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From: Eddie Chumney
To: heb_roots_chr@hebroots.org
Subject: Chapter 8: Israel: The Fig Tree Blossoms (Part 2 of 3)
CHAPTER 8
ISRAEL: THE FIG TREE BLOSSOMS
from the book by Eddie Chumney
"RESTORING THE TWO HOUSES OF ISRAEL"
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
CHAPTER 8
ISRAEL: THE FIG TREE BLOSSOMS
(Part 2 of 3)
POST WWII POLITICS IN ENGLAND
Even before the war ended, a significant
shift occurred through
the British elections of July 1945. Britain still had the League
of
Nations' Mandate to control Palestine. During the war, Prime
Minister
Churchill had been strongly supportive of Zionism and gave
Weizmann
his word that a State of Israel would be set up in Palestine
after
the war with three to four million Jews. 36 That was the view of
both
the Labour and Tory parties in their electioneering campaigns.
But in 1945, Churchill's coalition was
voted out of office in a landslide. 37 Britain's severe economic setbacks during the
war and
its shrinking world empire led to the dissatisfaction that
produced
this ouster. The Labour party of Clement Atlee took over with
high
expectations from everyone - including the Zionists.
Despite candidate Atlee's pro-Zionist
stance, however, his
administration soon reversed itself on the Palestine issue.
Ernest
Bevin was made Foreign Secretary and thus became Czar of the
Mideast
and its problems. Though a sharp statesman and keenly perceptive
of
growing Soviet power, he did not share the pro-Zionist sympathies
of
his colleagues and the former administration. 38 "Bevin
repudiated
all the pledges that had been made officially and unofficially by
Labour speakers for the last ten years, some of which may have
helped
the Party win the election." 39
Several changes made this reversal of
policy the politically
prudent course for the new foreign secretary. The Arab world was
gaining prestige and becoming a factor to be reckoned with. It
had
just added several independent states to its number and its oil
power
was claiming international respect. In juggling interests in the
Mideast, Bevin tended to favor the Arabs and downplay the rights
of
Jews. To this end, Bevin came to fiercely oppose the creation of
a
Jewish state in the troubled area. 40
Another factor contributing to
this reversal was the MacDonald "White Paper" of 1939, an anti-Jewish document
that continued in
effect throughout the war. Designed to mollify the Arabs, it in
fact
reduced Jewish immigration to Palestine to a trickle and intended
to
cut it off entirely. Had the White Paper been fully carried out,
the
hard-won advantages guaranteed the Jews in the Balfour
Declaration
would have been nullified. Arabs responded to this British
reversal
by increasing their opposition to Jewish immigration. Encouraged
by
Bevin, they boldly demanded that all Jewish immigration be
stopped
and a new Arab State be set up in Palestine. 41
The irony is that none of these Arab
nations (except for
Transjordan) supported the Allies in World War II. They remained
carefully neutral until the final months when Allied victory was
assured. The Palestinian leader (ex-Mufti Haj Amin Husseini), in
fact, defected to Iraq before the war and later joined Hitler and
Eichmann in Germany in their butchery of Jews. 42 Yet, the Arab
states were shown amazing respect by the Allied powers in the
postwar era; seven seats were given them in the United NationsAssembly. 43
THE JEWISH RESISTANCE MOVEMENT
When many Zionists began to realize that
a political solution to
establish a national homeland for the Jewish people (house of
Judah)
could not be achieved, they saw the need for military action. The
main Jewish resistance groups were the Haganah, the Irgun and
Lehi.
Arab riots in the land of Palestine in
1920 and 1921 strengthened
the view that it was impossible to depend upon the British
authorities to defend and protect the Jewish people in the land
of
Palestine. Furthermore, the Arabs would disrupt the agricultural
settlements set up by the Yishuv. In addition, after initially
encouraging the immigration of Jews to Israel, the British
now openly banned Jewish immigration. From these events, it
became
apparent that the British were not interested in providing
security
for the Jewish settlers in the land. Therefore, the yishuv needed
to
create an independent defense force completely free of foreign
authority.
THE CREATION OF THE HAGANAH
With the help of the worldwide Jewish
Agency, the Hagonah was
created. In June 1920, the Haganah was founded by the Histadrut
(General Federation of Jewish Labor). At the time, it was
considered
illegal by the British mandatory authorities. The Haganah became
the
underground defense organization of the yishuv from 1920 to the
establishment of the state of Israel in 1948.
As Arab hostilities increased, the
members of the Haganah split
over the question of how to react to Arab terrorism. Following
Arab
disturbances in the summer of 1929, a group of commanders and
members
of the Haganah, led by Avraham Tehomi, decided to split from the
main
group and set up their own organization to be more active in
pursuing
the Arab terrorists.
THE CREATION OF THE IRGUN
This new organization was named the Irgun Zva'i Leumi (National
Military Organization) also known by the name of Etzel. It was
founded in 1931 and became an underground organization that
operated
in Palestine in the 1930s and 1940s.
Irgun rejected the "restraint"
policy of the Haganah. They
carried out armed reprisals against Arabs and preferred to use
political powers to forward the goal of reclaiming the land.
While
the armed reprisals against the Arabs provided relief for the
Jewish
settlers, it was condemned by the Jewish Agency and brought
political
embarrassment to them. While the Jewish Agency tried to provide
an
image of the Jew being a good moral person who was being
terrorized
by the Arabs in order to win support from the non-Jewish world,
the
Irgun gave it's full support to the settlers.
On December 5, 1936, Avraham Tehomi
signed an accord with Ze'ev
(Vladimir) Jabotinsky, the leader of the Revisionist Movement,
making
Jabotinsky commander of Irgun. In April 1937, during the Arab
riots,
the Irgun split. About half its members returned to the Haganah.
The
rest formed a new Irgun Zeva'i Le'umi (National Military
Organization), which was ideologically linked with the
Revisionist
Movement and accepted the authority of its leader, Vladimir
Jabotinsky.
VLADIMIR JABOTINSKY AND
THE REVISIONIST MOVEMENT
Ze'ev (Vladimir) Jabotinsky was born on
October 18, 1880, in the
city of Odessa, Russia. The pogrom against the Jews of Kishinev
in
1903 spurred Jabotinsky to undertake Zionist activity. Jabotinsky
was
deeply impressed by Theodor Herzl. Jabotinsky was elected as a
delegate to the 6th Zionist Congress, the last in which Theodor
Herzl
participated.
After World War I, Jabotinsky became
disenchanted when Great
Britain severed almost 80% of the British Mandate originally
designated for a Jewish Homeland to create Transjordan (1922).
Disillusioned with Britain and angry at Zionist acquiescence to
British reversals, Jabotinsky became unhappy with the
direction of the Zionist Movement. He was unconvinced that the
Turks
or the Arabs would accommodate the aims of Zionism. So, he
advocated
bolder tactics.
Jabotinsky set about establishing
a separate Zionist federation
based on "revision" of the relationship between the
Zionist movement
and Great Britain. This federation would actively challenge
British
policy and openly demand self-determination or Jewish statehood.
The
goals of the Revisionist movement included restoration of a
Jewish
Brigade to protect the Jewish community and mass immigration to
Palestine of up to 40,000 Jews a year.
In 1925, the establishment of the World
Union of Zionist
Revisionists (Hatzohar) was announced with Paris as its
headquarters.
In 1931, Jabotinsky demanded that the Seventeenth Zionist
Congress
make a clear announcement of its Zionist aims (a Jewish state)
but
the delegates refused to do so.
In 1923, the youth movement Betar
(Brith Joseph Trumpeldor) was
created. The new youth movement was aimed at educating its
members so
that they would have a military and nationalistic spirit.
Jabotinsky
was also the leader of this movement.
In 1935, after the Zionist Executive
rejected his political program and refused to clearly define that "the
aim of Zionism was
the establishment of a Jewish state," Jabotinsky decided to
resign
from the Zionist Movement. He founded the New Zionist
Organization
(NZO) to conduct independent political activity for free
immigration
and the establishment of a Jewish State.
In 1937, the Irgun Tzvai Leumi (IZL)
became the military arm of
the Jabotinsky movement and he became its commander. The three
bodies
headed by Jabotinsky, The New Zionist Organization (NZO), the
Betar
youth movement and the Irgun Tzvai Leumi (IZL) were three
extensions
of the same movement.
With the outbreak of World War II, Irgun
declared a truce, which
led to a second split. Some forces decided to fight with the
British
against the Nazi Axis powers. This group declared a truce and
joined
the British army and the Jewish Brigade. The second group led by
Avraham Stern was known as the Stern Gang or Lehi. They operated
as
an underground organization from 1940 to 1948.
THE CREATION OF LEHI
Lehi was an acronym for Lohamei Herut
Yisrael (Fighters for the
Freedom of Israel). The split with the Irgun was due to
disagreement
on three main issues:
1)
The group's demand that the military struggle against the
British government be continued irrespective of the war
against Nazi Germany;
2)
Opposition to enlistment in the British army, which Jabotinsky supported; and
3)
Willingness to collaborate, as a tactical measure, with
anyone who supported the struggle against the British in
Palestine.
Lehi's
goals were:
1)
Conquest and liberation of Eretz Israel; war against the
British Empire;
2)
Complete withdrawal of Britain from Palestine;
3)
Establishment of a "Hebrew kingdom from the Euphrates to the
Nile."
MENACHEM BEGIN BECOMES LEADER
OF THE IRGUN
In December of 1943, Menachem Begin
became leader of the Irgun. Begin was a Polish Jew who had escaped a Siberian labor
camp in 1943
and made his way to Palestine to join the Irgun.
Menachem Begin was born in Brest-Litovsk
in 1913. As a child he
was forced to flee with his family to escape the fighting
between
the German and Russian armies in World War I. A passionate
Zionist
from an early age, he joined Ze'ev Jabotinsky's Betar youth
movement
in his teens, rising quickly to important administrative and
leadership positions.
In February 1944, Irgun declared war
against the British
administration. It attacked and blew up government offices,
military
installations and police stations. The Jewish Agency and their
group,
the Haganah responded against the Irgun in a campaign nicknamed
the
Sezon. The Haganah kidnapped several of the Irgun's members and
handed them over to the British.
THE JEWISH RESISTANCE MOVEMENTS BECOME UNITED IN PURPOSE
After World War II, the Haganah
realized that the British were
not relenting their ban on immigration, nor were they helpful in
combating Arab terrorism. In late 1945, the three groups (the
Irgun,
the Haganah, and Lechi) reached an understanding to coordinate
the
struggle to fight the British.
The unity of the groups was short-lived.
In May 1946 the Irgun
blew up the wing of the King David hotel in Jerusalem, which
housed
the British Palestine Command. The organizations' cooperation
broke
up following Irgun's bombing because Haganah claimed that the
attack
had not been coordinated with them.
THE JEWISH RESISTANCE MOVEMENTS ARE MERGED INTO THE IDF
After the end of World War II, the Haganah was the largest and
most important Jewish military force operating against the
British.
On May 26, 1948, the Provisional Government of Israel decided to
transform the Haganah into the regular army of the State to be
called
"Zeva Haganah Le-Yisrael" or The Israel Defense Forces
(IDF). When
the IDF was established on May 31, 1948, Irgun and Lehi announced
that its members would join also.
Haganah and Irgun became the Labor and
Likud political parties in
Israel. The Haganah and the Irgun have had their political
differences since they were created to fight against the British
in
order that the Jewish people (house of Judah) could have a
national
homeland. There was an event that took place before they merged
themselves into the IDF that highlights the division and tension
between these two groups. This division continues to the present
day
through the modern day political parties in Israel named Labor
and
Likud whose political roots go back to the Haganah and the Irgun.
The Irgun had a boat, the Altalena,
which had supplies and men
coming into Jaffa port. The boat was laden with munitions needed
by
the Jewish defenders. The Haganah wanted to take all supplies.
Negotiation between the Irgun and the Haganah ensued. No
agreement
was forged. The Haganah opened fire on the Altalena, sinking the
boat, killing and wounding Jewish lives and destroying supplies.
The
commander of the Haganah was Yitzhak Rabin. When the nation of
Israel
was established, the Jewish Agency and its followers took up the
leadership of Israel. Today, their political party is known as
"Labor." The opposition party, led by the soldiers in
the Irgun,
became the opposition party to the Haganah and is known today as the "Likud." Still today, these two
groups are politically fighting it out between themselves just as they did in the
time of the birth of the state of Israel.
THE BRITISH MANDATE
IS TURNED OVER TO THE UN
When the Irgun blew up the King David
Hotel in Jerusalem
(Yerushalayim) where the British government kept their office on
July
22, 1946, twenty-eight British were killed. By the beginning of
1947,
the British had decided they wanted nothing more than to wash
their
hands of the whole mandate affair. 44
Thus it was becoming more and more
evident that British
anti-Zionist policy was bankrupt and that a new approach was
needed.
The fault lay primarily with "Bevin's agonized intransigence
on the
immigration issue, provoking maximal Zionist demands for Jewish
statehood." This "ignited the terrorism, launched the
illegal refugee
traffic to Palestine, undermined Britain's economy, eroded its
international reputation, and finally doomed the Palestine
Mandate
itself." 45 The Atlee-Bevin government came to see how
impossible it
was to carry out the British Mandate with conflicting policies
toward
the Jews and the Arabs. 46
Acknowledging a deadlock on the issue,
the British cabinet on April 2, 1947, announced it was referring the Palestine
problem to
the United Nations General Assembly. This body set up an
eleven-nation investigative board (UNSCOP) to devise a plan of
action. After several months of review, they recommended
endorsing
the principle of independence for both the Jews and the Arabs.
However, they were divided regarding who should control what
area.
The majority voted for "partitioning" Palestine,
advocating three
divisions, an Arab state, a Jewish state, and an international
zone
in the Jerusalem area. 47
The General Assembly of the United
Nations voted on November 29,
1947, to support partitioning. The vote was thirty-three to
thirteen,
mainly the Western bloc against the Moslems and Asian blocs.
Eleven
nations abstained, including Britain. It was to be implemented at
the
termination of the British Mandate on May 14, 1948. 48
The partition plan vote became UN
Resolution 181. In Part III,
Section A of UN Resolution 181, the city of Jerusalem was
established
as a "corpus separatum" under a special international
regime and
shall be administered by the United Nations. Thus, the plan of
the UN
was for Jerusalem (Yerushalayim) to become an international city.
The Arabs unequivocally rejected
it, perceiving it as another step in Zionist expansionism. To maintain good relations
with the
Arab League, Britain also rejected it. Joining them, the United
States State Department under Secretary of State George Marshall
cautioned against the plan. In May 1947, the Soviet delegation
surprised everyone by endorsing partitioning. In
October, the Arab League began a troop buildup in Palestine. 49
President Truman chose to disagree with
Secretary of State George
Marshall on the issue. Truman accused the State Department of
having
an Arabic mentality. "Like most of the British
diplomats," he
quipped, "some of our diplomats also thought that the Arabs,
on
account of their numbers and because of the fact that they
controlled
such immense oil resources, should be appeased. I am sorry to say
that there were some among them who were inclined to be
anti-Semitic." 50 He then instructed the State Department to
support
the United Nations plan of partitioning Palestine. 51
Many commentators believe that this
courageous action by Truman
received the smile of heaven. That fall, Truman ran for
reelection
against the highly favored Republican governor of New York, Tom
Dewey, and won. Truman later referred to himself as
"Cyrus," the
biblical Gentile who in Persian times had assisted the
post-exilic
remnant in returning from dispersion. 52
ISRAEL'S 1948 WAR OF INDEPENDENCE
The Arabs responded to the Partition
Resolution by carrying out their oft-repeated threats. Jewish homes and
synagogues in the
major cities were immediately attacked while the British stood
by.
Calls went out for all available forces from the Arabic States to
mobilize for war. Arabs saw the British withdrawal as an
opportunity
to drive out the Jews and settle the immigration question once
and
for all. The Mufti moved from Cairo to Lebanon to take charge of
the
Palestinian operation. 53
In the late afternoon of May 14, 1948,
the British kept their
word and hauled down the Union Jack. Israel proceeded to raise
its
newly designed flag featuring the Star of David the same day.
David
Ben-Gurion became Israel's first prime minister. Chaim Weizmann
later
became the first President of the new republic. Within minutes,
President Truman issued a statement extending de facto
recognition to
Israel as a sovereign state. 54
Before the day ended, Egyptian planes
were already bombing Tel Aviv. Most of the Arab states sent men and material to the
attack,
including Syria, Transjordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Yemen, Iraq, and
Saudi
Arabia. Additional forces came from North African states. 55
The Arab's initial attack was full-scale
on all sides, confident
that their sheer numbers and superior armament would quickly
overwhelm the ill-equipped Jews. 56 Their plan was to take
Palestine's key cities within a few weeks and then quickly
"drive the
Jews into the sea."
From a statistical standpoint, an easy
triumph was practically a
given: the Arab's overwhelming power came from seven nations with
a
combined population of over 140 million; the Jewish remnant they
opposed totaled only 650,000 in all Palestine, with no promise of
backing from other nations; the Arab Legion of Transjordan was
"financed and officiated by the British." 57 However,
with divine
help from the G-d of Israel, the Jewish people (house of Judah)
won
the war and the nation of Israel was born.
The UN plan had assigned her 5,500
square miles and the new Arab
state 4,500. The spoils of war added additional territory, which
gave
Israel a total of 8,050 of the total 10,400 square miles in
Palestine. 58 King Abdullah of Transjordan acquired 2,350 square
miles in the West Bank plus over 750,000 Palestinians. 59
In May 1949, the new nation of Israel
was accepted into the
United Nations, recognized as an independent, sovereign
nation. 60
On four occasions in the next
twenty-five years, Israel was
forced to mobilize her troops to defend her borders. Each of
these
was a traumatic episode in itself, but each also resulted in
further
gain that fortified her position in the Middle East. 61
ISRAEL'S 1956 WAR WITH EGYPT
Egyptian General Gamal Abdel Nasser was
elected president of
Egypt in 1956. From 1948, Egypt had closed the Suez Canal to
Israeli
ships. Then in 1955, she began a blockade also of the Gulf of
Aqaba,
cutting off Israel's access to the Red Sea and Indian Ocean.
Responding to this challenge, Israel again mobilized her citizen
army
in October 1956, striking at Egypt through the rugged Sinai
wasteland. That desert campaign became known as "Operation
Kadesh."
62 With divine help from the G-d of Israel, the Jewish people
(house
of Judah) defeated the plans of Nasser and Egypt and won the 1956
war.
ISRAEL'S 1967
WAR WITH HER ARAB NEIGHBORS
In the spring of 1967 following a vast
military buildup of
Russian equipment, Nasser again closed the Gulf of Aqaba to
Israeli
shipping and demanded that UN observers withdraw from the
demilitarized zone. By May 17, seven Arabic nations had mobilized
armor on three fronts, broadcasting their intentions to "cut
the Jews
throats." King Hussein of Jordan decided to join the fray,
collaborating with Iraqi troops. He hoped to seize the Islamic
shrines in Jerusalem for his Hashemite kingdom. 63
When Nasser blockaded the Straits of
Tiran and closed off the Israeli port of Eilat, he prevented Israel's only access
from the
Gulf of Aqaba to the Red Sea, and from there to the Gulf of
Aden and
the Arabian Sea, and it meant Israel's access to oil from the
Persian
Gulf was cut off. The blockade, considered an act of war by
Israel,
was provocation of the first order. Israel had already notified
the
UN Security Council that it would soon have to act in its own
self-defense. But, the UN failed to enforce the conditions of the
truce that had existed since 1956. 64
The Arabs massed 547,000 troops, 2,504
tanks, and 957 combat
aircraft. Israel mustered 264,000 troops, 800 tanks, and 300
combat
airplanes. Israeli generals Yitzchak Rabin and Moshe Dayan
foresaw
that surprise was their only hope. 65 The preemptive strike was
decisive. "In 170 minutes Israel's pilots had smashed
Egypt's
best-equipped air bases and had turned three hundred of Nasser's
combat planes into flaming wrecks . The Egyptian air force, the
largest in the Middle East, was in ruins." 66 The same
scenario was
replayed in Syria, Jordan, and Iraq. "By nightfall of June
6, Israel
had destroyed 416 planes, 393 on the ground. It had lost
twenty-six
planes during that time, all to antiaircraft." 67
In two days, the Egyptian army in the
Sinai was virtually wiped
out, leaving Israel to occupy the Gaza Strip. To the north, after
a
desperate and costly tank battle, the Syrians were routed and the
strategic Golan Heights was taken. Thus ended the long nightmare
of
Syrian bombardment of Galilean villages. Israel was now secure on
her
northern border. 68
In the battle with Jordan, Israel gained
control of the West Bank
and the old city of Jerusalem fell into Israeli hands. By gaining
control of the West Bank, the cities of Bethlehem, Hebron,
Jericho,
and Shechem as well as Jerusalem came into Israel hands. For the
first time in nineteen hundred years, the Jews had control of the
old
city of Jerusalem. A newly composed ballad, "Jerusalem the
Golden,"
became Israel's popular anthem in the aftermath of the Six-Day
War. 69
In the war, "The Arabs
suffered 15,000 casualties; Israel's
losses were 777 killed, 2,186 wounded." 70 To its previous
eighty-five hundred square miles, it added twenty-eight thousand
square miles in the Sinai, Golan Heights, and West Bank. 71 The
occupied territories proved to be an ideal bone of contention for
the
Arabs, leading to further conflicts that would dwarf even the
monumental battles of Israel's first twenty years of nationhood.
72
ISRAEL'S 1973 YOM KIPPUR WAR
On October 6, 1973 on Yom Kippur, the
Arabs attacked Israel once
again. They had 750,000 troops, 3,200 Soviet tanks, 860 planes,
and
the latest Soviet missiles. 73 In the first grim hours at the
Canal
Zone, Israeli reservists were obliterated. Their token defenses
consisted of "precisely 436 Israeli soldiers in a series of
bunkers
seven to ten miles apart, together with three tanks and seven
artillery batteries." 74 Coming at them, "were
five Egyptian
infantry divisions, three mixed infantry and tank divisions, and
twenty-two independent infantry, commando, and paratroop
brigades.
With the air force, the enemy constituted not less than 600,000
men,
2,000 tanks, 2,300 artillery pieces, 160 SAM missile batteries,
and
550 combat planes." 75
In the third and fourth days of the war,
Israel began to win the
war. First, Israel was able to defeat Syria in the north. By
October
18, Israeli troops headed toward Damascus. In the battle with
Egypt
in the Suez, Israel gained the upper edge over Egypt. By October
23,
the Israeli army was at the Gulf of Suez. As a result, Egypt and
Russia demanded that the United Nations Security Council require
Israel to pull back to its pre-1967 borders.
As a result of the war, the United
Nations demanded that Israel
withdrawal from the West Bank and Gaza Strip based upon UN
Resolution
242. When Israel refused to comply, the council nearly voted her
out
of the United Nations in the summer of 1975. 76
THE POLITICS OF OIL IN THE MIDDLE EAST
The 1973 Yom Kippur war highlighted how
imported Arab oil has
become an important political and economic issue in understanding
the
present Israel / Arab conflict. The world economy depends on
imported
Arab oil and the Arab oil producing countries decided to use oil
as
an economic and political weapon to influence world opinion
against
Israel. On October 17, 1973, Arab petroleum ministers met during
the
Yom Kippur War and decided to cut oil production and exports.
"It was
under the façade of the war crisis . that the Arabs seized the
opportunity to launch a drastic escalation of oil prices. Libya
announced on October 18 that the cost of its oil would go up 28
percent - irrespective of the war and Israel's misdeeds. Iraq
thereupon declared a 70 percent price rise. Kuwait matched this
figure." 77
Members of the European Common Market
took immediate measures to placate Arab oil barons, making new demands on Israel to
give up the
occupied territories. Thus an oil-thirsty world forced Israel
into a
diplomatic ghetto. Though the Arabs suffered a devastating loss
in
the Yom Kippur war, they discovered a powerful new weapon and
found
themselves in the driver's seat of the world economy. By a simple
turn of oil valves they could further the goals of Palestine. 78
(End Part 2 of 3)
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