Prompt Number Five
Carlin Guthrie, Nathan Miller, Jane Windler, Sarah Dick
In what ways and to what extent was Zionism responsible for tensions in the Palestine Mandate up to 1939?
Introduction:
The Middle East often carries a connotation of violence when it is discussed, and perhaps the most well known example of this violence is displayed through the tension between Arabs and Jews in the discombobulated land of Palestine. These tensions were spurred on by a multitude of factors based on the relations between Jews, Arabs, and the British government.
Thesis: Zionism influenced the majority of factors such as leadership, Arab-Jewish relations, diplomacy, and immigration, all of which contributed to the tensions in the Palestine Mandate up to 1939.
Leadership in Palestinian Mandate Tensions
· Vladimir Jabotinsky was the leader for the Revisionist movement in Zionism, which was a polarized version of Zionism.
· He was an “increasingly controversial” member of the Zionist Executive.
· His goals for Zionism were to have the establishment of a Jewish state, with Jewish majorities on both sides of the Jordan River that should be facilitated by “massive, unlimited immigration” (Cohen).
· He wanted pre-1922 status that included Jordan as a part of Palestine. Wanted to go back to Theodor Herzl’s ideals, and rejected Chaim Weizmann’s ideas.
· He argued that Britain was quite capable of abandoning the Zionists and that the only way to achieve the Jewish majority required for independent statehood was by encouraging 50,000 immigrants to Palestine a year. Jabotinsky's territorial demands were even more controversial. He claimed that historic Palestine included Transjordan and insisted that large-scale Jewish colonization take place in that territory (Cleveland 244).
· He was pretty extreme—his followers were called “Jewish fascists” and his rhetoric was similar to that of Benito Mussolini.
· Though many of his ideas were rejected as extremist, after he died, most of them became part of Zionism by the 1940s—“including the open demand for a Jewish state with a Jewish majority and unlimited immigration” (Cohen).
· When he died in 1940, his ideals and majority died with him.
· David Ben-Gurion was educated at an Orthodox Hebrew School—Ultra ortho.
· He became chairman of the Zionist Executive in 1935. He believed in the classic goals of Zionism, not as radical as Jabotinsky’s thinking—wanted a Jewish majority in Palestine and a Jewish self-defense (these line up with Jabotinsky).
· “His paramount and partly successful political goal was to introduce stable majority rule to a disparate, divided Jewish society” (Bar-Zohar).
· He’s in Palestine; Jabotinsky not necessarily in Palestine.
· Haj Amin and the Arab Higher Committee wanted to stop Jewish immigration immediately, and ban land sales to Jews.
· They coordinated the strike, and received and rejected the Peel Commission’s findings.
· Haj Amin, one of the leaders of the committee, was exiled, but was still able to help and coordinate the strike and revolt from abroad.
· He refused to make any kind of compromise with the Jews, so there was nothing really that could be done.
Vladimir Jabotinsky had the most extreme Zionist goals, and David Ben-Gurion was a lesser version of him. The tension came because of the completely different ideals between these two Zionist leaders and Haj Amin, one of the leaders of the Arab Higher Committee. The beliefs of these leaders were on opposite sides of the spectrum, which made it impossible for them to compromise and find common ground.
Arab-Jewish Relations
Topic Sentence: Many of the Zionist tendencies as well as the Arab’s unwillingness to compromise made Arab-Jewish relations extremely difficult and strained.
· Religious differences attributed to some of the tensions in Palestine. Since many of both the Jewish and Arabic holy places are located in the same place, land rights and other issues over these areas created tension.
o Example: when the Jews put up the screen to separate the men and women in the Temple Mount (Nerves of Jerusalem)
· “the fight over the Western Wall created very real turmoil among the Jews.” (Nerves of Jerusalem 307).
o “tensions turned into outward violence” (Nerves of Jerusalem 307).
· Chaim Shalom Halevi writes in Nerves of Jerusalem that “[the Arabs] hate us and they are right, because we hate them too, hate them with a deadly hatred’…This was the truth, he insisted, behind the Zionist movement’s nice language and goodwill.”
· “a small incident was enough to set off a conflagration” (Nerves of Jerusalem 310).
o Example: August 14, 1929 – Ninth of Av (a fast day) Jewish demonstrators, speeches and waving of the Zionist flag. A demonstration by the Arab the next two days then led to an attack on the wall by the Jews.
· A major tension was the Jewish and Arabic unwillingness to work together
o Example: in drafting a solution to the Western Wall problems, the Jews rejected the treaty due to its language in that the Arab used “Al-Buraq” referring to the Western Wall.
· Arab Revolt 1936
o General strikes, violence, battles. Both sides resort to violence- a clear indicator of the flawed Arab-Jewish relations.
o Motive behind this violence was mainly over land/immigration however.
Concluding Remarks: The faulty Arab-Jewish relations can be overwhelmingly contributed to the dispute of Zionist tendencies and beliefs, especially when analyzing the religious conflict in the mandate. Other factors like poor leadership and land disputes did play a role in raising anxiety; however, there are a majority of examples that point to a religious or political dispute stemming from Zionism.
(Temple Mount)
Diplomacy
· The Hope-Simpson Commission described Arab unemployment as the result of Jewish Immigration. The immigration, a facet of the Zionist ideology, was directly affecting the lack of work and resources for Arab inhabitants of Palestine.
· The Peel Commission proposed the partition of Palestine into three zones, divided by nationality (Arab, Jewish, and International). Jewish leadership accepted the plan, with the additional demand that all Arabs be removed from the Jewish section of Palestine. The Arabs were totally opposed to this plan, and this lead to the second wave of the Arab revolt.
· “The tension which has prevailed… in Palestine is mainly due to apprehensions, which are entertained both by sections of the Arab and by sections of the Jewish population. These apprehensions, so far as the Arabs are concerned are partly based upon exaggerated interpretations of the meaning of the [Balfour] Declaration favouring the establishment of a Jewish home in Palestine” (Churchill 1922).
· Chaim Weizmann lobbied Prime Minister McDonald to override the Hope-Simpson Commission and permit immigration to Palestine. McDonald affirmed the intent of the British to create a Jewish homeland, adding that the rights of non-Jewish inhabitants would not be harmed.
Immigration
Topic Sentence: One of the major consequences of Zionism was the tension created by Jewish land purchases and immigration in Palestine.
· As confirmed in the Hope – Simpson report in 1930, “with the…methods of Arab cultivation [there] [is] no margin of land available for agricultural settlement by new immigrants.” However, more Jewish immigrants were arriving. There was a surplus of land owned by Jews, but it wasn’t being cultivated, therefore hurting the Arab majority economically, creating tension between the two ethnic groups, often resulting in violence.
· With an increase of immigration due to Zionism, there was the potential for the Jews to become the majority, “in a country…overwhelming Arab” (NYT article). The idea of self-determination would be deprived to the Arabs, which counters the intention of the mandate system. This installed fear in many Arabs, causing tension between the two parties.
· Immigration and land purchases as a result of Zionism gave inspiration to Iz al-Din al-Quassam to advocate for an uprising against the British, due to their support for the Jews in the matter. Immigration and land purchases also motivated the Arabs to create the Arab Higher Committee in April 1936. One of the main goals of this body was to put a halt on Jewish land purchases and immigration in Palestine.
· Tensions flared during the Western Wall incident. The Shaw-Commission declared that the Arabs were responsible for the violence, but the commission stated that the acted in fear of being powerless due to the amount of Jewish immigration and land purchases. The commission recommended a limit to be put on Jewish land purchases and immigration to stop violence.
· New York Times article in response to the Jaffa Riots; “discontent…arises perhaps from the habit of regarding Palestine as a deserted, derelict land, sparsely inhabited by a population without traditions and nationality, where political experiments may be launched with out arousing local opposition” (NYT). (this was the attitude of the Zionists).
· However, immigration that wasn’t a result of Zionism e.g. anti-Semitism in Europe created spikes in the fifth Aliyah, also created tensions between the Jews and Arabs in Palestine.
(Map of Palestinian Land Loss)
Conclusion:
Though there were evidently other factors that created tensions in the Palestine Mandate, most of the factors stem from controversies and disputes over Zionism. The Zionist leaders such as Vladmir Jabatinsky and Ben Gurion were extremely polarized to leaders such as Haj Amin. Therefore, this extreme difference created ostentatious problems between the two groups. Similarly, contrasting religious ideologies (especially Zionism) between the Arabs and Jews further divided Palestine. Diplomacy based on Zionist desires of a homeland created even more controversy in the new mandate as well as an influx of Jewish immigration. With the propensity of Zionism the diplomacy and immigration problems added to increasing tensions. Though there are many factors that directly caused the tensions in Palestine, Zionism is definitely the biggest indirect factor.