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Title: About Zionism
speeches and letters
Author: Albert Einstein
Translator: Leon Simon
Release date: September 24, 2026 [eBook #79647]
Language: English
Original publication: London: Soncino Press, 1930
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/79647
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABOUT ZIONISM ***
ABOUT ZIONISM
Speeches and Letters
by
PROFESSOR ALBERT EINSTEIN
Translated and Edited
With an Introduction by
LEON SIMON
London
THE SONCINO PRESS
5 Gower Street
1930
Printed in England
CONTENTS
_Introduction_ _page_ 9
Assimilation and Nationalism 23
The Jews and Palestine 41
Jew and Arab 51
_Select Bibliography_ 67
INTRODUCTION
There are two main ways of approach to Zionism. One starts from those
Jews who are made to suffer for being Jews, the other from the smaller
number who are not. In the one case Zionism means the transfer of
masses of Jews from countries in which they are obviously not wanted to
a country which they might call their own; in the other case it means
the re-creation in Palestine of a Hebraic type of life, which will be
regarded by all Jews as the embodiment of their own distinctive outlook
and ideals, and will thus help to counteract the inevitable tendency
of the Jews, when they are not driven back on themselves by external
restrictions, to lose their sense of being a separate people.
Of these two conceptions of Zionism, the former has the more direct and
obvious appeal. The fact that masses of Jews are made to suffer for
the crime of being Jews and wishing to remain Jews is too patent to
call for demonstration; and, while it is true that in some countries
Jewish disabilities have been removed so far as that can be done by
statute, bitter experience engenders a sceptical attitude towards the
idea that universal emancipation will provide a panacea for the Jew’s
troubles. In the first place, the countries with the largest numbers
of Jews are not all eager to admit them to full equality; and in the
second place, even where equality has been accorded, dislike of the
Jew often makes itself felt too strongly for his liking or comfort.
Hence, from the point of view of a Jew who wishes to see his people
better off in the world than it is to-day, or has been these many
centuries, there is much to commend a scheme which sets out to cut at
the root of the trouble by removing all the victims of anti-Semitism
to a land of their own. By contrast with this perfectly simple and
intelligible idea, the other conception of Zionism appears abstruse,
almost other-worldly. The problem to which it offers a solution is one
of which the existence, let alone the urgency, is not readily realised
by ordinary men and women. It requires no great exercise of thought
or imagination to appreciate the unenviable position of the Jewish
masses, or the desirability of transporting them to a safe home of
refuge. It is less easy to recognise that the emancipated Jew presents,
from the point of view of Jewish survival, at least as difficult a
problem as the unemancipated; that the very removal of restrictions
on the political and economic freedom of the Jews in this or that
country creates conditions which are more inimical than persecution
to the maintenance of whatever is worthily distinctive of the Jew
as such; that the consequent disintegration of an ancient people,
involving the disappearance of one of the world’s great cultures, is
even more tragic than the material ills of the Jewish masses; and
that the paramount need of the hour is a safe home of refuge for the
Jewish spirit. The line of argument here briefly indicated takes us
into the realm of abstract and metaphysical conceptions, of which the
common man is impatient. It presupposes the idea that the reality of
a people’s being is to be found in its distinctive “spirit,” by which
it is differentiated from other peoples, and that a people lives just
in so far as it is able freely to embody its spirit in the forms
and activities of an organised corporate existence of its own.
It regards a people as something bigger than the sum-total of the
individuals who compose it at any given time, as a personality with a
soul and a life and a history; it regards the well-being of a people as
something not to be measured in terms of the material prosperity or the
political freedom of its individual members. In relation to the Jewish
people in particular, it sees the crux of the problem in the fact
that the national personality is unable, in present conditions, to be
creatively self-expressive; and it seeks to save the people by securing
for it the possibility of another period of self-expression, naturally
in the only land which the people can in any sense call its own. This
type of Zionism, often called “Spiritual Zionism,” is more subtle and
more radical than the other, which is known, even less appropriately,
as “Political Zionism.” It can be defended on philosophical grounds,
and, despite its apparent abstractness, on strictly practical grounds;
but it does not speak with the clarion voice that rallies millions to a
banner.
Hence it is not surprising that Zionism did not begin to assume the
proportions of a large popular movement before 1895, when Theodor
Herzl, in his _Judenstaat_, propounded the beautifully simple idea
of finding, on some more or less unoccupied portion of the earth’s
surface, an autonomous home of refuge for those Jews who could not or
would not become completely assimilated to their surroundings. Herzl
did much more than propound the idea: he spent the rest of his brief
and care-laden days in working for its realisation. He created the
Zionist Organisation, the Jewish Colonial Trust to provide financial
backing for the diplomatic work of Zionism, the Jewish National
Fund to purchase land in Palestine. He gave to the Jewish masses the
hope and the vision for which they had unconsciously been yearning,
and fired their imagination as it had not been fired for many a long
year. But his actual plan did not come to fruition. There was no
country which could be turned into a Jewish country. The only land
of which the Jews were willing to think as potentially their own was
Palestine. As individuals they were ready (and, in those days, able) to
migrate from Eastern Europe to countries already developed, and to fit
themselves as best they might into the existing national structures;
for a national home of their own they wanted Palestine and Palestine
only. But Palestine was not suitable for a rapid mass-settlement; and
even if it had been, neither the requisite political conditions nor
the necessary financial resources were forthcoming. If the life of the
Zionist Organisation had depended on its prospect of accomplishing
within a measurable time the mass-migration and the autonomous state
which were fundamental to Herzl’s original conception, it would not
have lived for ten years. In fact, there was something more behind it
than a grandiose but impracticable vision. “Spiritual Zionism,” despite
its lack of mass appeal, was yet able in the hour of need to provide an
objective which could keep the Organisation together when its original
_raison d’être_ had disappeared. Not, of course, that the Organisation
officially adopted the philosophy of Spiritual Zionism as its own. Its
programme, its phraseology, its visions remained unchanged. But as a
matter of hard fact, it reconciled itself to comparatively small-scale
work in the field of Palestinian development. The settlement
of some thousands of Jews on the soil of Palestine, the concurrent
growth of Jewish industry in the principal towns, the creation of a
network of Hebrew schools—these and similar activities, important
as a demonstration of the unimpaired capacity of the Jew to re-make
the forms of his own life under modern conditions, and as a means of
reviving the practical interest of the Jewish people in Palestine, bore
no intelligible relation to the vision of a safe home of refuge for the
oppressed masses of Jewry. And to a large extent theory was inevitably
influenced by practice. Zionists came to recognise not only that the
idea of transporting the Jewish masses of Eastern Europe to Palestine
was a will-o’-the-wisp, but also that there was positive Jewish value
in the establishment in Palestine of a relatively small nucleus of the
Jewish people, speaking its own language and developing its own culture
on the basis of a healthy economic structure. Nor, so long as Palestine
remained in the hands of the Turks, did the question of the political
future of this nucleus achieve practical importance.
The Balfour Declaration of 1917, and the British Mandate for
Palestine, changed the situation in two respects. The establishment
of a progressive and friendly regime in Palestine removed many of
the obstacles which had hampered Jewish development before the war;
and Zionism has taken full advantage of the wider opportunities thus
afforded, allowance being made for the fact that the Jewish people
has suffered certainly not less than others from the impoverishment
and the weariness of the post-war world. The Jewish population of
Palestine has more than doubled in the last dozen years, and is
now in the neighbourhood of 160,000, about one-fifth of the total
population of the country. Jews have developed modern methods in
agriculture and industry, have drained marshes and brought neglected
areas under cultivation, have successfully fought the endemic diseases
of the land, and have done a great deal in the direction of raising
the general level of health and well-being. They have crowned their
educational edifice with a Hebrew University, have made the Hebrew
language once more their own, and on the foundation of this linguistic
revival have achieved at least the first steps in the evolution of a
type of individual and of life which can be called Jewish, or Hebrew,
without any hyphen. These developments are of some value to the world
at large, in so far as they mean the cultivation of a long neglected
estate. They are of benefit to the Arabs of Palestine, as bringing them
wider cultural opportunities and a higher standard of life. They are
of supreme importance to Jews the world over, not only because they
have provided many thousands of Jews from Eastern Europe with a better
and healthier way of life, but more particularly because of the tonic
effect of this gradual unfolding of the creative capacities of a people
which has learnt, seeing itself through the eyes of others, to regard
itself as incurably parasitic, and has forgotten, under the stress of
persecution and the blandishments of emancipation, that it has a great
moral and intellectual heritage of its own. Not the least noteworthy
effect of Zionist work in Palestine is the general quickening among
Jews all over the world of the sense of belonging spiritually
together, which is exemplified in the recently achieved union of
Zionists and non-Zionists in the Jewish Agency for Palestine.
At the same time, the Balfour Declaration and the Mandate have brought
into the foreground the hitherto dormant question of the political
status and future of the Jewish community in Palestine itself. The
Declaration contemplates “the establishment in Palestine of a national
home for the Jewish people.” It says nothing explicitly about the
status of the Palestinian Jews, who are not, and are unlikely to be,
more than a comparatively small fraction of that Jewish people to which
the national home is promised. But it was naturally understood, both
by those who gave and by those who received it, as implying a national
status for that part of the Jewish people which is or will be in the
national home itself. Nobody doubts that the Mandate was within the
intention of the Declaration in recognising the Jews of Palestine as
one of the national groups of the country—a recognition most clearly
exemplified in the status given to Hebrew as one of the official
languages of Palestine. The Declaration means, in other words, that
Palestine is not, as some people seem still to think, an Arab country
into which Jews may or may not be permitted to enter. It is a country
to which a Jew as such has a right to belong; it is in some senses a
Jewish land. But how much, or how little, is this going to mean in
practice? Is Palestine intended to become wholly a Jewish land, in the
sense that only its Jewish inhabitants will control its destinies (in
so far as the destinies of any small country can be controlled by its
inhabitants) and any others will have only such rights as the Jews see
fit to allow them? If that position is unthinkable while the Jews
are in a minority, would it be possible if they became a majority?
Justice and common-sense seem to dictate a negative answer to these
questions. The two national groups which are recognised as belonging
to Palestine, the Jewish and the Arab, ought to develop side by side
on a basis of political equality. There ought to be no possibility of
the domination of Arab by Jew or of the exclusion of Jew by Arab. The
question of majority or minority ought at no time, either now or in the
future, to affect the principle of national equality. But nothing of
this kind is clearly laid down in the Balfour Declaration; and even if
it had been, there is no guarantee that the Arabs of Palestine would
have accepted it as a reasonable view. For, rather paradoxically,
one of the effects of the recognition of Jewish national aspirations
has been to stimulate a Palestinian Arab nationalism which scarcely
existed before; and the spokesmen of this nationalism, unwilling to
admit a Jewish claim even to equal rights in the country, are naturally
anxious to persuade themselves and the world that the Jewish claim is
not for equal rights, but for predominance. That idea, again, though
flatly at variance with official Zionist declarations, has derived
some colour from the exuberances of less responsible Zionists, and
has had a favourable atmosphere in the general vagueness of the
political situation. Arab intransigence has naturally not encouraged
the development on the Jewish side of a policy of active co-operation
between the two national groups, which would at best have been
difficult enough by reason of the difference in their cultural levels
and of the fact that the Jews are as yet imperfectly Palestinised,
and have to bend all their efforts to the securing of their own
position in the country. In the result, the two national groups have
remained, in all but the merely literal sense, too far apart for a
spirit of mutual confidence to develop; and Arab politicians, perhaps
genuinely afraid of imaginary Zionist ambitions, have had no great
difficulty in stirring up mob passion on more than one occasion. The
lamentable outbreak of violence in August 1929 may be said to have
brought matters to a head. It has not, of course, affected the inherent
reasonableness of Zionist aims, or the determination of Jews both in
and out of Palestine to carry through the work of reconstruction which
they have begun; but it has emphasised the desirability of taking
active steps to bring about an understanding between the two peoples,
instead of leaving it to time and slow education to bridge the gap. On
the Arab side there is as yet scarcely any overt sign of a realisation
of the need for a more constructive policy than that of demanding the
repeal of the Balfour Declaration. But this attitude of mere negation
can scarcely persist in the face of the Government’s clear statement of
its intention to give the Declaration effect; and there is no need to
despair of a solution which will bring about permanent peace. There is
no reason to anticipate any obstacle to such a solution on the Zionist
side, though it has to be admitted that the recent handling of the
situation by the Mandatory Power has not tended to strengthen the hands
of those Zionist who are most firmly convinced of the wisdom and the
justice of a policy of moderation.
Professor Einstein, some of whose scattered speeches and letters on
Zionism and kindred questions are collected in this volume, is better
known to the world as a physicist than as a Zionist. Yet for many years
past he has given abundant proof both of a keen interest in Zionism
and of a penetrating insight into its underlying ideas. Himself an
assimilated Jew, he is impelled to Zionism by his acute consciousness
of the excessive price at which the blessings of assimilation are
bought by the Jewish communities of the Western world, which for
him are mainly represented by that of Germany. The price is a loss
of solidarity, of moral independence and of self-respect. These, in
his view, can be regained only if assimilated Jews find some common
task, of absolute human value, to which they can bend their corporate
energies as Jews. Such a task is to be found in the restoration of
Jewish national life in Palestine, which involves the regeneration of
Palestine itself and its transformation into a living and productive
country. The fact that this regenerated Palestine will offer a home of
refuge for many oppressed Jews is of secondary importance. What matters
most is the new moral freedom and health which Jewry will gain through
devotion to an ideal at once Jewish and broadly human, and through the
gradual emergence in Palestine of a civilisation at once Jewish and
modern. Jewish nationalism is justified, even to a mind so essentially
internationalist as Professor Einstein’s, because without it the
survival of the Jew is neither worthwhile nor ultimately possible. But,
as might be expected, there is in Professor Einstein’s nationalism
no room for any kind of aggressiveness or chauvinism. For him the
domination of Jew over Arab in Palestine, or the perpetuation of
a state of mutual hostility between the two peoples, would mean the
failure of Zionism. The events of August 1929 bitterly disappointed the
hopes that he had built on the apparently friendly relations between
working Jews and working Arabs in Palestine, and on the advantages
obviously derived by the Arab population from the Jewish development of
the country; they have not altered his conviction that the realisation
of the true aims of Zionism can be sought only along the line of peace
and co-operation between Jews and Arabs. Throughout this difficult
period he has been prominent among those Zionists who have urged most
strongly a policy of active peace-seeking: indeed he has, perhaps
inevitably, exposed himself to criticism for what the generality of
Zionists regard at present as a somewhat extreme and premature advocacy
of that policy.
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem represents a side of Zionist
activity which naturally makes a peculiarly strong appeal to Professor
Einstein, and he has been an active member of the Governing Body
of the University since its inception. He is, however, no less
alive to the necessity and value of a solid material basis for the
development of a Jewish civilisation in Palestine; and some years
ago he undertook a tour of the United States on behalf of the Keren
Hayesod (Palestine Foundation Fund). This combination of academic with
practical interests, coupled with his transparent single-mindedness
and simplicity of character, has won him the respect and affection of
Zionists the world over. The Einstein Forest in Palestine may prove no
less enduring a monument to his fame than the Theory of Relativity.
This volume is composed of translations of extracts from speeches
and letters delivered and written by Professor Einstein during the last
nine or ten years. The speech or letter form has not been preserved,
and short passages of purely ephemeral interest have been omitted here
and there. The arrangement is roughly, but not strictly, chronological.
Permission to reprint various passages has been readily given by
the editors of the _Manchester Guardian_, the _Jüdische Rundschau_
(Berlin), the _New Palestine_ (New York), the _Jewish Chronicle_
(London), and the _Jüdischer Almanach_ (Prague), to all of whom the
Editor expresses his grateful acknowledgments.
_London,_
_September 1930._ L.S.
ASSIMILATION AND NATIONALISM
(1)
Before we can effectively combat anti-Semitism, we must first of all
educate ourselves out of it and out of the slave-mentality which it
betokens. We must have more dignity, more independence, in our own
ranks. Only when we have the courage to regard ourselves as a nation,
only when we respect ourselves, can we win the respect of others; or
rather, the respect of others will then come of itself. Anti-Semitism
as a psychological phenomenon will always be with us so long as Jews
and non-Jews are thrown together. But where is the harm? It may be
thanks to anti-Semitism that we are able to preserve our existence as a
race; that at any rate is my belief.
When I come across the phrase “German Citizens of the Jewish
Persuasion,” I cannot avoid a melancholy smile. What does this
high-falutin’ description really mean? What is this “Jewish
persuasion”? Is there, then, a kind of non-persuasion by virtue of
which one ceases to be a Jew? There is not. What the description really
means is that our _beaux esprits_ are proclaiming two things:
First, I wish to have nothing to do with my poor (East European)
Jewish brethren;
Secondly, I wish to be regarded not as a son of my people, but only as
a member of a religious community.
Is this honest? Can an “Aryan” respect such dissemblers? I am not a
German citizen, nor is there anything about me that can be described
as “Jewish persuasion.” But I am a Jew, and I am glad to belong to the
Jewish people, though I do not regard it as “chosen.” Let us just leave
anti-Semitism to the non-Jews, and keep our own hearts warm for our
kith and kin.
(1920)
(2)
Until about a generation ago the Jews in Germany did not regard
themselves as belonging to the Jewish people. They felt themselves
only members of a religious community, and many of them still hold
this point of view. They are, in fact, much more assimilated than the
Russian Jews. They have been to mixed schools, and have thus adapted
themselves to German national and cultural life. Nevertheless, and in
spite of the equal political rights which they have secured, there
exists in Germany a strong movement of social anti-Semitism. And it
is just the educated circles who have set themselves up as carriers
of this anti-Semitic disease. They have built up for themselves a
“culture” of anti-Semitism, while the educated Russians, at least
before the war, were on the whole philo-Semitic, and made frequent and
honest endeavours to fight the anti-Semitic movement.
This phenomenon in Germany is due to several causes. Partly it
originates in the fact that Jews there exercise an influence over the
intellectual life of the German people altogether out of proportion
to their numbers. While, in my opinion, the economic position of the
German Jews is very much over-rated, the influence of Jews on the
press, in literature and in science in Germany is very marked, as must
be apparent to even the most superficial observer. This accounts for
the fact that there are many anti-Semites there whose anti-Semitism
is not just hatred of the Jew, but is based on arguments in which
they honestly believe. They regard Jews as of a nationality different
from the German, and therefore are alarmed at the increasing Jewish
influence on their national life. Although perhaps the percentage
of Jews in England is not much less than in Germany, English Jews
certainly do not exercise the influence on English society that
German Jews do in Germany. This notwithstanding that the highest
professional positions are accessible to them, and a Jew can become
Lord Chief Justice or Viceroy of India, whereas in Germany the
attainment of such positions by a Jew is unthinkable.
In many instances anti-Semitism may be determined by political
considerations. It often depends, in other words, on the political
party to which a man belongs whether he becomes a professed
anti-Semite. A Socialist, for instance, even if he is an anti-Semite
by conviction, will not proclaim his creed or act up to it, because it
is not in the programme of his party. Among Conservatives, however,
it is different. Anti-Semitism in their case arises from a desire to
exacerbate for their party purposes the ill-feeling inherent in the
populace. In a country like England, this influence is smaller than
in many others, while the existence of old and deep-rooted liberal
traditions hinders the rapid growth of anti-Semitism. I say this
without any personal knowledge of the country. I have never until now
been in England. That, I would add in parenthesis, perhaps accounts
for the enthusiasm with which my theories were received here. But
in Germany the judgement of my theories depended on the party
politics of the press, while English science did not allow its sense
of objectivity to be disturbed by political views. The English people
have had a great influence on the development of science, and so have
tackled the examination of the theory of relativity with particular
energy and particular success. Whilst in America, again, anti-Semitism
knows only social forms, in Germany communal anti-Semitism is much
stronger even than social. As I view the matter, the fact of the racial
peculiarities of Jews is bound to have an influence on their social
intercourse. I believe that German Judaism is thus being influenced to
a great extent by anti-Semitism. With increasing wealth and increasing
education the religious customs which formerly prevented the mixing of
Jews with Gentiles have tended to disappear. There was thus nothing but
the antithesis which Jews represent, and which is called anti-Semitism,
to preserve Jewish separateness. Without this antithesis assimilation
in Germany would have been complete long ago.
I have noticed this sort of thing in myself. Until two years ago I
lived in Switzerland, and during my stay there I did not realise my
Judaism. There was nothing that called forth any Jewish sentiments
in me. When I moved to Berlin all that changed. There I realised the
difficulties with which many young Jews were confronted. I saw
how, amid anti-Semitic surroundings, systematic study, and with it the
road to a safe existence, was made impossible for them. This refers
specially to the Eastern-born Jews in Germany, who were continually
exposed to provocation. I do not believe that their number is large
in Germany as a whole. Only in Berlin are they at all numerous.
Nevertheless, their presence has become a public question. At meetings
and conferences and in the press there is a movement for disposing of
them quickly or interning them. Housing difficulties and the economic
depression are used as arguments for these harsh measures. Facts
are deliberately exaggerated in order to influence public opinion.
These Eastern-born Jews are made the scapegoat of all the ills of
present-day German political life and all the after-effects of the war.
Incitement against these unfortunate fugitives, who have only just
saved themselves from the hell which Eastern Europe means for them
to-day, has become an effective political weapon, employed with success
by every demagogue. When the Government contemplated the expulsion
of these Jews, I stood up for them, and pointed out in the _Berliner
Tageblatt_ the inhumanity and the folly of such a measure. Together
with some colleagues, Jews and non-Jews, I started University
courses for these Eastern-born Jews, and I must add that in this matter
we enjoyed official recognition and considerable assistance from the
Ministry of Education.
These and similar happenings have awakened in me the Jewish national
sentiment. I am a national Jew in the sense that I demand the
preservation of the Jewish nationality as of every other. I look upon
Jewish nationality as a fact, and I think that every Jew ought to
come to definite conclusions on Jewish questions on the basis of this
fact. I regard the growth of Jewish self-assertion as being in the
interests of non-Jews as well as of Jews. That was the main motive
of my joining the Zionist movement. For me Zionism is not merely a
question of colonisation. The Jewish nation is a living thing, and the
sentiment of Jewish nationalism must be developed both in Palestine
and everywhere else. To deny the Jew’s nationality in the Diaspora is,
indeed, deplorable. If one adopts the point of view of confining Jewish
ethnic nationalism to Palestine, then to all intents and purposes one
denies the existence of a Jewish people. In that case one should have
the courage to carry through assimilation as quickly and as completely
as possible.
We live in a time of intense and perhaps exaggerated nationalism.
But my Zionism does not exclude cosmopolitan views. I believe in the
actuality of Jewish nationality, and I believe that every Jew has
duties towards his co-religionists. The meaning of Zionism is thus
many-sided. To Jews who despair in the Ukrainian hell or in Poland it
opens out hopes of a more human existence. Through the return of Jews
to Palestine, and so to a normal and healthy economic life, Zionism
involves a creative function, which should enrich mankind at large. But
the main point is that Zionism must tend to enhance the dignity and
self-respect of the Jews in the Diaspora. I have always been annoyed
by the undignified assimilationist cravings and strivings which I have
observed in so many of my friends.
Through the establishment of a Jewish Commonwealth in Palestine,
the Jewish people will again be in a position to bring its creative
abilities into full play without hindrance. Through the Jewish
University and similar institutions the Jewish people will not only
help forward its own national renaissance, but will enrich its moral
culture and knowledge, and will once again, as it was centuries ago, be
guided into better ways of life than those which are inevitably imposed
on it in present conditions.
(1921)
(3)
The rebuilding of Palestine is for us Jews not a mere matter of
charity or emigration: it is a problem of paramount importance for the
Jewish people. Palestine is first and foremost not a refuge for East
European Jews, but the incarnation of a re-awakening sense of national
solidarity. But is it opportune to revive and to strengthen this sense
of solidarity? To that question I must reply with an unqualified
affirmative, not only because that answer expresses my instinctive
feeling, but also, I believe, on rational grounds. Let us glance at
the history of the Jews in Germany during the last century or so. A
hundred years ago our ancestors, with very few exceptions, still lived
in the Ghetto. They were poor, and were separated from the Gentiles
by a barrier of religious traditions, secular forms of life and legal
restrictions. In their spiritual development they were confined to
their own literature, and were influenced but faintly by the immense
impetus which the Renaissance had given to the intellectual life
of Europe. But in one respect these men, humbly placed and scantly
regarded as they were, had a distinct advantage over us. Each one of
them was bound by every fibre of his being to a community which
embraced his whole existence, of which he felt himself a full member,
and which made on him no demand that ran counter to his natural mode
of thought. Our ancestors of those days were rather cramped both
materially and spiritually, but as a social organism they were in an
enviable state of psychological equilibrium. Then came emancipation.
It opened undreamt of vistas of progress. Individual Jews rapidly
became at home in the higher strata of economic and social life.
They eagerly absorbed the brilliant achievements of Western art and
science. They threw themselves with ardour into these developments, and
themselves made contributions of permanent value. In the process they
adopted the ways of life of the non-Jewish world, became increasingly
estranged from their own religious and social tradition, acquired
non-Jewish habits, customs and modes of thought. It seemed as though
they were going to be completely dissolved in the surrounding peoples,
so much more numerous than themselves, so superior in their political
and cultural organisation, and that in a few generations no visible
trace of them would remain. The complete disappearance of the Jews
in Central and Western Europe seemed inevitable. But things turned
out differently. Nations with racial differences appear to have
instincts which work against their fusion. The assimilation of the Jews
to the European nations among whom they lived, in language, in customs,
and to some extent even in the forms of religious organisation, could
not eradicate the feeling of a lack of kinship between them and those
among whom they lived. In the last resort, this instinctive feeling
of lack of kinship is referable to the law of the conservation of
energy. For this reason it cannot be eradicated by any amount of
well-meant pressure. Nationalities do not want to be fused: they want
to go each its own way. A state of peace can be brought about only if
they mutually tolerate and respect one another. This demands above all
things that we Jews become once more conscious of our nationality, and
regain the self-respect which is necessary to our national existence.
We must learn once more to avow our ancestry and our history; we
must once more take upon ourselves, as a nation, cultural tasks of a
kind calculated to strengthen our feeling of solidarity. It is not
sufficient for us to take part as individuals in the cultural work of
mankind: we must also set our hands to some work which can serve the
ends of our corporate national existence. In this way and in this way
only can the Jewish people regain its health.
It is from this point of view that I look upon the Zionist
movement. History has to-day allotted us the task of contributing
actively to the economic and cultural reconstruction of Palestine.
Inspired men of genius and vision have laid the foundations of our
work, to which many of the best among us are prepared to devote their
whole lives. It were well if all of us felt the full significance of
the work and contributed each his utmost to its success.
It was in America that I first discovered the Jewish people. I have
seen any number of Jews, but the Jewish people I had never met either
in Berlin or elsewhere in Germany. This Jewish people, which I found
in America, came from Russia, Poland and Eastern Europe generally.
These men and women still retain a healthy national feeling; it has
not yet been destroyed by the process of atomisation and dispersion.
I found these people extraordinarily ready for self-sacrifice and
practically creative. They have, for instance, managed in a short time
to secure the future of the projected University in Jerusalem, at any
rate so far as the Medical Faculty is concerned. I also found that it
was mostly the middle classes and the ordinary folk, and not those
enjoying a high social position or any natural advantages, who had most
conspicuously preserved the healthy feeling of belonging together
and the willingness to make sacrifices. The impression that I gained
there is that if we really succeed in establishing a nucleus of the
Jewish people in Palestine, we shall once more have a spiritual centre,
notwithstanding that the great majority of us are scattered over the
world, and the feeling of isolation will disappear. That is the great
redeeming effect which I anticipate from the rebuilding of Palestine.
(1921)
(4)
I am convinced that our colonising work in Palestine will be successful
in the sense that we shall create there a completely coherent
community, well fitted to form a moral and spiritual centre for the
Jewish people. Therein, and not on the economic side, I see the real
significance for us all of the work of reconstruction. In my opinion it
is not so important for Palestine to become economically independent
at the earliest possible moment as for it to possess a high spiritual
and moral value for the whole Jewish people. From this point of view
much has already been achieved by the revival of Hebrew. Institutions
for the pursuit of the arts and sciences must follow. In this
connection I attach the greatest importance to the Hebrew University.
Palestine will not solve the Jewish problem, but its development will
mean a revival of the soul of the Jewish people.
(1923)
(5)
Generally speaking, it does not accord with my ideal that communities
bound together by the bond of race or tradition should make special
efforts to cultivate and emphasise their separateness. In so far,
however, as a given community is attacked as such, it is bound to
defend itself as such, in order that its individual members may be able
to maintain their material and spiritual interests. Corporate action
is needed to save the individual from those spiritual dangers which
isolation necessarily entails. Whoever understands this clearly must
approve of united action by all Jews for a corporate purpose, be he
never so unsympathetic in principle to nationalism.
It is for me beyond any shadow of doubt that in present circumstances
the rebuilding of Palestine is the only object which has a sufficiently
strong appeal to stimulate the Jews to effective corporate action. It
is the immortal service of Herzl that he was the first to see this
clearly and to draw the right practical conclusions. For this reason
I am convinced that every Jew who cares at all for the health and the
dignity of Jewry must co-operate with all his power in the realisation
of Herzl’s ideal.
The German Jew who works for the Jewish people and for the Jewish home
in Palestine no more ceases to be a German than the Jew who becomes
baptised and changes his name ceases to be a Jew. The two attachments
are grounded in realities of different kinds. The antithesis is not
between Jew and German, but between honesty and lack of character. He
who remains true to his origin, race and tradition will also remain
loyal to the State of which he is a subject. He who is faithless to the
one will also be faithless to the other.
(1926)
(6)
The greatest enemies of Jewish national consciousness and Jewish
dignity are fatty degeneration—by which I mean the loss of moral
fibre which results from wealth and comfort—and a kind of spiritual
dependence on the surrounding non-Jewish world, which is a consequence
of the disruption of Jewish corporate life. The best in a man can
be brought out only when he belongs entirely to a human group. Hence
there is grave moral danger in the position of the Jew who has lost
contact with his own national group, and is regarded as an alien by the
group among which he lives. Often enough a situation of this kind has
produced a despicable and joyless egotism.
The external pressure on the Jewish people is particularly heavy at the
present time. Yet our very sufferings have been wholesome. There has
set in a revival of Jewish corporate life, of which the last generation
but one could not have dreamt. Under the influence of the newly
awakened sense of Jewish solidarity, the colonisation of Palestine,
carried out by able and devoted leaders in the teeth of apparently
insuperable difficulties, has already produced such favourable results
that I cannot doubt its permanent effect. This work is of high value
for the Jews of the whole world. Palestine will become a cultural home
for all Jews, a refuge for the worst sufferers from oppression, a field
of activity for the best among us, a unifying ideal and a source of
spiritual health for the Jews of every country.
(1929)
THE JEWS AND PALESTINE
(1)
The Palestine problem, as I see it, is twofold. There is first the
business of settling the Jews in the country. This demands external
assistance on a large scale; it cannot be successfully accomplished
unless the national resources of Jewry are laid under contribution. The
second task is that of stimulating private initiative, especially in
the commercial and industrial spheres.
The deepest impression left on me by Zionist work in Palestine is that
of the self-sacrifice of the young men and women workers. Gathered
here from all sorts of different environments, they have succeeded,
under the influence of a common ideal, in forming themselves into
closely-knit communities and in working together on lines of systematic
co-operation. I was also most favourably impressed by the spirit of
initiative shown in the urban development. There is something here that
almost suggests an avalanche. One feels that the work is being borne
along on the wings of a strong national sentiment. Nothing else could
explain the extraordinarily rapid advance, especially on the sea-coast
near Tel-Aviv.
At no time did I get the impression that the Arab problem might
threaten the development of the Palestine project. I believe rather
that, among the working classes especially, Jew and Arab on the
whole get on excellently together. The difficulties which are as
it were inherent in the situation do not rise above the threshold
of consciousness when one is on the spot. The problem of the
rehabilitation and sanitation of the country seems incomparably more
difficult.
It is a common thing for Jews to miss the significance of the Palestine
question: they do not see what it has to do with them. It is indeed
easy to ask what it matters to a scattered nation of so many millions
whether a million or a million and a half of them are settled in
Palestine. But for me the importance of all this Zionist work lies
precisely in the effect that it will have on those Jews who will not
themselves live in Palestine. We must distinguish in this connection
between internal and external effects. The internal effect, in my
opinion, will be a healthier Jewry: that is to say, the Jews will
acquire that happiness in feeling themselves at one, that sense of
being self-sufficient, which a common ideal cannot fail to evoke. This
is already evident in the younger generation of our day—not among the
young Zionists only—and distinguishes it, greatly to its advantage,
from earlier generations, whose endeavours to be absorbed in non-Jewish
society produced an almost tragic emptiness. That is the internal
effect. The external effect I see in the status which a human group
can attain only by collective and productive work. I believe that the
existence of a Jewish cultural centre will strengthen the moral and
political position of the Jews all over the world, by virtue of the
very fact that there will be in existence a kind of embodiment of the
interests of the whole Jewish people.
(1927)
(2)
The Hebrew University in Jerusalem is to be organised in such a way
as to meet the existing requirements of the country for scientific
research institutes. It cannot be compared in its initial stages
with a fully equipped University in the West. It must begin with a
number of research institutes devoted to the scientific investigation
of the natural conditions of Palestine. The first to be considered
will be an Institute of Agriculture, and then probably a Chemical
Institute. These Institutes must be in the closest touch with existing
and future experimental stations and agricultural schools. The next
most urgent need is for an Institute of Microbiology, which on
the practical side of its activities will help to fight epidemics in
Palestine. Then for one of the early foundations we have to consider
an Institute of Oriental Studies, which will have for its province the
scientific exploration of the country and its historical monuments,
and the philological study of its languages, Hebrew and Arabic, and
possibly of other Oriental languages as well. These Institutes will
lay the foundation of scientific research work in Palestine. For the
present there is less need for actual teaching by professors and
lecturers. Indeed, it is positively undesirable to encourage the
Jewish population of Palestine, which as yet is very small and can
grow but slowly, to repeat the old mistake of one-sided devotion to
the professions and intellectual pursuits. On the contrary, the thing
to aim at is a normal distribution of the Jewish population among the
various occupations. The notorious one-sidedness of the occupational
distribution of the Jews in the Diaspora must not be reproduced in
Palestine. Only with an increase of the population will there be a
gradual extension of the University, and a gradual addition of teaching
activities to pure research work.
Due consideration must, however, also be given to the possibility
that from the outset Jewish students will be attracted to the Hebrew
University from all over the world. To what extent this tendency should
be encouraged in the early stages is a problem requiring special
consideration. But it is at any rate permissible to hope that in the
course of time the Jerusalem University will grow into a centre of
Jewish intellectual life, which will be of value not for Jews alone.
(1921)
(3)
A University is a place in which the universality of the human spirit
finds self-expression. Science and investigation recognise as their
aim the truth and nothing but the truth. It is natural, therefore,
that institutions which serve the interests of science should be
a factor making for the union of nations and men. Unfortunately,
the Universities of Europe to-day are for the most part nurseries
of chauvinism and of a blind intolerance of all things foreign to
the particular nation or race, of all things bearing the stamp of a
different individuality. Under this regime the Jews are the principal
sufferers, not only because they are thwarted in their desire for free
participation and in their striving for education, but also because
most Jews find themselves particularly cramped in this spirit of
narrow nationalism. On this occasion of the birth of our University, I
should like to express the hope that our University will always be free
from this evil, that teachers and students will always preserve the
consciousness that they serve their people best when they maintain its
union with humanity and with the highest human values.
Jewish nationalism is a necessity to-day, because only through a
consolidation of our national life can we eliminate those conflicts
from which the Jews suffer at the present time. Let us hope that
the time will soon come when this nationalism will have become so
thoroughly a matter of course that it will no longer be necessary
for us to give it special emphasis. Our affiliation with our past
and with the present-day achievements of our people inspires us with
assurance and pride in the face of the whole world. But our educational
institutions in particular must regard it as one of their noblest tasks
to keep our people free from nationalistic obscurantism and aggressive
intolerance.
Our University is still a modest undertaking. It is quite the correct
policy to begin with a number of research institutes, out of which
the University will develop naturally and organically. I am convinced
that this development will make rapid progress, and that in the
course of time this in institution will demonstrate with the greatest
clearness the achievements of which the Jewish spirit is capable.
A special task devolves upon the University in the spiritual direction
and education of the labouring sections of our people in the land. In
Palestine it is not our aim to create another people of city-dwellers,
leading the same life as in the European cities, and governed by the
standards and conceptions of the European bourgeoisie. We aim at
creating a people of workers, at creating the Jewish village in the
first place, and we desire that the treasures of culture should be
accessible to our labouring class, especially since, as we know, Jews
in all circumstances place education above all else. In this connection
it devolves upon the University to create something unique in order to
serve the specific needs of the forms of life developed by our people
in Palestine.
All of us desire to co-operate in order that the University may
accomplish its mission. When the significance of this cause is realised
by the Jewish masses, our University will develop speedily into a great
spiritual centre, which will evoke the respect of cultured mankind the
world over.
(1925)
JEW AND ARAB
(1)
Shaken to its depths by the tragic catastrophe in Palestine, Jewry must
now show that it is truly equal to the great task it has undertaken.
It goes without saying that our devotion to the cause and our
determination to continue the work of peaceful construction will not be
weakened in the slightest by any such set-back. But what has to be done
to obviate any possibility of a recurrence of such horrors?
The first and most important necessity is the creation of a _modus
vivendi_ with the Arab people. Friction is perhaps inevitable, but its
evil consequences must be overcome by organised co-operation, so that
the inflammable material may not be piled up to the point of danger.
The absence of normal contact in every-day life is bound to produce
an atmosphere of mutual fear and distrust, which is favourable to
such lamentable outbursts of passion as we have witnessed. We Jews
must show above all that our own history of suffering has given us
sufficient understanding and psychological insight to know how to cope
with this problem of psychology and organisation: the more so as no
irreconcilable differences stand in the way of peace between Jews and
Arabs in Palestine. Let us therefore above all be on our guard against
blind chauvinism of any kind, and let us not imagine that reason and
common-sense can be replaced by British bayonets.
But one demand we must certainly make of the Mandatory Power, which is
responsible for the well-being of the country. Adequate protection must
be afforded to those who are engaged in peaceful work. The measures
devised for their protection must have regard on the one hand to the
scattered position of the Jewish settlements, and on the other hand
to the need for helping to smooth over national differences. It goes
without saying that there must be adequate participation of Jews in the
police force. The Mandatory Power cannot escape the reproach that this
duty has not been fully carried out, quite apart from the fact that
the responsible authorities misjudged the true state of affairs in the
country.
The greatest danger in the present situation is that blind chauvinism
may gain ground in our ranks. However firm the stand we make for the
defence of our lives and property, we must not forget for a single
moment that our national task is in its essence a supra-national
matter, and that the strength of our whole movement rests in its
moral justification, with which it must stand or fall.
(Aug. 1929)
(2)
It was with a wonderful enthusiasm and a deep sense of gratitude
that the Jews, afflicted more than any other people by the chaos and
horror of the war, obtained from Great Britain a pledge to support the
re-establishment of the Jewish national home in Palestine. The Jewish
people, beset with a thousand physical wrongs and moral degradations,
saw in the British promise the sure rock on which it could re-create a
Jewish national life in Palestine, which, by its very existence as well
as by its material and intellectual achievements, would give the Jewish
masses, dispersed all over the world, a new sense of hope, dignity,
and pride. Jews of all lands gave of their best in man-power and in
material wealth in order to fulfil the inspiration that had kept the
race alive through a martyrdom of centuries. Within a brief decade some
£10,000,000 were raised by voluntary contributions, and 100,000 picked
Jews entered Palestine to redeem by their physical labour the almost
derelict land. Deserts were irrigated, forests planted, swamps drained,
and their crippling diseases subdued. A work of peace was created
which, although still perhaps small in size, compelled the admiration
of every observer.
Has the rock on which we have built begun to shake? A considerable
section of the British press now meets our aspirations with lack of
understanding, with coldness, and with disfavour. What has happened?
Arab mobs, organised and fanaticised by political intriguers working
on the religious fury of the ignorant, attacked scattered Jewish
settlements and murdered and plundered wherever no resistance was
offered. In Hebron, the inmates of a rabbinical college, innocent
youths who had never handled weapons in their lives, were butchered in
cold blood; in Safed the same fete befell aged rabbis and their wives
and children. Recently some Arabs raided a Jewish orphan settlement
where the pathetic remnants of the great Russian pogroms had found a
haven of refuge. Is it not then amazing that an orgy of such primitive
brutality upon a peaceful population has been utilised by a certain
section of the British press for a campaign of propaganda directed, not
against the authors and instigators of these brutalities, but against
their victims?
No less disappointing is the amazing degree of ignorance of the
character and the achievement of Jewish reconstruction in Palestine
displayed in many organs of the press. A decade has elapsed since the
policy of the establishment of a Jewish national home in Palestine
was officially endorsed by the British Government with the almost
unanimous support of the entire British press and of the leaders of all
political parties. On the basis of that official recognition, which
was approved by almost every civilised Government, and which found its
legal embodiment in the Palestine Mandate, Jews have sent their sons
and daughters and have given their voluntary offerings for this great
work of peaceful reconstruction. I think it may be stated without
fear of exaggeration that, except for the war efforts of the European
nations, our generation has seen no national effort of such spiritual
intensity and such heroic devotion as that which the Jews have shown
during the last ten years in favour of a work of peace in Palestine.
When one travels through the country, as I had the good fortune to do
a few years ago, and sees young pioneers, men and women of magnificent
intellectual and moral calibre, breaking stones and building roads
under the blazing rays of the Palestinian sun; when one sees
flourishing agricultural settlements shooting up from the long-deserted
soil under the intensive efforts of the Jewish settlers; when one
sees the development of water-power and the beginnings of an industry
adapted to the needs and possibilities of the country, and, above all,
the growth of an educational system, ranging from the kindergarten to
the university, in the language of the Bible—what observer, whatever
his origin or faith, can fail to be seized by the magic of such
amazing achievement and of such almost superhuman devotion? Is it not
bewildering that, after all this, brutal massacres by a fanaticised mob
can destroy all appreciation of the Jewish effort in Palestine and lead
to a demand for the repeal of the solemn pledges of official support
and protection?
Zionism has a two-fold basis. It arose on the one hand from the fact
of Jewish suffering. It is not my intention to paint here a picture
of the Jewish martyrdom throughout the ages, which has arisen from
the homelessness of the Jew. Even to-day there is an intensity of
Jewish suffering throughout the world of which the public opinion
of the civilised West never obtains a comprehensive view. In the
whole of Eastern Europe the danger of physical attack against the
individual Jew is constantly present. The degrading disabilities of
old have been transformed into restrictions of an economic character,
while restrictive measures in the educational sphere, such as the
“numerus clausus” at the universities, seek to suppress the Jew in
the world of intellectual life. There is, I am sure, no need to stress
at this time of day that there is a Jewish problem in the Western world
also. How many non-Jews have any insight into the spiritual suffering
and distortion, the degradation and moral disintegration engendered by
the mere fact of the homelessness of a gifted and sensitive people?
What underlies all these phenomena is the basic fact, which the first
Zionists recognised with profound intuition, that the Jewish problem
cannot be solved by the assimilation of the individual Jew to his
environment. Jewish individuality is too strong to be effaced by such
assimilation, and too conscious to be ready for such self-effacement.
It is, of course, clear that it will never be possible to transplant to
Palestine anything more than a minority of the Jewish people, but it
has for a long time been the deep conviction of enlightened students
of the problem, Jews and non-Jews alike, that the establishment of a
National Home for the Jewish people in Palestine would raise the status
and the dignity of those who would remain in their native countries,
and would thereby materially assist in improving the relations between
non-Jews and Jews in general.
But Zionism springs from an even deeper motive than Jewish
suffering. It is rooted in a Jewish spiritual tradition, whose
maintenance and development are for Jews the _raison d’être_ of their
continued existence as a community. In the re-establishment of the
Jewish nation in the ancient home of the race, where Jewish spiritual
values could again be developed in a Jewish atmosphere, the most
enlightened representatives of Jewish individuality see the essential
preliminary to the regeneration of the race and the setting free of its
spiritual creativeness.
It is by these tendencies and aspirations that the Jewish
reconstruction in Palestine is informed. Zionism is not a movement
inspired by chauvinism or by a _sacro egoismo_. I am convinced that
the great majority of the Jews would refuse to support a movement
of that kind. Nor does Zionism aspire to divest anyone in Palestine
of any rights or possessions he may enjoy. On the contrary, we
are convinced that we shall be able to establish a friendly and
constructive co-operation with the kindred Arab race which will
be a blessing to both sections of the population materially and
spiritually. During the whole of the work of Jewish colonisation not
a single Arab has been dispossessed; every acre of land acquired by
the Jews has been bought at a price fixed by buyer and seller.
Indeed, every visitor has testified to the enormous improvement in
the economic and sanitary standard of the Arab population resulting
from the Jewish colonisation. Friendly personal relations between the
Jewish settlements and the neighbouring Arab villages have been formed
throughout the country. Jewish and Arab workers have associated in the
trade unions of the Palestine railways, and the standard of living
of the Arabs has been raised. Arab scholars can be found working in
the great library of the Hebrew University, while the study of the
Arabic language and civilisation forms one of the chief subjects
of study at this University. Arab workmen have participated in the
evening courses conducted at the Jewish Technical Institute at Haifa.
The native population has come to realise in an ever-growing measure
the benefits, economic, sanitary and intellectual, which the Jewish
work of reconstruction has bestowed on the whole country and all its
inhabitants. Indeed, one of the most comforting features in the present
crisis has been the reports of personal protection afforded by Arabs to
their Jewish fellow-citizens against the attacks of the fanaticised mob.
I submit, therefore, that the Zionist movement is entitled, in the
name of its higher objectives and on the strength of the support which
has been promised to it most solemnly by the civilised world, to demand
that its unprecedented reconstructive effort—carried out in a country
which still largely lies fallow, and in which, by methods of intensive
cultivation such as the Jews have applied, room can be found for
hundreds of thousands of new settlers without detriment to the native
population—shall not be defeated by a small clique of agitators, even
if they wear the garb of ministers of the Islamic religion. Does public
opinion in Great Britain realise that the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem,
who is the centre of all the trouble, and speaks so loudly in the name
of all the Moslems, is a young political adventurer of not much more,
I understand, than thirty years of age, who in 1920 was sentenced to
several years’ imprisonment for his complicity in the riots of that
year, but was pardoned under the terms of an amnesty? The mentality
of this man may be gauged from a recent statement he gave to an
interviewer accusing me, of all men, of having demanded the rebuilding
of the Temple on the site of the Mosque of Omar. Is it tolerable that,
in a country where ignorant fanaticism can so easily be incited to
rapine and murder by interested agitators, so utterly irresponsible
and unscrupulous a politician should be enabled to continue to
exercise his evil influence, garbed in all the spiritual sanctity of
religion, and invested with all the temporal powers that this involves
in an Eastern country?
The realisation of the great aims embodied in the Mandate for Palestine
depends to a very large degree on the public opinion of Great Britain,
on its press, and on its statesmen. The Jewish people is entitled to
expect that its work of peace shall receive the active and benevolent
support of the Mandatory Power. It is entitled to demand that those
found guilty in the recent riots shall be adequately punished, and
that the men in whose hands is laid the responsible task of the
administration of a country of such a unique past and such unique
potentialities for the future shall be so instructed as to ensure that
this great trust, bestowed by the civilised world on the Mandatory
Power, is carried out with vision and courage in the daily tasks of
routine administration. Jews do not wish to live in the land of their
fathers under the protection of British bayonets; they come as friends
of the kindred Arab nation. What they expect of Great Britain is that
it shall promote the growth of friendly relations between Jews and
Arabs, that it shall not tolerate poisonous propaganda, and that it
shall create such organs of security in the country as will afford
adequate protection to life and peaceful labour.
The Jews will never abandon the work of reconstruction which they
have undertaken. The reaction of all Jews, Zionist and non-Zionist
alike, to the events of the last few weeks has shown this clearly
enough. But it lies in the hands of the Mandatory Power materially to
further or materially to hamper the progress of the work. It is of
fundamental importance that British public opinion and the Governments
of Great Britain and of Palestine shall feel themselves responsible
for this great trust, not because Great Britain once undertook this
responsibility in legal form, but because they are deeply convinced
of the significance and importance of the task, and believe that its
realisation will tend to promote the progress and the peace of mankind,
and to right a great historic wrong. I cannot believe that the greatest
colonial Power in the world will fail when it is faced with the task
of placing its unique colonising experience at the service of the
reconstruction of the ancient home of the People of the Bible. The task
may not be an easy one for the Mandatory Power, but for the success it
will attain it is assured of the undying gratitude not only of the Jews
but of all that is noblest in mankind.
(Letter to the _Manchester Guardian_, 12 Oct. 1929)
(3)
One who, like myself, has cherished for many years the conviction that
the humanity of the future must be built up on an intimate community
of the nations, and that aggressive nationalism must be conquered, can
see a future for Palestine only on the basis of peaceful co-operation
between the two peoples who are at home in the country. For this
reason I should have expected that the great Arab people will show a
truer appreciation of the need which the Jews feel to re-build their
national home in the ancient seat of Judaism; I should have expected
that by common effort ways and means would be found to render possible
an extensive Jewish settlement in the country. I am convinced that
the devotion of the Jewish people to Palestine will benefit all the
inhabitants of the country, not only materially, but also culturally
and nationally. I believe that the Arab renaissance in the vast
expanse of territory now occupied by the Arabs stands only to gain
from Jewish sympathy. I should welcome the creation of an opportunity
for absolutely free and frank discussion of these possibilities, for I
believe that the two great Semitic peoples, each of which has in its
way contributed something of lasting value to the civilisation of
the West, may have a great future in common, and that instead of facing
each other with barren enmity and mutual distrust, they should support
each other’s national and cultural endeavours, and should seek the
possibility of sympathetic co-operation. I think that those who are
not actively engaged in politics should above all contribute to the
creation of this atmosphere of confidence.
I deplore the tragic events of last August not only because they
revealed human nature in its lowest aspects, but also because they have
estranged the two peoples and have made it temporarily more difficult
for them to approach one another. But come together they must, in spite
of all.
(Letter to the Palestinian Arab Paper
_Falastin_, 28 January 1930)
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
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1918. (Original German, 1862.)
Herzl, Theodor: _A Jewish State_. Federation of American Zionists, New
York, 1917. (Original German, 1895.)
Ahad Ha-Am (Asher Ginzberg): _Ten Essays on Zionism and Judaism_.
Routledge, 1922. (Hebrew Essays, 1889–1910.)
Sokolow, Nahum: _History of Zionism, 1600–1918_. Longmans, 1919.
_Zionism and the Jewish Future_. Edited by H. Sacher. Murray, (1916.)
Sidebotham, Herbert: _England and Palestine_. Constable, 1918.
Simon, Leon: _Studies in Jewish Nationalism_. Longmans, 1920.
_Awakening Palestine_. Edited by Leon Simon and Leonard Stein. Murray,
1923.
Conway, Sir Martin: _Palestine and Morocco_. Arnold, 1923.
Stein, Leonard: _Zionism_. Benn, 1925.
Worsfold, W. Basil: _Palestine of the Mandate_. Benn, 1925.
Graves, Philip: _Land of Three Faiths_. Cape, 1923.
Granovsky, A.: _Land Problems in Palestine_. Routledge, 1926.
Ruppin, Arthur: _Agricultural Colonisation in Palestine_. Hopkinson,
1926.
Horowitz, Phineas: _Zionism and the Jewish Question_. Benn, 1927.
Balfour, Earl of: _Speeches on Zionism_. Arrowsmith, 1928.
Stein, Leonard: _Memorandum on the “Report of the Commission on the
Palestine Disturbances of August 1929”_. Jewish Agency, for Palestine,
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_Reports on Palestine Administration, 1920–1929_. Issued by H.M.
Stationery Office.
This book has been set in Ludlow Jenson and is printed direct from
Ludlow slugs at the Curwen Press, Plaistow, London.
Transcriber’s Notes
Italicised words are indicated by _underscores_.
Archaic and alternative spellings as well as hyphenation differences
have been left unchanged.
In the Contents list, the page number for _Select Bibliography_ was
changed from “68” into “67”.
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