From labour Zionism to New Zionism: Ideological change in Israel

Key takeaways

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Reading notes

• 1977 was the first time Labour lost the elections and the new government was formed by the Likuids headed by Begin

• Ideology of Gush Emunim (block of the faithful) is increasingly felt

• Settlements from such groups in the west bank of Jordan have received support via the Israeli government

• New Zionism is a religious ideology increasingly gaining popularity from a secular society

• It is a revolutionary ideology that seeks to change the structure of society

• When it succeeds via ideological routinisation and becomes the new centre the more revolutionary aspects are dropped

• The new centre must shift emphasis from radical to conservative elements to legitimise the new structure and its position in it

• Israel's shift can be understood via an intergenerational conflict

• The young see that the fathers have betrayed the mobility of society (Feuer)

• Most likely to occur in post-revolutionary countries

Labour Zionism

• Labour Zionism derived from the ideology of the Hehalutz movement and the teachings of Gordon

• Main features were national resurrection by emigration to Palestine, social salvation by becoming agricultural labourers in egalitarian communal settlements, and individual salvation by service to the community- implying asceticism

• Revolutionary by advocating for a  complete restructuring of Jewish society by shifting political power from religious organisations

• Labour Zionism created a new Jewish national identity epitomised by the pioneer

• The Ahfut Haaboda leadership claimed hegemony in the power structure

• Political power could not be coercive due to British control, so economic means were employed

• The Twelfth Zionist congress in 1921, Zionism was no longer identified with settlement as such but with pioneering settlement which was communal or cooperative

• If all Jews came to Palestine, there would be none left to provide the necessary funds. This was never stated explicitly, but was agreed tacitly. B

• ioneering was described as an avant garde activity, performed only by the most dedicated and certainly not required of everyone. In fact, insistence on exclusiveness constituted the main strength of the minority - the Labour movement never became a majority of the Jewish population in Palestine, but was only the largest single cohesive group and political bloc. E

• 51% were laid out by the agricultural settlement depart- ment for agricultural settlers, 11.8% by the Palestine Agricultural Settlement department (again for agricultural settlers), and only 20% by the housing section

• 1930, Ahdut Haavoda united with Hapoel Hazair, a nonmarxist socialist party adhering to Labour Zionism more closely than Ahdut Haavoda. The united party was renamed Mapai. In 1942, a split occurred in Mapai which was seen by the party to jeopardize its dominant position, both in Palestine and in the Zionist Organization. The secessionists, called Faction B and com- prising mainly the more Left-oriented leaders and members of Labour, joined with the Kibbutz Hameuhad, one of the Kibbutz movements. T

• Consequently, by 1944, the ideological shift had become explicit when Ben Gurion stated, "We will not obtain a Jewish state solely by the will of the workers of Palestine. [But] Without their will it will not be obtained at all."2

• ced. "The Jewish working class in this country is not a party, but an apostle: the emissary of Jewish history. It has absorbed the heritage of Jewish life and expresses all its cravings for redemption

• This stage of ideological routinization shifted emphasis to the least radical component of original Labour Zionism, namely to national redemption

• For its economic power, in turn, it depended on an organi- zation external to the society of which it formed the center. Consequently, it had to meet challenges from two different directions, since it had to assert its dominance both within Palestinian Jewish society and in the Zionist Organization. The following ideological shift was linked to a challenge to the position and support of Labour in the Zionist Organization

• The center no longer represented a selective (pioneer), or large avant-garde (working class) group within the Jewish population of Palestine, but rather the population of Palestine as a whole vis-a-vis world Jewry