Zionism, Imperialism, And Racism 0856647616, 9780856647611

Table of contents :
Contents
Introduction
Part One: Zionism: Its Philosophic and Historical Foundation
1. The Historical Roots of the Imperialist-Zionist Alliance
2. The Racial Myths of Zionism
3. Zionism: A Form of Racism and Racial Discrimination
4. Non-Jewish Zionism: Its Roots and Origins in England in Relation to British Imperialism, 1600-1919
5. Zionism: Racism or Liberation?
6. Zionism as a Racist Ideology
Part Two: The Application and Effects of Zionism in Palestine
7. The Right to Nationality in the State of Israel
8. Israel’s Treatment of the Arabs in the Occupied Areas
9. Consequences of Zionism for Palestinian Class Structure
10. The Colonial Exploitation of Occupied Palestine: A Study of the Transformation of the Economies of the West
Part Three: Zionism and the Arab World
11. The Jews of Iraq in the Nineteenth Century: A Case Study of Social Harmony
12. Economic Dimensions of Arab Resistance to Zionism: A Political Interpretation
13. The Efficacy of Zionist Ideology and its Implications for the Arab-Israeli Conflict
14. Sectarianism and Zionism: Two Elementary Forms of Consciousness
Part Four: Zionism and the International Community
15. Israel and South Africa: A Comparative Study in Racism and Settler Colonialism
16. Israel and South Africa: The Racists Allied
Index

Citation preview

Zionism Imperialism and Racism Edited b y A.W . K A Y Y A L I

CR O O M H ELM

LO N D O N

© 1979 À.W. Kayyali Croom Helm Ltd, 2-10 St John’s Road, London SW11 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Zionism, imperialism and racism. 1. Zionism - History I. Kayyali, Abdul-Wahhab 956.94*001 DS149 ISBN 0-85664-761-6

Printed in G reat Britain by offset lithography by Billing & Sons Ltd, Guildford, London and Worcester

CONTENTS

Introduction Part One: Zionism : Its Philosophic and H istoriad F oundations 1.

The Historical R oots o f the Im perialist-Zionist Alliance A bdul W ahhabAl K ayyali

9

2.

The Racial M yths o f Zionism A bdul Wahab Al-M assiri

27

3.

Zionism: A Form o f Racism and Racial Discrimination F ayez Sayegh

SI

Non-Jewish Zionism: Its Roots and Origins in England in Relation to British Imperialism, 1600-1919 Regina S h a rif

56

5.

Zionism: Racism or Liberation? A bdeen Jabata

71

6.

Zionism as a Racist Ideology Sayed Yassin

87

4.

Part Tw o: The A pplication and E ffects o f Zionism in Palestine 7. 8. 9. 10.

The Right to N ationality in the State o f Israel A pis F. Kassim

109

Israel’s Treatm ent o f the Arabs in the Occupied Areas M ichael A dam s

118

Consequences o f Zionism for Palestinian Class Structure Elia T. Z ureik

137

The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine: A Study o f the Transform ation o f the Economies o f the West Bank and Gaza Sheila R yan

169

Part Three: Zionism and th e Arab World 11. 12. 13.

The Jews o f Iraq in the N ineteenth Century: A Case Study o f Social Harmony Walid K hadduri

199

Economic Dimensions o f Arab Resistance to Zionism: A Political Interpretation Joe S to rk

209

The Efficacy o f Zionist Ideology and its Im plications for the Arab-Israeli Conflict M ichael C. H udson

234

14.

Sectarianism and Zionism : Two Elem entary Form s o f Consciousness Halim Barakat

250

Part F ouri Zionism and th e International C om m unity 15. 16. Index

Israel and S outh Africa: A Com parative Study in Racism and Settler Colonialism R ichard P. Stevens

265

Israel and South Africa: The Racists Allied P eter HeUyer

286 300

IN T R O D U C T IO N Right and wrong are the same in Palestine as anywhere else. What is peculiar about the Palestine conflict is th at the world has listened to the party th at com m itted the offence and has turned a deaf ear to the victims. Professor Arnold Toynbee

In our era o f unprecedented global interdependence and lethal m ilitary technology the world may ignore the issues o f potential intercontinen­ tal conflict only at its peril. This is particularly so in the case o f the dangerous situation in the Arab Middle East. The 'casus belli' in th at part o f the world is the Arab-Zionist conflict, which owes its origin to the im perialist inspired alien Zionist invasion o f Palestine and th reat to the future o f the entire Arab N ation. Zionism, as the contributors to this volume point o u t, is.a colonial movement based on racist* supremacist and distant religious notion» perceived and launched as a political project w ithin the imperialist fram ework' o f late Tiineteenth ancT early tw entieth-century Europe. Both the antagonistic W estern attitude towards th e ' Arabs "and the Zionist colonial ideology are now clearly anachronistic and actually threaten the interest and well-being o f the West, the Jews and hum anity. That these W estern attitudes and Zionist ideas are presently at variance w ith the spirit o f our tim es, is borne o u t by the liquidation o f colonial­ ism and racist entities in Africa and elsewhere and by the United Nations Resolution 3379 o f 10 November 1975 which determ ined th at Zionism is a form o f racism and racial discrim ination. It was on the first anniversary o f th at m om entous resolution th at the University o f Baghdad invited prom inent thinkers and scholars from 46 countries to participate in a seminar on ‘Zionism and Racism' to examine Zionism in theory and practice. The seminar was singularly successful, and it is my privilege to present a selection o f the papers subm itted to th at seminar in the hope o f contributing to a greater understanding o f the underlying factors o f the Arab-Zionist conflict. Unless the West is prepared to adm it the justice o f the Palestinian claim in the Middle East, there can be no hope o f peace in the region. Such an understanding is vital to the future o f the Western industrial societies and will help future efforts to build peace on the firm foundations o f justice. It is tim e the West listened. A.W. Kayyali

Part One ZIO N ISM : IT S P H ILO S O P H IC A N D H IS T O R IC A L F O U N D A T IO N S

T H E H IS T O R IC A L R O O TS O F T H E IM P E R IA L IS T -Z IO N IS T A L L IA N C E Abdul Wahhab AI Kayyali

In as much as imperialism is an international politico-economic system based on the concept o f moral and m aterial inequality o f nations, entailing subservience and exploitation o f the ruled by the ruler through the oppressive use o f force as well as by other means, it is necessarily a racist phenomenon. This is borne out by the historical record o f imperialism throughout the world, and w ithout such a basic view, no correct reading o f racism and m odem history is possible. Historical evidence points to the fact th at Zionism, as we know it, was bom within the framework o f imperialist thoughts and designs o f the early decades o f nineteenth century Europe and enthusiastically embraced by some Jewish intellectuals and activists who were influen­ ced by the prevalent chauvinist and racist ideas o f the latter part o f th at century. The common denom inator was the interest to find solutions for European problems and needs at the expense o f other people, in this case the Arabs. The use o f the term ‘alliance* refers to the partnership and the nature o f the link between the two parties and n o t to any semblence o f parity between the two as it is quite obvious that Zionism is merely one o f the offshoots o f the tree o f imperialist ideology. The peculiarities o f the Zionist ideology and entity tend to assert rather than negate its racist character. Zionsim as a m odem political creed and as an effective organised movement can only be correctly conceived as an artificial or tem porary solution to three interacting challenges facing Europe in the nineteenth century, the heyday o f Western imperialism. 1. The growth and expansion o f European imperialism, which neces­ sitated the search for new sources o f raw materials and m arkets for the finished products, in addition to securing the lines o f commercial and m ilitary communications. The importance o f the Arab lands as the gateway to Africa and the bridge to Asia was made abundantly evident by Napoleon’s campaign (1797-1799) and by the “dangers” o f Mohammed Ali’s attem pt to form an independent state comprising Egypt and the Arab States. Thus the need for stifling any nascent independent state, doubly more threatening to imperialism in the wake o f the spread o f Arab-nationalist sentim ent, became increasingly

9

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persistent as the “O ttom an Empire” , the “sick man o f Europe,’* drifted further toward disintegration. ^ 2. The failure o f European liberalism and the ideas o f equality and democracy to incorporate and assimilate the Jew coupled w ith the capitalist crisis in Eastern Europe. The adoption o f industrialization led to a loss o f vocation for a great num ber o f Jews who could n o t easily adjust to the transform ation o f the feudal economic system. It is im por­ tan t to note th at Jewish “apartness” was, in the past, a contributory factor to the phenomenon o f anti-Jewishness. 3. The spread o f aggressive and chauvinist expansionist nationalism in Europe which stressed the racial basis o f the national state as well as racial superiority and the need for expansion (Lebensraum ) was diver­ ted to overseas colonies and possessions. Superiority, exploitation and dom ination were upheld as a civilizational mission under the notion o f the “white m an’s burden.” The first tw o o f these challenges were known as the “Eastern Question” or the “Syrian Question” , and the “Jewish Question” . The inter-European rivalries and the scramble for colonies precipitated world wars and revolutions and was transform ed into the “colonial question.” The first question prom pted the m ajor im perialist figures to propose the idea o f creating a client Jewish settler-state in Palestine primarily designed to block the fulfillm ent o f unity and independence in th at im portant area o f the world and to serve the interests o f its sponsors. The events o f the latter part o f the century were conducive to the creation o f a consensus o f opinion among the im perialist and Western politicians, w ith the cooperation o f Western Jewish m illion­ aires and anti-Semites everywhere in favor o f Zionism and Jewish emigration to , and the establishm ent of, a Jewish state in Palestine. The interaction o f the challenges and the persistence o f the problems and issues fed into the imperialist design and directed events toward finding solutions at the expense o f peoples o f the Third World. The Growth o f Western Influence Toward the end o f the eighteenth century the Western powers’ interest in the Arab area intensified as the aging O ttom an Empire became increasingly dependent on the European powers which obtained privi­ leges, footholds and spheres o f influence w ithin the Empire itself. These powers sought to establish direct links w ith the various populations and religious sects in the area. Thus France became the protector o f the Catholic comm unities in Syria, Lebanon hnd Palestine while the O rtho­ dox Christians came under Russian protection.

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11

It was during his Palestinian campaign (1799) th at Napoleon, m oti­ vated by his war needs and later by his am bition to attract the loyalty o f the Jews as agents throughout the w orld, issued his call for the re­ building o f the Temple in Jerusalem and the “return” o f the Jews to Palestine for political purposes. Napoleon’s campaign itself had aroused British interest in Palestine as it had posed a threat to the British over­ land route to India. When Mohammed Ali (Al-Kabir) o f Egypt em­ barked on his am bitious plan to modernize Egypt and build a strong independent state comprising Egypt, Greater Syria and the Arab Penin­ sula during the first decades o f the nineteenth century, the British government adopted a course o f direct m ilitary intervention and was instrum ental in driving the armies o f Ibrahim Pasha (son o f Mohammed Ali) back to Egypt. Mohammed Ali’s advance into Syria opened the Syrian Question (a question which still remains as it is synonymous with Western schemes and endeavours to prevent Arab unity). New British policies were for­ m ulated. One o f the keys to the new approach was Palestine, the Jews a prom inent part o f its spearhead. In 1838 the British decided to station a British consular agent in Jerusalem and in the following year opened the first European consulate in that city. During the 1840s and the 1850s the British government, which had no protégées o f its own, established a connection w ith the Jews in Palestine (around 9700 in all), the Druze in Lebanon and the new Protestant churches. “Behind the protection o f trade and religious m inorities there lay the major political and strategic interests o f the powers.” 1 From its start the British presence was associated w ith the prom o­ tion o f Jewish interests. “This question o f British protection o f Jews >became, however, and remained for many years the principal concern o f the British Consulate in Jerusalem.” 2 The form ulation and frame­ work o f British imperial policy in the area was best drawn out by its architect, Prime Minister Viscount Palmerston. In a letter to the British Ambassador at Constantinople explaining why the Ottom an Sultan should encourage Jewish immigration to Palestine, Palmerston wrote “ . . . the Jewish people if returning under the sanction and protection and at the invitation o f the Sultan would be a check upon any future evil designs o f Mohammed Ali or his successor.”3 It is remarkable indeed th at Palmerston used the term “Jewish people” in reference to racial-religious unity as there were no other bonds between the Jews at a time when even prom inent Jews were speaking o f Jewish “com m unities,” and when the Jewish assimilationist movement, the Haskalah, was making headway. Also notew orthy was

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the use o f the word “returning” in reference to mistaken racial ancestry - as if history stood still for tw o thousand years —and taking religious memories as a title deed with u tter disregard, nay in studied direct opposition, to the will o f the inhabitants o f the land. All this preceded the conversion o f the father o f Zionism to Zionism and the official birth o f the movement by more than half a century. Nor was Palmerston’s concept a bolt in the sky o f British imperial policy. This particular idea o f erecting a colonial Jewish settler-state in Palestine to serve imperial interests and a variety o f moral pretentions, was shared and upheld by a number o f prom inent British imperialist prime m inisters, statesm en, m ilitary leaders and adventurers. These included Palmerston, Shaftes­ bury, Colonel Gawler, Disraeli, Rhodes, Colonel C.H. Churchill, Lawrence Oliphant, Joseph Chamberlain, General Smuts,4 A J . Balfour and W. Churchill, to name but a few. Many o f these patrons o f Zionism were not philo-Semites as is some­ times commonly assumed. Balfour’s pro-Zionist stance was initiated by Herzl's argument before a British Royal Commission on the immigration o f Jews to Britain (1902) that diverting the Jews to Palestine was the solution to th at British problem . Lawrence Oliphant provides a very clear-cut case o f the contradiction between the moral and idealistic pretensions o f gentile Zionists and their actual imperialist m otivation. According to Lawrence’s biographer, the man “shared much o f the facile anti-Semitism o f his tim e.” 5 A more recent example is provided by President Richard Nixon who provided more arms and money to Israel than all the preceding American Presidents combined and who, according to press reports about the White House tapes, was n o t above derisory remarks about Jews in his private counsels. The British imperialist Zionist seed did not sprout immediately and had to await the rains o f wider imperialist interest in the area — the opening o f the Suez Canal in the 1860s and the British occupation o f Cyprus and Egypt in the seventies and eighties respectively. An additional im petus was the spread o f anti-Semitism in Eastern and, later, Western Europe. The growth o f Western influence “caused the Western Jewish com­ m unities to play an increasingly im portant role in the Holy Land.”4 This role was conceived within the confines o f these interests under the protection o f the privileges (capitulations) granted by the Sultan to the Western powers. It was financed as well as guided by rich Western Jews closely associated with the ruling circles in the West. The first organizations to prom ote fhe proposed colonialization program were British and inspired by the Palmerston-Shaftesbury line

R oots o f the Im perialist-Zionist A lliance

13

o f thought — The British and Foreign Society for Promoting the Restoration o f the Jewish Nation to Palestine, The Association for Promoting Jewish Settlem ents in Palestine, The Society for the Promo­ tion o f Jewish Agricultural Labour in the Holy Land. The Jewish Chronicle was established and became “an im portant vehicle for the popularization o f Palestine colonization in Jewish circles.“ 7 In 1861 the London Hebrew Society for the colonization o f the Holy Land and the French Alliance established the agricultural school o f Mikveh Israel near Jaffa, obviously aiming at the settlem ent o f Jews in Palestine on a considerable scale. Richard Stevens explained this surge o f French interest: “Following the Crimean War there was generally a renewed interest in extending French influence in the Levant and various political writers championed n o t only the protection o f an autonom ous and Christian province o f Lebanon but also an autonom ous Jewish province o f Palestine.*’* At th at stage several British writers wrote pamphlets prom oting the idea o f Jewish settlem ent in Palestine. Byron’s H ebrew M elodies, George Eliot’s Daniel Deronda and Disraeli’s Tanored conveyed a rom antic touch and stim ulated public acceptance o f the self-interested British-inspired idea o f a Jewish “return’’ to Palestine. These Western attitudes and efforts provided the necessary back­ ground for the emergence o f Zionism. As previously noted, tw o Euro­ pean developments in the second half o f the nineteenth century pro­ vided the necessary birth conditions o f the imperialist-conceived Zionist idea and im planted it in Jewish minds as if it was a natural and inner-motivated Jewish development. The first was the direct and indirect result o f the intellectual and political growth o f European chauvinist nationalism . It was no accident th at the first proponent o f the Jewish national idea as a m odem creed, Moses Hess, entitled his book R om e and Jerusalem (1862) in direct reference to the nationalist , movement in Italy, and in which he embraced the racial concepts and the pseudo-scientific racist theories o f the nineteenth century. Hess stressed th at Jews should avoid assimilation and reassert their unique­ ness by “reconstituting their national centre in Palestine.*’ For all his attem pted logic, Hess, like m ost Zionist thinkers, betrays the intrinsic superstitious and messianic traits in what is often otherwise non-religious Zionism, when he speaks o f im m inent victory o f the Jewish idea thus heralding the “Sabbath o f History.’’ It is n o t the immediate impact o f R om e and Jerusalem th at is o f primary historical im portance but rather the intellectual and political climate th at produced it. To the intellec­ tual and political founders o f Zionism file realpolitik o f European

14

R o o ts o f th e Im perialist-Zionist A lliance

statesm en was o f trem endous influence, th at o f Bismarck a virtual inspiration. The second European development which pushed the Zionist idea to the fore was the Russian pogroms in 1881. These pogroms led to a mass exodus o f Jews to Eastern and Western Europe and brought about the collapse o f the Haskalah assimilationist movement. Its place was taken by a new m ovem ent, Hibbath Zion (the Love o f Zion), inspired by Leo Pinsker’s pam phlet A uto-E m ancipation (1882). Societies were form ed in Jewish centres to discuss the question o f settling in Palestine as an immediate and practical prospect and the revival o f Hebrew as a living language. The first Jewish colonists belonged to an organization o f Russo-Jewish students, known as Bilu, which was form ed at Kharkov for the specific purpose o f colonizing Palestine. -H erd and the G row th o f Zionism Despite the sprouting o f colonial-oriented Jewish organizations no cen­ tral leadership emerged. The continuing flow o f Jewish immigrants into Western Europe brought anti-Semitism and intensified the interest o f prom inent Western Jews in the fate o f the Jews o f Eastern Europe. A famous Jewish fam ily, the ultra-rich Rothschilds, financed an endeavour to minimize Jewish immigration to Western Europe by diverting it to Palestine; thus the dire consequences o f anti-Semitism were avoided and Jewry was aligned to the expansive imperialist inter­ ests in the Middle East in the post-Suez era.9 A young Viennese Jew, a journalist by profession, named Theodor Herzl was to provide the political and organizational leadership o f the new movement. What converted Herzl from indifference to his Jewishness to active Zionism was the anti-Semitic Dreyfus Affair o f 1894. In 1896 his D er Judenstaat (The Jewish State) aroused the interests o f Jewish activists from various parts o f the Western world. The book dealt w ith the situa­ tion o f the Jews and argued th at only through the attainm ent o f state­ hood on a land purely their own could the Jewish Question be solved. In the following year Herzl was able to convene the First Zionist Congress at Basle (August, 1897) and form the World Zionist Organiza­ tion. Herzl was elected president and its carefully worded program declared that the aim o f Zionism was a “publicly recognized, legally secured hom eland in Palestine,” to be achieved through organization, colonization and negotiation under the um brella o f the imperialist powers. It would be difficult to overstate the im portance o f Herzl’s ideas and the effect his efforts had on the Zionist movement. As the founding

R oots o f the Im perialist-Zionist Alliance

15

father, he left his im print on the entire mold o f that movement and may be said to have influenced it more than any other leader. A reading o f his works and the followup o f his frame o f mind and reference o f action, as well as an analysis o f the congress at Basle are m ost revealing particularly in the light o f his meticulously and candidly recorded D iaries}0 His ideas, strategies and m ethods were of tremendous impact on Zionist thought and action, even to the point o f becoming character­ istic o f the movement. H erd's Zionism was an outcome o f the Jewish Question and his vision o f its solution within the framework of alliance with the domin­ ant imperialist powers and as molded by the ideologies o f nationalistcum-racist European movements and societies. To H erd these societies were permanently incapable o f tolerating the Jew who was aliented by his apartness and nonconformism and this was the basis o f anti-Semitism^ as well as o f the rootlessness o f the Jew. The solution could not possibly be the reform o f these societies through such notions as freedom and equality, nor the loss o f Jewish identity and apartness, but rather the realization o f conform ity on “a national basis" and the alignment o f the proposed Jewish national-state, which was to be established on a purely Jewish land, with the European powers, whose umbrella and patronage was necessary for bringing about the state as well as protect­ ing it thereafter, in return for services rendered against third parties. — The relationship between the European powers and the proposed Zionist settler-state was conceived mi an imperialist-colonialist basis. This underlying fact notw ithstanding, Zionist colonialism had nuances o f its own, which in turn render it more anomalous or extrem e. The first o f these nuances was that while the European colonialists were an extension o f an already established national identity and state, the Jewish colonialists sought to forge a nation or a national identity through the colonization act itself. Unlike the other nation-seeking movements this was to be based on. religion, as they did not speak one language nor did they have social norm s, and continued historical experience in com m on.11 In order to make it more viable to the Euro­ pean m ind, Zionism claimed the racial unity o f the Jew s-thus^dding pseudo-scientifidsm to the anachronistic concept o f building a religious nation state. Another characteristic was th at, while endeavouring to secure die enthusiastic patronage o f the m ost powerful or m ost inter­ ested o f the Western powers, Zionism based itself on the consensus o f Western and imperialist powers through and through. It sought and procured benefit from, inter-imperialist com petition in contradistinc­ tion with other colonial settler-states. The last o f these nuances was an

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ideologically-powered one—namely th at Zionism sought to expel the “natives” as their basic strategy called for a purely Jewish national state. Any thorough exam ination o f the writings and guiding lines o f Zionist theory and action would reveal the overriding and dynamic im pact o f im perialist thought and m odus operandi, as well as the dom inant racist influence o f nineteenth century Europe. To illustrate this it is proposed to establish H erd's outlook and m ethods regarding the basic concepts and issues involved in the im perialist-Zionist alliance w ith occasional reference to his successors to point o u t the consistency and continuity o f Zionist strategy and tactics. It should be noticed how influential and crucial were Palm erston’s proposals and thoughts and subsequently the clim ate o f British im perialist and European racist thought, on the subject o f a Jewish settler-state in Palestine. O utlook The fundam ental concepts underpinning Herzl’s thought and Zionist outlook are in his D er Judenstaat: “Supposing IBs Majesty the Sultan were to give us Palestine, we could in return undertake to regulate the whole finances o f Turkey. We should there form a portion o f the ram­ part o f Europe against Asia, an outpost o f civilisation as opposed to barbarism . We should as a neutral State remain in contact w ith all Europe, which would have to guarantee our existence.” 12 The same them e recurs, appropriately enough, in Herzl’s address to the First Zionist Congress: “It is m ore and m ore to the interest o f the civilised nations and o f civilisation in general th at a cultural station be estab­ lished on the shortest road to Asia. Palestine is this station and we Jews are the bearers o f culture who are ready to give our property and our lives to bring about its creation.” 13 ' ' Twenty-one years later, Herzl’s prom inent successor Chaim Weizm ann was to explain to th eJJritish im perialist statesm an m ost readily associated w ith Zionism ^ A rthur Jam es Balfour, the contem plated Zionist plan: “a com m unity o f four to five m illion Jews in Palestine p . . from which the Jews could radiate out into the Near E a s t----- H u t all this pre-supposes free and unfettered development o f the Jewish National Home in Palestine n o t mere facilities for colonisation.” 14 This concept did n o t only echo Palm erston’s proposal b u t also respon­ ded to the rising Western needs in the area after the opening o f the Suez Canal, British occupation o f Egypt and World War I. The gist o f British strategic thought was spelled out in a m em orandum by the General S taff a t the War Office: “The creation o f a buffer Jewish

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17

State in Palestine, though this State will be weak in itself, is strategically desirable for Great Britain.” 15 Basic Strategy The Basle Program, form ulated by the First Zionist Congress determ ined that the “aim o f Zionism is to create for the Jewish people a home in Palestine secured by public law .” A reading o f HerzTs Diaries as well as an exam ination o f subsequent Zionist action would reveal th at the term “public law” refers to die patronage o f the imperialist powers. This patronage was deemed necessary in more ways than one. Herzl sought a colonial concession w ith explicit and public imperial backing as this would establish his own credibility among the Jews16 as well as secure viability and protection to the venture. He envisaged th at the European powers would back Zionism for one o f three main motives: (1) imperial­ ist self-interest; (2) ridding themselves o f Jews and anti-Semitism (in West Europe’s case avoiding the influx o f Jewish immigrants from East­ ern Europe) and (3) using organized Jewish influence to com bat revolu­ tionary movements and other internal factors. Herzl first turned to the German Kaiser, the “one man who would understand my plan,” 17 n o t merely because o f the German cultural influence w ithin Zionist ranks but because Germany was bent on push­ ing its imperialist way toward the East: German policy has taken an Eastern course, and there is something symbolic about the Kaiser’s Palestine journey in more than one sense. I am, therefore, more firmly convinced than ever th at our movement will receive help whence I have patiently been expecting it for the past tw o years. By now it is clear th at the settlem ent o f the shortest route to Asia by a neutral (among Europeans) national ele­ m ent could also have a certain value for Germany’s Oriental policy.18 In a draft letter to the Kaiser, Herzl later explained the Zionist aim and its use to Germany’s Oriental policy, th at the Jews were the only Euro­ pean colonialists ready and willing to settle Palestine as the land was poor, and th at Palestine had to be settled as it occupied a strategic posi­ tion. Europe, he added, “would more readily perm it settlem ent to the Jews. Perhaps not so m uch because o f the historic right guaranteed in the m ost sacred book o f m ankind, b u t because o f the inclination, present in m ost places, to let the Jews go.” 19 This last argum ent was his passway to M. de Pleuwhe the antiSemitic Russian Minister o f Interior who in 1903 endorsed the Zionist

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It was inevitable th at London would become the center o f gravity.31 Britain was the im perialist power m ost interested in the future o f Pales­ tine as it had possessions in neighboring countries as well as an interest in the overland route to India. There Herzl approached the arch-imperial­ ist Colonial Secretary Joseph Chamberlain, through the good offices o f Lord Rothschild, whom Herzl described as “the greatest effective force th at our people has had since its dispersion.”33 During the Chamberlain interview in O ctober 1902, Herzl's voice trem bled as he explained his proposal for an Anglo-Z ionistpartnership involving colonial concessions for the Jews in Cyprus, el Arish and the Sinai Peninsula to serve as a “rallying point for the Jewish people in the vicinity o f Palestme7ï25(A later reference will be made to the im perialist-colonialist lógiclised by Herzl.) To Chamberlain and to Lord Lansdowne, the foreign secretary, Herzl explained th at by patronizing the Zionist endeavour the British Empire yvould n o t only “be bigger by a rich colony” but th at also ten ews: 1 wear England in their hearts if through such a deed it becomes . rotective power o f the Jewish people. At one stroke England will get ten m illion secret b u t loyal subjects active in all walks o f life all over the w orld. At a signal, all o f them will place themselves at the service o f the magnanimous nation th at brings long-desired help . . . . England will get ten m illion agents for her greatness and her influence. And the effect o f this so it o f thing usually spreads from the political to the econom ic.34 / ^ Herein lies the Zionist quid pro quo: for the power th at undertakes to be universal protector they offer tire Jews as universal agents and the Jewish settler-state as a client-state. Herzl’s efforts in England included soliciting the backing o f the m ajor colonialist figures. Forem ost among them was Cecil Rhodes and in a letter to Rhodes Herzl explained th at although his project did n o t involve Africa b u t a piece o f Asia Minor, “But had this been on your path, you would have done it yourself by now .” 35 Why then did Herzl turn to him , the Zionist leader rhetorically asked; “Because it is some­ thing colonial” was the answer.36 What Herzl sought was a Rhodes certificate for colonial viability and desirability — “I Rhodes, have examined this plan and found it correct and practicable” and quite good for England, for G reater Britain. Furtherm ore, there was profit for Rhodes and his associates if in.

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19

Rhodes died before Herzl got w hat he w anted from him . Fifteen years later HerzTs successor Weizmann obtained from the British im perialists w hat Herzl could n o t possibly have obtained from his British sym pathizers, namely im perialist patronage protection for a Jewish National Home in the form o f the Balfour D eclaration o f November 2 , 1917. International endorsem ents (public law ) followed from the other powers and the Declaration was incorporated in the Palestine Mandate against the will o f the Arab Palestinian people who constituted the overwhelming m ajority o f the population o f Palestine.27 A t a later stage the Zionists obtained U.S. patronage for statehood endorsed by “public law** in the form o f the Palestine Partition Flan (1947) followed by the T ripartite Declaration (1950), the m ajor im peri­ alist powers (the U nited States, Britain and France) guaranteeing the expanded Zionist state. The U.N. Resolution o f November, 1975 regard­ ing Zionism as a form o f racism is the beginning o f rectifying this anom alous situation. —— Basic Tactics Zionism sought self-fulfillm ent through m obilizing the Jews, negotia­ tions w ith the im perialist powers and colonization. The prim ary m obili­ zing force in favor o f Zionism was anti-Sem itism , w hich, as we have seen, attracted gentile politicians to the Zionist fold. Herzl explained: “No great exertion will be necessary to stim ulate the im m igration m ovem ent. The anti-Sem ites are already taking care o f this for us.**28 Indeed a prom inent “spiritual” Zionist — Ahad Ha*am — described Herzlian Zionism as being “the product o f anti-Semitism and is depen­ dent on anti-Sem itism for its existence.**29 The Grand Duke o f Baden told Herzl th at “people regarded Zionism as a species o f anti-Semitism**30 and Herzl reported it w ithout objecting. Wherever anti-Semitism was weak or nonexistent the Zionist m ovem ent sought to elicit “Jewish national feeling** by incitem ent and propaganda or by staging antiJewish violent acts through special agents as happened in Iraq after 1948. A nother means o f mobilizing Jewish opinion was the appeal to Jewish complexes through certain Jewish notions, m ost notably th at o f the “chosen people.** In the racist clim ate o f nineteenth century Europe this was transform ed to sound like the notion o f the “white m an’s burden,” and tied to the concept o f the “Promised Land” and the promise o f “return,” despite the fact th at the leading Zionists were either nonreligious or downright agnostics. Moses Hess m aintained, “Every Jew has the makings o f a Messiah, every Jewess th at o f a M ater

20

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Dolorosa.** Ahad Ha’am stated, “we feel ourselves to be the aristocracy o f history.** Herzl declared, “our race is more efficient in everything than m ost other peoples o f the earth.**31 In 1957 Ben Gurion asserted the same notion, “I believe in our m oral and intellectual superiority to serve as a model for the redem ption o f the hum an race.’*32 The second tactic — negotiations with the imperialists — involved stressing the common interests against third parties as the basis o f partnership, and the use o f deception and graft. During his negotiations w ith Chamberlain over Jewish colonization o f Cyprus, Herzl betrayed his colonialist outlook and m ethod: “Once we establish the Jewish Eastern Company, with five million pounds capital, for settling Sinai and El Arish, the Cypriots will begin to want that golden rain on their island, too. The Moslems will move away, the Greeks will gladly sell their lands at a good price and migrate to Athens or Crete.**33 The colonization tactic was an even more telling feature o f the nature o f Zionism for it explains its colonial nature, its dependence on imperialism and its racist attitudes vis-à-vis the Arab natives as well as its intended reactionary role in the area. The names and purposes o f the early colonization nation-building instrum ents tell something about the nature o f the Zionist movement — The Jewish Colonial Trust (1898), the “colonization commission** (1898), the Palestine Land Development Company. From the start the Zionist colonists sought to acquire lands in strategic locations, evict the Arab peasants and boycott Arab labour; all this was closely related w ith the essence o f Zionism, the creation o f a Jewish nation on “purely” Jewish land, as Jewish as England was English to use their famous expression.34 The same notion was clearly implied by Palmerston’s concept o f a Jewish barrier colonialstate. These aspects o f Zionism became more pronounced as the Zionist colonial invasion developed. Here again these Zionist traditions owe their origins to Herzl and his racist-colonial dom inated m ind: “The voluntary expropriation will be accomplished through our secret agents ___ we shall then sell only to Jews, and all real estate will be traded only among Jews.**35 What about the fate o f the natives? “We shall try to spirit the penni­ less population across the border by procuring em ploym ent for it in the transit countries, while denying it any em ploym ent in our own country ___ The property owners will come to our side. Both the process o f expropriation and the removal o f the poor m ust be carried o u t discreetly and circumspectly.**36 But before spiriting them away Herzl had some work for them :

R oots o f the Im perialist-Zionist A lliance

21

“If we move into a region where there are wild animals to which the Jews are not accustomed —big snakes, e tc----- —I shall use the natives, prior to giving them employment in the transit countries, for the exterm ination o f the animals.”37 When he later discovered th at the Zionist colonies needed large-scale drainage operations he decided to use the Arabs, a fever attacked the workers and he did not want to expose the Zionists to such dangers.38 But what would happen if the Arabs refused to be spirited away from the country they naturally considered their own? Herzl could not have possibly ignored what all colonialists and colonial ventures possess as a precondition to their venture: “O ut o f this proletariat o f intellectu­ als I shall form the general staff and the cadres o f the army which is to seek, discover, and take over the land.”39 His projected army would comprise “one-tenth o f the male population; less would not suffice internally.**40 Indeed life in his proposed Zionist state would have to be param ilitary: “Organize the labor battalions along m ilitary lines, as far as possible.**41 No one can accuse Herzl o f not realizing the logical conclusions o f this plan: evicting the natives would be a formidable task and the unheard o f ration o f one-tenth o f the male population for internal purposes is in order. Regimenting labor is a corollary to the garrisonstate, the forward citadel o f Western “civilization’* in what Herzl considered the “filthy comers**43 o f the Orient. Using force was what British imperialist bayonets had to perform in Palestine to enforce the Zionist Jewish National Home in the wake o f the Angio-Zionist unholy marriage declared on November 2, 1917. Weizmann lost no time in facing the British with the facts o f imperial­ ist life in Palestine as early as 1919: “Will the British apply self-deter­ m ination in Palestine which is five hours from Egypt or not? If not it will have to be co-erced. . . . Yes or no: it amounts to that.**43 On this point as on many other issues Weizmann found himself on the same platform as the major British imperialist politicians.44 Z ionist Expansionism The annals o f Zionist history are full o f Zionist leaders outdoing other Zionist leaders on the importance o f m ilitary power and the role o f m ilitary action and ten o r in the building and safeguarding o f the Zionist state: Joseph Trumpeldor, Vladimir Jabotinsky, Menahem Begin, Ben Gurion and all the generals-tumed-politicians. In some o f their writings and revelations the gods o f the Zionist war machine assert that violence and coercion are the backbone o f the plan to enforce the

22

R o o ts o f th e Im perialist-Zionist A lliance

Zionist program , in addition to its being an adulation o f power in reaction to Jewish meekness in European history. This was necessarily so because the Zionists invaded the country, evicted the m ajority o f the population, followed this up by further use o f force and terrorism 45 and continued to carry out their expansionist schemes through wars and m ilitary occupation. The garrison-state had to expand the domain o f the citadel as an inner mechanism (econom ic, political and psychologi­ cal) as well as to intim idate the Arabs for the benefit o f im perialist designs in the area. Expansionism was n o t alien to Herzl, an adm irer o f German expan­ sionists as well as British imperialists: “We ask for w hat we need —the m ore imm igrants, the more land.**46 The story o f Zionist expansionism is a long one,47 suffice it to read the above statem ent in the light o f the Zionist aim o f the in-gathering o f all the Jews o f the world and to rem ember the utterances o f the m ajor leaders o f Israel in 1956 and 1967 which in essence reflected another o f HerzTs m ottoes: “Area: from the Brook o f Egypt to the Euphrates.**48 These attitudes are part and parcel o f Zionism. Jay G onen, an Israeli scholar, writes o f “the Arab Problem**: “From the very beginning o f the Zionist endeavor m ost Zionists displayed a blind spot in their view o f the Arabs, a blind spot th at was a to tal lack o f vision and later became distorted vision.**49 They called the Arabs derogatory racist names and were convinced “th at the Arabs understood only the language o f force, a bias th at persisted for m any years and became especially pronounced after the Holocaust.**50 The Israelis, furtherm ore, are convinced “th at physical force is the only tangible political reality which carries weight and is significant in the affairs o f n a tio n s. . . current Israeli political vision is m ostly conceptualized in term s o f tanks, jets.**51 The prevalence o f the Massada complex or fortress Israel is n o t accidental. Nor was Golda Meir’s absurd ihetoric o f June 15, 1969 when she inquired assertively “The Palestinians . . . where are they? there is no such thing.**52 The Koenig report53 is m erely the m ost recent m anifestation, by no means the m ost extrem e, o f Zionist attitudes towards the Arabs o f Palestine. It would be both erroneous and dangerous, however, to think th at Zionist racist-colonialist attitudes tow ard the Palestinian Arabs are divorced from the wide context o f im perialist-Zionist attitude vis-à-vis Arab unity and the Arab future as a whole. On several occa­ sions Herzl sought to present Zionism as the political m eeting point between Christianity and Judaism in their common stance against

R o o ts o f the Im perialist-Zionist A lliance

23

Islam and the “barbarism” o f the Orient. A thorough reading o f Herzl reveals th at to him as well as to other imperialists the term “Islam” refers to the Arabs and to no other Islamic people. This became more evident when the Zionists allied themselves w ith the O ttom an Revolu­ tion o f 1908 “in their common battle against the incipient Arab national movement and Arab independence.” 94 In 1919, in a secret meeting attended by Weizmann and a num ber o f high-ranking British officials the m atter was very frankly discussed. Ormsby-Gore, who later became colonial secretary and therefore effective ruler o f Palestine, was in favour o f encouraging non-Moslems, Europeans and Jews, to develop and stabilize the Near East in view o f the fact th at Islam was the main dan­ ger. Since the Zionist Organization provided the required hum an ele­ m ent to man the Palestinian outpost in Europe’s fight against Islam: “It is the interest o f England to assist the Zionist Organization and any other organization which may cooperate with them in the practical development o f Jewish colonization in Palestine” .55 The idea o f Balkanization was implemented in the post-World War I division o f the Arab nation. Zionism, however, continued to work for the creation o f smaller sectarian states, this tim e in cooperation w ith the French imperialists. During the thirties a Zionist rapprochem ent with the pro-French M aronite leaders in the Lebanon took place. In 1941, as the Zionists began to push for declaring their state, an associ­ ate o f Ben Gurion, Berl Katznelson stated: “We should say to the Arab peoples: in us, Jews, you see an obstacle in your way tow ard indepen­ dence and unification. We do n o t deny it.” 56 A fter 1948 the Zionist state worked on creating a “Druze national­ ity ” through state legislation and segregation from the other sectors o f the Arab population in Palestine. In 1965, the forem ost Zionist spokes­ m an, the then Foreign Minister Abba Eban wrote a m ajor article in Foreign A ffa irs, which presented a polite sugar-coated version o f Zionist thinking and strategy. Eban reiterated the Zionist opposition to Arab unity claiming th at the area is a mosaic and th at a Jewish state therefore is a natural part o f the scene. More recently the Zionists have been very active in the Lebanese civil war. Their backing o f the Maron­ ite isolationists is no longer a secret. From the im perialist point o f view Zionist opposition to Arab unity is Israel’s raison d ’être, from the Zionist point o f view it is a sine qua non. Viewed in the wider imperialist context Israel is essentially a tool, a b et, against Arab liberation, unity and progress. Historically, Zionism sought to ally Jews and imperialist gentiles against and at the expense o f the Arabs. They sought to bring about Jewish conformism by adopt­

24

R oo ts o f the Im perialist-Zionist A lliance

ing the same reactionary notions th at aggravated the Jewish situation in Europe. Zionism accepted and em ulated (elsewhere) the notions o f the European enemies o f the Jews: chauvinist nationalism , anti-Semi­ tism and reactionary governments. With the help o f the im perialist West they recreated the ghetto in the East in the form o f an alien aggressive nation-state, and reincarnated the traditional role o f being an agent for the feudal lord by becoming the agent o f the dom inant imperialist power, only this tim e they could play the role o f the oppressor for a change. That is why Zionism viewed anti-Semitism as being one o f its best friends for they constitute tw o faces o f the same coin: Zionism represented an escapist reactionary m ovem ent, a negative verdict on hum an societies and their inability to tolerate the Jew merely because he is different. Inasmuch as Israel is a regression to the idea o f religion as a basis for a nation-state it is an anachronism. Inasmuch as it is an alien Western invasion o f Arab land it is another Crusade doomed to failure. Inasmuch as it is a colonial-racist state it is an enemy o f the spirit o f the age o f liberation and equality. Thus, the peoples o f the Third World started to move in the direction o f denying Zionism the international legiti­ macy it unjustly enjoyed since the declaration o f its state. Inasmuch as it is naturally allied to the im perialist powers in their battle against Arab rights and the Arab future it will collapse w ith the defeat o f imperialism in the Arab hom eland as it was defeated elsewhere. The verdict o f history is clear: there is no place in the coming cen­ tury for racism, Zionism and imperialism. The peoples o f the Third World shall assert their rights and liberate themselves, thus ridding all societies o f the burden o f inequality and oppression.

Notes 1. Albert Hourani, "Ottoman Reform and the Politics of Notables,” in Begin­ ning o f M odernisation in the M iddle East: The N ineteenth C entury, ed. William Polk and Richard Chambers (Chicago, 1968), pp. 41-68. 2. Albert Hyamson, The British Consulate in Jerusalem in M o tio n to the Jews o f Palestine, 1838-1914 (London, 1939-41) p t.l, p. xxxiv. 3. Viscount Palmerston to Viscount Ponsonby, August 2,1840, F .0 .78/390 (No 134), Public Record Office. 4. See die excellent study by Richard Stevens, Weizmann and Sm uts (Beirut, 1976). 5. See Philip Henderson, The L ife o f Lawrence Oliphant, D w eller, D iplom at, and M ystic (London, 1956). 6. Ben Halpem, The Idea o f a Jewish State (Cambridge Mass., 1961), p. 107. 7. A. Taylor, The Zionist M ind, (Beirut, 1974).

R o o ts o f the Im perialist-Zionist A lliance

25

8. Richard Stevens, Zionism and Palestine Before die Mandate (Beirut, 1972), p. 6. 9. The Rothschilds themselves were extremely involved in the Suez Canal. It was Disraeli, with money from the Rothschilds, who acquired the British share in die Suez holding company which later brought British invasion of Egypt. 10. Raphael Patai, ed. and Harry Zohn, trans., Diaries o f Theodor H erzl (New York and London, 1960). 11. For a thorough discussion of the subject see Godfrey Jansen, Zionism , Israel and Asian Nationalism (Beirut, 1971), pp. 12-79. 12. Patai, ed., Diaries p. 213. 13. Quoted in Jansen, Zionism , p. 83. 14. “Note on the Interview with Mr. Balfour,” December 4 ,1918, F .0 .371/ 3385, PRO. 15. “The Strategic Importance of Syria to the British Empire,” General Staff, War Office, December 9,1918, F.O. 371/4178, PRO. 16. Patai, ed., Diaries, pp. 223,240-41 and 445. 1 1 .Ib id ., p.187. 18. Ib id ., pp. 639-40. 19. Ib id ., p.642. 20. Ib id ., p. 1535. 21. Ib id ., p. 276. 22. Ib id ., p. 1302. 23. Ib id ., p. 1362. TA .Ibid., pp. 1365-66. 25. Ib id ., v . 1194. 26. Ib id ., 27. For a detailed history of Palestinian Arab resistence to Zionism and imper­ ialism, see Abdul Wahhab Kayyali, Tarikh Falastin al-Hadith (Modem History of Palestine] (Beirut, 1970). 28. Patai, ed., Diaries, p. 152. 29. A. Hertzberg, The Zionist Idea (New York, 1959), p. 24. 30. Patai, ed., Diaries, p. 657. 31. Quoted in Jansen, Zionism , pp. 33-34. 32. See Patai, ed., Diaries, pp. 70,322,568 etc. 33. Ib id ., p. 1362. 34. See Kayyali, Tarikh Falastin. 35. Patai, ed., Diaries, p. 89. 36. Ib id ., p. 88. 37. Ib id ., p. 89. 38. Ib id ., p.740-741. 39. Ib id ., p. 28. 40. Ib id ., p. 38. 41. Ib id ., p. 64. 42. Ib id .,p . 1449. 43. May 10,1919, Central Zionist Archives, Z/16009. 44. See Balfour to Prime Minister, February 19,1919, F.O. 371/4179. 45. For a detailed account of Zionist terrorism see Who Are the Terrorists, (Beirut, 1974). 46. Patai, ed., Diaries, p. 701. 47. For a detailed account see al-Matame al Sahhiyoniyyah al-Tawsu uyyah (Zionist Expansionism] (Beirut, 1966). 48. Patai, ed., Diaries, p. 711. 49. Jay Gonen, A Psychohistory o f Zionism (New York, 1975), p. 182. S0.Ibid.,p. 180.

26

R o o ts o f the Im perialist-Zionat A lliance

5 1 . /M rf.,p. 181. 52. Zionist propaganda had previously circulated the totally deceptive m otto “ Land without people, people without land," in reference to Palestine and the Jews. 53. A I Hamishmar, September 7,1976. 54. See Kayyali, Tarikh Falostin , chap. 2. 55. May 10,1919, C.Z.A. Z/16009. 56. Gonen, Psychohistory, p. 186.

2

THE RACIAL MYTHS OF ZIONISM Abdul Wahab Al-Massiri

Even though the Zionists do not accept a religious definition o f the Jew, it should be pointed out that their anti-religious stance is neither neces­ sary nor essential. The Zionists do not hesitate to make full use o f mys­ tic elements and to take full advantage o f any religious sanction they can get. They form many government coalitions with the “religious” parties, and make many concessions to some o f the formalities o f orthodoxy. Their main target has been, and still is, the assimilated Jew, be he religious or non-religious. A religious definition o f the Jew, placed within a “nationalist” context, is perfectly acceptable. The ‘Danger’ o f A ssim ilation The assimilationist outlook views the Jew as a complex personality, belonging to whatever country he may be living in, contributing to whatever cultural tradition he may have evolved from , yet simultane­ ously interacting with his specific religious and cultural heritage. But Zionist theoreticians denounce assimilation and characterize it as a form o f alienation from a hypothetically true and pure Jewish identity. Their writings are replete with references to assimilation as a poisonous and destructive force. A rthur Ruppin, a Zionist theoretician who was also in charge o f a Zionist settlem ent in Palestine, described absorption as an ’im m inent danger” 1 threatening Jewish life. Klatzkin could characterize assimilation as a disease “infecting” the Jewish communi­ ties and “disfiguring” and “impoverishing” them,2 and Chaim Weizmann had nothing but unqualified contem pt and deep “hatred” for assimi­ lated Jews,3 even talking o f the “assimilationist tain t.”4 In keeping with this anti-assimilationist Zionist outlook, the joint meeting o f the Israeli Cabinet and the Zionist Executive, held on March IS, 1964, referred, in its official communiqué to “the danger o f assimi­ lation” as a major problem facing the Jewish people in the Diaspora. This fear o f political freedom and assimilation as a “threat” to Jewish survival, even more detrim ental to the Jews than “persecution, inqui­ sition, pogroms and mass m urder,” was the theme o f the 26th Zionist World Congress in 1965,s (a theme earlier harped on by Dr Goldmann in his speech to the World Jewish Congress Executive in 1958: “Our emancipation may become identical with our disappearance”).6 Rabbi

28

The Racial M yths o f Zionism

Moritz Guedemann o f Theodor Herzl*s home town Vienna pondered the question o f assimilation and the Zionist attack m ounted against it in the name o f "race and nationhood"7 and pure Jewishness. He then asked a m oot question, in a pamphlet on Jewish nationalism : who is indeed more assimilated, the nationalist Jew who ignores the Sabbath and dietary laws, mistaking Judaism for the folk dances and ways o f eastern European ghettos, or the believing and practicing Jew who takes him self to be a full citizen o f his country?8 It is a question to be put not only to Zionists, but also to "ethnic Jew s" who, preferring the easy to the good life, follow the lure o f consumerism, dissociating themselves from any oversubtle religious beliefs,.and practice folk rituals devoid o f any moral content. As expected, the Zionist attack on assimilation in the name o f a higher, autonom ous Jewish nationalism is not always m et with uni­ versal jubilation among the vast m ajority o f the Jewish people in the Diaspora. In the hope o f pacifying an indignant or embarrassed Dias­ pora, Zionist spokesmen at times make conciliatory statem ents which assure the Diaspora Jews o f their autonom y. Such a statem ent was made by Ben Gurion on August 23, 1950, when he said th at the state o f Israel "represents and speaks only on behalf o f its own citizens." He then drew a sharp distinction between “the people o f (the state of) Israel," and the Jewish communities abroad. In no way, said Ben Guri­ on, did the Zionist state presume to represent or speak in the name o f the Jews.9 In its lead editorial o f May 10, 1964, the Jerusalem P ost asserted "the right o f every J e w . . . to have as much or as little contact with Zionism and Israel as he personally pleases."10 Such statem ents are duly quoted at the appropriate m om ent, b u t the more persistent under­ lying premise in Zionist thought and practice is one o f universal panJewish peoplehood. Ben G urion's use o f the phrase "the people o f Israel" in reference to the Jewish citizens o f Israel only, is neither representative o f the Zionist use o f th at term nor o f the meaning usually attached to it. Zionism, always dissatisfied with a belief in com plexities, ever intolerant o f dialectics, advocated the concept o f the abstract, quint­ essential Jew , or, to use K latzkin's comic term , "the unhyphenated Jew "11 who has a unique, separate, national identity. What constitutes this pure Jewishness o f this peoplehood? What is the basis o f this "new definition o f Jewish id en tity ," the new '"secular definition?” 12 In attem pting to answer this question a curious fact emerges: the antiassimilationist Zionists wanted to reconstitute “the Jewish character and situation"13 in such a way th at they become a people like any other.

The R acial M yths o f Zionism

29

Instead o f assimilation» w hat is suggested is a dissolution, a com plete merging into the world at large, a trend quite consistent with their levelling godless pantheism . The way to achieve th at goal is to “norm alize” the Jew ,14 deriving the norm s n o t from the Jewish tradition b u t rather from the beautiful world o f the gentiles the Zionists at tim es claim to hate so m uch. Nathan Birnbaum sarcastically notes in his moving essay “In Bondage to Our Fellow Jews,” th at Zionists try “to rem old” the Jews “on the Euro­ pean m odel, *to make men o f us*. . . and to drag (our children) away from our holy teachings, from our Judaism . . . to ‘their’ teachings, to their world o f license.” 15 Describing Zionist vocational training, a spea­ ker at a H istadrut convention referred to it as being “the self-preparation o f the Jewish worker to become a gentile___ The Jewish village girl shall live like a gentile country lass..’*16 To prove th at this program for reform , this vision splendid, is n o t untenable, the Zionists tried to develop a theory o f a national Jewish identity, separate from all others, yet n o t any different from them . The Jew , who is at the heart o f the Zionist program , is at tim es biologically determ ined, at others the determ ination is cultural or even religious, b u t at all tim es he is determ ined by the one or tw o exclusively “Jewish elem ents” in his existence, which turn him into an im m utable elem ent or essence, existing above all gentile tim e and place and therefore, like all gentiles, he needs to be “ingathered” in his own Jewish Homeland, on his own soil. Corporate Identity: A Racial D efinition The view o f a biologically or racially determ ined Jewish identity was first advocated by Moses Hess, w ho, predicting th at the race struggle was going to be the “primal one,” subscribed zealously to the cele­ brated Semitic-Ary an racial dichotom y which was destined to serve as one o f the main dichotom ies o f later theoreticians o f European racial­ ism .17 Herzl, for a while at least, flirted w ith the idea o f a corporate racial identity freely using term s and phrases such as “Jewish race” or the “uplifting o f the Jewish race.” Even though the term was then, as now , ambiguous, acquiring at tim es a biological, a t others a cultural content, we know from his answer to an anxious Nordau about the anthropological fitness o f the Jews to be a nation, th at w hat Herzl had in m ind was a biological determ inism .18 On his first visit to a synagogue in Paris, what attracted Herzl’s attention was the racial ‘likeness” he claims to have noticed betw een the Viennese and Parisian Jews, “bold misshapen noses; furtive and cunning eyes.” 19

30

The R acial M yths o f Zionism

It appears that the ranks o f the Zionists were buzzing with “scien­ tists” interested in proving that the Jews were a distinct race, so th a t they could claim to be just like the gentiles. Klatzkin reported that som e Zionists wanted to argue for “the impossibility o f complete assim ila­ tion“ on the basis o f a “theory o f race.“20 Karl Kautsky refers to o n e such Zionist thinker, Zollschan, who, while objecting to some o f th e ideas contained in Chamberlain's classic on race, The Foundations o f th e N ineteenth C entury, nevertheless firmly subscribed to the central thesis o f the book: that hum anity is moving from a “politically con­ ditioned racelessness to a sharper and sharper definition o f race.'* Zollschan, like others, tried to prove th at the Jews constitute a pure race, to make the Zionist world ghetto “the necessary goal for all Jews.”21 It seems that Zollschan, who is relatively unknown now, was an authority on the subject o f the “Jewish race“ , for he is approvingly quoted several tim es by Ruppin, in his The Jew s o f Today, the m ost system atic Zionist effort at evolving a racial definition o f Jewishness. The Jews, Ruppin argues, “have assimilated to a small extent certain foreign ethnical elem ents, though in the mass, as contrasted with the Central European nations, they represent a well characterized race.“ 22 The racial purity achieved instinctively throughout history should be perpetuated consciously now. Ruppin asserts that a “highly cultivated race deteriorates rapidly when its members m ate with a less cultivated race, and the Jew naturally finds his equal and m atch m ost easily within the Jewish people.“23 He frowns on the whole process o f “assimilation which begins in denationalization and ends in interm arriage“ — the enemy o f all racist thinkers.24 Through “interm arriage, the race charac­ ter is lost,“ and the descendants o f such a marraige, are n o t the “most gifted.“ Since intermarriage is “detrim ental to the preservation o f the high qualities o f the races, it follows th at it is necessary to try to prevent it to preserve Jewish separation.“25 Defense not only o f Jewish racial purity but also o f Jewish racial superiority runs through Ruppin’s study as it does through the writing o f many Zionists. Morris Cohen noticed th at the Zionists fundamen­ tally accept the racial ideology o f the anti-Sem ite, but draw different conclusions: “Instead o f the Teutons, it is the Jew th at is the purer or superior race.“26 Ruppin is true to type, for on the basis o f this alleged purity and superiority, he builds his ideological Jewish separatism. He argues that races 'less numerous and infinitely less gifted than the Jews have a right to a separate national existence, so why not the superior Jews.” He also quotes with obvious satisfaction Joseph Kohler, another

The R acial M yths o f Zionism

31

racialist theoretician, who declared th at the Jews are “one o f the m ost gifted races m ankind has pro d u ced /’ Ruppin accounts for the superiority on Darwinian grounds: “The Jews have n o t only preserved their great natural racial gifts, b u t through a long process o f selection these gifts have become strengthened.’’37 Many Zionist theoreticians and functionaries, who did n o t con­ sciously advance the racial definition, assumed it as a m atter o f fact in their statem ents. Norman Bentw itch, in an interview in 1909, claimed th at a Jew could n o t be a full Englishman “bom o f English parents and descended from ancestors who have mingled their blood w ith other Englishmen for generations.’’38 Judge Louis Brandéis defined Jewishness, in a 1915 speech, “as a m atter o f blood.’’ This fact, he said, was accepted by the non-Jews who persecute those o f the Jewish faith, and Jews themselves who take pride “when those o f Jew ish blood exhibit m oral or intellectual superiority, genius, or special talent, even if they have abjured the faith like Spinoza, M arx, Disraeli, or Hum e.” 39 Nahum Sokolow “frequently referred to his people as a race,” and, like the theoreticians o f racialism, believed th at there were no pure races; however, o f those th at existed, “the Jews were the purest.” 30 Dr. Eder, the acting chairm an o f the Zionist comm ission, argued in 1921 against the “equality in the partnership betw een Jews and Arabs,” and called for “a Jewish predom inance as soon as the num bers o f th at race are sufficiently increased.”31 In a 1920 speech at Heidelberg University, Nahum Goldm ann asserted the eternal racial separateness o f the Jews. According to his view, “the Jews are divided in to tw o categories, those who adm it th at they belong to a race distinguished by a history thousands o f years old and those who don’t;” he charac­ terized the latter group as open to the charge o f dishonesty.33 Lord Balfour, a gentile Z ionist, thought in racialist term s o f the Jew. Perhaps it is n o t entirely w ithout significance to recall th at one o f the earlier drafts o f the Balfour Declaration talked o f a “national hom e for the Jewish race,” 33 a phrase which, given the racialist outlook o f the tim e, carried an unm istakable biological content and designation. An E thnic D efinition All these Zionist efforts notw ithstanding, the argum ent for a racialist corporate identity had to be dropped. Theories o f race and racial superiority and inferiority have always had a dubious validity and little scientific sanction. “By the 1930s, the intellectual clim ate had swung clearly away from racism and racism had lost its apparent scientific

32

The Racial M yths o f Zionism

respectability.”34 Even though we still hear statem ents about th e “Jewish race” among Zionists and racists» such statem ents were far more frequent before the 30s. Simcha King observed that 4 ^ CMCO 2•8•8• •

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177

The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine

agricultural produce, including grains, fruit and vegetables, and are now actually less self-sufficient in food supply, despite the increase in agri­ cultural production, than they were in 1967, an obvious effect o f Israeli efforts to tailor the production o f farms in the West Bank and Gaza to the needs o f the Israeli m arket rather than to the food requirem ents o f the people o f the regions. The deficit in the occupied areas* balance o f trade w ith Israel am oun­ ted to IL885.5 m illion in 1974. This huge deficit is financed by the sale o f the labor power o f the Palestinian residents o f the occupied areas in Israel; the wages earned by the West Bank and Gaza residents in Israel have now become the dom inant elem ent in the credits o f the occupied areas in the balance o f paym ents w ith Israel, 60 percent in 1973. These wages are increasing in absolute term s, and relative to the gross national product o f the occupied areas (see Table 4 ), an indication o f how heavily the to tal econom y o f the West Bank and Gaza now depends on the workers who are employed in Israel. Table 4: Wages Earned in Israel by Residents of the Occupied Terri­ tories in Relation to the Gross National Product of These Territories, 1968-73 (In IL millions)

Year 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973

Wages Earned In Israel 12 52 111 210 406 609

GNP* 566 680 687 1005 1582

Wages as % of GNP 2 8 16 21 25 30+

*GNP at factor pricas. -»estimated. Sources: Aria Bragman, Economic Growth in the Administered Arm s, (Bank of Israel, Research Department), p. 91 ; Stetisticel Abstrect of Isreel, various years.

While trade w ith Israel dom inated the m arket o f the West Bank and Gaza, trade w ith Jordan, via the “open bridges*’ is very significant. The occupied areas export agricultural produce, particularly citrus, and industrial products, m ostly processed agricultural goods like olive oil and dairy products. It im ports far smaller quantities o f goods from Jordan in return. The “open bridges** policy, under which Israel allows the m ovem ent o f goods and people across the Jordan River bridges,

178

The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine

began inform ally as a means o f providing a m arket for West Bank agriculture w ithout eroding the prices in Israel» where products from the West Bank would have undersold Israeli produce by approxim ately 25 percent in 1967.19 This policy achieves three basic benefits for the Israeli government. First» it weakens the Arab boycott» by using the West Bank as an entrepot in which Israeli and Arab trade can furtively m ix. Second» it m aintains econom ic links betw een the West Bank» especially some o f the notables who are m ajor exporters» and Jordan» and supports political relations betw een th a t class and the Hashemite regime. T hird, it aids Israel econom ically, by providing a source o f hard currency, the Jordanian dinar. The Israeli government offers export incentives to exporters o f industrial products who convert their Jordanian dinars in to Israeli pounds; rates announced in August, 1970, for exam ple, offered incen­ tives o f about 23 cents to the dollar for export o f shortening; and for soap, candles, alcoholic beverages and plastic, about 30 cents to the dollar.30 These incentives increase the num ber o f dinars in the hands o f the Israeli government. From exports, transfers by the Jordanian govern­ m ent to civil servants and others, the spending o f summer visitors (who are said to average $250 each)31 and private transfers, the Israeli govern­ m ent obtains significant am ounts o f dinars. Official conversions betw een 1968 and 1973 reached JD 23 m illion.33 Labor The occupied areas have becom e a source o f scores o f thousands o f workers for the m ost m enial, miserable and poorly paid jobs in Israel. Each m orning these workers leave their homes in Gaza and the West Bank to face a day o f hard w ork and racial discrim ination; their labor goes n o t to build a national econom y o f their ow n, b u t to augm ent the econom y o f the colonial power which oppresses them — this is the central fact o f the econom ics o f occupation. The num ber o f residents o f the occupied areas w orking in Israel grew from 5,000 in Septem ber, 1968 to 68,700 in 1974. This figure represented about a quarter o f all the residents o f the occupied areas employed in w ork and, as Table 5 shows, some 35 percent o f employees from the occupied areas. (The statistics for “employees” give a clearer indication o f the working class, since “employed persons” includes those engaged in w ork for profit as well as for wages, such as tens o f thousands o f farmers and shopkeepers. According to the m ost recent figures available, there may now be a downward trend in em ploym ent o f workers from the occupied areas in Israel, due to greater economic

The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine

179

activity in the West Bank and Gaza, and to the recession in Israel.33 Table 5: Location of Employment of West Bank and Gaza Employees, 1970-74 (in thousands) 1970

1971

1972

1973

1974

West Bank Employees in West Bank in Israel % in Israel

56.6 14.0 19.8

63.8 25.0 28.1

71.8 33.4 31.8

729 369 339

78.4 409 349

Gaza Employees in Gaza Strip in Israel % in Israel

35.2 5.8 14.1

36.4 8.1 18.2

429 17.4 289

46.1 22.5 32.7

48.1 25.7 34.8

91.7 19.8 17.7

100.2 33.1 24.9

114.7 509 309

119.0 599 33.3

126.5 66.5 34.5

Total Employees from Occupied Areas in Occupied Areas in Israel % in Israel

Source: Bated on Statistic»/ A bttn ct of Israel, 1975, tables xxvi/22 and 23.

The channeling o f workers from the occupied areas into Israel is a m atter o f policy o f the m ilitary government. The Israeli Ministry o f Labor operates Labor Exchanges throughout the occupied areas. When the offices opened in December, 1968, they sent 44 percent o f the workers who applied to them for jobs to relief and other work in the West Bank and Gaza themselves, b u t now virtually all o f the placements are for work in Israel. The government describes the purpose o f the Labor Exchanges as “mainly for the care and organization o f the work o f the inhabitants in Israel.” 34 The Labor Exchanges, according to official estim ates, arrange for the em ploym ent o f about two-thirds o f the residents o f the West Bank and Gaza who work in Israel. In addition to this em ploym ent, called O rganized w ork,” there is the “unorganized work” o f those who find jobs in Israel through personal initiative or through labor contractors. In U norganized work,” income taxes can be evaded by the employee and, more significantly, the employer can avoid paym ent o f contributions to a num ber o f official social and health benefit funds, which can am ount to over 33 percent o f the labor costs.35 Workers in this “unorganized” sector are, o f course, vulnerable

180

The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palatine

to the m ost severe exploitation. Many people, including some officials o f the m ilitary governm ent, believe th at the estim ate o f one-third o f all workers from the occupied areas in Israel being in “unorganized work** is actually to o low: many o f these workers cross in to Israel by fo o t, and they have a m otive to deny their illegal em ploym ent to Israeli censustakers. If this suspicion is correct, all figures for em ploym ent in Israel are downwardly biased. In addition to Labor Exchanges, the Israeli m ilitary government uses “vocational training centers** to channel workers from the occupied areas in to Israel. These centers offer training, often rather cursory (the construction course is only three m onths long) in the kinds o f w ork in demand in Israel. In 1973 the Israeli M inistry o f Labor reported th at o f 55,000 workers from the occupied areas then employed in Israel, 15.000 (or 27 percent) were graduates o f these Israeli training centers,26 and m any trainees are known to leave the centers for work before graduation. The trainees receive a daily stipend: IL 1.75 for m ost courses and IL 2.50 for construction (the kind o f workers m ost in demand in Israel, according to the 1971 rates) and a food ration from CARE, a U.S. relief agency which distributes surplus U.S. foods. In 1971/72, 70.000 o f these m onthly rations were distributed.27 Workers from the occupied areas, while constituting about 6 percent o f all employed persons in Israel in 1973, played a m uch m ore critical role in the construction industry, where they num bered 26 percent o f the w ork force, and in agriculture, where they made up 13 percent o f the workers. As Table 6 points o u t, Palestinian Arab workers in Israel, including b o th those from the areas occupied in 1967 and those living w ithin the territory seized in 1948, make up a very im portant segment o f the work force in construction, where they hold 44 percent o f the jobs, and in agriculture, where they are 29 percent o f the workers. O ther branches o f the Israeli econom y, such as public and personal services and banking and finance, rely on workers from the occupied areas to a minimal extent or n o t at all. The workers from the occupied areas have played a very im portant role in the development o f the Israeli econom y since occupation, allowing the Israeli econom y to expand very rapidly during the **boom years,” unfettered by a labor shortage in Israel, and proving flexibility for the Israeli econom y in the hard tim es which came in the wake o f the O ctober war. The Bank o f Israel observed th at workers from the occupied areas did not lose their jobs after the O ctober war, as m ight have been expected o f the m ost oppressed laborers in a contracting econom y. The em ploym ent figure did decline in the fourth quarter o f

181

The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine

1973, to 49,600 from the previous quarter's level o f 68,500, but this was tem porary; by the second quarter o f 1974, the figure had reached a new high o f 69.800.)28 The Bank o f Israel's yfmuoz/ R eport comm ented : It is precisely a definite deceleration in activity and uncertainty as to developments in the future th at makes it m ore worthwhile to em­ ploy workers from the administered areas a t low pay and w ithout social benefits or work rights. This, so long as the deceleration in em ploym ent does not require the dismissal o f workers in significant volume (the increase in em ploym ent from the adm inistered areas in Israel occurred in unorganized w ork; in the num ber o f man-hours per employed there was a decline). Moreover, in contrast to previous years, the rate o f the rise o f wages o f workers from the adm inistered areas (28.5 percent) was lower than it was for Israelis. It transpires th at in unskilled, difficult and poorly paid jobs the workers from the administered areas managed to oust marginal Israeli workers (inclu­ ding Israeli Arabs), particularly in view o f the fact th at, as already m entioned above, some o f these found alternative em ploym ent and income in the form o f arm y service. Such a “conquest” o f a branch involving the ousting o f Israelis is particularly striking in the construction b ran d i, in which m ost o f the tem porary em ploym ent is unorganized. Things have readied such a pass th at unskilled jobs have come to be considered the preserve o f workers from the admini­ stered areas.39 Table 6: Composition of Employed Persons in Israel by Branch, 1973

Branch Construction Industry Agriculture Other TO TA L

Total of Employees 131,200 281,200 92,500 645,000 1,149,900

% Palestinians from Areas Occupied . . . In 1967 In 1948 18 7 16 8 9

26 4 13 1 6

Source: Based on statistics in Statistic»/ Abstract o f Israël 1974 and Bank of Israel, Annual Raport 1973, table ix/4.

182

The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine

The effects o f occupation on the em ploym ent o f women are not easy to assess. The participation o f women in the West Bank and Gaza in w ork other than unpaid fam ily labor is low. One analyst notes the movement o f women in the West Bank into sewing and into packing and cannery jobs form erly held by m en.30 However, the rate o f wom en's participation in the labor force, after rising in 1968-70, fell between 1970 and 1973, and rose again in 1974. The m ost likely explanation is th at betw een 1970 and 1973, when th e statistics were showing a decline in the num ber o f persons employed in agriculture, some women were refraining from w ork in paid jobs and taking the place o f male family members who had left w ork on their farms for jobs in Israel; probably these unpaid women workers on farms were, through statisti­ cal error, n o t enum erated. In 1974, the num ber o f persons em ployed in agriculture rose in the statistics, a t which point the num ber o f women in the labor force also rose, and their rate o f participation as well.31 Educated people in Gaza and the West Bank seem to have been especially adversely affected by the im pact o f occupation employ­ m ent. The possibilities for em ploym ent for educated people are severely lim ited: Israel takes advantage o f the pool o f labor in the occupied areas to satisfy its need for unskilled labor, b u t it does not perm it Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza to com pete w ith Israelis for skilled or professional w ork. A Bank o f Israel study observed that An analysis o f em ploym ent rates in correlation w ith education levels indicates th at, unlike the situation among the Jewish popula­ tion o f Israel, the em ploym ent rate in the adm inistered areas goes down as the level o f education (measured in years o f schooling) rises. This m ay be attributed to the paucity o f suitable jobs for edu­ cated workers. A similar problem exists among educated non-Jews in Israel [i.e., Palestinians] who have a relatively high unem ploy­ m ent rate.32 Workers in Israel from the occupied areas earn, on the average, about h alf the gross wages earned by Israelis.33 (These figures refer to employ­ m ent through the Labor Exchange; some employees in “unorganized w ork" are even more severely exploited.) In fact, th e disparity betw een wages for Israeli workers and those from the occupied areas is even greater than this figure indicates, because a deduction o f approxim ately IS percent is made from their wages for various kinds o f social and health insurance. For a num ber o f years the government “froze" these

The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine

183

deductions In a special account, from which it drew for the expenses o f adm inistration in the West Bank and Gaza.34 Later the employees from the occupied areas were supposed to receive certain health, acci­ dent and social benefits b u t apparently they still do not in fact draw the same benefits available to Israelis.33 Approxim ately one-third o f the workers, those engaged in “unorganized work,** receive no health and social benefits at all. Income tax is also deducted from the wages o f those in “organized work,** and any others who comply w ith the law, and paid to the Israeli government. Furtherm ore, they have no protection through unions: the unions existing before the 1967 war were banned, and the H istadrut does not accept workers from the occupied areas as members. Even in a work­ place w ith a m ajority o f workers from the West Bank and Gaza, there­ fore, these workers will n o t be form ally represented in the union com m ittee. The laborers from the occupied areas, especially agricultural workers from Gaza, are often forced to reside tem porarily in Israel, illegally and in inhum an conditions, because the tim e and cost o f transportation to their own residence is excessive. Moshe Dayan has adm itted th at “ In Tel Aviv during the past five years Arabs [working in Israel] have been sleeping in the gutters —why evade this?**36 The Israeli police have been instructed to take firm measures against “workers from the territories [who] sleep overnight near their work place in cellars o f buildings under construction, in the kitchens o f restaurants, in orchards and other agricultural areas.**37 Reports in the Israeli press describe “entire families [from Gaza] including children and toddlers sleeping overnight in the chicken houses o f Jewish farm ers.’*38 Some employers lock their employees from the West Bank and Gaza in at night, lest they be found in the streets by the police, and the em ployer fined heavily. In March 1976, three workers were sleeping in a warehouse at night when a fire broke o u t; trapped behind lock doors, they died.39 No aspect o f the economic changes brought about by the occupation has caused greater cultural confusion w ithin Israel than the influx o f Palestinian workers. For exam ple, in 1975, the Haifa Labor Council organized a photo com petition on the them e o f “Man and his work** in which 130 photographers participated. The plan, according to M aartv, was to “exhibit the results at a large num ber o f plants during the Hanukkah holiday. Over 1000 photographs were presented by the participants to the selection com m ittee, b u t, to the great embarrassment o f the com m ittee, it appeared th at over 70 percent o f them showed the Arab laborer at work. Only 300 imm ortalized the Jewish worker. One

184

The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine

o f the com m ittee members said, “The only w ork left for Jewish people to do is to photograph Arab labor in Israel.”40 The cultural conflict is not m erely betw een racism and hum anitarianism, b u t betw een tw o different form s o f racism: th at which holds th at Arabs are n o t fît to do the work o f building Zionism , and only Hebrew labor ought to be em ployed, and th at which m aintains th at Arabs are in fact precisely fitted to do the hard and dirty w ork o f Zionist society. An interesting example o f this conflict on a popular level is the contrast betw een tw o letters which appeared in the Israeli press. The first w riter expressed his objections in the early days o f occupation to Prime M inister Golda Meir’s hesitation to perm it workers from the West Bank and Gaza to be employed in Israel: If Mrs. Meir wants to see Hebrew workers sweating away on hot summer days, if it gives her pleasure, this is her own business. But it cannot becom e the national criterion on which to convince the pub­ lic th at we should n o t integrate the econom y o f the West Bank . . . Every Jewish m other wahts her son to finish high school and university and to becom e a chem ist, technician, engineer, or at least a trained plum ber. Who is training the young people o f today for the simple tasks, carrying buckets o f cem ent or asphalt for road making? In the course o f tim e we shall in any case need Arab w ork­ ers for building agriculture and even industry. Immigrants are m ore and m ore people whose professions are far from these simple tasks.41 The second letter was w ritten by a worried woman to Moshe Dayan, then published in the press: Both I and m y husband were bom in a moshav in the center o f the country. Up until the Six Day War we lived com fortably, worked hard and m ade an honorable living. Since th at w ar, however, things have changed dram atically, for m y husband, a capable m an, has become a farm-work contractor. His w ork involves no problem s: labor is cheap and there is a ready m arket. Today we have five Arab workers and we have reached the point where no one on the moshav lifts a finger. Nowadays my eldest son refuses even to mow the lawn. “ Let Mohammed do it,” he says. And to ask him to shift the irrigation pipes or do any m anual labor is simply o u t o f the question. My children and the other children o f the moshav are, before my very eyes, becoming rich m en's sons o f a base and disreputable kind, whose work is done by

185

The Cobnial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine

servants. They do not know how to drive the tracto r standing in our yard and they behave as if farm w ork is beneath th eir dignity.43 A griculture The Israeli occupation has had tw o m ain effects on the agriculture o f the occupied areas: a decline in the num ber o f persons em ployed in agriculture and a m ovem ent away from crops which would contribute to self-sufficiency in food o r to export o f food to the surrounding Arab region — and tow ard production o f crops for the Israeli m arket and especially for Israeli industry. The shift away from em ploym ent in the agricultural sector is occuring on the West Bank, where m any farmers and agricultural workers have left the land for jobs in Israel From an estim ated 60,000 to 100,000 em ployed in agriculture before the 1967 war,43 th e num ber declined to 33,400 in 1973, and rose som ewhat to 40,500 in 1974. A bout 90 percent o f the farm land on the West Bank is owned by the farm ers themselves, b u t there are agricultural workers available for hire: the figures for these employees show an especially sharp decline, from 12,200 in 1969 to 7,900 in 1974. (See Tables 7 and 8 .) Table 7: Persons Employed in Agriculture, Number and Percent of Total Persons Employed, 1969-74 1969

1970

1971

West Bank Number* %

47.0 47.0

45.0 39,1

39.9 34.1

Gaza Strip Number* %

11.0 33.0

19.2 32.0

20.2 33.0

1972

1973

1974

38.5 30.7

33.4 26.4

40.5 29.6

19.4 30.5

20.0 293

20.2 27.7

*ln thousands of employed. Source: Statistical Abstract of Unet, 1970 and 1975.

Even the Israeli government adm its th a t the increase in em ploym ent in Israel has been responsible for the decrease o f certain kinds o f agri­ cultural production in the West Bank. A report by the M inistry o f Defense for 1971/72, for exam ple, states th at, “The grow th in num ber o f those em ployed in Israel was among the causes for the liquidation o f m any herds o f sheep and the decrease in production o f lamb and goat

186

The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine

Table 8: Employees in Agriculture in the West Bank, Number and Percent of Total Employees, 1969*74

Number* %

1960

1970

1971

1972

1973

1974

12.2 24.4

11.2 19.8

10.0

9.8

1 6 j6

13 j0

7.3 10.0

7.9 10.1

*ln thousands. Source: Statistical Abstract o f Israel, 197S

m eat. Similarly m ilk production was reduced by 6 percent.**44 More­ over, one critic o f the Israeli occupation writes th at the econom ic deform ations brought about by the occupation have led to a neglect o f olive culture, one o f the m ost im portant form s o f agriculture on the West Bank.45 The Israeli M inistry o f Agriculture, operating under the auspices o f the m ilitary government o f the occupied areas, has played an active role in transform ing the kinds o f crops grown in the West Bank. In 1968*69, the M inistry o f Agriculture drew up guidelines for the West Bank,46 which called for the reduction o f dependence on trade w ith Jordan (the East Bank); although the Israeli government wanted to m aintain econ­ omic links betw een the West Bank and Amman via the “open bridges,** it did n o t w ant trade w ith the East Bank to be crucial to the West Bank*s econom y, for then Hussein would have great leverage if he threatened to close the bridges. To replace certain crops which had been im portant in export to the East Bank and surrounding Arab coun­ tries, the M inistry o f Agriculture planned new crops which would com­ plem ent Israeli agriculture and be suitable for processing in Israel or export to Europe.47 The M inistry o f Agriculture uses a netw ork o f agricultural councils, agronom ists and agricultural training agents, and incentives o f seeds and partial subsidies o f costs to encourage farm ers to plant the new approved crops rather than the traditional crops.48 An excellent exam ple o f the effect o f this process is the m elon crop: before the 1967 war, the West Bank produced three tim es as m any melons as it consum ed, exporting the rest to the East Bank and other Arab countries. In 1967/68, the West Bank grew 60,000 tons o f m elons; by 1973/74, the figure had dropped to 4,200. In fact, in 1973/74, the West Bank was im porting 83 percent o f its m elons, m ost o f them from Israel and a small num ber from the Gaza Strip.49 The crops which have increased m ost are vegetables and potatoes

The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied P alestine

187

and field crops. Thirty-tw o percent o f the West Bank*s vegetable and p o tato crop is exported, m ostly to Israel,50 either for canning or con­ sum ption. The West Bank now grows a significant am ount o f th e cucum ­ bers and tom atoes consum ed in Israel. The opening o f th e Israeli m arket to West Bank produce in 1971/72 helped to cause a sharp rise in th e prices o f vegetables in the West Bank itself: the consum er price index for vegetables and fruit leapt to 142.1 in 1971, while th e general index was 125.9; and to 1 7 7 3 in 1972, while the general index was 148.1. (Base: average July 1968 to June 1969 is 100.0.)51 Field crops have also expanded, principally because o f th e expansion o f industrial crops for export to Israel, including tobacco, sesame and sugar beets.53 The production o f m utton, b eef and poultry has been ham pered by the occupation. The Israeli m ilitary adm inistration halted the im port o f sheep from Jordan, for the stated reason o f preventing contagion from sheep disease in Jordan. A t the same tim e, Israeli officials were noting “the trend o f m any herders to kill o ff their herds once they shift to working in Israel.'*53 Producers o f b eef and poultry were adversely affected by com petition from Israel, where th e poultry indus­ try enjoys governm ent subsidies.54 In the words o f a Bank o f Israel study: A ttem pts were m ade [by Israeli authorities in the occupied areas] to change consum ption habits from m u tto n to turkey and chicken m eat through subsidies and price reductions. A high propor­ tion o f livestock products — such as chicken and turkey m eat, eggs and m ilk products —is im ported from Israel.55 Gaza*s exports o f agricultural produce have been expanding. In 1973/74 Gaza exported 197,000 tons o f citrus, 73,000 tons to Jordan and the rem ainder to Eastern Europe, W estern Europe and Israeli industry.56 In addition Gaza vegetables, some produced under plastic cover in a jo in t enterprise by an Israeli entrepreneur and a Gaza landow ner, are exported.57 There has been some increase in technology in th e agriculture o f th e West Bank during the period o f occupation: the num ber o f tractors has risen from 147 in 1967 to 1,013 in November 1974.58 Industry Industry in the West Bank and Gaza has n o t developed significantly during the nine years o f occupation. There seem to have been m odest increases in the num ber o f persons em ployed in industry and in the industrial product, b u t it is difficult to make a statistical com parison w ith the prewar years because o f a lack o f data. The structure o f industry has rem ained basidy unchanged: small workshops, 90 percent

188

The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine

o f them employing 10 o r fewer workers, 66 percent employing 5 or fewer, using labor intensive m ethods and concentrated in the processing o f agricultural products.59 The occupation has had three basic effects on industry: (1 ) by direct investm ent; (2) by subcontracting, and (3 ) by placing constraints on the development o f industry. In O ctober 1972, the Israeli governm ent's Ministerial Economic Committee extended the Law for the Encouragement o f Capital Invest­ m ent to the occupied areas, giving Israeli investors there the same privileges awarded to investors in the “ A” priority developm ent areas in Israel itself: low-interest loans, grants and tax exem ptions, delays and abatem ents.50 In fact, however, Israeli capitalists have been reluctant to take advantage o f these opportunities and invest in the West Bank and Gaza because o f the political uncertainty and the danger th at they would lose their enterprise if tfre West Bank and Gaza were liberated. An exception to this reluctance is the industrial zone near the Eretz checkpoint between Gaza and Israel. There Israeli entrepreneurs have invested IL 10 m illion, and employ 500 Gaza residents to produce m etal goods, textiles and item s o f wood and rubber.51 The owners are reported to be large Israeli corporations, like Koor, and form er Israeli m ilitary officers and bank managers who served in the occupied areas.53 On the West Bank an Israeli investor is involved in a jo in t enterprise in a packing house in Jericho, hi general, however, invest­ m ent is not extensive. The m ajor way th at Israeli industrialists are b en efitin g from the industrial capacity o f the occupied areas is through subcontracting: a large portion o f industrial exports o f the occupied areas to Israel are actually goods subcontracted by Israeli industry.53 These subcontracted exports are a disguised form o f Israel's quest for cheap labor: produced w ith high labor intensity, these articles o f sewn and knitted clothing, textiles, furniture, m attresses, candy, building blocks for construction and floor tiles are produced to the order o f Israeli m anufacturers. Usually the w ork involves only part o f the entire process o f production. Using this indirect m ethod, Israeli m anufacturers can lower th e costs o f production significantly, since the wage rates in the West Bank and Gaza are even lower than in Israeli factories employing workers from the occupied areas. For exam ple, in 1974 an industrial worker from the West Bank averaged (net) IL23.0 per day if he worked on the West Bank, b u t IL27.2 in Israel; and an industrial worker from Gaza earned (net) IL27.2 if he worked in Gaza, b u t IL31.2 if he worked in Israel.54 In addition, employers in Israel o f "organized" labor from the occupied

The Colonial Exploitùtion o f Occupied Palestine

189

areas have additional labor costs o f contributions to various govern* m ent health and social funds which am ount to about SO percent o f the em ployee’s net wages.65 The subcontracted w ork does not contribute to the growth o f national industry in the occupied areas. A Bank o f Israel study noted th a t,“replacem ent o f subcontracting jobs w ith the full production o f the same p ro d u cts. . . would m ost probably call for measures to protect at least part o f th e adm inistered areas* dom estic production from com petition by Israeli products — as is com m on for infant indus* tries.**66 Israel, o f course, would not be willing to impose tariffs to protect the industries o f its colonies against com petition from Israeli m anufacturers. This subcontracting could, in the long run, if the occupation and present econom ic trends were to continue, have a m arked effect on the com position o f products produced by industry in the occupied areas. The m ost rapidly growing sectors o f industry are those in which sub­ contracting is extensive: clothing production in th e West Bank had a real annual growth rate o f 32 percent (1969-1972), well above th e real annual grow th rate o f industry in general in th at period in the West Bank (IS percent); and nonm etallic minerals production (which includes production for Israeli m anufacturers o f textiles and building m aterials) had a real annual growth rate o f 40 percent. However, these branches are b o th quite small, accounting for only 3 percent and 2 percent respectively o f to tal industrial production in the West Bank. Food, beverage and tobacco production, the largest sector o f indus­ trial production on the West Bank, accounting for 38 percent o f produc­ tion in 1972, had a com paratively small rate o f real annual grow th, only 8 percent. Olive oil presses, the second largest sector o f industrial production in the region, recorded an annual real grow th rate o f 22 percent in th at period.67 (The significance o f this figure is difficult to assess: the olive crop is b o th cyclical in nature, alternating betw een good and bad years, and very vulnerable to w eather conditions. In th at period in question, olive oil production, which is directly dependent on the olive crop, is “rising** from a low point at which the im m ediate disruptive effects o f the June war were still very m uch a factor, and at which olive production was disastrously affected by drought.) It appears then, th at the Israeli occupation is tending to push indus­ try in the West Bank away from processing its own agricultural prod­ ucts and tow ard the com pletion o f certain phases o f industrial produc­ tion for Israeli m anufacturers, relying on the im port o f raw m aterials o r partially com pleted goods from Israel, and the export o f the m aterials

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The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine

back to Israel after the addition o f labor to the m aterial. Certain m anufacturers receive subsidies involving significant sums for their exports to Jordan, as m entioned previously. In 1970-1971, nearly three-quarters o f these subsidies were awarded to exporters o f shorten­ ing, soap and oils from Nablus. (See Table 9 .) Table 9: Payments of Incentives for Exports, April 1970-March 1971 District

Product

Amount

Bethlehem

Plastic Beauty Products Alcoholic Beverages

IL 187,000 170/XX) 6,000

Remelleh

Paper Chocolate Soap

210,000 53,000 47,000

Hebron

Scales Steel Wool

1,357 1387

Neblus

Shortening Matches Oils Soap

1,194300 177,000 11300 1,146,000

TO TA L

3315344

Source: Coordinator of Government Operations in the Administered Territories, Israel Ministry of Defense, Four Years o f M ilitary Adm inistration 1967-1971: Data on Civilian A ctivities in Judas and Samaria, tha Gasa Strip and Northam Sinai, p. 56.

These export incentives are a subsidy to a small class o f industrial­ ists, designed to encourage the m aintenance o f links w ith the Hashemite regime and to attem pt to win their support o f passive acceptance o f occupation. However, whatever privileges awarded to this class by the occupying power, there has not been a significant increase in invest­ m ent in industrial production or in the infrastructure o f industry in th e area. The constraints which occupation places on industrialization o f the occupied areas are illustrated by the experiences o f tw o concerns: th e United Company for Fodder Ltd. in Nablus and the National Textile Company in Beit Jala:

The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine

191

The directors o f b o th enterprises emphasize the sharp com petition • o f the Israeli industries who are technically m ore advanced and well provided w ith credits, raw m aterials and Governm ent support, and noted, in effect, th at they are living on borrow ed tim e. The director-owners o f th e first enterprise rem arked th at the raw m aterials allocated to his com pany were meagre and they have to buy their needs in the black m arket. F urther he noted th at the com pany has to pay high electricity rates because the occupation authorities collect high fuel prices from the m unicipality which does n o t receive any subsidies like those received by th e m unicipali­ ties or enterprises in Israel. The ow ner-director o f the second enterprise stated th at his com pany buys raw m aterial in Israel and added — in case Israeli industries consume die locally produced co tto n then we shall have no raw m aterial. It would be difficult for this com pany to im port raw m aterial from the outside.68

Effects on d ie Population The people o f the occupied areas have w ithstood th e occupation w ith­ o u t relatively massive em igration (except for the departure o f refugees in 1967 and 1968); the population o f the West Bank appears to be increasing at a m ore rapid rate than during the period o f its annexa­ tion to Jordan. Population figures still give indications, o f course, o f em igration o f men o f working age, presum ably for em ploym ent abroad, b u t the Palestinians under occupation are increasing in num ber, and the West Bank and Gaza are n o t being depopulated. It is difficult to compare incom e, consum ption and product w ith prewar levels, b u t in general the population o f the occupied areas appears to have experienced a rise in standard o f living from 1969 to 1973.69 The sharpest increases in incom e seem to have been among th e big exporters,70 and workers em ployed in Israel earned m ore than those w ho rem ained in Gaza o r the West Bank. Moreover, some sectors o f the econom y, notably tourism , never recovered their prew ar position. The econom ic recession which h it Israel after the 1973 war had a serious im pact on the occupied areas. Inflation was very high, reaching 256.5 on the consum er price index (see Table 10). In 1973 and 1974, the residents o f the occupied areas experienced a decline in their stand­ ard o f living. The m ost serious effect o f the occupation has been the subordina­ tion o f the econom ies o f the West Bank and Gaza to th at o f Israel.

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The Colonial Exploitation o f Occupied Palestine

Table 10: Consumer Price Index of the Occupied Areas,* 1968-74 Year

Index

1968 1968 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974

100.0 102.0 106.4 120.4 148.1 179.9 256.5

*Baw: Average 6/68 to 7/68 is 100.0. Source: Israel Central Bureau of Statistics.

There is no doubt th at when th e Israelis entered th e West Bank and Gaza Strip th ey found th a t the events o f th e previous tw enty years had m ade th eir econom ies vulnerable to colonization. Gaza had been placed in an econom ically im possible position in 1948: refugees packed the narrow strip far beyond th e capacity o f its natural resources. The West Bank had suffered econom ically n o t only from th e effects o f th e loss o f p art o f Palestine to Zionism , b u t also from the bias o f th e Hashemite regim e, w hich discouraged industrialization in the West Bank and favored it in the East Bank. The principal effect o f the occupation on the class structure o f th e West Bank has been to force a quarter o f its em ployed people in to th e Israeli proletariat. Many thousands o f farm ers, artisans, small shop­ keepers and herders have left the peasantry and p etit bourgeoisie for the w orking class. The working class now has some 35 percent o f its m em bers going daily to jobs in Israel, facing severe racial discrim ination. For professionals and educated people, em ploym ent opportunities are very lim ited. In Gaza, where the population is predom inantly refugees, the people have found them selves n o t returning to th e land and villages in Palestine, b u t going by tru ck and bus each day to do th e m ost m enial w ork o f th e Z ionist econom y. The occupation has had m ixed effects on th e industrial bourgeoisie o f the West Bank, a small class which controls a rather lim ited and under-developed means o f production. The m ilitary governm ent has sought to appease certain sectors o f this dass, especially those w ith established econom ic links to th e Hashemite Kingdom, by th e paym ent o f “export incentives.** However, com petition from Israeli industry, w hich raises wages and reduces m arketing possibilities, has m ade th e

The Colonial E xploitation o f O ccupied Palestine

193

grow th o f new independent industry all b u t impossible. In sum , the occupation has cast the West Bank and Gaza into the form o f classical colonies.

N otes 1. David Ben-Gurion, Israel a Personal H istory (New York, 1971), p. 845. 2. Quoted in Sir John Hope Simpson, Palestine: R eport on Im m igration, Land Settlem ent and D evelopm ent, British Colonial Office cmd. 3836 (October 1930), p. 53. 3. For a description o f the value o f the seized property, see Don Peretz, Israel and the Palestine Arabs (Washington, 1956). For an analysis o f the way the labor power o f the Palestinians who remained in the Zionist state was used by the Israeli economy - in significant ways a forerunner o f the exploitation of the people o f the West Bank and Gaza - see Yoram Ben-Porath, The Arab Labor Force in Israel (Jerusalem, 1966). 4. "U.S. Capital in Socialist Israel,” Fortune, June 1950, p. 5. 5. Ibid. 6. Abba Eban, Voice o f Israel (New York, 1957), pp. 76 and 111. 7. Sheila Ryan, ''Israeli Economic Policy in the Occupied Areas: Foundations o f a New Imperialism,” M ERIP R eports, no. 24 (January 1974). 8. David Horowitz, The Enigma o f Econom ic Growth: A Case Study o f Israel (New York, 1972), p. 20. 9. M a’ariv 2 February 1973, translated in Israleft News Service, 15 February 1973. 10. Davor, 7 March 1973, translated in Israleft News Service (3 April 1973). For a sense o f the economic debate in Israel, see "The Demographic Problem ," Israel Econom ist (September-October 1972). "The Credo o f Mr. Ben Aharon," and "An Answer to Ben Aharon's Challenge," Israel Econom ist (December 1972), pp. 298-300. 11 .N ew York Tim es, 3 June, 1969,p. 11 ; and Abraham S. Becker, Israel and the Palestinian Occupied Territories: M ilitary-Political Issues in the D ebate (Rand, 1971). 12. Unit for Coordination o f Activity in fite Administered Areas, Israel Ministry o f Defense, D evelopm ent and Econom ic Situation in Judea, Samaria, the Gaza Strip and N orth Sinai: 1967-1969, A Sum m ary, October 1970, unpaged. 13. Israel Central Bureau o f Statistics, Foreign Trade Statistics M onthly 26, no. 12 (December 1975). 14. Israel Central Bureau o f Statistics, Statistical Abstract o f Israel, 1975, pp. 188-9. 15. See the Bank o f Israel, Annual R eport, 1974 (Jerusalem, 1975), p. 4 ff. 16. Arie Bregman, Bank o f Israel Research Department, Econom ic Growth in the Adm inistered Areas 1968-1973 (Jerusalem, 1975), p. 85. \l.Ib id .» p . 88. 18. Statistical A bstract o f Israel 1968, p. 602, and Statistical A bstract o f Israel 1975, table xxvi/17. 19. Ann Mosley Lesch, Israel's O ccupation o f the West Bank: The F irst Two Years (Master’s Thesis, Columbia University, 1969). 20. Coordinator o f Government Operations in the Administered Territories, Israel Ministry o f Defense, Four Years o f M ilitary A dm inistration, 1967-1971: Data on Civilian A ctivities in Judea and Samaria, the Gaza Strip and N orthern

194

The Colonial E xploitation o f O ccupied P alestine

Sinai p. 56. 21. Bank o f b ra d , Research Department, The Econom y o f the Adm inistered Areas, 1970 (Jerusalem, 1971), p. 31. 22. Bregman, Econom ic G rowth, p. 13. 23. Israeli E conom ist, June 1976, p. 20. 24. Coordinator o f Government Operations in the Adminsitered Territories, b ra d Ministry of Defense, The Adm inistered Territories 1971/72: Data on Civilian A ctivities in Judea and Samaria, the Gasa Strip and N orthern Sinai, p. 97. 25. Bregman, Econom ic G row th, p. 39 and elsewhere. 26. Israel E conom ist, 1973, p. 262. 27. Ryan, “ Israeli Economic Policy,** pp. 13 and 19. 28. Israel Central Bureau o f Statistics, Q uarterly Statistics o f the Adm inistered Areas, December 1974, p. 34. 29. Bank o f Israel, Annual R eport 1974, pp. 300*301. 30. Vivian A. Bull, The West Bank: Is I t Viable? (Lexington, Mass. 1975) p. 124. 31. Statistical A bstract o f Israel 1975, table xxvi/18. 32. Bregman, Econom ic G rowth, pp. 34*5. 33. Statistical Abstract, 1975. 34. Israel Econom ist, January 1973, pp. 13*14; Bull, West Bank, p. 122. 35. Maoriv, 1 June 1973, translated in Israel Mirror 14 July 1973. 36. H aaretz, 30 July 1972, translated in Israleft, 13 September 1972. 37. H aaretz, 3 August 1972, translated in Israleft, 13 September 1972. 38. Yediot A haronot, 9 August 1972, translated in Israleft, 13 September 1972. 39. Yediot A haronot, March 1976. 40. Maariv, 10 October 1975, translated in Israel M irror, 28 November 1975. 41. H aaretz, 15 May 1969, translated in ISRACA, no. 2 (June-July 1969), p. 9. 42. Yediot A haronot, 6 October 1972, translated m Israleft, 6 November 1972. 43. Bregman, Econom ic G row th, p. 58. 44. Israel Ministry o f Defense, Adm inistered Areas 1971/71, p. 5. 45. Emile Tourna, “The Question o f the Economic Viability o f the Palestine State,” Inform ation B ulletin, Communist Party o f b ra d , (October-November 1974), pp. 93-94. 46. Israeli Ministry o f Agriculture, Judea and Samaria: Agricultural Develop­ m ent Plans fo r 1969-1970, (no date). 47. Ib id . 48. Ryan, “ Israeli Economic Policy,” p. 14. 49. Coordinator o f Government Operations in the Administered Territories, Israel Ministry of Defense, Three Years o f M ilitary G overnm ent 1967-1970: Civilian A ctivities in Judea, Samaria, the Gaza Strip and N orther Sinai, (June 1970), p. 15; Statistical A bstract o f Israel 1975, tables xxvi, 26 and 27. 50. Statistical A bstract o flsrea l 1975, table xxvi/27. 51. Statistical A bstract o f Israel 1975, table xxvi/13. 52. Bregman, Econom ic G row th, p. 55. 53. Bank o f Israd, Research Department, The Econom y o f the Adm inistered Areas 1971, p. 27. 54. Ib id . 55. Bregman, Econom ic G row th, p. 57. 56. Statistical A bstract o f Israel 1975, table xxvi/27. 57. Eliyahu Kanovsky, The Econom ic Im pact o f the Six Day War (New York, 1970), p. 180.

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195

58. Bull, W est B ank, p. 65 ; Q uarterly Statistics o f th e A dm inistered Areas, December 1974, Table 1/5. 59. Bregman, Econom ic G row th, p. 53. 60. H aaretz, 9 October 1972, translated in Isro left, 18 O ctober 1972, p. 8. 61. Israel E conom ist, September 1973, p. 249. 62. H aaretz, 16 June 1972, translated in K now , 31 August 1972, p. 5. 63. Bregman, Econom ic G row th, p. 85. 64. Statistical A bstract o f Israel 1975. 65. Bregman, Econom ic G row th, p. 39. 66 . Ib id ., p. 85. 67. Ib id ., p. 64. 68. Tourna, “Economic V iability,” p. 93. (He cites A l Fair, 28 August 1974 and 4 September 1974). 69. Statistical A bstract o f Israel 1975, table xxvi/8. 70. Bank o f Israel, Econom y o f the A dm inistered Areas 1971, p. 15.

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UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA

Part Three Z IO N IS M A N D T H E A R A B W O R L D

11

T H E JEW S O F IR A Q IN T H E N IN E T E E N T H C E N T U R Y : A C A SE S T U D Y O F S O C IA L HARM ONY Walid Khaddurl

It has becom e a popular notion in W estern literature to point out the Jewish com m unities in the Arab countries as an exam ple o f an alienated m inority, suffering b o th socially and econom ically. A careful study o f the historical record shows, however, th at the situation was totally different from w hat the Zionist inform ation m edia have p u t o u t during the past four decades. A nd, as a study o f the Iraqi Jewish com m unity indicates, the conditions and standards, as well as the progress o f the local com m unity was sim ilar to th at o f the other segments o f society, and if it were n o t for the propaganda agitation o f the Zionists during the first h alf o f the tw entieth centuiy, the Jewish com m unity o f Iraq would have evolved in a similar p attern as the other social groups in the country. Background To study social com m unities in Iraq prior to the rise o f the m odern state, it is necessary to understand bo th the inner dynamics o f those groupings, and also their relationship to Islam, to the O ttom an ruling authorities, and to inter-group dynam ics existent at the tim e. The basic legal premise underlying the relationship o f an Islamic governm ent to its non-Muslim com m unities (dhim m is) is th at Muslim laws are concerned w ith the affairs o f Muslims, while relationships among the dhimmis are governed separately w ithin each com m unity according to its own canons and institutions. The religious head o f a group is responsible to the Muslim caliph, and the individual dhim m i’s status is derived from his m em bership in a protected com m unity. This system came in to existence during the Muslim em pires, survived them , and continued throughout the O ttom an period. As part o f the contractual relationship betw een the Muslim caliph and the dhim m is, the latter were granted freedom o f worship, travel, residence and education. Their obligation was to pay a special tax for the protection they received and not to assist the enemies o f the state. Certain social restrictions were im posed, b u t they were often left unim plem ented and were freely violated. An example o f this from the

200

The Jew s o f Iraq in the N ineteenth C entury

’Abbasid Empire was the violation o f the rule th at no new non-Muslim houses o f worship were to be built. Rabbi Benjamin ben Tudela, who visited Baghdad in 1168» stated that there were twenty-eight syna­ gogues at th at tim e. None o f these could have been built before the beginning o f Muslim rule, as Baghdad was founded by the Caliph alMansur in 762. Similar evidence o f legal laxity in other cities is abun­ dant. At the zenith o f ’Abbasid rule in Baghdad, philosophers, scholars and scientists o f all faiths contributed to a flourishing civilization. Jewish m erchants, especially the Radhaniya group, played a key role in the international trade o f the Empire. When Arab rule declined and tribal-m ilitary invasions destroyed the bases o f agriculture, commerce and public adm inistration, all com m unities, w ithout exception, suf­ fered. O ttom an rule (1534-1914) was punctuated by foreign invasions and local armed conflicts. Chronic instability resulted in stagnation: no public social programs were introduced until the nineteenth century, and Istanbul followed a policy o f sheer neglect tow ard the Iraqi pro­ vinces. For example, the reform s, Tanzim at, o f the m id-nineteenth century were applied in Iraq several decades after being introduced in Istanbul. However, the O ttom an Empire recognized the protected status o f the dhimmis. As early as 1326, the Jewish com m unity (m illet), was granted finnans perm itting Jews to build synagogues and schools and granting them freedom o f travel, occupation and residence. At a tim e when Jews suffered social and religious persecution in Europe, many in the O ttom an Empire were diplom ats, w ealthy m erchants and craftsm en.1 Nevertheless, despite the legal and institutional reform s o f the late nineteenth century, social and econom ic processes remained backward in the Empire as a whole, and particularly in Iraq. A few Iraqis in the m ajor cities and towns lived prosperous lives, b u t the m ajority o f the population, regardless o f creed, continued to suffer as a result o f centuries o f economic decadence, exploitation and poor adm inistration. Most O ttom an adm inistrators were ignorant o f the language and conditions o f the territory. Modem education was lim ited to the sons o f notables, while others received only traditional religious education. The O ttom an governors controlled the local population through a com bination o f m ilitary force and by coopting the notables and the religious elites into their entourage. N atural disasters contribu­ ted to the general backwardness o f the area; some sixty percent o f the inhabitants o f Baghdad were killed in the Spring o f 1831, when both a flood and a plague attacked the city during the same week.

The Jew s o f Iraq in the N ineteenth C entury

201

Social Conditions The history o f the Jews o f Iraq is ancient, dating from 586 B.C., if not earlier. From thence onward and throughout the Islamic Em pire, Jews played a significant intellectual, religious and commercial role. Well-known accomplishm ents during this period and before the advent o f the O ttom ans in the fourteenth century include the academies at Sura, Nehadra and Pum baditha, the Babylonic Talm ud, the offices o f the Exilarch and the Geonim, the works o f the Responsa, and religious missions to Egypt, N orth Africa, South Asia and the Far East. Records concerning the conditions o f Iraqi society betw een the fourteenth and nineteenth centuries are sparse. However, accounts by travellers as early as the seventeenth century describe Baghdad as a tow n o f 20,000 to 30,000 houses, 200 to 300 o f them inhabited by Jews. More reliable figures are supplied by travellers in the late nine­ teenth century, who estim ated the total Jewish com m unity o f Baghdad a t 50,000. This figure corresponds to the census carried out by the British occupation authorities in 1920 which estim ated the to tal popu­ lation o f Iraq at 2,849,282, including 87,484 Jews. O f the hitter, 50,000 lived in Baghdad, 15,000 in the N orth and 7,000 in Basra.2 The Jews o f Iraq form ed an integral part o f society. Their cultural and social practices were those o f the population at large: It was a com pletely Arabized com m unity. . . (The Jews) spoke Arabic among themselves, introduced Arabic into their religious services, and w rote Arabic in Hebrew characters for their correspon­ dence. Their social life was th at o f Arabs, their cu isin e. . . super­ stitions, ev en . . . harem .3 In com parison to Jews living in other societies in the East, they fared well econom ically. Rabbi Israel Benjamin, who travelled the area exten­ sively during the middle o f the nineteenth century, found the Baghdadi Jewish com m unity well established: “ In no other place in the east have I found m y Israelith brethren in such perfectly happy circum stances, and so w orthy o f their condition.“4 As w ith other social groups the m ajority o f m oderate-incom e Jews lived in their own sector o f Baghdad while their richer counterparts lived in elaborate houses by the Tigris alongside Muslim and Christian notables and Turkish officials. Thus, the socioeconom ic conditions o f Iraqi Jews differed from one city quarter to another as well as from one area o f the country to another, and were closely correlated to their choice o f profession; generally they were

202

The J e m o f Iraq in th e N ineteenth C entury

more frequently engaged in trade, less frequently in agriculture. Trade was concentrated in central and southern Iraq, particularly in Baghdad and Basra, where a large portion o f the Jewish com m unity participated in commerce. Quite a few families engaged in international trade and opened commercial houses in Persia, India and England. The m ajority were small retail m erchants in m ajor cities, and also through­ o u t the rural areas, except for certain districts o f the Middle Euphrates. In the N orth, there were a few Jewish tradesm en among the Kurdish tribes and serving as advisers to aghas and princes. Most however, were in agriculture. There were also some landlords, whose peasants were themselves Jewish, b u t the m ajority lived in the isolated m ountains at the same socioeconomic level as other peasants in Iraq. They were heavily arm ed, paid an annual sum to stronger tribes for protection, and rendered services, such as digging canals and building houses, to their landlords. Jewish landlords existed elsewhere in Iraq, especially in Basra, Hilla and Diyala, where they owned date groves, grain farms and fruit gar­ dens. In smaller towns, such as Anna and H it, some Jews were both m erchants and landowners. Members o f the Jewish com m unity were also engaged in the primi­ tive industries th at existed at the tim e: textile, silk and leather manu­ facturing. Except for the silk exports from Kurdistan, their products were consumed locally. Political Leadership Throughout this period, when the central adm inistration was weak o r nonexistent, communal groups in Baghdad were under the direct political and religious influence o f certain families, who retained their power through ancestry, respect for their scholarship and wealth. Because o f their small num bers and special privileges, such as exemp­ tion from taxes and m ilitary service, these families com peted w ith one another and intrigued among themselves. O ften a family was connected w ith a particular governor and as his fortunes fluctuated, so did theirs. Their relationship to the communities they represented was despotic and much corruption and injustice occurred. Becoming part o f a gover­ nor's entourage, they fulfilled his wishes and shared in the wealth he distributed. The contributions o f these families to religious and scien­ tific scholarship were insignificant. The schools they operated gradua­ ted religious functionaries, reactionaries in their outlook tow ard b oth the spiritual and secular worlds. The hakham bashi was the leading religious representative o f the

The Jews o f Iraq in the N ineteenth Century

203

Jewish comm unity. The hakham bashi o f Istanbul was the represen­ tative o f all Jews in the Empire in the Council o f State. He was respon­ sible for apportioning and collecting taxes from the comm unity and for confirming the appointm ent o f lower hakhamim. In Baghdad, the hakham bashi was selected by representatives o f the local com m unity and confirmed by the governor as well as by the hakham bashi o f Istanbul. However, in tim e, he became isolated from the comm unity and served as the governor's lackey rather than as the com m unity's representative. This led to a major conflict within the Jewish com­ m unity o f Baghdad in 1879. The hakham bashi at the tim e, Sassoon bin Elijah Smooha, had held his office for thirty-five years and enjoyed the support o f the local governors and the hakham bashi o f Istanbul. One o f the com m unity’s grievances against him was embezzlement o f the m ilitary tax. A m ajority o f the Jewish com m unity, including the leading lower hakhamim, addressed a petition to the governor reques­ ting his removal. The governor felt forced to comply, despite his friend­ ship w ith Smooha, but the hakham bashi o f Istanbul reversed the decision. However, Smooha's return to office was brief. His behaviour caused the comm unity to cable Istanbul and, finally, the Sultan him self intervened and forced Sm ooha's dismissal. By th at tim e the conflict had left a m ajor division w ithin the Baghdadi Jewish com m unity.5 In addition to the hakham bashi, the power structure within the Jewish comm unity included a Beth-Din, which adjudicated disputes within the com m unity, while the hakham bashi determined punish­ m ents. The Beth-Din was usually made up o f members o f wealthy mercantile Jewish families. A single family would often, in effect, inherit all these positions for centuries. A nasi ("noble”) was the secular representative o f the comm unity and was often the wealthiest o f the m erchants. He was also the treasurer or financial adviser o f the governor. Community financial m atters, mainly tax collection, were administered by a m illet cha’ush. He was elected by the com m unity, as was a body o f ten notables who super­ vised the educational and social programs o f the com m unity. During the seventeenth, eighteenth, and early nineteenth centuries, the nasi o f Baghdad, rather than the hakham bashi, held effective political power over the com m unity. The Sassoon family inherited this post generation after generation. They had dose ties w ith Istanbul. When Daud Pasha, the last o f the Mamluk governors, attained power in Baghdad in 1817, he had to rely on the Sassoons in order to receive a firm an from the Sultan. However, this particular intervention created enemies for the Sassoons w ithin the governor's entourage, which

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ultim ately led to the migration o f a branch o f the family to India and later to England. In the decades th at followed the Tanzim at, the office o f nasi continued to be held by the wealthiest m erchant in tow n, b u t political power reverted to the hakham bashi.6 Religion The Jews o f Iraq were all rabbinical and adhered com pletely to the Talmud. With a decline o f scholarship w ithin their com m unity and the country in general during the O ttom an period, religious practice became heavily concerned w ith ritual, especially in the rural areas. Certain contacts w ith foreign Jews were m aintained and influenced the religious practices and beliefs o f Iraqi Jews. Kabbalism and m ysti­ cism were particularly widespread in the Jewish communities o f Eastern Europe, Turkey and Safed, Palestine. It was w ith these groups th at Iraqi Jewish contacts were especially strong, and their religious publications were familiar in Baghdad. Furtherm ore, Hakham Yusif Hayim, one o f the chief spiritual leaders in Baghdad from 1859 to 1909, encouraged the spread o f these practices. As a learned and wealthy m an, a great speaker, and the author o f thirty-tw o books o f hom ilies, commentaries, kabbalistic prayers, poems, liturgy and responsa, the hakham had a large following.7 Changes in the N ineteenth Century The introduction o f the Tanzimat in the nineteenth century trans­ formed the official status o f the dhimmis. The Hatti-Humayun o f 1856, and to a lesser extent the Hatti-Sherif o f 1839, granted equal citizen­ ship and rights to all the people o f the Empire, including assurances o f security for life and property, admission to civil and m ilitary systems, equal taxation, freedom o f worship, special and mixed courts and equality on the witness stand. The communal system was retained only in th at religious authorities continued to control civil m atters such as marriage and inheritance. The C onstitution o f 1876 granted representation to property holders in local, regional and imperial administrative councils and legislatures. These new institutions had great symbolic im portance, even if those elected were handpicked by the authorities and their functions lim ited in scope. Jewish representatives included Minahayim Danyal, one o f three Baghdadi representatives to the first parliam ent o f 1877; Sassoon Hisqail, who held th at seat in the parliam ent o f 1909; Yusif Kurqui, a member o f the Administrative Council o f Baghdad in 1873; and Yusif Shantub, a member o f the council in 1888. All were wealthy m erchants,

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except for Sassoon Hisqail, who was an official at the M inistry o f Com­ merce. He was later to become the first finance m inister o f Iraq and held th at post for a num ber o f years. In the last decades o f the nineteenth century, Jewish education began to benefit from foreign assistance, not only from the w ealthy Iraqi-Jewish com m unities in India, b u t also through direct establish­ m ent o f m odem prim ary and secondary schools by the Alliance Israel­ ite Universelle de Paris and the Anglo-Jewish Association o f London. These schools preceded bo th the m ilitary and civilian public systems which began in 1870, and graduated some sixty percent o f all the secondary students in Iraq before the tu rn o f the century. The first boys’ school was established by the Alliance and the Anglo-Jewish Association in 1865. A girls’ school, the first in Iraq, was established in 1897. Among non-Jewish Iraqis, only the sons o f notables and a few m ilitary cadets were able to receive m odem education during the same period. An educational census was taken in Baghdad in 1913. The results are revealed in Table 1.* Table 1: Schools in Baghdad in 1913 Number

Type

38 13

Official primary Official secondary (both military and civilian) Ja'fariya private Christian private Jewish private

6 12 39

No. of Students Mala Female 1525 2706 860 995 4791

300 —

—

918 1096

Source: Abdel-Rezzeq Al-Hillali, History of Education in Iraq During tha Ottoman Ragima. 1638-1917 (Baghdad, 1959).

Despite the influence o f Western Europe on the Iraqi-Jewish educa­ tional system , the intellectual w ork o f the com m unity continued to be lim ited to religious subjects. Books and newspapers available during the nineteenth century were m ainly from Poland and Russia. The first Jewish printing house, established in 1855, published m ainly books on religious topics, particularly kabbalism and the zohar. Exceptions included an Arabic translation o f Rabbi Benjamin bin Tudela’s tw elfthcentury travels and some works by Maimonides. Two journals appeared: harDober (1868-1870) in Hebrew and Jeshurun (1910) in Arabic and Hebrew. They dealt w ith affairs o f the local com m unity. Throughout this period, very few instances o f tension betw een the

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The Jew s o f Iraq in th e N ineteenth C entury

Jewish com m unity and other groups have been recorded. The few inci­ dents th at did occur were m inor. For exam ple, in 1860 a conflict arose when the authorities, for an undeterm ined reason, stopped the pilgrim­ age o f Jews to the tom b o f Esekiel, located a short distance from Baghdad. Upon the intervention o f the Anglo-Jewish Association w ith the Sultan, the m atter was settled. In 1889, a shrine outside Baghdad called Nabi Yusha, one o f the burial grounds o f the Baghdad rabbis, was sold to a Muslim in the course o f a dispute betw een the form er hakham bashi, Sassoon Smooha, and the m illet cha’ush. Later th at year one o f the rabbis died and a conflict arose as to th e ownership o f the grounds. The hakham bashi and a few other persons were im prisoned. Contacts were again established w ith the Anglo-Jewish Association and the Jewish Board o f Deputies in London, who in tu rn contacted the British ambassador in Istanbul. As a result, the grounds were returned to the com m unity, despite the original sale; the hakham bashi and his follow­ ers were released and the governor o f Baghdad was dismissed by the Sultan.9 The social conditions o f Iraqi Jewry continued to prosper through­ o u t the first h alf o f the tw entieth century. Education flourished among its young. The num ber o f students m ultiplied; they attended public institutions as well as private Jewish schools. In the latter, their num ber increased from 5,886 male and female students in 1913 to 11,435 in 1935.10 The num ber o f synagogues in Baghdad increased from 29 in 1915 to 41 in 1936.11 The com m unity prospered econom ically as well, especially w ith the advent o f the new state and the increase in commer­ cial activity. According to a report published by Joseph Schechtem an o f the Jewish Agency, commercial activity in Iraq before World War II was estim ated as follows: Im ports, 95 percent in Jewish hands; contracts, 90 percent Jew ish-controlled; exports, 10 percent in Jewish hands.13 The basic disturbing elem ent took place w ith the Zionization o f Palestine and the infiltration o f the Jewish Agency in the ranks o f the Iraqi-Jewish com m unity during the forties. Their agents organized Zionist cells, laid the grounds for the im m igration at the latter part o f the decade — after m eeting stiff opposition from th e com m unity itself at the beginning o f the decade - and planned sabotage operations and internal disturbances. Tension was deliberately created among the members o f the com m unity and betw een them and the rest o f the population, as well as the authorities, in order to create an appropriate dom estic and international atm osphere for an im m igration campaign. This was clearly dem onstrated in the following concluding paragraph o f

The Jew s o f Iraq in th e N ineteenth C entury

207

a Jewish Agency report, subm itted by one o f their agents upon his return from Iraq: . . . there could be no substantial im m igration from Iraq in the fore* seeable future (early forties) and th at our m ain efforts should be directed to the expansion and training o f the defence cadres we had set up there and their appropriate training. These cadres would at the same tim e continue educational w ork and prepare for immigra­ tion in to Palestine at all costs and by any m eans.13 Conclusions The Iraqi-Jewish com m unity, when studied w ithin the developm ental process o f Iraqi society during the nineteenth century and the overall social conditions th at prevailed th en , fared well in com parison to th e rest o f the population. Despite th e despotic and corrupt practices pre­ vailing in the country at large, there was freedom o f religion, residence, w ork and travel. Moreover, during the tum ultuous political changes th at to o k place w ithin Iraq during the same period, there was little, if any, tension betw een the Jewish com m unity and other social groups. This situation, was, o f course, com pletely the opposite in Europe at th e tim e. The people o f Iraq to o k advantage o f the period o f reform s in the O ttom an Empire and began educating their young a t a m uch larger and wider scale than before. This expansion in the educational system , along w ith the gradual expansion o f trade and rapid econom ic develop­ m ent, created new social and econom ic opportunities for the popula­ tion at large. The Jews o f Iraq figured prom inently in these tw o developments. The disturbing elem ent in m odem Iraqi-Jewish history, and w hat led to their abrupt and sudden im m igration after centuries o f social har­ m ony and cohesion, and at a critical period o f social integration, was the agitation and propaganda directed at them , as well as at the rest o f Arab Jew ry, by the Jewish Agency and the Zionist organizations. This, coupled w ith the occupation o f Palestine in 1948 and the continuous threats to the security o f the Arab people, are m ajor factors in an analysis o f the current history o f the Middle East.

N otes 1. For a discussion o f the rights, duties and roles o f the non-Muslim com-

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The J e m o f Iraq in th e N ineteenth C entury

inimitiés during the Mamie and Ottoman periods, see: H.A.R. Gibb and Harold Bowen, Islam ic Society and die West voL 1, p t 2, pp. 207*61; and, Majid Khadduri, “International Law” , in Law in the Middle East, eds. Majid Khadduri and Herbert J. Leibesny (Washington, D.C., 1955), vol. I, pp. 349*73. 2. Yusif Rizq-AUah Ghanimah, A H istory o f the Jews o f Iraq (Arabic) (Baghdad, 1924), p. 184. 3. Cecil Roth, The Sassoon D ynasty (London, 1941), pp. 20-21. 4. Israel Jospeh Benjamin H, Eight Years in A da and Africa from 1846 to 1855 (Hanover, 1859), p. 110. 5. David Soloman Sassoon, A H istory o f the Jew s in Baghdad (Letchworth, 1949), pp. 157*61. 6. Ibid., pp. 149-52 and Ghanimah, Jews o f Iraq, pp. 168*69. 7. G hanim ah,/ettv o f Iraq, p. 170 and Sassoon, Jews in Baghdad, pp. 124-25. 8. Abdal-Razzaq Al-Hillali, H istory o f Education in Iraq During the O ttom an Regime, 1638-1917 (Arabic) (Baghdad, 1959), pp. 249-52. 9. M. Franco, “Baghdad,“ in The Jewish Ecyclopedia (N.Y., 1912), voL 2, p. 438. Also, Ghanimah, Jews o f Iraq, p. 179 and Sassoon,/ew s in Baghdad, p. 161. 10. The Iraq D irectory, 1936 (Baghdad, 1936), pp. 462*63. 11 .Ib id ., p. 465. 12. Joseph Schechtman, On Whigs o f Eagles. The Plight, Exodus, and Homecoming o f Oriental Jewry (New York, 1961), p. 104. 13. Munya M. Mardor, Haganah (New York, 1964), p. 100.

AQ I iL

EC O N O M IC D IM EN SIO N S O F A R A B R E S IS TA N C E T O ZIO N IS M : A P O L IT IC A L IN T E R P R E T A T IO N Joe Stork

The economic weakness o f the Arab world and its subordination to the world capitalist economic system was an essential and inseparable precondition for imperialist division and control o f the Arab territories after World War I, which in turn provided the political and economic basis for Zionist colonization o f Palestine. The capacity o f the Pales­ tinian Arab people to resist this Zionist/British im position in the 1930s and 40s was considerably bounded by the consequences o f more than a century o f Western capitalist penetration o f the region. The relative ease w ith which the British, and later the Americans, took over the area's oil resources (over the same decades th at the Zionist foun­ dations were laid) was directly related to the way the region had been softened up by centuries o f O ttom an and later European oppression and exploitation. Prior to the beginnings o f the industrial revolution in England and Europe and after the ciritical commercial and trading function o f the Middle East had sharply declined under the im pact o f European naval exploits, surpluses from peasant agricultural production were expropriated and consumed by the local ruling classes or trans­ m itted to the Ottom an capital. There was no sustained process o f expanding productive investm ents. Local m anufacturing was lim ited to artisan and handicraft scale and was not industrial. Contact between the developing capitalist economies o f the West and the traditional economies o f the Middle East occurred through trade as well as m ilitary expeditions and assaults. The pattern o f ex­ changing Western m anufacturers, chiefly textiles and hardware, for Middle Eastern raw m aterials used in the new industries was laid this early, and sm oothed the way for the period o f imperialist expansion in the latter half o f the nineteenth century. This was partly due to the failure o f the O ttom an authorities to impose any kind o f protective tariffs or otherwise stim ulate local production. Typical o f the relation­ ship was the Anglo-Turkish Commercial Convention o f 1838 which “confirmed now and fo rever. . . all rights, privileges, and immunities which have been conferred on the subjects or ships o f Great Britain by the existing Capitulations and Treaties.” 1 Hershlag describes the effect o f the capitulations, which were not abolished until the 1920s

209

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E conom ic D im ensions o f Arab R esistance to Zionism

and 30s, as follows: The low tariff barrier enabled foreign wares, sometimes inferior to local products, to flood O ttom an m arkets and to deal a serious blow to the productive capacity and com petetive ability o f local pro­ ducers, while the m arkets th at were opened to Turkey's raw m aterials. . . represented only partial com pensation for the ruin o f prospects for the development o f a diversified local econom y.3 This unequal trading relationship was not the accidental outcom e o f intangible forces, b u t represented the fulfillm ent o f a commercial strategy fully shared by the rival European bourgeois regimes. One British com m entator, writing in 1838, observed: We m ay calculate, at no rem ote period, if, indeed, political troubles are arrested, on supplying the necessities as well as the luxuries o f the whole o f the eastern population, whose attention will thus be directed to agriculture, and the furnishing o f raw produce; when we can take from them their produce in return for our wares, or find them the means o f exchanging it. These changed circumstances are beginning to produce their effects. Persia, which lately drew raw silk from Turkey for its m anufactures, now has commenced to im port silk from England; and the current o f precious m etals, which a few years ago carried LS ,000,000 tow ards the east, is now drawn back­ wards by the spinning mules and power looms o f England.3 This division o f the world did n o t go w ithout challenge at the tim e. The m ost serious and sustained effort in the Middle East in the nineteenth century was made in Egypt under the reign o f Mohammed Ali. He endeavoured to transform Egypt from a subsistence peasant econom y to a "m odem " industrialized one under state control, independent o f the O ttom an Empire, and largely closed o ff from the expanding European economies. Virtually all this effort was linked to Muhammad Ali's in ten t to develop and equip an Egyptian m ilitary th at could defend and extend his rule in the face o f opposition from the O ttom an regime and the European powers. The threat was m ilitarily crushed by 1841. Although the threat o f Mohammed Ali did n o t arise elsewhere in the Middle East, his efforts were n o t solitary. In Iraq, Dawud Pasha, governor from 1817 to 1831, introduced a m odem m unitions factory, textile plant, water-oil-pum p, and printing press, in a similar attem pt to govern independently o f the Sublime Porte and o f the British

Econom ic D im ensions o f Arab R esistance to Zionism

211

Residency in Baghdad. But the attem pt “proved to be abortive owing to the rising forces o f foreign economic expansion and penetration in Iraq.*’4 hi the decade after 1827, in the Ottom an Empire itself, Sultan Mahmoud II sponsored the establishm ent o f a tannery and boot works, a spinning mill, wool-spinning and weaving facilities, a saw mill, a copper-sheet rolling plant and the conversion o f a cannon foundry and m usket works to steam power. Almost w ithout exception: These early attem pts to introduce European industrial m ethods were devoted exclusively to the m anufacture o f goods intended for governmental and m ilitary use. They concentrated on the final stages o f m anufacture and ignored or only partly solved associated problems such as internal sources o f raw m aterials, transportation and other economic infrastructure.5 Recognition o f the need for a m ote am bitious program o f “defensive industrialization“ by Ottom an authorities reached a peak in the years o f the Tanzimat reform period th at lasted from the early 1840s to the eve o f the Crimean War. The ultim ate failure o f these efforts resulted n o t only from the competetive hostility o f the European powers, b u t from the “hothouse” character o f the efforts. Nearly all the machinery was im ported from Europe, and “most if not all foremen, m aster craftsm en, and skilled workers o f necessity came from abroad to assemble, operate and repair factories and equipm ent.” 6 Both invest­ m ent and consum ption were confined solely to the state sector, and this proved fatal when the regime's poor financial condition led to cut­ backs on both fronts. “With the Crimean War came the first European loans and Ottom an indebtedness, and the Porte was forced to abandon the greater part o f its industrialization program.” 7 The resemblance between early efforts at industrialization in the Middle East and many o f the industrial projects being prom oted there today in the wake o f what Business Week calls the “tidal wave o f oil m oney” is more than coincidental and should give pause to those who think th at industrial­ ization is some mere agglomeration o f capital and technique, some machine th at can be transplanted from abroad w ith all its com ponent parts. The development o f industrialization under capitalism is dependent not only on die local setting, b u t on the global context. These early attem pts in the Middle East were made at the same time die industrial revolution was on the rise in Europe, creating the need for raw m aterials,

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Econom ic D im ensions o f Arab R esistance to Zionism

cheap labor and wider m arkets th at m otivated imperialist expansion. This stage was characterized by the export o f capital to the Middle East precisely to consolidate the raw m aterial export orientation o f those economies and the penetration o f those m arkets. This was the age o f great infrastructural projects — railways, ports, the Suez Canal. “The canal, whose ownership was held in common between European banking interests and the Egyptian ruler, was dug almost by hand by tens o f thousands o f Egyptian peasant laborers performing unpaid corvee labor. About 20,000 reportedly perished in this endeavor.**8 M erchant and investm ent bankers financed the purchase o f European industrial and commercial goods by Middle Eastern rulers, and then refinanced their debts at usurious rates. All the states soon w ent bank­ rupt (1976 is the centennial for Egypt's plunge under Khedive Ismail) and European diplom atic residents and bank agents came to virtually rule those countries which they hadn't taken direct control of, like Egypt. By the turn o f the century nearly one-third o f all state revenue, plus a 3 percent customs surtax and 8 percent ad valorem tax went to service the O ttom an public debt. The peasant economies were sub­ stantially redirected from subsistence farming to cash crops (notably cotton in Egypt) to raise the foreign exchange necessary to service the public debt. It was this phenomenon which Issawi characterized for Egypt as “a process, consummated only after the British occupation, integrating Egypt as an agricultural unit in the international politicoeconomic system ."9 Thus the forced accum ulation o f capital necessary for industrial­ ization took place in the Middle East under foreign direction rather than th at o f local capitalists or local state authorities. It was then used to finance the development o f European industry. This had consequen­ ces not only for the local economies in general b u t for the peasant sectors in particular, as governments attem pted to raise revenues to pay o ff these debts by intensifying exploitation o f the lower classes. M.S. Hasan describes the application o f these developments to Iraq: Thus the expansion o f European demand for Iraq*s produce o f wool, dates and grain was satisfied by the utilization o f Iraq's surplus productive capacity o f land and labor. The economic process where­ by the surplus productive capacity was used for the satisfaction o f rising European demand took the form o f a decline in subsistence agriculture and pasture, and an expansion o f commercial production for exports.10

E conom ic D im ensions o f Arab R esistance to Zionism

213

The shift also included the changeover from tribal to private landownership and the local expropriation o f surplus value by the sheikhs and urban m erchants: The tribal system was transform ed into the system o f private [tapu] landownership. They became landlords, entitled to a substantial share in the crops which they sold to m erchants; the latter m arketed the surplus agricultural p ro d u ce. . . in the towns and abroad. The share o f landlords in agricultural produce increased in proportion to the expansion in production, the transform ation o f tribal into tapu landownership, and the decline o f subsistence relative to commercial agriculture — but above all in proportion to the growth o f exports and the development o f law and order which made practicable the effective appropriation o f the tapu crop share. The expenditure o f the greater part o f the proceeds o f surplus agri­ cultural produce on consum ption m eant th at there was very little investm ent in maintaining, let alone improving, the fertility o f the soil, flood control, and the quality o f seed. The declining produc­ tivity o f the land and the growth o f rural population more rapidly than p ro d u ctio n . . . resulted in a fall o f the output per head o f the pastoral and agricultural population. Thus the annual output o f grain fell from 1,000 kilos per head o f the rural population in the 1880s to S60 kilos during the 1930s and further to 505 kilos during the 1950s. The increasing effective share o f the landowners in a rela­ tively declining agricultural production m eant a fall in the standard o f life o f the Iraqi peasantry.11 A similar transform ation in land tenure took place in Palestine, where peasants frequently registered their lands in the names o f local town m erchants to avoid taxation and conscription. Reudy states, The growing value o f cash crops in the late 19th century encouraged the urban bourgeoisie o f Beirut, Damascus and Jerusalem to take advantage o f the w indfall. . . thousands o f peasants from the 1870s onwards found themselves in fact deprived o f the m ost minimal rights o f tenure as they became increasingly under the control o f the owner, who might be landlord, tax collector, and m oneylender com­ bined.12 As Polk points out regarding the application o f the O ttom an Land Code

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o f 1858: “ Long before the Balfour Declaration, which is often seen as the fount o f all contention over Palestine, the inarticulate b u t ancient peasantry had dipped a rung on the ladder which was to lead them down into the refugee camps in 1948.” 13 The Mandate Period and the 1948 Defeat The com petition among the European powers th at led to World War I had decisive im pact on the Middle East. The m andate system , a m odi­ fied form o f direct colonial rule, was concocted to provide a facade for the division and subjugation o f the Arab world according to the com­ petitive economic and strategic needs o f Britain and France. It was in this period th at the im portance o f crude oil for m odern warfare in par­ ticular and industrial strength in general became ap p aren t Thus, the British insistence on control o f Iraq's northern provinces. After the nationalist struggle was suppressed in Syria and Feisal, the Britishsponsored spokesman for Arab nationalist demands, was run o u t o f Damascus by the French arm y, Britain had need o f a pliable king to help pacify the struggle th at had erupted in Iraq in May 1920 w ith the announcem ent o f the British Mandate. The insurrection posed the first serious challenge to British policy in the area, and it was m et and crushed as such. Among other tactical innovations, the British used air­ planes to bom b and terrorize peasant villages in the countryside. Certainty among the reasons for the failure o f resistance was the decades-long deterioration o f the living standards o f the masses o f peasants and the absence o f indigenous econom ic, political and social institutions and relationships th at could sustain a protracted struggle. A similar situation obtained in Palestine, except th at it was aug­ m ented by the Zionist settler-colonial enterprise which led to the development o f a strong capitalist sector w ithin Palestine th at, w ith the help o f the Mandate power, quite dom inated the non-capitalist traditional Arab sector. Probably the m ost im portant single reason for the issuance o f the infam ous Balfour Declaration on November 2, 1917, was related more to the imminence o f the Bolshevik Revolution and the vain hope o f mobilizing Russian Jewish influence to keep Russia in the war against Germany. But the value o f a friendly colony in such a strategic position was already well appreciated by British policymakers. While n o t itself a promising candidate as an oil pro­ ducer, Palestine was an im portant link in the chain o f colonial control o f the region. One o f the m ost im portant consequences o f the heritage o f imperial­

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215

ism in the Middle East was the form ation and consolidation o f a class o f local bourgeoisie, their wealth for the m ost part based in their land holdings, and to a lesser extent in trade (in which sector ethnic compra* dores were relatively im portant.) Certainly in Palestine it was this local bourgeoisie, including m ost o f the traditional notables, which made up the political establishm ent. But now their dominance had a class charac­ ter as well. They led the political struggle against the Zionists and their sponsors, b u t their own self-interest dictated a response th at would not challenge their own privileges and prerogatives, hi Palestine and else­ where their nationalist am bitions were m uted by their stake in the status quo. This class perform ed a m ediating role w ithout which the Mandate could not have functioned. To grasp the full im port o f the economic dimension o f the struggle during the Mandate period, the transform ation o f Palestine m ust be articulated in class term s, along the lines which Talal Asad has advan­ ced. For Asad, the MJewish sector'* m ust be identified functionally as the capitalist sector, for whose relative and absolute growth the Man­ date apparatus was essential: “The Mandate Adm inistration m aintained a fiscal structure which facilitated the extraction o f surplus from the non-capitalist sector, and its partial transfer to the expanding capitalist sector.” 14 Both the rural property tax and the various forms o f indirect taxation, concentrated on necessities, were extrem ely regressive. Peas­ ant indebtedness was increased, facilitating the lim ited land acquisition o f the Mandate period; capital-intensive Jewish agricultural enterprises paid proportionately less tax, and sometimes none at all. Similarly in the industrial sector, tax policies favoring large-scale enterprises (m ainly Jewish) “hastened the demise o f Arab craft m anufacture” and “as in the agricultural sector, the fiscal structure served to support the dif­ ferential wage rates between Jewish (imm igrant) and Arab (native) labor obtaining in the industrial sector.**15 As for Mandate adm inistration expenditures, these were devoted primarily to improvement o f transport, communications and other infrastructural features, “which im parted relatively greater value to capitalist production'*16 and to 'defense* — “the m aintenance o f a rep­ ressive state apparatus, continuously and primarily directed against the Arab producing masses.**17 In the 1930s “security m atters” consumed as m uch as 35 percent o f the budget. Moreover the Adm inistration “was in ten t on amassing a surplus to repay Palestine’s portion o f the O ttom an public debt, and it strove to make Palestine self supporting and hence less o f a burden on the ill-tempered British taxpayer.'*18 The increase o f European Jewish immigration in the 1930s m eant

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the grow th, w ith fluctuations to be sure, o f the capitalist sector. Owing to the "conquest o f labor** policies o f the Zionists, it directly and adversely affected the Arab population by causing high unem ploym ent and significant inflation. This increased tensions among the Arab classes as well as providing the direct im petus to strike econom ically and m ilitarily at the Zionists. For the peasants and poor workers o f Pales­ tine, the political conflict w ith the Zionists was felt m ost acutely and m ost frequently on an imm ediate econom ic level. It was n o t an abstract or m ystical "love o f the land** th at m otivated the Palestinians to struggle against great odds, b u t their u tter dependence on the land which was only reinforced by the pauperization and sub-proletariani­ zation o f the Zionist project. Protests against imm igration and land acquisition policies, and against u tility concessions to Zionist corpora­ tions, were prom inent on the agendas o f the Palestine Arab congresses in the 1920s. It is not coincidental th at when th e Palestinian masses struck, it was via an economic weapon: the general strike o f 1936. As Waines cor­ rectly points o u t, b o th this and other m ore spontaneous random out­ breaks o f violence, which make apparent the revolutionary potential o f the Palestinian masses, were due to the fact that “the position o f the Arab peasant and worker had become intolerable.** Thus the uprising o f 1929 (and m ore especially the rebellion o f 1936-39) was related to the overall ineffectiveness o f the m andate adm inistration to cope w ith the fundam ental economic grievances o f the peasantry. Im plicitly [sûr], the Jewish national home was called in to question, for extensive planning and expenditure on the Arab sector o f the econom y would seriously retard the rate o f the Zionists* progress in their sector.19 Waines is one o f the few w riters who, while n o t adopting a Marxist framework o f analysis, can grasp the fact th at in the Arab population the perspectives o f the upper class and the peasantry were quite d ifferen t. . . The form er sought a resolution to the question o f political power, while the latter struggled to alleviate their economic plight. Representative institutions would secure the interests o f the upper class which would then enjoy the privilege o f rule in an inde­ pendent Palestine; hence the basis o f political action o f the Arab leadership was direct negotiation w ith the British for a dem ocratic constitution. The basis o f political action for the peasantry was

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through violence so long as political negotiations and the demands for econom ic stability proved fruitless. A strong movement among the peasantry was perhaps [sic] the m ore radical approach, for the transfer o f political power from the m andatory to the upper classes did n o t necessitate die betterm ent o f the peasants* living conditions ___ the failure o f the nationalist program was largely due to the inability and unwillingness o f the Arab leadership to co-opt the peasants' full support in bringing about the destruction o f the m andate. The upper classes could n o t think in term s o f being obliga­ ted to the lower classes in the context o f a to tal national struggle; they could only feel som e obligation fo r the lower classes insofar as this did n o t conflict with their own vital in te re sts. . . In tim es o f crisis___ the Arab leadership seemed to shrink in horror at the prospect o f violence from below .30 The general strike and rebellion o f 1936-39 was the m ost im portant blow struck against the Zionists and the M andate, and its ultim ate failure is related to the social and econom ic structure o f the Arab com m unity, and to the high degree o f organization and econom ic co­ herence o f the Zionist com m unity, which by this tim e equalled oneth ird o f the to tal population. The Zionists were Mon the threshold o f a new stage o f rapid development and expansion"31 and took advantage o f the Arab strike to consolidate and expand their econom ic dom ain. This certainly contributed to the final decision o f the Arab Higher Com mittee to seek an end to the rebellion and rely on political nego­ tiations w ith the British, pressed now by the shadows o f war in Europe. It is also an indication o f their relative weakness w ithin the Palestinian com m unity th at they had to request the ruling circles o f Iraq, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Yemen to intercede w ith the Palestinian masses to bring an end to the uprising. Those ruling circles led by Iraqi Foreign M inister Nuri as-Said, were only too happy to oblige, given their similar dass interests and their own subservient position vis-à-vis the British. This episode marks the beginning o f the internationalization o f the Palestine question. The defeat o f 1936-39 was a precursor to the defeat o f 1948. The inability o f the Arab states to intervene successfully in 1948 can be attributed to the bankruptcy o f the local bourgeoisie which had taken over the reigns o f state power under the supervision o f the form er colonial authorities. It is in this period, however, th at the use o f econom ic warfare by the Arab states against Israel and its supporters was initiated.33

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Economic Aspects, 1948-67 The straggle for Palestine after World War II, corresponding to the internationalization' o f the conflict w ithin the Arab w orld, brings w ith it the first application o f economic sanctions against the new state o f Israel: a general economic boycott o f Israel organized under the aegis o f the newly-formed Arab League, and specifically an oil boycott and closure o f the Suez Canal to Israeli shipping. The general boycott was extended to apply against Western firms trading w ith Israel, as well as prohibiting any Arab trade w ith the Zionist state. The main im por­ tance o f the general boycott was th at it prevented Israel's emergence as, in the words o f Chaim Weizmann, "the new Switzerland, supplying con­ sumer goods to the untapped m arkets o f the Middle E ast."23 British, D utch, South African and American capital entered Israel, according to F ortune, " n o t . . . out o f compassion b u t in the expectation o f profits."24 But only if the boycott were lifted or rendered ineffective would it be possible for Israel to establish a classically im perialist relationship w ith its Arab neighbors, which Abba Eban envisioned as being "akin to the relationship between the United States and the Latin American continent."25 The early fifties were tough years for the IraeH econom y, a fact to which the Arab boycott surely contributed. The reasons why it was n o t a m ore decisive factor are Israeli expropriation and exploitation o f virtually the entirety o f Palestinian Arab property w ithin its borders, including the property o f thse who did n o t leave as refugees, and the large-scale financial aid from the United States, West Germany and international Jewish organizations. David Horowitz, a leading Israeli econom ist and form er head o f the Bank o f Israel, adm itted th at the im port o f capital in Israel's first tw enty years "financed n o t only investm ent, b u t also to a considerable ex tent, consum ption." By mid1973 Israel had received over $8 billion from foreign sources, an aver­ age o f $233 per year per capita. By comparison the to tal per capita income o f an Egyptian in 1969 was less than half that am ount — $102.26 The Zionist th eft o f the property and productive resources o f the Palestinians is well docum ented by Don Peretz from official records: Abandoned property was one o f the greatest contributions toward making Israel a viable state. The extent o f its area and the fact that m ost o f the regions along the border consisted o f absentee property made it strategically significant. O f the 370 new Jewish settlem ents

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established betw een 1948 and the beginning o f 1953, 350 were on absentee property. In 1954 more than one-third o f Israel's Jewish population lived on absentee property and nearly a third o f the new immigrants (250,000 people) settled in urban areas abandoned by Arabs. They left whole cities like Jaffa, Acre, Lydda, Ramleh, Baysan, Majdal; 338 towns and villages and large parts o f 94 other cities and towns, containing nearly a quarter o f all the buildings in Israel. Ten thousand shops, businesses and stores were left in Jewish hands. A t the end o f the M andate, citrus holdings in the area o f Israel totaled about 240,000 dunum s o f which h alf were Arabowned. Most o f the Arab groves were taken over by the Israel Cus­ todian o f Absentee Property. But only 340,000 dunum s were cul­ tivated by the end o f 1953.. By 1956, 73,000 dunum s were either cultivated or fit for cultivation. In 1951-52, form er Arab groves pro­ duced one-and-a-quarter m illion boxes o f fruit, o f which 400,000 were exported. Arab fruit sent abroad provided nearly 10 percent o f the country's foreign exchange earnings from exports in 1951. In 1949 the olive produce from abandoned Arab groves was Israel’s third largest export, ranking after citrus and diam onds. The relative economic im portance o f Arab property was largest from 1948 until 1953, during the period o f greatest imm igration and need. A fter th at, as the immigrants became m ore productive, national depen­ dence upon abandoned Arab property declined relatively.37 The conflict in 1948 also directly linked, for the first tim e, the fortunes o f Zionism and Western oil interests. The form er Iraqi Prime M inister Saleh Jabr, revealed th at Saudi Arabia had blocked an Arab League plan to cut o ff all oil production as a result o f the U.N. partition deci­ sion. In December 1947, Crown Prince (later King) Saud told the American arbassador in Jidda th at if other Arab states (chiefly Iraq) insisted on breaking relations w ith the United States over Palestine, Saudi Arabia would break w ith them . Nevertheless, the Americans were aware in the first h alf o f 1948 th at the King m ight be forced by popular Arab sentim ent to take some action in this regard. There is no question th at oil politics was an im portant factor in shaping U.S. policy in 1948. Top officials in the defense and state departm ents opposed U.S. support o f the Zionists precisely because they saw it would jeopardize the U.S. hold on Middle East oil reserves, and the Jo in t Chiefs o f Staff had already warned (in 1946) against any policy th at would require the dispatch o f U.S. troops: "The political shock attending the reappearance o f US armed forces in the Middle East

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would unnecessarily risk such serious disturbances throughout th e area as to dw arf any local Palestine difficulties.'*38 The U nited States followed the path o f least resistance, bo th in term s o f dom estic political pressures and international com plications. As it turned out, the only repercussions on the oil fro n t came in Pales* tine itself, w here, after the Zionist takeover o f Haifa, Iraq shut o ff crude deliveries (via pipeline) to the Iraq Petroleum Company refinery there, foregoing about h alf its norm al exports and foreign exchange. The Iraqis steadfastly refused to renew the oil flow, despite consider­ able pressure from the United States through U.N. m ediator Bem adotte. A related developm ent occured in Syria, where negotiations for the Aramco Trans*Arabian Pipeline project right-of-way were being conduc­ ted. An agreem ent was worked o u t in Septem ber 1947 after a two-week conference o f U.S. diplom atic personnel in the region, b u t the w ar o f 1948 broke o u t before ratification by the Syrian parliam ent. Syrian reluctance to proceed was sidestepped when Colonel Husni Zaim seized control o f the government at the end o f M ardi 1949 and dissolved the parliam ent. The U nited States quickly recognized the new regime and the agreem ent w ith TAPline was finally signed in Damascus in May 1949. The lim ited application o f econom ic w arfare by the Arab regimes during and after 1948 m ust be related to the class character o f those regimes, the lim ited econom ic resources a t their disposal, and their even more lim ited control over those resources. In alm ost every instance the regimes were composed o f and represented the interests o f the landed oligarchies and bourgeoises who had come to power under (British) colonial tutelage. It has been said, n o t w ithout some justification, th at they entered the Palestine w ar in 1948 as m uch to fight and checkm ate each other as to confront the Zionists in b attle.39 Their corruption and subservience to imperialism was fam ous. It is a significant exam ple o f the interaction o f the Palestinian national struggle w ith the general course o f the class struggle in the Arab world th at the defeat o f 1948 precipitated the overthrow o f m ost o f these regimes in the following decade (in order o f their proxim ity and responsibility to Palestine): Egypt in 1952; Syria in 1954; Iraq in 1958. Abdullah o f Jordan was assassinated in 1951, b u t British and later American direct intervention managed to preserve his mercenary state under his grandson, Hussein. The oil producers were an exception; there was no upheaval in Saudi Arabia, and even in Iraq it to o k the Baghdad Pact, the Eisenhower D octrine and the crisis in Lebanon to bring down Nuri as-Said and the Hashemite entourage. This can be attributed to the decision by the oil

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m onopolies to buy o ff the regimes and a t the same tim e give them a greater stake in perpetuating the status quo by offering them a nom inal 50/50 share in their vast profits from Middle East production. George McGhee, then a high state departm ent official and later an oil com pany executive, described the strategy: We felt it exceedingly im portant from the standpoint o f the stability o f the regimes in the area and the security o f th e Middle East as a whole and the continued ownership o f our oil concessions there and the ability to exploit them , th a t the Governm ent o f Saudi Arabia receive an increased oil incom e.30 If the 1948 defeat signalled the death knell for the landed oligarchy and bougeoisie, 1956 represented the apogee o f the radical nationalism o f the p etit bourgeois regimes o f Nasser in Egypt and the Baath in Syria (and later Iraq). The particular origins o f th at crisis were o f an eco­ nom ic dim ension: the dedson by Egypt to nationalize the Suez Canal and to enter in to aid agreements w ith the Soviet Union in order to assert some autonom y for the Egyptian econom y regarding Western control. The nationalization issue was doubly portentious for the oil­ m en, for it served as an example to the Arab peoples o f w hat m ight be achieved in the oil-producing states along similar lines. The United States, for its part, used an array o f econom ic levers to pressure Egypt, Israel and Britain and France to arrive a t a settlem ent. Even before the Suez crisis in November, there were widespread strikes by oil and other workers in April in Bahrain, the adm inistrative center o f British rule in the Gulf, demanding, among other things, the dismissal o f the British political agent, Sir Charles Belgrave. In June 1956 a visit o f King Saud to Dhahran sparked a spontaneous protest against Aramco. Shaken by the massive character o f the dem onstration and its nationalist anti­ im perialist slogans, the King ordered a crackdown on any and all trade union or political activity by workers. The m ilitant and popular charac­ ter o f Nasser’s appeal throughout the Arab world was seen as a clear th reat to Western econom ic interests w hich could be easily detonated by the simmering Palestine conflict. This fear was heightened when in 1958 Egypt and Syria joined to form the U nited Arab Republic (UAR), since, according to oil industry sources, it seemed to enhance Nasser's ability to disrupt oil operations by controlling the IPC and Aramco pipelines through Syria as well as the Suez Canal. This in tu rn led to the construction o f a pipeline in Israel (w ith French financial assis­ tance) and increased exploration activity in Libya and Algeria. The

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form ation o f the UAR enhanced further the prestige o f the radical nationalist forces in the Arab world. The m ilitary coup in Iraq on July 14, 1958 was th e first against a puppet regime in an oil-producing country and precipitated the U.S. and British m ilitary intervention into Lebanon and Jordan, partly to guard against nationalist victories in those countries, and largely to prepare for a possible invasion o f Iraq. Repeated declarations by th e new.regime th at oil interests would n o t be touched and the absence o f any indigenous counter-revolutionary activity removed the possibility o f m ilitary intervention in Iraq. In the 1960s Iraq took the lead in th e Arab world in asserting popular sovereignty over its national resources. The period between 1956 and 1967 marks the rapid development o f an “oil consciousness“ on the part o f the Middle Eastern regimes and those political forces challenging them . While n o t o f imm ediate rele­ vance to the Palestine conflict, an understanding o f the meaning and im plications o f the oil weapon requires a probe o f the political charac­ ter o f the persons and institutions through which the oil weapon was im plem ented. It is n o t necessary to detail the mechanisms by which Western corporations m aintained control o f Middle East oil, nor th e waste and exploitation th at characterized their adm inistration o f this power. The governments had been totally dependent on the companies for the econom ic inform ation and analyses used in form ulating conces­ sion term s and revisions. As late as 1951 neme o f the Iraqi negotiators knew anything about the function o f the posted prices on w hich their country’s revenues were to be calculated, nor did they have access to the econom ic studies th at would help them form ulate a negotiating position n o t effectively predeterm ined by the com pany. By the middle o f the 50s, a small b u t growing num ber o f Arabs w ith Western technical training in petroleum engineering and economics began to fill positions in the companies and in the state oil m inistries. The m ost influential o f these was Abdullah Tariki, who returned to Saudi Arabia from the University o f Texas in 1954 at age 29 to become the first director general o f petroleum affairs. Tariki's dedication to educating the public about oil affairs, to improving concession term s and opening up management positions for Saudis, to using th e coun­ try ’s w ealth for the benefit o f all the people — made him stand o u t in a regime where venality and corruption was the rule and where power and influence depended on one’s lineage in the House o f Saud. Tariki realized early th at real changes in company-government relations could only come about through concerted action by the producing countries. He pressed for the convening o f an Arab Oil

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Congress under the auspices o f the Arab League, which was finally held in April 1959. While results were lim ited and vague, this communica­ tion and contact facilitated the convening o f the special m eeting o f oil m inisters in Baghdad in Septem ber 1960 after the second round o f com pany-dictated price cuts. OPEC emerged from this m eeting. The political transform ation o f the Middle East during the 1950s, a trans­ form ation related in no small measure to the im pact o f the Palestine conflict, was characterized by increasingly radical popular demands regarding the future o f the oil industry. These demands threatened companies and regimes alike. There could be no question o f w hether things would change, b u t rather w hat forces would dom inate and control those changes and how extensive they would be. OPEC m ust be understood in the context o f the political forces contending for power and influence in the region. While it achieved some very lim ited economic gains during the 1960s, it failed to achieve the measure o f control th at Tariki, perhaps naively, had envisaged for it. Indicative o f the problem s it would face was the consolidation o f the Saudi m onarchy under Feisal in 1962 w ith U.S. assistance, leading to Tariki’s dismissal from his post and eventual banishm ent from Saudi Arabia. Tariki was the m ost radical o f the technocrats; his departure left OPEC in the hands o f those who distrusted the vague Arab nationalist ideology then in the ascendancy and who saw the task o f OPEC to lie in “removing oil m atters from the realm o f ordinary poli­ tics” perhaps w ithout realizing th at this was in itself a highly political stance which best suited the reactionary regimes by depolitidzing the one area in which they were m ost politically vulnerable. In the end, though, it was not the political character and cultural dependency o f the technocrats which determ ined the politics o f OPEC, b u t the fact th at they were functioning as agents o f regimes who for the m ost part owed their power to the oil companies and Western governments. It could go no further than allowed by its m ost conser­ vative members, like Saudi Arabia, for whom OPEC served as a means o f diffusing Arab nationalist criticism . The alliance betw een the com­ panies and the reactionary regimes is perhaps m ost clearly expressed in the struggle for control o f Iraqi oil during this period, precipitated by the issuance o f Law 80 under the Kassem regime in 1961 and later by Laws 97 and 123 in 1967. The companies helped ferm ent the political instability th at characterized Iraqi politics in the 1960s by reducing o u tput and therefore the main source o f national incom e. Saudi Arabia, through the ubiquitous Yamani, gave the companies every incentive to avoid making concessions to Iraq by warning th at

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any concession to Iraq would have to be im plem ented in Saudi Arabia as well. He gave this approach a m ore general form ulation in 1966 by proclaim ing his opposition to “unilateral action*' (as urged by the nationalists) as “inconsistent w ith the friendly atm osphere which characterizes our relation w ith the oil companies at present.“ “ I am sure,” he added, “th at th e oil companies operating in Saudi Arabia have no interest whatsoever in shaking our faith in this philosophy b y showing us th at other means are m ore rewarding in safeguarding our oil interests.” 31 On the surface the changes in the Middle East from 1948 to the eve o f the 1967 June War were enorm ous, chiefly related in the success o f the radical regimes in nationalizing th eir resources and m ain industrial and financial sectors. But underneath the surface another reality was lurking. The political m om entum o f th e radical nationalists had been jo lted by the Egyptian fiasco in Yemen and a kind o f political m odus vivendi was erected by the contending regimes, chiefly Egypt and Saudi Arabia, at a series o f sum m its beginning in 1964 (where n o t coin­ cidentally a new bureaucratic form ation called th e Palestine lib eratio n Organization was p u t fo rth , chiefly to com pensate for th e inability o f the regimes to confront the Israeli diversion o f th e Jordan river waters). One m ust look at the underlying econom ic reality. A U nited Nations survey o f the situation in th e early sixties revealed th a t prim ary com­ m odities m ade up 96 percent o f the exports o f Middle Eastern coun­ tries. F or the non-oil producers these were m ainly agricultural products. Forty-five percent o f the im ports o f these countries were prim ary com­ m odities, m ainly food item s, th e value o f w hich exceeded m achinery and transport equipm ent im ports together. Sixty-five percent o f these countries’ exports w ent to the capitalist countries; sixty-four percent o f their im ports came from those same countries. The other “export” n o t covered in these statistics is the outflow o f capital, including foreign profits, which exceeded capital im ports (investm ents and aid) by $1 billion annually.32 On the eve o f th e 1967 w ar, it was clear th a t the end o f form al colonialism had n o t ended th e subordination o f th e region’s econom y to the needs o f the industrialized West rather than the needs o f its own peoples. This is the fundam ental econom ic dim en­ sion th at underlies the catastrophe o f 1967. Econom ic Aspects, 1967-1976 If 1948 represented the u tte r failure o f the landed oligarchies and com­ prador bourgeoisie to resolve the national question posed by the Zionist endeavor, 1967 represented the failure o f a similar scale o f the p etit

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bourgeois radical nationalist regimes represented by Nasser in Egypt and th e Baath in Syria. There w ere, to be sure, m any contributing causes to this devastating defeat, and it w ould be a m istake to over­ look, fo r exam ple, the degree o f im perialist collusion th a t lay behind the Israeli blitzkrieg . But the single m ost im portant cause lay w ith the failure o f the regimes in question to m obilize their societies for the kind o f protracted struggle th a t is critical fo r th e liberation o f Palestine. Behind th is failure, and sym ptom atic o f it, was th e ex ten t to w hich th e class divisions in those societies had been m aintained and accentuated, while th e surplus exacted from th e masses was used to construct a m ilitary m achine th a t was com pletely inadequate to th e task o f libera­ ting Palestine or even defending th e co untry’s borders, b u t was used instead to discourage and repress indigenous mass actions aim ed at social and political change. In Egypt in 1966, 1 percent o f th e rural population appropriated 25 percent o f th e agricultural incom e: 50 per­ cent o f th e population appropriated 25 percent o f the agricultural incom e; 50 percent o f the population received less th an 20 percent o f th e incom e. In Syria 50 percent o f th e peasants were still landless after a decade o f land reform , and the regime published th a t 60 percent o f the state budget was devoted to the defense establishm ent.33 H ie regimes had succeeded in transposing class frustrations to focus on th e national question, b u t th en u tterly failed to resolve th a t question. Politically the radical nationalist p etit bourgeois regimes proferred an alternative to b o th reaction and revolution —socialism w ithout class struggle. Their failure in 1967 resulted forem ost in a political polariza­ tio n betw een th e forces o f reaction, led by Saudi Arabia, and a new com m itm ent to revolutionary change sparked by th e resurgence o f th e Palestine resistance m ovem ent. The struggle betw een these forces over th e n ex t six years effectively determ ined th e ex ten t to w hich econom ic factors w ould play a param ount role in th e n ex t war. To review th e ex ten t to w hich econom ic aspects came in to play in 1967, particularly w ith regard to oil: in th e im m ediate afterm ath o f the Israeli attack there were dem onstrations and strikes in th e Saudi oil fields. Num erous Palestinian w orkers were deported and there were over 800 arrests. A strike at Aram co on June 25 resulted in damage to Am erican p roperty. Radio Baghdad broadcast an appeal o f th e Iraqi oil workers* union calling on m em bers to guard installations against spontaneous sabotage. Libyan oil w orkers kept facilities there shut dow n for m ore th an a m onth. There was a suspension o f all oil ship­ m ents from all the producers for about a w eek beginning June 7 , and an em bargo on shipm ents to Britain and th e U nited States follow ed.

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Abu Dhabi, where popular dem ands to join th e b rief boycott had been ignored, finally shut down operations on June 11, after an explosion wrecked a British bank. By the end o f the m onth, Arab oil operations were back to 50 percent o f norm al, the m ain exceptions being Iraq and Libya. B ut in a m ore fundam ental sense things would never be “norm al” again. Saudi Arabia was com plaining th at the boycott o f the U nited States and Britain was costing m ore than it was w orth, while in Syria and Iraq the technocrats were pressing m ore strongly than ever fo r nationalization. Iraq unilaterally resolved the dispute w ith IPC over N orth Rumaila by authorizing the state com pany, INOC, to undertake production there. But the radical nationalists, after th e June defeat, could n o t prevail. Iraq and Algeria among the oil producers, supported by Egypt and Syria, pressed in high-level political meetings for strong measures against the industry. A comm uniqué after a mid-August m eeting in Baghdad o f all Arab m inisters o f finance and oil, did n o t even m ention nationalization proposals. The stage was set for the Arab sum m it con­ ference in K hartoum , where the “spectacular rapprochem ent” betw een Nasser and Feisal was the result o f Egyptian capitulation to th e Saudi line on the question o f oil embargoes. The conference stipulated th at “nothing should be done to im pair the financial capacity o f th e Arab oil-producing states to back the unified Arab effo rt; and th at the res­ ponsibility for deciding on appropriate measures should be left to the producing countries themselves” .34 In return for this and im m ediate withdrawal o f troops from Yemen, Egypt was granted tw o-thirds o f an annual subsidy o f $378 m illion from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Libya; the rest was earm arked for Jordan. The partial embargoes o f the United States and Britain were lifted under the form ula o f using oil as a “posi­ tive w eapon.” Saudi Arabia’s determ ination to hold the financial reins tightly was evident in Feisal’s refusal to grant any funds to Syria, which had boycotted the conference. Polarization continued. Iraq moved in a steadily m ore assertive direc­ tion which culm inated in the oil agreem ent w ith th e Soviet Union in 1969. Pressure built up w ithin OPEC for higher revenues. In effect, the bill for reactionary hegem ony on the oil question was passed on to th e W estern companies and governments. This dimension was outlined by the editor o f M iddie E ast E conom ic Survey: In the present political turm oil the m ajor Arab oil producing counttries have on the whole opted for a m oderate course and, at the expense o f considerable effort on their part in highly explosive

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circum stances, perform ed an invaluable service for the whole world in maintaining the flow o f oil to international m arkets, hi the process o f accomplishing this, they have incurred very heavy finan­ cial burdens which, if n o t made up in some way or another, could result in heavy damage to their developing economies. It is therefore n o t surprising th at the Arab oil producers should now be looking to the consuming countries and the oil companies for a broad measure o f understanding when it comes to their current drive for an increase in their revenue from oil.35 Under the leadership o f Saudi Arabia, the conservative oil states moved to isolate themselves politically from the radical upsurge in the rest o f the Arab world following the 1967 war by creating the Organization o f Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC). Such an organization had long been demanded by the radical technocrats like Tariki, one which countries like Syria and Egypt would have a stake in as transit states as well as m inor producers. OAPEC, though, was restricted to states for which oil production was the m ain source o f incom e: Saudi Arabia, Libya and Kuwait. Iraq rejected the initial invitation to join. The M iddle E ast E conom ic Survey observed : The purpose o f this restrictive condition is clearly to ensure th at all countries adm itted in to the organization would be equally anxious to m aintain a purely econom ic approach to the developm ent o f th e oil sector to the exclusion, as far as possible, o f dangerous political crosscurrents.36 It proved impossible to keep questions o f oil policy isolated from the Palestinian struggle. The m ain body o f th e resistance, Fatah, received financial support from Saudi Arabia and other oil states, b u t radical Palestinians carried their hostility to Arab reaction beyond rhetoric in June 1969 when the Popular F ront for the Liberation o f Palestine (PFLP) sabotaged a portion o f the TAPline running through the occupied Golan Heights. Similar attacks followed. Despite these om in­ ous portents, though, Western control o f oil in the G ulf seemed rela­ tively secure. When the “dangerous political crosscurrents” started to blow, they came n o t from the G ulf, where everyone's attention was riveted, b u t from the h o t N orth African sands o f Libya, where rapid and intense exploitation o f oil reserves gave the industry a strategic vulnerability it had n o t experienced in any other country at any other tim e, a direct consequence o f the 1967 war. On Septem ber 1 ,1 9 6 9 ,

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young arm y officers under the leadership o f Muamm&r Qaddafi toppled the m onarchy in a bloodless coup: the code words were “Palestine is ours.'* Despite the . cautious moves o f the revolutionary regime in its first year, the M iddle E ast E conom ic Survey anticipated th at the coup could well signify a m om entous realignm ent o f the balance o f forces in the Arab w o rld . . . and this is likely to have long-term im plications on a num ber o f fronts — n o t the least for the rem aining oil-produ­ cing m onarchies, for the oil industry, and for the Arab struggle against Israel together w ith the related strategic interests o f the big powers.37 This study will n o t review the process th at culm inated in crude oil price hikes in Teheran and Tripoli in early 1971. The OPEC demands were genuine, albeit prom pted by the unilateral initiative o f Libya and Algeria. Once the need for an increase had becom e unm istakably clear, the companies could m old and channel those demands in to specific form s th at did n o t threaten the structure o f the industry and in fact enhanced its stability and profitability. In this way they were aided by the pliable politics o f the dom inant OPEC countries, Iran and Saudi Arabia, and were able to short circuit m ore serious challenges from Libya, Algeria and Iraq. This scenario was even m ore blatantly repeated in the push for nationalization and the Saudi counterm ove dubbed “participation*': “We w ant the present setup to continue as long as possible and at all costs to avoid any disastrous clash o f interests which would shake the foundations o f the whole oil business. T hat is why we are calling for participation.'*38 During the actual participation negotiations in 1972 Yamani bluntly told a Financial Tim es conference in London th at participation repre­ sented an alternative to nationalization for “appeasing patriotic senti­ m ents'' in the Arab W orld.39 The next opportunity for Saudi Arabia to “appease patriotic senti­ m ents" was the outbreak o f the O ctober war. Before discussing the application o f the oil weapon in th at con tex t, a review o f some o f the events o f 1973 th at led up to th at war is appropriate. Alm ost every m onth o f th at year was punctuated by incidents th at stressed the fragility o f the status quo: the Libyan airliner shot down by the Israelis over Sinai in February; the Black Septem ber attack on the Saudi embassy in K hartoum in M arch; the Israeli comm ando raid in to Beirut in April w hich killed three resistance leaders and num erous civilians. The late spring brought direct reports from Saudi Arabia th at Feisal

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feared he could no longer stand virtually alone in the Arab world as a U.S. ally. A U.S. offer o f Phantom jets was turned down as being no substitute for a change in U.S. support o f Israel. These energy warnings were sharpened on May 15, the anniversary o f the 1948 defeat, by the sym bolic shut-off o f oil production for one hour in K uw ait, Algeria and Iraq, and for tw enty-four hours in Libya. In the spring o f 1973 Malcom K err ended his review o f Nixon adm inistration policies by noting th at : the Palestine crisis has crystallized the accum ulating unhappiness o f a whole generation, and continues today to channel it in a rising stream against certain targets th at under other circum stances would n o t be so vulnerable: the U nited States, their own governm ents and the established b u t shaky fabric o f institutions and classes in their own society. K err concluded w ith the following observation: Americans m ay well come to wish th at their governm ent had taken decisive steps to stem the d rift and give the forces o f m oderation in Arab society a chance to recover their grip on affairs while there was still tim e.40 By this tim e pressure had already built up for an Arab oil policy th at could be used to pressure the U nited States. The OPEC success in the price negotiations, particularly Libya’s careful use o f production cuibs, raised the obvious question o f why such tactics could n o t be used to secure a political objective. A t the end o f 1972 the Econom ic Council o f the Arab League issued a study entitled E conom ic Interests in th e Service o f Arab Causes which took the view th at while Arab interests in the long run would best be served by developing independent and auto­ nom ous industrially based econom ies, in the short run a m ore restrict­ ive oil production policy would b o th conserve wasting resources for future use and bring a significant degree o f pressure on industrial con­ suming countries to alter their support for Israel and hostility tow ard the Palestinian cause. The report did n o t call for an embargo b u t a slower expansion rate th at w ould allow m axim um flexibility for pro­ portionate degress o f escalation. In July 1973 the Palestine Liberation Organization endorsed the tactic o f freezing oil production at existing levels. The Saudi decision to cooperate w ith the oil embargo after the war had started is closely related to the Egyptian shift to the right under

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Sadat, and it was on FeisaTs urging th at the Russian arms advisers were sent packing in 1972. When this faded to produce any perceptible change in U.S. policy, the Saudis were under some obligation to support Sadat when he finally chose the course o f lim ited war. For the m onths leading up to the war, the Saudi campaign to use oil as a weapon was restricted to the arena o f communiqués and press interviews. Produc­ tion for the first seven m onths o f 1973 was up to 37 percent over the previous year, w ith July production up a whopping 62 percent and production scheduled to h it 10 million barrels per day by early 1974. The campaign was aimed at securing a public and superficial indication o f change in U.S. policy th at would validate Saudi-U.S. ties and pre­ clude the need to actually wield the “weapon.” In August, Prince Abdullah, FeisaTs brother and head o f internal security forces, urged th at “all Arab countries, w hether oil producers o f n o t, should act to prevent the debate on the use o f oil from being transferred to the s tre e t/'41 A m eeting o f Arab oil m inisters on September 4 produced no recom mendations for the upcoming m eeting o f heads o f state and apparently split betw een the Saudi-led camp and the nationalists push­ ing for seizing control o f U.S. operations. As it was, Sadat had to put public pressure on Feisal after the war was well under way. Only Iraq had moved to action by nationalizing the U.S. interests in the Basra Petroleum Company. This set a m ilitant tone for future deliberations, b u t it was m ore than a week, following N ixon's request to the U.S. Congress for m ore than $2.2 billion in m ilitary aid to Israel, before the OAPEC embargo o f selected countries and general production cutback was initiated. The oil weapon was an integral feature o f the O ctober war. The same popular pressures th at forced the Sadat regime to undertake a lim ited m ilitary campaign also forced Feisal to implement an embargo o f oil to the allies o f Israel. The oil weapon was specifically instrum ental in cutting into Israel's diplom atic and political support among th e W estern countries. But ju st as the war itself was lim ited in its cope and purpose, the oil w eapon's effectiveness was im portant b u t lim ited. None o f th e contradictions in the Middle East which led to the war have been m ore than partially defused or deflected. Even the question o f the occupied Egyptian and Syrian territories has not been resolved, n o t to speak o f the m uch more intractable question o f Palestinian demands. The unstated goals o f the war included the consolidation o f political power and legitimacy by rightist forces in the frontline countries and in the Arab world as a whole. In this sense the oil weapon can best be understood as a class weapon, an instrum ent for providing the Sadat

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regime w ith a political victory over Israel and a means o f expanding the political and econom ic role o f Saudi Arabia, Iran and other reaction* ary forces throughout the Arab w orld. It thus furthered the political trend set in m otion by the defeat o f the radical nationalist Arab regimes in 1967. It also furthered U.S. goals o f prom oting the reactionary regimes against more radical elem ents. For the U nited States, under Kissinger’s direction, the w ar provoked the crisis which Kissinger used to justify a shift from alm ost com plete reliance on Zionism to a more equal reliance on Arab reaction as well. The war proved to be the political trem or th at unleashed pressures th at had been building for more than a generation for the producing states to take unilateral control o f pricing and production policies. The result was the sharp increase in crude prices and significant cutbacks in production for conservation and political reasons. This in tu rn , though, has not proved to be an unm itigated blessing, as the capitalist countries and corporations have expanded their m arkets in to the Middle East and are lining up secure supplies o f raw m aterials and profits as well. The bulk o f the oil revenues are being spent in ways th at strengthen rather than weaken the prevailing international system. Even the development o f prim ary industries like steel and petrochem icals comes at a tim e when the m ultinational corporations are looking for locations where labor is controlled by regimes whose m ost m odem sector is the police and armed forces, and where pollution can be im posed. Will the Middle East oil producers be content w ith moving one rung up the ladder b u t being no closer to the top? Saudi Arabia under its present regime no doubt will. What about th e radical nationalist regimes like Algeria and Iraq? They have made the m ost serious efforts to develop well-integrated economies relatively less open to the vicissi­ tudes o f the international system . But the Algerian program, at least, has been subjected to sharp criticism from Algerian dissidents who argue th a t its industrialization is being accomplished on the basis o f an exchange w ith international capital, th at it is highly dependent on the im portation o f Western equipm ent and technology, and th at to date it has tended to reinforce the hydrocarbon export orientation o f the econom y, albeit at a higher stage. The existence o f this debate is a reflection o f the fact th at the highly integrated and pervasive nature o f the international capitalist econom y calls into question the possibility o f development outside th at system except along the path o f socialist revolution. The debate further shows the distinct need for a class perspective in discussing the m erits o f economic nationalism as a development

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strategy, since th at nationalism in and o f itself seldom represents sharp disengagement from the international system. Patterns o f uneven devel­ opm ent and distorted income distribution are reproduced and accentu­ ated w ithin and among the countries and regions. In an age where the most dynamic force is the m ultinational corporation, economic national­ ism may not reflect more than the growth o f a techno-bureaucratic class com m itted to a version o f state capitalism and leading to a modifi­ cation b u t not a radical change o f the country's economic role. It may reflect a shift in the basis o f capital accum ulation from primary produc­ tion and industries to technology-intensive producer and consumer goods in which international capital is mainly interested in a reliable and adequate supply o f raw m aterials, even at a higher price and not necessarily m aintaining direct control. It is surely no mere flip o f the tongue th at led Kissinger to discuss Third World demands at UNCTAD in term s o f “trade unionism ," and from a class perspective economic nationalism may serve as an alternative rather than a stepping stone to socialism. But this is simply to suggest the shape o f the present stage, for the resulting relationship is bound to be anything b u t stable. The inter­ action between the class and national struggles o f the Arab people will surely produce violent ruptures in the future o f which the current struggle in Lebanon is one m anifestation. In a study o f the significant economic aspects o f the struggle from a political point o f view, an understanding o f the changing class form ations o f Arab societies and the shifting class character o f their leadership is essential. Understand­ ing th at leadership is a necessary precondition to changing it. One thing th at is clear from this survey, b u t which has been conveniently shelved by the Arab regimes today, is th at the struggle against Zionism can only be won by struggling against imperialism, not by striking deals w ith future Kissingers.

N otes 1. The text o f the convention can be found in Q uitos b a n d , ed., Economic H istory o f the M iddle East (Chicago, 1966), p. 39. 2. Z.Y. Hershlag, Introduction to the M odem Economic H istory o f the M iddle East (Leiden, 1964), pp. 44-5. 3. Urquhait, “Turkey,” in Issawi, Econom ic H istory, p. 42. 4. M.S. Hasan, “the Role o f Foreign Trade in the Economic Development o f Iraq, 1864-1964,” in Studies in the Econom ic H istory o f the M iddle East, (ed., M.A. Cook (London, 1970), p. 346. 5. Edward C. Clark, “The Ottoman Industrial Revolution,” International

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Journal o f M iddle East Studies 5 (1974): 66*7. 6. Ib id , p. 69. 7. Ib id ., p. 73. 8. Samih Farsoun, "Changes In Labor Force Structure in Selected Arab Countries," paper presented at the Joint AAUG —Kuwait National Council for Culture, Arts and Letters Conference on Issues in Human Resource Development in the Arab World, December, 1975. 9. Charles Issawi, E gypt in Révolution (London, 1963), p. 19. 10. Hasan, "Role o f Foreign Trade”, p. 349. 1 1 .Ib id ., pp. 350-52. 12. John Reudy, "Dynamics o f Land Alienation," in The Transformation o f Palestine, ed. Ibrahim Abu-Lughod (Evanston, 1971), p. 124. 13. William Polk, et aL, Backdrop to Tragedy (Boston, 1957), p. 236, quoted in Reudy, "Dynamics," p. 124. 14. Talal Asad, "Anthropological Texts and Ideological Problems," in Review o f M iddle East Studies /, eds. Asad and Owen (London, 1975), p. 15. lS .I b id ,p . 15. 16. Ib id ., pp. 15*16. 17. Ib id ., p. 18. 18. David Waines, "The Nationalist Resistance," in Abu Lughod, Transforma* tion, p. 224. 1 9 .Ib id ., p. 227. Emphasis in original. 20. Ib id ., pp. 227*8. 2 1 .1 b id ,p . 230. 22. For an analysis of the motives o f the Arab states in this period, see Fawwaz Trabulsi, “The Palestine Problem,” N ew L e ft Review 57 (September/October 1969): 65-71. 23. Sheila Ryan, "Israeli Economic Policy in the Occupied Areas,” MERIP R eports 24 (January 1974): 5. TA. Ib id , 25. Abba Eban, Voice o f Israel (New York, 1957) p. 111. 26. Ryan, “ Israeli Economic," p. 6. 27. Don Peretz, Israel and the Palestine Arabs (Washington, 1958), p. 143. 28. Foreign Relations o f the U nited States, 1946, YH (Washington, 1969), p. 632. 29. Trabulsi, "Palestine Problem ," pp. 68-9,73. 30. Testimony to the Subcommittee on Multinational Corporations, S a u te Foreign Relations Committee, January 28,1974; released February 24,1974. 31. M iddle East Econom ic Survey, November 18,1966. 32. United Nations Economic and Social Office in Beirut, Studies on Selected D evelopm ent Problems in Various Countries in the M iddle East (New York, 1967), pp. 14-15. 33. Trabulsi, "Palestine Problem ," pp. 80,84. 34. M iddle East Econom ic Survey, September 1,1967. 35. M EES, September 22,1967. 36. M EES, January 12,1968. 37. M EES, September 5,1969. 38. Zuhayr Mikdashi, ed., C ontinuity and Change in the World Oil Industry (Beirut, 1970), p. 220. 39. Joe Stork, M iddle East O il and the Energy Crisis (New York, 1975), p. 299. 40. Malcom Kerr, "Nixon’s Policy Prospects," Journal o f Palestine Studies, Spring 1973, pp. 28-9. 41. M EES, August 17,1973.

J A l O

E F F IC A C Y O F Z IO N IS T ID E O L O G Y A N D ITS IM P L IC A TIO N S f o r t h e a r a b - i s r a e l i C O N F L IC T

th e

Michael C. Hudson

There is no doubt th at Zionism today remains an exdusivist, particular* ist ideology, a throw back to the folk nationalisms o f the m id-nineteenth century. Nor is there any doubt th at the behavioral m anifestations o f Zionism in the Israeli state have given rise to system atic discrim ination against Arabs, both Muslim and Christian, and also against Jews from Arab societies. This pattern o f discrim ination has been so widely observed by Western journalists, Arab lawyers like Sabri Jiryis, and even by Israelis such as Israel Shahak and Felicia Langer as to require no further elaboration.1 As the recent events in the Galilee and Hebron indicate, the policy o f discrim ination has n o t diminished over the years, despite the relaxation o f m ilitary restrictions in some areas. R ather, it continues up to this very day and in such an aggressive form as to require the physical displacem ent o f Arab individuals and comm unities.2 It is im portant, therefore, to dwell upon the exdusivist character o f Zionism if a proper understanding o f this phenomenon is to be reached. But such a focus should n o t obscure another characteristic o f Zionism th at is even m ore im portant for an understanding o f its remarkable political efficacy.. This is what may be called the m ultiple appeals o f Zionism to people, Jews and non-Jews, living outside Israel. If Zionism is understood simply as the racist nationalism o f a small state called Israel the main sources o f its power are ignored. One o f these is th e Jewish communities o f the Western sodeties. The other is among im portant non-Jewish elites o f these sodeties. The fact th at a national­ ism so exdusivist in its practices, so parochial in its concerns, and so defective in its m oral vision could generate interest, let alone support, from outsiders, Jewish or non-Jewish, is seemingly paradoxical. It demands additional explanation. Today it may seem self-evident th at the natural constituency o f Zionism should be all the w orld's Jews. In fact, however, the political congruence o f Zionism and Judaism is o f relatively recent origin and still far from consolidated. Not until World War II did the Zionist move­ m ent become the dom inant political tendency in Judaism , and perhaps not until the 1967 war did it succeed in mobilizing Jews on a truly mass

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scale. It has taken concerted effort by Zionist thinkers and organizers to win world Judaism to their program . How was this accomplished? The answer lies in the m ultiple faces which Zionism could present to Jews o f different orientations. Chameleon-like, it could take on a vari­ ety o f ideological colorations and thus broaden its appeal in the diverse Jewish com m unities o f the West. Similarly, Zionism could and still does present a variety o f faces to non-Jews. To be able to do so seems incom patible, if not directly con­ tradictory, w ith exdusivism and particularism ; yet these m utliple appeals have had an undeniable reality — and success. Although Zion­ ism is centrally concerned w ith w hat it has unilaterally defined as the political aspirations o f the w orld's Jews, it is also —and paradoxically a movement which has been able to enlist supporters and sym pathizers from im portant non-Jewish elites throughout the Western w orld. To them Zionism is not racist chauvinism b u t a m oral force, a religious doctrine, a means o f assuaging guilt and even latent anti-Semitism , and a strategic and economic interest. An instructive comparison in this respect may be made w ith Arab nationalism . Although Arab national­ ism , in its various form s, has m any friends in the Third W orld, it gener­ ates mainly indifference or outright hostility from the Western industrial societies. Zionism 's success among Western gentiles, o f course, is due in part to the influential Jewish com m unties th at are found throughout the West, especially in the United States. The distribution o f Jewish com­ m unities clearly is im portant in explaining the success o f Zionism as an organization. B ut, contrary to some impressions, the Jewish communi­ ties in the West do n o t control the larger non-Jewish societies. They rem ain m inorities, and still — unfortunately — in several countries, despised m inorities to bigots in the m ajority populations. They are well-to-do m inorities in m ost cases b u t in no way do they possess th e economic or financial influence to control th e m ajority societies. The answer lies in the content o f Zionist ideology and the specific appeals which Zionism makes to specific elites. Whatever the political situation at any given m om ent may be —such as a t the present tim e when it appears th at Israel is once again in a superior position because o f inter-Arab weaknesses —the long-term fact is th at Israel’s future depends increasingly on the support it m ust have from non Jew ish sources in the West. Anybody interested in the future o f Palestine, therefore, m ust have the best possible understanding o f th e ideological linkages betw een Zionism and th e world outside.

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Appeals to Worid Jewry The early history o f Zionism affords some interesting insights into the diversity o f the Jewish peoples in the nineteenth century and the diversity o f ideological appeals embodied in such seminal thinkers o f Zionism as Leon Pinsker, Ahad Ha-Am, A D . Gordon and Theodor Herzl. What emerged in the first Zionist Congress a t Basle in 1897 and definitely by the seventh Zionist Conference o f 1905 was a pro* gram th at responded to several strongly felt, if contradictory, concerns in the European Jewish com m unities. One o f these concerns was fear. Plagued by persecution in the Christian societies o f Europe ever since their expulsion from Palestine by the Romans, many Jews dreaded the thought o f extinction as an ethnic-religious com m unity. Even during periods o f Gentile toleration, such as the post-Napoleonic Enlightenm ent, there were some who feared the obliteration o f their culture precisely because o f such toler­ ance. In the enlightened societies o f France, Britain and Germany in the early nineteenth century, the solution to the “Jewish problem*' was assim ilation. Jews were given the opportunity to merge into th e m ajority’s society and culture — and m any, especially in the m iddle and upper classes, to o k it. Yet some Jewish intellectuals feared th at the unique Jewish heritage might thus ultim ately disappear. The more predom inant and intensely felt fear, o f course, was the fear o f physical persecution through the program s. As historians like A rthur Hertzberg have pointed out, the program s o f Russia in 1881 following the assassi* nation o f Tsar Alexander II unleashed terror in the ghettoes o f Eastern Europe.3 Then, in the 1890s, the blight o f anti-Semitism broke o u t in the presumably enlightened Western Europe when the Dreyfuss affair rocked French society. In her autobiography Golda Meir paints a vivid description o f the fear felt by her family and neighbors in the ghetto o f Pinsk.4 And so, the emerging comm on elem ent in the European Jewish perspective o f the late nineteenth century was a palpable fear — the fear o f not belonging. It was an attitude th at was given peihaps its m ost dram atic expression by the early Zionist thinker, Leon Pinsker: The essence o f the problem , as we see it, lies in the fact th at, in the m idst o f the nations among whom the Jews reside, they form a distinct element which cannot be readily digested by any n a tio n .. . . Among the living nations o f the earth the Jews occupy the position o f a nation long since d e a d .. . . This ghostlike apparition o f a people w ithout unity or organization, w ithout land or other bond o f union,

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no longer alive, and yet moving about among the living —this eerie form scarcely paralleled in history, unlike anything th at preceded or followed it, could n o t fail to make a strange and peculiar impression upon the im agination o f the nations___ He m ust be blind indeed who will assert th at the Jews are not th e chosen people, the people chosen for universal hatred.* The persecutions perpetrated by Adolph Hitler in the 1930s and 1940s against the Jews and other m inorities, far overshadowed anything ever done by the Tsar or even contem plated by pessimistic Zionists. The Nazi holocaust is still to o firmly branded on the consciousness o f Jews today living in Europe, Russia and the United States to allow them to rest fully at ease in their societies. Many do not believe th at “it can’t happen here.” T hat, they feel, is w hat their naiVe German Jewish forbears thought, and they paid for their complacency in the ovens o f Auschwitz. One’s impression is th at m uch o f the appeal o f Zionism today for even the m ost com fortable and secure Jewish com­ mun ties in the United States lies in the idea o f Israel as a haven, a place they can retreat to , in case an epidemic o f anti-Semitism should break o u t in the West. The alm ost hysterical joy which erupted in American Jewish com m unities in 1967 and again m ost recently at Entebbe, seems to reflect a deeply rooted insecurity;and any spectacular m anifestation o f Israeli power has for them an alm ost cathartic effect. Insofar as latent fear is an im portant bulwark o f Zionist support among Western Jews, it has very little to do directly w ith the Arabs. For m ost Jews the Arabs are basically a primitive people and unable to carry out a holocaust on their ow n; the real dangers lie among the Christian peoples o f the West. Obviously, however, when Jews see b oth the United States and the Soviet Union providing m ilitary assistance to Arab regimes, even when both superpowers are known to support Israel's continued existence, it gives rise to a great deal o f alarm. The defeat suffered by the Zionist lobby in Washington over arms to Saudi Arabia and and anti-Arab boycott legislation gave rise to considerable anxiety among American Jews, an anxiety only partly assuaged by the grant o f $1 billion in arms to Israel a few days later. But Zionism does more than relieve fear and anxiety among Western Jews. It also has come to shape for them a specific sense o f nationalism which in turn reflects a deep-seated desire for assimilation as a nation in the world o f nations. This is the second principal appeal o f Zionism for Jews. The historical Jewish dilemma o f desiring both acceptance and separateness at the same tim e is circumvented through the existence

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o f a Jewish state — a state like all states, w ith sovereignty, territory, coercive power, and national identity; and yet at the same tim e a state w ithin which the uniqueness o f Jewish culture can be preserved and developed. The primary exponent o f assimilation-through-nationalism was Theodor Herzl. It was H erd's audacious idea, expounded in The Jew ish S ta tet th at the Jews could turn European anti-Semitism to their own advantage by arguing th at a separate Jewish state would draw Jews out o f the Western societies. Furtherm ore, inasmuch as the Jews o f H erd's dass and orientation considered themselves (anti-Semitism notw ithstanding) a part o f the Western cultural and political tradition, he could even argue th at a Jewish state could actually be helpful to the cause o f European imperialism.6 Accordingly, the Jewish people, through the agency o f the Jewish state, would become assimilated into the world o f nations. Originally, the specific location o f such a state was relatively unim­ portant, and Zionists were divided betw een East Africa and Palestine. But once the Palestine adherents had won the day the next step was to begin to fashion linkages w ith th at particular piece o f territory. Since the Western European Zionists were essentially secular, the religious ties o f the Jews o f Palestine played only a subordinate role in their thinking. Among the Jews o f eastern Europe the religious im portance o f Palestine was much stronger; the idea o f a Jewish nation-state was subordinate to the goals o f establishing essentially non-nationalist settlem ents w ith a pious communal or secular socialist utopian charac­ ter. What the Zionist immigrants who began pouring into Palestine early in this century eventually succeeded in accomplishing was th e merging o f these original diverse tendencies into a coherent ideology o f Jewish territorial and sovereign nationhood. By the mid-1930s the revisionists and the m ilitant Zionists led by Ben-Gurion were in the ascendent, and the goal o f a Jewish sovereign state rather than the ambiguous ''national home” was virtually undisguised. So, after the Nazi holocaust and the formal establishm ent o f Israel, Zionism developed into a highly national­ ist ideology rooted in th e land o f Palestine. The idea th at ail the Jews o f the world somehow held title to th at land because Jewish tribes had migrated into it 4000 years ago and at tim es had established political control was widely propagated. The fact th at the Jews had been largely driven out o f Palestine by the Romans in the second century AX)., never to return in num bers until the tw entieth century, and the extreme tenuousness o f any racial or sociocultural sim ilarity between the m odem Western Jews and the Jewish inhabitants o f Biblical Palestine, did not prevent this idea from gradually winning wide and fervent

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acceptance among Jews throughout the world. In Israel itself, the national passion for archaeology was only the m ost obvious sym ptom o f the need to establish (or to obliterate nagging latent uncertainties) about the people’s link w ith the land. Many Jews, o f course, were disturbed (and continue to be disturbed) about the im plications which the loyalty claims o f a distinct Jewish nation* state, brael, hold for their loyalty to the nation-states in which they are citizens and in which they reside. On balance, however, since the 1967 war Zionism appears to have succeeded in winning over many o f the world’s Jews through its celebration o f a m achism o kind o f national identity, one which to people who have been a persecuted m inority has an understandable appeal. One receives the impression th at for many Jews outside Israel, the Jewish state, w ith its skill, cunning, and bravado in the m artial arts, becomes an instrum ent for surrogate assimilation into the world o f the m ighty. The third way in which Zionism today appeals to Jews outside Israel is through its ideological pluralism. However m onolithic and exdusivist it may be in term s o f its basic nationalism , it has come to offer a loose com patibility for a variety o f ideological currents present among the Jewish com m unities in the West. This ideological pluralism also exerts an appeal to non-Jews. Philosophic difficulties notw ithstand­ ing, it is possible to be a Zionist and also a capitalist or socialist, a pious believer or a secularist, a friend o f Western neo-imperialism or a friend o f the Third Worid. Early Zionism or proto-Zionism had its religious hum anists like Ahad Ha-Am and its socialists like A. D. G ordon. It had its brazen im perialists like Herzl and its liberals like Magnes. There was philanthropic Zionism , cultural Zionism, messianic Zionism , practical Zionism and revisionist Zionism. One can only speculate as to whether these different and contradictory Zionisms would not have w ithered away through endless factional struggles if the Zionist leadership had not succeeded, through the Balfour D eclaration, in obtaining its toe­ hold in Palestine. Once th at toehold was achieved, all th e Zionist tendencies had a concrete territorial reality to focus upon and support; and the success o f the leaders o f the Yishuv in building national insti­ tutions which could accommodate this pluralism and yet contain its natural self-destructiveness, gave Zionism b o th a structure and a catholi­ city which in the future would stand it in good stead in mobilizing the Jews outside. To be sure, there were and still are serious divisions w ithin Zionism both inside and outside brael. Some small splinter groups, either highly orthodox in their religion or o f an uncompromising progressive-inter­

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nationalist character, reject the all-embracing nationalist shell o f m od­ em Zionism. Anti-Zionist Jewish organizations still exist in the United States and Europe. Nevertheless, it appears th at just as almost all Israelis accept the basic territorial and national postulates o f Zionism, so to o do m ost Jews in the world uncritically accept these assumptions, hi the United States, certainly, it is rare to find a Jew opposed to the national legitimacy o f Israel; and while one can find a good m any Jews (notably on college campuses) th at are opposed to specific Israeli policies (some indeed, believe th at Israeli policies tow ard the Arabs are racist) these to o are a small m inority. Part o f the secret o f this success is that Zionism is relatively tolerant o f ideologies th at do n o t directly challenge its own nationalist core values. A ppeals to Non-Jews in th e West One does not have to be Jewish to be Zionist. Zionism has proven rem arkably functional in appealing to a wide variety o f constituencies. At first glance it seems incongruous if not illogical th at an ideology so exclusively centered on Judaism should excite any im portant support from non-Jews. A Jew usually explains his or her adherence to Zionist doctrine on the basis o f his prim ordial membership in the Jewish people — an ethnic identification reinforced by religious law — or else by his intellectual and spiritual adherence to the precepts o f the Jewish reli­ gion. Usually it is some com bination o f the tw o. Yet this creed, which owes its appeal to its members to some extent precisely because it excludes the less-enlightened, even misguided or hostile outsiders, still exerts a distinct magnetism for these very outsiders. Much o f the success o f Israel is due to Christian Zionists like Lord Balfour and President Truman. Respected spokesmen for the Christian churches — Catholic and Protestant — argue the case for Zionism w ith as m uch fervor as the rabbis. In the United States, at least, the pro-Zionist orientation o f im portant editors, colum nists, journalists and television com m entators is conspicuous; yet these people are often as n o t non-Jewish. To explain the popularity o f Zionism among non-Jews by asserting th at the news m edia are all owned by Jews is not only factually wrong b u t tends to obscure an im portant aspect o f the strength o f Zionism as an ideology. In no way can it be shown th at the news media o r the educational system are controlled by Jews, and even if they were it would still not be a satisfactory explanation for the general acceptance o f Zionism. Nor is it particulariy enlightening to explain this phenom e­ non, in the United States at least, by asserting th at Americans gullibly accept whatever they read; such assertions, in the first place, are insults

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to the intelligence o f Americans and, in the second place, aie contra­ dicted by the deeply engrained individualism and skepticism in the American character. Explanations such as these simply will not do. The fact remains, however, th at Zionism is widely accepted by nonJews w ho, by definition, cannot be said to accept it on the grounds o f some prim ordial identification w ith the “tribe.” There has to be, there­ fore, a factor o f intellectual rationality involved. People consciously choose to support Zionism because they believe th at it is congruent w ith other deeply felt values. Its appeal to nonJew s rests upon its supposed congruence with the Judaeo-Christian tradition, its parallels in Christian fundam entalist theology, its function as restitution for the sins inflicted on the Jews by the West, its pioneering ethos, its egalitar­ ian character, and Israel’s alleged position as the weaker party in its conflict w ith the Arabs. In addition Zionism and Israel exert a purely pragmatic appeal to the political elites o f the West, especially the United States; politicians find th at support for Zionism pays o ff in term s o f financing and votes in electoral campaigns; and foreign-policymakers perceive Israel as a strategic asset to the United States, as long as Israel appears m ilitarily preponderant and the Arabs appear m ilitarily weak and politically divided. Arab-Islamic civilization and the Western Judaeo-Christian tradition have much in common in term s o f religious values, rationalism , and humanistic and scientific accomplishments; thus it is difficult to under­ stand the gap which m ost Westerners perceive between their culture and th at o f what was quaintly known as “the Orient” or “the m ysterious East.” In reality, die conventional Western perception o f the Arab world is colored by deep-rooted prejudice. Only relatively recently has Islam been regarded in an objective light, and the residue o f older biases lingers on, even in reputable American universities. Memories o f the Crusades (or the Crusader m yth) do not die easily.7 But, today, the problem o f the “gap” is mainly a problem o f ignorance rather than o f outright prejudice. In the United States, m ost school children go through the secondary level w ithout any serious exposure to nonWestern culture, and w hat little m aterial they receive about the Arab world is, more often than not, fraught w ith a degree o f bias, often unw itting.8 Even a t the university level, while there are now at least tw enty programs that*deal w ith the Middle East (and the Arab w orld, to some extent), very few university students are involved w ith them . But the average American is familiar w ith Israel or “the Holy Land” from learning about it in Sunday schools and reading about it (usually portrayed in a positive light) in their daily newspapers. Israel is portrayed

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as an outpost o f civilization in a region otherwise noted only for backwardness and barbarism . While a fairly large proportion o f Westerners has some general notion o f the Holy Land b u t little else in the Middle East, there is a smaller section o f fundam entalist Protestant Christians (m ostly Baptists) whose ideas about Israel are m uch m ore fully crystallized. These “Bible Belt** Christians sincerely believe th at the return o f the Jews to Palestine is ordained by Scriptures and is an event to be celebrated. E fforts by non-believers or infidels to thw art the return o f the Jews are viewed, accordingly, as sins o f the highest order. Perhaps such fundamentalism is m ore a political factor in the United States than elsewhere ; b u t even the Catholic and Protestant establishm ents have been supportive o f a Jewish return to Palestine, especially in light o f the desire for ecumeni­ cal cooperation. Then there is the guilt factor. Zionism owes m uch o f its non-Jewish support in the West, it is argued, because Europeans and Americans feel a deep collective sense o f guilt for the destruction o f the Jews by the Nazi German regime. The issue has been discussed so fully th at there is no need to com m ent further here except to underline the fact th at the horrors o f the holocaust have been (and continue to be) presented in grim detail to the entire educated strata in the West. They are, in short, very well-known, an im portant fact in estim ating the significance o f the guilt factor. It might be added, however, th at “guilt” is perhaps not quite the correct term for what m any Americans and Europeans feel. Today, one would surmise, there is less a sense o f collective guilt about what happened as there is (in America at least) an attitude that the Jews have been badly treated by historical circumstances and th at, consequently, it would be decent and hum ane to lend them a helping hand. Zionism has provided a ready vehicle for implementing these sentim ents in a concrete m anner. To many Westerners the idea o f establishing, and now m aintaining, a Jewish commonwealth is an em inently sensible m ethod for recompensing the Jews for the bad treatm ent they received at the hands o f others. Conversely, not to support the Jewish state when it is threatened by Arab enemies, w ho, are perceived as alien to Western cultural tradition, is viewed n o t only as a mean thing to do b u t also as an abrogation o f the obligation impli­ citly assumed by helping create the Zionist entity in the first place. Another elem ent in the appeal o f Zionism to non-Jews is its seeming com patibility w ith a variety o f other deeply held ideological principles. Just as Zionism could, in a broad sense, embrace a variety o f disparate ideological tendencies w ithin Judaism , so to o it appears to express

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values, m any o f which are m utually contradictory, among non-Jews which have nothing directly to do w ith the Jewish people. Possibly the m ost im portant o f these values is dem ocracy. U.S. politicians never tire o f justifying their support on the grounds th at Israel is “an outpost o f dem ocracy.“ If w hat is m eant is liberal democracy, characterized by meaningful structures o f popular representation and freedom o f politi­ cal expression and activity, then the appellation is substantially correct when applied to Israel’s Jewish population. The fact th at Israel has never treated its Arab population as fully equal to its Jewish nationals is not widely known and where it is known it is justified (as it is in Israel) on grounds o f state security. The relevant point here is th at to Western elites, the Zionist state appears to em body, or at least strive for, the same political ideals so highly valued by Western societies. This com­ mon dem ocratic basis makes it easier for Western elites to id en tify w ith Israel; it brings Israel psychologically closer to them . In contrast, o f course, the Arab political systems — regardless o f conservative or progressive ideology —appear alien, to say the least. The Zionist ideology also holds attractions for socialists and capital­ ists alike in the West. To progressives, Israel still tries to present itself as a socialist state, even though its private sector is large and flourishing. The ruling Labour party and coalition o f Israel is officially socialist, and Israeli leaders regularly attend the meetings o f European socialist par­ ties. The distribution o f national income in Israel is one o f the m ost equal in the world — a statistical dem onstration o f one o f socialism’s central tenets.9 Once again, the inequalities suffered by the Arab com m unity and the Arab Jewish communities are masked; and the exploitation o f Arab labor in the occupied territories, to the detrim ent o f their development, is concealed by the aggregate picture. People looking at Israel from afar perceive only the positive aspects and tend to be ignorant of, or unready to believe, the negative ones. A t the same tim e, Zionism exerts attractions to a conservative, capitalist audience. Foreign investors are hardly frightened by the fact th at Israel’s government is socialist; on the contrary, they find th at Israelis have the m ost sym pathetic understanding o f capitalism and are ready to facilitate and guarantee investm ents from abroad. Even in the United States, perhaps the last country in the world where socialism is regarded as an intrinsically evil ideology, there is no discernible unhappi­ ness w ith Israeli socialism; certainly Israeli banks and Israeli products are thriving in the U nited States, and America’s volume o f trade and investm ent in Israel is substantial indeed. It is understandable, though a b it ironical, th at Western capitalist enterprise has developed a much

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greater interest in the Arab w orld, w ith its larger m arket and its petrol­ eum , than it has, or can ever have, in Israel. In term s o f political and cultural values, Zionism and Israel have “the inside track” w ith the West, b u t in term s o f economic interests and opportunities they hold no such advantage; and the desperate attem pts by Israel’s supporters in the United States to counter the Arab boycott are a dram atic testam ent to the strong attraction between American capitalism and th e Arab economies. Any list o f Zionism’s attractions to the outside world would be incom plete w ithout an allusion to the alleged peaceful character o f the Zionist state in international relations. Im plicit in the European context o f Zionism 's origins is the idea th at the Jewish hom eland would be essentially a refuge for persecuted Jews the world over. The idea th at this Jewish state could ever be aggressive, or th at it m ight behave in the amoral, if n o t imm oral, way in which other nation-states behave, m ust have been hard to entertain seriously. Certainly, at the tim e o f Israel's creation, its Western backers tended to regard it as an innocent, almost defenseless creature, which would be lucky to survive in a world o f powerful, predatory adversaries. The fact th at there was an expansionist strain in Zionism , and th at the Zionist movement was being taken over by m ilitants even on the eve o f Israel's establishm ent, might have given people warning o f w hat was to com e; b u t m ost people believed, and m any continue to believe, th at Israel only wishes to live in peace and does not covet the territory o f its neighbors. References to Zionist claims to southern Lebanon, Syria, and Transjordan, and the assertion by right-wing and religious zealots in Israel to the territory from the Nile to the Euphrates are dismissed by m ost Europeans and Americans as mere rhetoric. Even the four wars which Israel has waged (including the 1973 war which Israel did not initiate, b u t which the Arabs launched to try and recover Israeli-occupied territory), as well as its brutal assaults on southern Lebanon, are widely interpreted in the West as evidence th at Israel is a victim rather than an instigator o f aggression. To be sure, it has not gone unnoticed th at Israel has become a m odem Sparta and th at its armed forces are extraordinarily capable. American m ilitary specialists concede privately th at they expect th at Israel will initiate the next Arab-Israeli war, and American diplom ats concede privately th at Israel has been far more obstructionist than the Arab states in the effort to reach a diplom atic settlem ent. Yet among the public at large and the leading politicians, Israel somehow m aintains its image as a peaceable society and thus w orthy o f Western support. It is especially ironic, therefore, th at the final item in the catalogue

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o f Zionism attractions in the West is adm iration for the Jewish state's m artial capabilities. If, in the United States at least, one feels a certain virtue in supporting the underdog, one feels an added, unexpected grati­ fication, bordering on glee, when the underdog wins a round. It was natural and understandable th at the Israelis should have indulged them­ selves in ecstatic euphoria after the 1967 victory and, more recently, after the successful Entebbe operation; b u t it is both curious and significant th at the same em otions swept through American public opinion. It was almost as if “we” had done it ourselves. Three-quarters o f a century after H erd tried to persuade British policymakers th at the Zionist state could be useful to them in a strategic sense, the Israelis have made considerable progress in convincing American policymakers th at they constitute a strategic asset to the West, mainly by virtue o f their power in the region. The P olitical Consequences The fact th at Zionism today exerts m ultiple appeals to a variety o f constituencies in the world has im portant im plications for the course o f the Arab-Israeli conflict, hi the first place, it distorts rational Israeli foreign policymaking because it persuades the policymakers th at they have both the obligation and the ability to involve all the Jews o f the world and their sympathizers in the pursuit o f Israeli national interests, hi the process, such perspectives also lead to an exaggeration o f what actually constitute valid Israeli national interests. Second, because Zionism is so influential in the form ation o f American Middle East policy, U.S. policy is often premised on the assum ption o f a com plete congruence o f interests between brael and the United States. The operative question in American policy thus becomes, “ What can we do to support Israel?” rather than “What policy best serves American interests?” Third, the many faces o f Zionism tend to confuse Arab policymakers and opinion leaders. This confusion takes various forms and has a number o f im plications, b u t possibly the most im portant is the clim ate o f uncertainty which it generates. It is difficult to come to term s w ith a force which embodies so many contradictory elements and whose ultim ate objectives are by no means clear. While Israel's immedi­ ate interests are thus served by keeping the Arabs o ff balance, the long-term consequence is an ominous and pervasive sense o f distrust and insecurity which can easily lead to policy miscalculations. hi his definitive study o f the Israeli foreign policy process, Michael Brecher rightly draws attention to the im portance o f political culture in affecting the decision-making process and then asserts th at in Israel

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the Mprim ordial and preem inent aspect o f the political culture [is] its Jewishness.” He writes th at members o f the High Policy Elite “perceive Jewry as a world people o f which Israelis are an integral p art.” Empha­ sizing Israel’s link w ith Jewish antiquity and the experience o f the Holocaust, diese policymakers perceive the State o f Israel as the logical, and necessary, and rightful successor to the collective interests and rights o f the few who sur­ vived. Israel as the voice, the representative, and the defender o f Jews in distress anywhere —this is a role which flows naturally from the MJewish prism .” Through this lens too, there is created an expec­ tation th at world Jewry will reciprocate w ith massive and continu­ ous support for th at segment o f the People resettled in the Home­ land.10 Jewish policym akers, in short, do not see themselves simply as the leaders o f a small nation o f three m illion people; their goals and their perceptions o f their policy options are o f m uch broader scope. What has emerged over the years is a curious amalgam o f messianic perspect­ ives and highly pragm atic, reaipolitik practices. Noting th at the m ilitant insiden, typified by Ben-Gurion, Dayan, Peres, Allon, and Begin, gained predominance over the m oderate outsiders like Weizmann, Sharett and Eban, Brecher observes th at m ilitancy and coercion became the norm in Israel’s dealings w ith the Arabs while at th e same tim e there was a cynical exploitation o f its links w ith American Zionism to carry on the struggle.11 The American connection today is even m ore vital for the success o f Israeli policy objectives than it has been in the past. The strength o f th at connection also seems to have increased. While there were some signs ju st after the 1973 war, during th at rare and brief period when Arab strength, determ ination and unity had been credibly dem onstra­ ted , th at the U.S. government m ight place some constraints on its policy o f to tal support for Israel, subsequent developments indicate very little significant change. The bases fo r the pro-Israel bias in U.S. foreign policy are com plex.12 It suffices to indicate th at in a poll con­ ducted in Septem ber 1976, designed to compare the differences between Republican and Dem ocratic party workers, the investigators found clear disagreements in every foreign policy area except the Middle East. “In only one area, Middle East policy, did they tend to come together. Great m ajorities o f both groups agreed w ith a statem ent th at *the United States has a m oral obligation to prevent the destruction o f

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Israel,* and disagreed with a statem ent th at *to protect our supply o f oil, the United States should be more pro-Arab in the Middle East conflict.’13 Addressing a Washington conference on Arab and American cultures, Senator James Abourezk, the first U.S. Senator o f Arab origin, remarked th at he did n o t see Ma nickel’s w orth o f difference” between presidential candidates Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter on the Middle East question. And in the second Ford-Carter debate, on foreign policy, die tw o candidates tried to outdo each other in courting the Jewish vote w ith the extravagance o f their promised support for Israel. Shortly thereafter President Ford gave $1 billion in arms aid to Israel. Nothing had changed on the internal scene since the Truman-Dewey campaign o f 1948. One can only surmise how Arab policymakers now analyze the Zionist phenomenon. Some o f the past perceptions and reactions have been sim plistic, for exam ple, the view th at equated Zionism and international communism, or th at conceived o f a Jewish conspiracy to take over the w orld. Hopefully, such erroneous views are no longer seriously entertained. The fact remains, however, that Zionism still poses dilemmas for rational Arab policymakers. The m ultifaceted appeals o f Zionism to im portant constituencies outside Israel, and Israel’s cynical m anipulation o f the Western Jewish communities cannot b u t be disquieting. Israel’s persistent unwillingness to define its borders may be nothing m ore than a sensible bargaining maneuver, b u t it can also be interpreted as evidence o f latent expansionist tendencies. The unwillingness or inability o f Israeli governments to renounce historic daim s or to oppose effectively the m ilitant Jewish settlers in the occu­ pied territories cannot b u t be disturbing. As long as the same m ilitance which has characterized past Zionist policy toward the Arabs continues, Arab policymakers m ust face its im plications in term s o f m ilitary, and nuclear, possibilities. The fact th at Zionism historically has been unable to perceive the Arabs as hum an beings carries grave doubts about the possibility o f m ilitary restraint in the future. If Israeli leaders feel th at they can count on American backing in alm ost any adventure (w hether or not this feeling is correct), then Arab leaders are not unreasonable to expect adventurous behavior on their part. Furtherm ore, the position o f m oderate Arab opinionmakers and policymakers can only be weakened by m ilitant inflexible Israeli stands. In short, the hardline reaipoiitik o f Zionist policymakers tends to strengthen the case for m ilitancy on the Arab side, in strictly rational term s. Given the m ulti­ dimensional nature o f Zionism and its successes in building up a variety o f constituencies, the Arabs find themselves driven to responses which

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appear em otional and irrational, even though they can be supported by logic and prudence. What does seem beyond dispute, however, is th at Arab policies to counter Zionism and Israeli expansion, have thus far been almost completely unsuccessful. They have not only failed to prevent the est­ ablishm ent o f the Jewish state on Arab land, they have also failed to contain it. These failures have been accompanied by catastrophic hum an, m aterial and territorial losses. There have been some successes in term s o f losses inflicted on Israel and the isolation o f Israel from the greater part o f world opinion. But Israel's lifeline to the United States remains as solid as ever, while the Americans for the m ost part remain either ignorant, indifferent or hostile to Arab aspirations. Only when objective knowledge about the Arab world has been widely diffused over a long period o f tim e is the situation likely to change. From an Arab point o f view, therefore, it would seem that there is a great need for further study o f the Zionist phenomenon. Such a study m ust go beyond the discovery th at Zionists are racist in their attitude towards Arabs. What requires study are the im plications o f such attitudes in the form ation o f Israeli policy and, ju st as im portant, the functions o f Zionism as an ideology instrum entally capable o f mobilizing a diverse group o f powerful constituencies outside Israel itself and even outside the Jewish communities o f the world. Above all, it is im portant to remember that Zionism has been an effective instru­ m ent for political m obilization; its leaders, as Erskine Childers states, were superb long-range planners.14 No m atter how obvious the paroch­ ial atavism o f Zionism may be, it serves a political movement unexelled in the rationality —and ruthlessness —o f its m ethods.

Notes 1. See Sabri Jiryis, The Arabs in Israel (New York, 1976); Felicia Langer, With M y Own Eyes (London, 1975); Uri Davis and Norton Mezvinsky, eds., D ocuments from Israel 1967-1973 (London, 1975). A casual sampling of articles in The Washington Post, The New York Times and The Christian Science M onitor since October 1975 which are critical of Israel’s discrimination against its Arab inhabitants includes William J. Drummond, “Zionism Gives Israel’s Arabs an Uphill Life,” Washington Post, 12 November 1975; Eric Silver, “Israel Applies Pressure in Nazareth Election,” Washington Post, 9 December 1975 ;William J. Drummond, “Christians Pressure Israel for Old Lands,” Washington Post, 6 May 1976; John K. Cooley, “Political Dissenter in Israel Fearful of Another War,” Christian Science M onitor, 14 July 1976; William E. Farrell, “Fence Touches a Nerve with West Bank Arabs,” The New York Times, 11 August 1976; Jason Morris, “Israel Draws Line in West Bank,” Christian Science M onitor, 26 August

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1976; John Chadwick, “Settlement Efforts o f Israel Rightists Anger Arab Hebron,“ Washington Post, 27 August 1976; and Wflham J. Drummond, “ Israeli Settlements Called Obstacle to Peace Accord,“ Washington Post, 26 September 1976. 2. See, for example, on the current dispute over the “Koenig Report,“ William E. Farrell, “ Israeli Arabs C alla Strike in Galilee,” N ew York Times, 23 September 1976; and William E. Farrell, “ Israeli’s Proposal on Arabs Disputed,” The New York Times, 9 September 1976. 3. For an enlightening and sympathetic analysis o f Zionist thought, see Arthur Hertzberg's introduction in Hertzberg, ed., The Zionist Idea (New York, 1959), pp. 15-100. 4. Golda Meir, M y L ife (New York, 1975), pp. 17-27. 5. Pinsker, excerpts from “auto-Emancipation,” reprinted in Hertzberg, Zionist Idea, pp. 182-85. 6. Theodor Herzl, The Jewish State (1896). 7. Some examples of this prejudice, see Phillip K. H itti, Islam and The West: A H istorical C ultural Survey (Princeton, N J . 1962), Chap. 4 , “Islam in Western Literature.” 8. Committee on the Image o f the Middle East, The Image o f the M iddle East in Secondary School Textbooks (New York, 1975). “ In far too many texts the Committee found not only errors but also bias. This often occurs in regard to I dam and the Arab world when authors display latent prejudices abetted by care­ less research, poor writing, and inadequate editing,” p. 25. The committee was chaired by Professor Farhat J. Ziadeh o f the University o f Washington, Seattle. 9. For income inequality estimates, see Charles L. Taylor and Michael C. Hudson, World Handbook o f Political and Social Indicators, 2nd ed. (New Haven, 1972), pp. 263-66. 10. Michael Brecher, The Foreign PoUcy System o f Israel (New Haven, 1972), pp. 229-31. 11. Ibid., pp. 246-47. 12. Michael C. Hudson, D om estic Politics and American Policy in the ArabIsraeli Conflict,” Politique Etrangère (Paris) 39, no. 6 (December 1974): 641-58. 13. Barry Sussman, “Elites in America: a Washington Post-Harvard Survey," The Washington P ost, 27 September 1976, p. A2. 14. Erskine Childers. “The Worldless Wish: From Citizens to Refugees,” in The Transformation o f Palestine, ed. Ibrahim Abu-Lughod (Evanson, DL 1971), pp. 165-202, esp. pp. 166-78.

U

S E C T A R IA N ISM A N D Z IO N IS M : TW O E L E M E N T A R Y FORM S O F CON SC IOU SN ESS Halim Barakat

Sectarianism in Lebanon and Zionism in Israel are two ideologies based on prim ordial sentim ents and com m itted to rigid orders th at foster the dominance o f one religious comm unity over others. Both have nega­ tive consequences for Arab society. Their basic task is to m aintain a specific religious comm unity in power, to preserve the existing hierar­ chical arrangements, and to spread their models into the neighboring countries. In fact, Arabs are faced w ith tw o alternative designs for themselves. One is more in continuity w ith the prevailing trends and aims at further dismantling o f Arab society by the establishm ent o f small states as national homes for the different ethnic and religious communities in the area. The alternative design represents a departure from the status quo and aims at the establishm ent o f a unified, secular and democratic Arab country. The first design is partly intended to secure Western dom ination and the legitim ization o f the existence o f Israel. It is most significant to point o u t th at the prevailing conditions in Arab countries provide the needed climate for dismantling o f the Arab society, the legitim ization o f Israel, the fostering o f sectarianism in Lebanon, and the diffusion o f these models in the whole area. These prevailing conditions are not merely political. Much more basic is the dominance in Lebanon and other Arab countries o f traditional ties and vertical loyalties represented in grouping on the basis o f religion, kinship, ethnic, regional and similar identification.1 The alternative design, namely, the establishm ent o f a unified secular-democratic Arab country requires liberation from traditional ties and value orientations and the development o f a higher order o f national and social dass consciousness. The current civil war in Lebanon which witnessed drastic shifts in alliances (particularly the support o f several Arab countries to the isolationists) dem onstrates beyond doubt th at there is an urgent need for redefining Arab nationalism toward incorporating class analysis in a m uch more genuine and accurate manner. Two argum ents will perm eate the discussion o f the similarities bet­ ween sectarianism and Zionism: First, sectarianism, Zionism, and other

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similar communal system s based on traditional loyalties represent some sort o f an elem entary form o f consciousness th at underm ines the development o f a higher order o f national and social class identifica­ tio n ; second, a set o f hypotheses will be posed th at stands in diam et­ rical opposition to the claims th at Zionist and other communal models serve the cause o f m odernization in the Arab society. On the contrary, all sorts o f evidences dem onstrate th at they serve as deterrent forces in the whole area. Both o f these ideologies (1 ) were created to secure national homes for one religious com m unity against the welfare o f others; (2 ) serve as bases for imperialism; (3) practice discrim ination and prom ote inequalities; and (4) suffer from inability to correct in­ justices and transform themselves. N ational Homes for Religious Communities Lebanon and Israel were created w ith the help o f Western powers as national homes for Maronites and Jews respectively. The republic o f Lebanon in its present form was carved o u t o f Syria by the French Mandate on August 20, 1920 and externally imposed on a significant segment o f the Christian Arab and Syrian nationalists and the great m ajority o f the Muslim com m unities. Form al protests and petitions were made by Christian and Muslim nationalists. Some o f these peti­ tions were signed by family representatives in several districts, cities and tow ns including Beirut, Tripoli, Sidon, Tyre and Baalbeck. In their attem pt to create and m aintain Lebanon as an independent and sover­ eign state, the M aronites have presented themselves as a persecuted and constantly threatened com m unity th at needs a national hom e o f its own, and insisted on talking in the name o f other Christians. Even after independence, they continued to reinforce the image in the m inds o f their own people, particularly the young. Hence th e image o f Lebanon as a victim , as a m odem country in a backward region, as a Christian state th at needs to preserve its identity or Mm elt in a Muslim sea,'* and as a dem ocratic society in an area controlled by authoritarian m ilitary or traditional dictatorships. They have continued to prom ote this image to justify converting the country into a base for W estern imperialism for the control o f öftrer Arab countries. W ith tim e M aronites and some other Christians tended to believe th at they are entitled to hold the larger share o f power. This is ration­ alized by pointing o u t th at " it is they who have m ore frequently tended to feel responsible for national leadership” and th at the "Muslim Lebanese m asses. . . are unprepared to appreciate the virtues o f a liberal way o f life.” 3

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Because o f the insistence on reinforcing this image and asserting the religious identity o f Lebanon, the Muslim com m unity never recon* d ied itself to the new state and relationships between the different religious communities have continued to waver between outright con­ flict and hypocritical accomm odation. U nfortunately, the religious clea­ vages disguised the sodoeconom ic cleavages —a situation which has con­ tributed to political organization and polarization between communi­ ties rather than dasses. Unlike the Zionists, the Lebanese sectarian isolationists are natives o f the area and tried to establish a relatively open pluralistic system w ith the help o f the traditional Muslim leaders. The Zionists, being colonial settlers, created Israel by uprooting the Palestinian natives and disper­ sing them from their native land. In 1948, more than 726,000 Pales­ tinians (estim ate o f the U.N. Economic Survey Mission for the Middle East) left their homes, lands, livelihoods, villages, towns and country under conditions o f war and sought safety in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Gaza where they have continued to live stateless and under the mercy o f authoritarian governments. The part o f Palestine which was assigned to the Zionists by the U.N. partition plan in 1948 to form a Jewish state had a to tal o f 495,000 Arabs as compared w ith 489,000 Jews. Were the Arabs allowed to stay, the dream o f a Jewish state would not have been realized. There were 340,000 European Jews waiting in Cyprus for immigration to Israel as soon as the new state was created. Don Peretz tells us th at the property abandoned by the Palestinian Arabs was a valuable resource helping to make room for hundreds o f thousands o f Jews who replaced the Arab refugees. The abandoned Arab fields, orch­ ards, vineyards, homes, shops, factories, and businesses provided shelter, economic sustenance, and employment for a significant percentage o f the nearly 700,000 new immigrants who came to Israel between May, 1948, and the end o f 1951. Israel would have found it far more difficult to more than double its population during this period w ithout access to abandoned Arab property.3 Y et, Zionists have prom oted the image o f Israel as a victim constantly threatened to be thrown into the sea, as the only civilized democracy in the Middle East, as a Western m odel for m odernization and as a pioneering society th at converted the desert into bloom. This image continues to be reinforced and the security o f Israel has become the most significant criterion for m orality within Israel as well as in the

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United States. In the name o f Israeli security, boundaries are changed and the m ost sophisticated arms are supplied to drive the Palestinians into submission. Again, reality is disguised as evidenced in th e current civil war in Lebanon. The Palestinians are presented to the world as ungrateful terrorists and th ey , rather then the Israeli colonizers, become the target o f the m ilitary genius o f the present Syrian regime in com plicity w ith several Arab states, Israel, and the United States. These are facts th at no academic objectivity can deny o r disguise. Bases for Western Imperialism Both Lebanon and Israel have served as bases for Western imperialism in the area helping to m aintain Western dom ination over Arab resources as well as checking the advancement o f Arab unity. Israel participated in a m ilitary invasion o f Egypt in 1956 to prevent nationalization o f the Suez Canal and to depose Nasser. It has also continually threatened to invade Jordan and Lebanon in the event o f any real threats to the existing traditional regimes and particularly in case o f a nationalist take­ over. Threats were even made to Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Libya in case o f oil boycotts agains the West. Similarly, Lebanon was used directly in 1958 against the EgyptianSyrian unity and Iraqi revolution by inviting American m ilitary inter­ vention. The 1958 civil war should be seen against the background o f an on-going struggle between forces for Arab unity and forces for enforcem ent o f the Western design for a fragmented area. The emer­ gence o f the United Arab Republic alarmed the West, Israel, and the isolationist elem ents w ithin Lebanon. Thus, a pro-western government controlled by Camille Shamoun and Charles Malik was formed prior to the civil war in an attem pt to play a m ore direct role in undermining Arab unity. Lebanon became the center for active plots against the emerging Arab Republic. These moves were considered by the Lebanese Muslim com m unity and the Christian Arab nationalists as a break from the spirit o f the National Pact whose tenets states th at Lebanon (1) is an Arab state and follows a policy o f cooperation w ith the rest o f the Arab w orld, and (2 ) would refrain from seeking Western protection. In fact, the isolationists continued to collaborate against the Arab cause and to look up to the West for protection and as a m odel. The Christian Lebanese isolationists, particularly the M aronites, exposed themselves m ost willingly, freely and uncritically to Western influence. As pointed o u t by Kamal S. Salibi, they saw “Western nations as protectors rather than conquerors or m asters. . . Hence, when they westernize, they do

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so w ithout apology. A lthough th eir understanding o f W estern ideas is frequently shallow, th ey nevertheless adopt them w ith enthusiasm.**4 This tendency to W esternize and allow Lebanon to serve as a base against Arab unity had long been seen by th e isolationists as th e best way to preserve the Christian dom ination in Lebanon. To th a t end, as shown by William H addad, “some Lebanese M aronites viewed w ith favor the establishm ent in Palestine o f a Jewish state which would be a seem* ingly natural ally against th e Muslim sea surrounding these tw o states.**3 To support this daim , William Haddad quotes the M aronite Archbishop M ubarak w ho said in an interview in B eirut in 1946, “Developm ent o f the Lebanon is tied up w ith th at o f Palestine. We Christian Lebanese know th at. We realize th at Zionism is bringing dvilization to Palestine and to th e entire Middle East.**4 G reat com m otions were caused by such a point o f view, one th at m any M aronite politicians had to denounce. Y et, it actually stem m ed from deep-rooted sentim ents th a t escape the censorship o f diplom atic inhibitions whenever Christian dom ination is threatened. F or exam ple, in the recent civil w ar, having failed to get direct American o r French m ilitary intervention, they accepted Syrian intervention and sought Israeli support. The Lebanese rightists continue to view w ith alarm and suspicion any reform ist in d in atio n in th e country let alone th e develop­ m ent o f a progressive nationalist m ovem ent. Sim ilarly, th e Z ionist claim th at Israel would serve at least as “a catalyst o f th e m odernization process in Arab society” was proved wrong as shown by the Israeli sodologist Yochanan Peres. His data based on focused interviews w ith 472 Israeli Arabs carried o u t in th e Fall o f 1967 by Arab students at th e Hebrew University proved “quite surprising. They [results] com pletely contradict Israeli propaganda which tends to stress the relative progress o f Israeli Arabs as com pared w ith th e population o f Arab countries, and are furtherm ore n o t in accordance w ith statistical data, w hich are published interm ittently by Israeli sources.” 7 Practice o f D iscrim ination Sectarianism and Zionism have grown to be increasingly rightist partic­ ularly in term s o f discrim inating against o th er com m unities, contribu­ ting to th e widening and deepening o f th e gap betw een the privileged and deprived, and collaborating w ith imperialism and racist regimes in Africa and Asia. C ontrary to the liberal heritage o f the Jews in E urope, the Zionist m ovem ent has grown to be increasingly rightist, m ilitaristic, rad al, non­

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secular, and repressive. The Zionist dream o f a Jewish state in Palestine could be realized only at the expense o f Palestinian Arabs and the Zion­ ists have continued to feel th at there is no place in Palestine for Arabs and Jews together. To be an Arab in Israel is to be totally alienated in your own country. As pointed o u t by Uri Davis in his introduction to Fauzi el-Asmar’s 7b B e A n Arab in Israel, an Arab faces "a political reality which exdudes apriori, by the elem entary term s o f its motiva­ ting raison d 'etre, equal partidpation o f non-Jews, first and forem ost, the native population o f the land: The Palestine-Arabs. To th e extent th at the state is Jewish it m ust deny equality o f econom ic, political and national rights to its native non Jew ish population."8 Lebanese sectarianism has been bound by its very nature to develop in the same direction. Again, discrim ination against non-Christian com­ m unities occurred in spite o f the professed principles and goals as expressed by Michel Shiha (one o f the m ajor architects o f the Lebanese sectarian system ): "Lebanon is a country o f associated confessional m inorities. All m inority groups should find their places and obtain their rights in it. This is the raison d 'etre o f this country and this is its originality."9 The fact o f the m atter, however, is th at the raison d 'etre o f the country was to establish a national hom e for the Christians. This, coupled w ith the fact o f scarcity o f powers and rewards, contributed to the emergence o f greater disparities betw een th e Lebanese religious com m unities and to further polarization rather th an assim ilation. The influence o f religion on parliam entary elections has been increasing rather than decreasing and a process o f polarization betw een th e Christian and Muslim com m unities has been taking root — a situation which will render the political system less capable o f resolving accumu­ lating problem s from w ithin the system .10 Sim ilarly, in spite o f the great w ealth th at poured into Lebanon (rendering it th e finance center o f the area), prosperity has continued to be confined to some areas and groups. M ount Lebanon and some neighborhoods in Beirut have been growing prosperous at a m uch m ore rapid pace than the South, the N orth, and the Beqa' Valley. Two poverty belts inhabited predom inantly by Muslims emerged and evidence the disproportion o f w ealth and rewards. One belt includes the poor districts o f the South, the Beqa' and the N orth which surround the prosperous M ount Lebanon. The other belt surrounds Beirut whose suburbs were rapidly converted into overcrowded slums. The disparities are m any, including educational opportunities and availability o f roads, hospitals and other basic facilities. To illustrate the immense disparities

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in educational opportunities — about 40 percent o f the children between the ages o f 6 and 10 do not attend schools in South Lebanon compared to about 4 percent in M ount Lebanon. While the population o f the deprived areas constitute 38.5 percent o f the to tal population, official statistics show th at 63.95 percent o f their students attend illequipped public schools. In contrast, the great m ajority (78.18 percent) o f those who attend expensive private schools come from M ount Lebanon and Beirut. The percentages o f those who attend public schools were found to be 83 percent in Nabatieh (a Shi’ite tow n in the South) and 84 percent in Akkar in the N orth in com parison to only 21 percent in N orthern Matn and 18 percent in Kisrwan (M aronite districts in M ount Lebanon).11 Wide discrepancies in educational opportunities have also existed on the bases o f rural-urban residency, social class, sex and religious affiliation. The illiteracy rate (1970) for Lebanese males aged 25 years and over in rural areas is alm ost twice as m uch as th at for the same population in Beirut (40.1 percent vs. 22.1 percent), likew ise, 7.1 percent o f this male age group in rural areas have earned interm ediate and secondary education in comparison to 23.4 percent in Beirut. Finally, only 1.5 percent o f this male age group in rural areas have earned university education in comparison to 12.4 percent in Beirut. Similar discrepancies betw een rural and urban areas exist in the case o f the female population; 59.9 percent o f th e female population aged 25 years and over are illiterate o r have less than prim ary education in Beirut in com parison to 91.1 percent o f the cor­ responding population in rural areas.13 These disparities extend to other areas and can be easily docum en­ ted. The point to be established, however, is connected w ith the tend­ ency o f the sectarian and Zionist systems to favor some religious com­ m unities and discrim inate against others. While the dom inating groups grow more conservative, nonsecular and discrim inating, their victims become increasingly revolutionary, secular and socialist in orientation. The Palestinian cause has merged w ith the cause o f the deprived Lebanese in the current civil war and b o th have changed through involvement in the struggle for liberation from confessionalism and Zionism. The change has been moving gradually away from traditional loyalties and elem entary form s o f consciousness and in the direction o f secularism, socialism and democracy. By liberating themselves from prim ordial ties and adopting a secular-socialist-revolutionary ideology, the Pales­ tinians and other Arab leftists could cooperate w ith socialist Jews and w ork together in opposition to the emerging confessional-Zionist alliance.

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Rigidity o f Confe8sk>nalisin and Zionism : Their Inability to Transform Themselves Both confessionalism and Zionism are bom rigid and unable to trans­ form themselves in response to emerging conflicts and challenges. Com­ m unal conflicts in particular gain m omentum w ith tim e provoking violence and generating unexpected difficulties. Discrimination and oppression are built in the very nature o f the systems and the existing com m unities never get assimilated into one unified nation. On the con­ trary , as Milton Esman points o u t, “where communal and class cleav­ ages coincide, the probability o f severe conflict increases.” 13 To be sure, several mechanisms o f conflict management are used to bring conflicts under control, b u t “the conflict management perspective has an inevit­ able bias tow ard conservatism and system m aintenance, tow ard the orderly and peaceful continuity o f a conflict-ridden or violence-prone political system .” 14 Such a built-in inclination tow ard conservatism is rooted not in comm unal differences as such b u t in the determ ination o f the dom inant strata to preserve their privileges and powers. This explains why Lebanon and Israel have not been able to effectively use conflict-regulating practices such as those suggested by Eric Nordlinger, nam ely, stable coalition, the proportionality principle, depoli­ ticization, m utual veto, comprom ise, and concessions by the stronger to the weaker p arty .13 Simply, confessionalism and Zionism are com­ m itted to preserve the dom inance o f Maronites and Jews over others who are expected to adjust to a condition th at renders them inferior, powerless and deprived. They subscribe to a democracy in form not o u t o f concern for justice and freedom b u t because dom inant com­ m unities benefit from laissez-faire com petition. The rigidity does now even allow for liberal change. Injustices can­ n o t be corrected. Amos Elon wonders about the reason for the outcry in Israel over the Arab villages o f Berit and Berem whose inhabitants were expelled about twenty-five years ago and prevented from return­ ing to their homes by the m ilitary in spite o f the Supreme C ourt's reaffirm ation o f their rights to repossess their houses and lands. He condudes th at one reason for the outcry may be “an undercurrent o f guilt feeling tow ard the Palestinian Arabs, caught as they are under the wheels o f history. Indeed, a certain sense o f guilt toward individual Arabs runs like a red thread through a great num ber o f novels, plays and poems o f the post-1948 period.” 16 Elon further states th at Mrs. Meir (then prem ier o f Israel) defended her position o f refusing to aUow th e people o f Berem and Berit to go back to their homes. She stuck to

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three main reasons. First, there is a security consideration. Second, there is a grave danger o f setting a precedent. She feared th at all sorts o f claims may be put forward by hundreds o f thousands o f Arab refugees o f the 1948 war. What begins as Ik iit and Berem, Mrs. Meir was said to fear, might end in Tel Aviv-Jaffa. . . Therefore, although the original expulsion m ight have been a m istake, it is now too late, too dangerous to redress the wrong done. Third, there is the concern over a crisis o f Zionist ideology for the restoration o f the tw o towns might intensify the doubts in the righteousness o f the Zionist cause.17 The point here is the inability o f the system to redress injustices. By attem pting to do so it erradicates its very foundation. As m entioned by Noam Chomsky, the Supreme Court o f Israel decreed th at “there is no Israeli nation apart from the Jewish people and the Jewish people consists not only o f the people residing in Israel b u t also o f th e Jews in the Diaspora.** Israel, thus, is a Jewish State governing a society th at is in part non Jew ish. This f a c t. . . has always been the Achilles heel o f political Zionism. If a state is Jewish in certain respects, then in these respects it is not dem ocratic. . . (and) a non Jew ish citizen suffers various forms o f discrim ination. He is not perm itted to lease o r work on state lands. He is not able to reside in allJew ish cities, such as Karmiel, built on lands confiscated from Israeli Arabs. To m ention a recent case, a Druze, form erly an officer w ith 20 years service in the Israeli Border Police, was denied the right even to open a business near Karmiel by decision o f the Israel Land A uthority. “ Consequently, Israel is not only unable to be dem ocratic and redress its injustices, it is an embodim ent o f the concept o f Jewish nationhood and racism and stands in diam etrical opposition to the ‘democratic secular state’ proposed by the Palestinian revolutionary movement. The Lebanese political system was conceived and arranged according to a sectarian form ula which rendered it highly rigid and static. Rep­ resentation in the Parliament and distribution o f m ajor and m inor posts on a sectarian basis did not take into account the fact th at religious ratios do change. It has been constantly feared th at any basic reforms would certainly upset the delicate balance. Hence, the tendency o f the Lebanese ruling class to resist change.

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The inability o f the system to transform itself and the tendency o f resisting change are reflected in several interrelated phenomena: 1. Christian elites have refused to take a census o f the Lebanese population since 1932 even though planning, scientific research, developmental projects, the social security plan, etc., have been ham­ pered by this refusal. The government has also failed to adopt a policy on imm igration, naturalization and citizenship rights. While some groups were rightly granted citizenship (such as Armenians), others were wrongly deprived o f it (such as Kurds). 2. The traditional leaders o f Lebanon have continued to control the country and perpetuate themselves. Political positions have been inherited like family names, and some children could not wait the death o f the father. Hence, the phenomenon o f voting both father and son into Parliament (as in the case o f Pierre Jum ayil and his son Amin). Some liberal professionals and newly prosperous businessmen were able to reach the Parliament and Cabinet b u t only under the wings o f the traditional leaders and by buying their nom inations on their slates. Once in power the liberal technocrats and businessmen could m aintain their positions only by adhering to the policies o f these traditional leaders. Those liberal technocrats who were appointed to the Cabinet in the early 1970s (reference is made here to Ghassan Tueini, Elias Saba, Emile Bitar, Henry Eddeh) took their jobs seriously and tried to introduce such reforms as the im position o f higher taxes on luxury item s, lowering the soaring prices o f medical drugs, enforcing laws governing taxation, improving public schools and revising educational curricula. All these attem pts were vehemently resisted and all o f these ministers had to resign; in one instance a m inister (Henry Eddeh) was expelled from office upon refusal to resign. Simply, the political system has proved non-responsive to public opinion. A research survey conducted by Iliya Harik and m yself in Beirut (1972) showed th at the m ajority o f the Muslim (86 percent) and Christian (61 percent) respondents favored ending M aronite m onopoly over the office o f the president — rather th at it should be accessible to all Lebanese regardless o f their religious affiliation. In fact, increasing powers had been centered in the office o f the presidency undermining the office o f the premier reserved for Sunni Muslims. The results o f a research study conducted on a representative sample o f Lebanese students at the American University o f Beirut in 1969 showed th at 84 percent were dissatisfied w ith the political conditions at that tim e; 73 percent expressed basic disagreement with the political trends and activities of the Lebanese government; 71 percent believed that the

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political system was not realty dem ocratic; and 94 percent agreed th at there was a great deal o f corruption and favoritism in the political adm inistration. Yet, the dissatisfied Lebanese isolationists felt they had to defend the system and oppose change out o f fear o f upsetting the delicate balance. Hence the decline in the capacity o f the Lebanese establishm ent for institutional adjustm ent and the potential dilemma observed by Michael Hudson: “To adjust to the new social justice and the newly politicized elements may lead to a derangement o f the traditional balance o f p o w er. . . ; not to adjust may invite the to tal destruction o f the political system .” 19 3. There had been a great disparity between popular support to pro* gressive groups and their representation in parliament and the cabinet. The immensity o f this disparity has been clearly dem onstrated in the current civil war. This in turn has contributed to further aggrevation o f the polarization process gradually taking place between the Christian and Muslim comm unities. The m ore the gap widened and deepened, the more the confessionalists tended to publicly deny the existence o f disunity and n o t tolerate criticism. Conclusion In spite o f the national and social struggle, Arab society continues to be threatened w ith further deterioration. What undermines the struggle and contributes to the gap between dream and reality is the failure to develop a scientific secular-revolutionary vision. The prevailing tradi­ tional loyalties provide the necessary climate for the survival and the sustenance o f sectarianism and Zionism. Unless the Arabs liberate themselves from the traditional loyalties, the dream will be th at distant from realization. Human will makes a difference as long as reality allows for a choice. A choice will have to be m ade, for there can be no com fort in the successive tragedies th at have haunted Arab life. The choice is in revolutionary confrontation.

Notes 1. For more details on this thesis, see Halim B anket, Lebanon in Strife: Student Preludes to the Civil War (Austin, Texas, 1977). 2. Kamal S. Salibi, 'T h e Personality o f Lebanon in Relation to the Modern World,” in Politics in Lebanon, ed. L. Binder (New York, 1966) pp. 268-269. 3. Don Peretz, "The Palestine Arab Refugee Problem", in Political Dynamics in the M iddle East, eds. P.Y. Hammond and S.S. Alexander (N.Y., 1972), p. 281. 4. Salibi, "Personality", p. 266.

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5. William W. Haddad, “ Lebanon, Officially and Unofficially, and Palestine,“ unpublished manuscript presented at the annual convention o f the Association o f Arab-American University Graduates in New York, October 1-3,1976, p. 10. 6. Quoted from Palestine Post, 21 March 1946. 7. Yochanan Peres, “Modernization and Nationalism in The Identity o f the Israeli Arab,“ M iddie East Journal, Autumn, 1970, pp. 479-492, p. 488. 8. Uri Davis, ‘T o Be an Arab in Israel“ , in D ocum ents From Israel 1967-1973: Readings For a Critique o f Zionism , eds. Uri Davis and Norton Mezvinsky (London, 1975). 9. Michel Shiha, Politique Interieure (Beirut, 1964), p. 44; cited in William W. Haddad, “ Lebanon, Officially,“ p. 1. 10. Halim Barakat, ‘T h e Religious Factor and Parliamentary Elections in Lebanon: A Tendency Toward Sectarian Polarization“, M awaqif, no. 19/20, 1972, pp. 6-16. 11. These official statistics are reported in Educational Statistics fo r the Year 1974-75, Center for Educational Research and Development, Ministry o f Education, Lebanon. 12. See Liban, Ministère du Plan - Direction Centrale de la Statistique, L E nquete Par Sondage sur la Population A ctive au Liban, November 1970, Fascicule No. 4 Scolarisation et Education, March 1972; and Joseph Antoun and Khali Abou-Rujaily, The O utputs o f the Lebanese Educational System (Beirut, 1975) (in Arabic). 13. Milton J. Esman, “The Management o f Communal Conflict,” Public Policy voL 21, no. 1 (Winter 1973): 49-78, p. 50. 14. Ib id ., p. 52. 15. For details on these six conflict-regulating practices, see Eric A. Nordlinger, C onflict Regulation in D ivided Societies, Occasional Papers in Inter­ national Affairs, No. 29 (Cambridge, Mass., 1972). 16. Amos Eton, 'T w o Arab Towns that Plumb Israel’s Conscience,” The New York Times M agazine, 22 October 1972, p. 69; see also Amos Elon, The Israelis: Founders & Sons (London, 1971). 17. Elon, “Two Arab Towns.” 18. Noam Chomsky, “Israeli Jews and Palestinian Arabs,” The H oly Cross Q uarterly 5, no. 2 (Summer 1972): 16-17. 19. Michael C. Hudson, The Precarious Republic: Political M odernization in Lebanon (N.Y. 1968), p. 12.

Part Four ZIO N ISM A N D T H E IN T E R N A T IO N A L C O M M U N ITY

IS R A E L A N D S O U TH A F R IC A : A C O M P A R A TIV E S T U D Y IN RACISM A N D S E T T L E R C O L O N IA L IS M Richard P. Stevens

In parallel developments, remarkable not so much for their occurrence but as for the reluctance o f Western opinion to acknowledge their reality and interrelationship, Israel and South Africa today present the world w ith the predictable responses o f tw o surviving settler states as they struggle to ward o ff the demands o f the original inhabitants seek­ ing the full exercise o f their natural and political rights. In addition, a further challenge is presented to both states at the international level where the demand has grown for their exclusion from the United Nations and other world bodies. Faced w ith such pressures it is small wonder th at the relationship between these two settler entities, long played down for a variety o f motives, has recently assumed an open character. There is a pattern o f behavior which is identical in its general lines exhibited by those European settlers who have formed political entities in non-European lands. This pattern o f behavior is quite recognizable in South Africa and Israel. It also is observable in Rhodesia but this state merely reproduces most o f the historical phenomenon which gave rise to South Africa. The same pattern was present in Algeria and in part in Kenya. In the latter two cases, however, the m etropolitan power still retained ultim ate authority and thus saw fit to bring about m ajority rule. Such an approach to the study o f settler colonialism is not only valid, but it is useful in comprehending the past and rewarding in attem pting to predict the course o f future events. As settler colonialism is different from traditional colonialism because the settlers are perm anently there, and permanently in contact w ith the indigenous inhabitants, the “natives,” the discrim inatory treatm ent imposed upon the latter is more intense, systematic and brutal than that which the natives were subjected to by overseas imper­ ial authorities. A declared espousal o f discrim ination on the basis o f race, color or creed w ithout apology also distinguishes settler colonial­ ism. Because the settlers are well-entrenched in the lands they have occupied, indeed, many being cut o ff after several generations from any alternative hom e, new approaches are required which were n o t essential to the dismantling o f the old colonialism. Although n o t overseas agents

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who came to the colonies on duty, for a variety o f historical and cultural reasons they continue to derive support from their Western sources. Because o f their success in establishing strong fortified positions these states are able to stubbornly hold on to power. This does not mean, however, th at they are w ithout challenge, internally and extern* ally. Although the future is uncertain, if there is any lesson in history it is th at apeople will not be displaced in their own land w ithout a right. And today, w ith the objective international environment changing so dram atically, it is difficult to believe th at the settler colonial phenome­ non can continue to receive the unqualified Western support it has traditionally expected. Fundam ental to an understanding o f the policies o f both Israel and South Africa is the fact that the character o f each is ultim ately determ ­ ined by the processes employed by an external element in acquiring, occupying and maintaining control o f the land whether through purch­ ase, force, legal enactm ent or judicial interpretation. For it is this dependence upon the acquisition and holding o f land, presumably in perpetuity, and the policies adopted to dispossess the original inhabi­ tants, which gives settler colonialism its distinctive character. Once set in m otion the process carries w ithin it a logic and a rationale almost predictable in its ideological and practical elaboration including a wide range o f tactical stratagems designed to deal w ith intem ationl realpolitik . But whatever the tactics adopted by Israel and South Africa, their inability to contain internal dissent, to ward o ff international criticism , tp sustain external support, or to prevent that fatal erosion o f convie'lion and dedication among the dom inant augurs ill for the continued survival o f these states, at least in their present form. Zionism and Afrikaner Ideology: Response to Internal Threats* O f primary importance in understanding the character o f Afrikanerdom and Zionism is the fact that both developed more in response to threats /rom within the comm unity than, as customary among nineteenth1 / century nationalistic movements, from fear o f external elements. Briefly, the intermingling o f disparate elements in South Africa, while resulting in instability and conflict, also witnessed an intermingling o f various groups which promised to lead to m utual assimilation and com bination. The final product o f such a response would necessarily have been a blend o f the contributions o f each according to their respective strengths, whether Dutch, H ottentot, Bushmen or Bantu. But it was not the challenge o f the indigenous elements to Dutch arrival at the Cape in 1652 which precipitated the evolution o f Dutch

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or Afrikaner nationalism into unmitigated racism as nationalism. Rather, it was in the challenge presented by the more advanced English, who themselves first arrived as occupiers in 1795, that the core o f Afrikaner ideology developed. For while the Dutch (Boer) offshot could maintain itself while mingling with the less-advanced indigenous culture and technology, the British presence revealed all too clearly the latter's cultural and technological superiority. Hence, the determ ination o f the most extreme elem ent, always the prime mover o f Afrikaner nationalism, to use language, religion, and their own way o f life as proof o f separate divine mission. Group consciousness, introversion, ethnocentrism and loyalty to the group as a supreme end in itself was thus enshrined at all levels o f society and government. Over the next century and a half, culminating in political victory in 1948, Afrikaner nationalism reached its full flower with racism, in the form o f apartheid, enunciated as state policy. To view Zionism as embodied in the Israeli state in historical perspec­ tive the circumstances giving rise to that nationalistic Jewish phenome­ non must also be observed. Accordingly, it can be postulated that the vital thrust behind the Zionist movement came neither from those Jews living in eastern Islamic societies where centuries o f interaction and accommodation had testified to the strength and capacity for survival o f the Jewish tradition, nor from those o f Jewish faith in the Western Hemisphere where religious belief, as distinct from "nationality” or "race” was well on the way to formal disassociation. Not only did the American Reform rabbis declare in 1869 th at “the messianic aim o f Israel is not the restoration o f the old Jewish state,” but in 1885 they said that they considered themselves "no longer a nation, b u t a religious comm unity and, therefore, expect no return to Palestine.” Where then did Zionism derive its impulse? Primarily from eastern and central Europe where, against the background o f the less-developed ‘tsa rist and Austro-Hungarian empires, a new freedom, whether the product o f liberal democratic philosophy or Marxian socialism, threat­ ened the integrity o f Jewish life as traditionally practiced. For if the ghetto or restrictive class employments were to be overthrown along w ith serfdom and other relics o f political stagnation, so also would ,those internal and external constraints which had long molded Jewish life in eastern and central Europe presumably be weakened. In short, a new ghetto, psychological, culturad and political, was to be erected in the form o f Zionism, only then, it was assumed, could the processes o f assimilation be countered. If no actual physical threat existed it was nevertheless stated as dogma that the non-Jew, the goyim, was by

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A C om parative S tu d y in Racism and S e ttle r C olonialism

nature anti-Semitic and must be regarded as such. In short, only separa­ tion could save the group. Asserting th at the God o f Abraham and Moses had given the Jews the right as the Chosen people to a land o f their own in Palestine, the Zionists would also marshall cultural, historical and political arguments in support o f their claim. Some Zionists cared less about Palestine as the end product, but all were concerned about assimilation. While the chief argument employed, the religious, was properly Judaic and acceptable in its spiritual sense to Christians and Muslims (tw o other faiths which shared the Biblical legacy) as well as to "spiritual” Zionists, once linked w ith land occupation through political stratagems, Zionism increasingly unfolded as a racist phenomenon. Step by step through the Balfour Declaration, the Mandate, and finally the creation and expansion o f the state o f Israel, a land allegedly promised to Jews and no others, was to be occupied at whatever cost. The sacralization o f the state and its people was thus enshrined as religious d u ty /T h e fore­ m ost enemy would be those Jews who would refuse to accept the identification o f Jewish faith w ith possession o f the lan