65, 82, 85, 88, 95–97, 103, 116, 133, 173, 176 Zionist Labor movement 15, 19, 32, 34, 38–40, 44, 51, 53, 57, 59, 61,

189

62, 64, 71–73, 78–79, 81, 97, 105, 109, 133, 150–51, 167, 177, 181 Zionist movement 1–2, 4–7, 9, 11–15, 17–18, 20–21, 27, 29, 33, 44, 59–61, 63, 66, 79, 90–91, 95, 97, 107–109, 112, 119, 129, 131–32, 142, 145–46, 151, 154, 166, 168, 171, 173–77, 180 Zionist Organization 4–5, 9, 11–12, 15, 22–24, 29, 35, 38, 40, 45–46, 59, 64, 97, 112, 125–26, 129 Zurich 85