The Price of Zionism Trade-offs in Civil Well-Beings and Public Segments from 1948 to 1973

Written for coursework of Modern Israel, lectured by Dr. David Engel, New York University, Spring 2014
In a set of interviews named Unease in Zion conducted by Ehud Ben Ezer amidst the Yom Kippur War that broke out in 1973, interviewees were asked of the price of Zionism since the War of 1948, a question that calls upon attendance on both political and cultural identifications and economic consequences. The attention to these issues involves both influence upon public segments represented cultural heritage, political environment, national economic conditions, and so on. In order to evaluate the price of Zionism that cast effect Jewish Israelis in terms of the evaluation of gains and lost during the period marked by two most important wars in modern Israeli history, it is crucial to look into the states of being of the aforementioned aspects shortly after the War of 1948 (or War of Independence) as well as the changes in respective aspects that took place in the later periods. The purpose of this paper is to try to explicate the changing landscape that formulates the price of Zionism through the lenses of authors of literary texts or official statements that were written among years of 1948 to 1973 that even until today reflect major social consequences in Israeli cultural identification, immigration debates, and national security efforts.
In the cultural aspect, despite that the Zionist Movement has been accused by some for sacrificing more profound Jewish heritage such as some of the historical sites as well as allowing a number of violations of the Jewish law, Torah, for materialized secular benefits such as political influence, financial strength, territorial expansion, and so on, the Zionist Movement ever since its founding has made the effort to build a Jewish awareness from Jews across the globe in the land of Israel. However, the existential crisis that, according to Zionist leaders, was formed by Diaspora lifestyle and suppressions did not necessarily cease even after the establishment of state. Many believed that the sacrifices of cultural heritages and spiritual principles foregone in order to get rid of the existential crisis were almost outweighed the pieces of benefits that Zionism tried to collect in the first score of years after 1948. Gideon Hausner, a Diaspora Jew born in Austria-Hungary, would have agreed with this observation and responded to the Ben Ezer’s question by saying that a large portion of Jewish life had indeed been given up for the Zionist ambition.
In his essay “The Holocaust and the Education of Our Youth” written in 1962 shortly after the trial of Adolf Eichmann where he served as Attorney General, Hausner criticizes the negligence of the importance and significance of traditional Jewish values in a recently established society. Hausner makes it clear that the Zionist regime had since the establishment of the State of Israel abandoned too many invaluable merits of Jewish culture in pursuit of short-term benefits and that the culture of Diaspora Jews was, instead, the culture that sustained the livelihood of Jewry in its darkest times and was the spirit needed if the state was to prosper in the long run. Hausner wrote in the essay that “[the] diaspora that perished is the one from which we sprang, the fountain of Jewish inspiration and creativity […] All we have to do is visit Kibbutz Lohamei HaGetaot in order to become aware what great creative powers were stored there. […] We must show the current generation that it has the honor of identifying itself with the generation of its parents and the duty of learning the tragedy’s historic lesson.”
With respect of domestic stabilities, Zionism’s focus on immigration created policies that later became “difficult” to control for the Zionist leaders, who were comprised mostly of Ashkenazi Jews with European origins at the time. The Zionist government formed policies and passed legislations that, in a short period of time, created massive social problems caused by the immature official treatments and improper settlements of a large number of Mizrahi immigrants of North African or Middle Eastern descendants. This particular group of Mizrahi Jews (often referred to as “Oriental Jews”) struggled with language barriers, poor resources of education and employment, difficult housing conditions, and subsidiary discriminations. The dichotomy of treatments toward immigrants of opposite background had tempered the original Zionist ideal that the State of Israel was going to become a place for all Jews around the world to live with prosperities and transmit their Jewish roots to the next generations. Such actions taken by the Zionist government had created an irreconcilable gap between Jewish Israelis and the influence of such a gap lingers until today. Abraham Abbas, the author of From Ingathering to Integration: The Communal Problem of Israel, would say that Zionism had paid great price for internal exhaustion coming from the improper handling of domestic issues among its own people.
In his report compiled by 1958, Abbas emphasized that the loyalty held toward the collective goal of the state of Israel was what enabled the Zionist Movement to advance thus far, and that if the state was going to sustain its growth and not forfeit its progress, it had to recognize and resolve the problems caused by the improper settlements of the immigrants coming from North Africa and the Middle East, who, according to Abbas’ report, had much less means to advance and success in the Israeli society at that period of time. Abbas commences his report by saying that, “[the] paramount concern of us all is for the welfare of the State we have established after thousands of years of dispersion […] I profoundly believe that the full integration of these new settlers into the community of Israel is the key problem of this country, and on its just and equitable solution will depend the survival of the State.” Abbas argued that the “600,000 of 900,000 immigrants who arrived in Israel during the first decade came from Moslem countries, North Africa, and Arabia” during the first decade after 1948 could transmit into a great threat to long-term instability and unity if their voices weren’t heard and their sufferings weren’t compensated with care. Abbas claimed that the Zionist leadership had created the separation of Ashkenazi and Mizrahi Jews, and that such separation is the result of the Zionist government that is built upon “absolutely sectional basis.” The negligence of the needs of this group of immigrants not only undermined Zionism’s own beliefs, but also created profound instability in the development of the State of Israel in the long run.
One of the most major purposes of the Zionist Movement that constituted the foundation of the movement is to provide a secure space for the Jewish population around the world in order to protect them from external attacks organized and conducted over both racial discriminations and territorial disputes. While the Zionist regime acquired 20% more land than the UN Partition Plan granted in 1948 in less than a decade, controlling a large portion of the West Bank, the Zionist government had also stimulated enormous tension between Israel and its neighboring countries and regions. Despite their accomplishments in building and greatly strengthening the state’s military power, however, Israeli Jews paid a large price due to the decisions that Zionist leaders made in dealing with conflicts that aroused by primarily the Zionist ideal of territorial expansion and that take place both in controversial borderline regions and within the nation where non-Jewish population resides, stimulating alarming casualties and senses of insecurity.
In The Voice of Israel, Abbas Eban wrote that “[on] innumerable occasions the active defense of Israel life and territory has been compromised in deference to international opinion. We know that Israel is most popular when she does not hit back and world opinion is profoundly important to us.” Eban also numerated numbers of major incidents that halted the progress of the pursuit of national security that would ultimately lead to the well being of the Jewish population inside of State of Israel.
The price of the Zionist ideal even included the sacrifice of some of its own beliefs and insistences. The political decisions that the Zionist government took during the first two decades after the establishment of the State of Israel was largely influenced by its consideration of economic and financial consequences. Upon the establishment of state, Israel was in tremendous need of financial resource that, at the time, would have no other options but to rely heavily on financial aids from Diaspora Jews because of the great discrepancy between the large domestic need and insufficient taxation and other national income due to insufficient population that were both physically and financially stabilized. American Jewry who comprised the vast majority of Diaspora Jews as well as the wealthiest and most politically influential Jewish community around the globe became the most targeted potential patrons of the Zionist government. American Jewish society who had openly objected to the idea that the establishment of the State of Israel would automatically imply that the Jewish population around the world would acquiesce to the Zionist ideal that every Jewish person who lived by Jewish belief and was Jewish descendent would identify with Israel and consider the Land of Israel as the center of the world’s Jewry.
The Ben Gurion-Blaustein Agreement issued in 1950 marked the beginning of the compromise made by Zionist leaders for the sake of stable financial channeling between the American Jewish community, and the subsequent joint agreement issued in 1961 confirmed that the decision to forego the centrality of Israeli Jewry that constituted one of the most major Zionist ideal and Israeli national interest that concerned its political standings had been profoundly seceded. There would be no doubt that it was clear to both Prime Minister David Ben Gurion and Jacob Blaustein that the Zionist political ambition in its domestic ideological as well as international standing had been sacrificed to compensate ponderous financial needs. In the joint statement, American Jewish community represented by Jewish business magnate Jacob Blaustein almost strong-armed the Zionist government into consenting to a mutual understanding that would ensure 1) a democratic government promised to be maintained by the regime 2) that the Zionist government would discontinue to impose one collective national identity upon Jews “in Diaspora” 3) that the regime would work as promised to secure a peaceful environment. Ironically, therefore, in order to pursue its goals, Zionism had to give up one of its own authority in order to seal the deal.
In conclusion, the Zionist Movement in the first two decades whose beginning and ending were marked by the War of 1948 and the Yom Kippur War of 1973, respectively, resulted in major consequences both macro political presence and micro aspects that concern the daily well being of individual citizens. In order to sustain the security of Israeli Jews, expanding territories, and consequently promote the authority of Zionism over Jews in Diaspora, the Zionist Movement led to sacrifices in Jewish cultural inheritance, the social statuses of certain non-European Jewish immigrants, and an even greater exhaustion in dealing with disputes with non-Jewish population in- and outside of the State. Furthermore, in order to implement such progresses, Zionism also had to sacrifice its own ideological ideals in exchange of economic affluence. Therefore, the price of Zionism not only includes sacrifices concerning Jewish population in the society, but also some of Zionism’s own ideology.