-Caveat Lector-
>From http://www.washington-report.org/backissues/0191/9101029.html
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In the Public Prints
Rabbi Meir Kahane's Role in Life and Death
By Sheldon L. Richman
January 1991, Page 29
The murder of Meir Kahane has revealed an interesting aspect of the militant, racist
rabbi's career that perhaps even he did not appreciate. In life, and now in death,
Kahane functioned as a foil alongside whom others may look more attractive.
In an otherwise worthwhile column in The Washington Post on Nov. 11, Walter Reich
of the Woodrow Wilson Center wrote that Kahane "expressed views about
Palestinians and advocated actions against them, particularly their 'transfer' to Arab
countries, that are simply incompatible ... with ... traditional Israeli [standards].
They
were, to be sure, compatible with the standards of rhetoric and behavior toward Jews
in most Arab countries".
This statement clearly is intended to separate Kahane from Israel's leaders and
indeed Israeli society generally. Let's see if they pass historical muster.
Historical Muster
If Kahane's proposal for the transfer of Arabs is incompatible with Israeli standards,
what are we to make of Joseph Weitz, director of the Jewish National Fund, the
organization that acquired land in Palestine? In 1940 Weitz wrote the following:
It must be clear that there is no room for both peoples in this country ... If the
Arabs
leave the country, it will be broad and wide open for us. And if the Arabs stay, the
country will remain narrow and miserable ... The only solution is Eretz Israel, or at
least Western Eretz Israel, without Arabs. There is no room for compromise on this
point! The Zionist enterprise so far ... has been fine and good in its own time, and
could do with "land-buying"-but this will not bring about the State of Israel; that
must
come all at once ... and there is no way besides transferring the Arabs from here to
the neighboring countries, to transfer them all; except maybe for Bethlehem,
Nazareth and Old Jerusalem, we must not leave a single village, not a single tribe.
And the transfer must be directed to Iraq, to Syria, and even to Transjordan. For that
purpose we'll find the money, and a lot of money. And only with such a transfer will
the country be able to absorb millions of our brothers, and the Jewish question will be
solved, once and for all. There is no other way out. [Emphasis added.]
Weitz uses the T-word four times, eight years before the state of Israel declared its
independence. We can go back further. There is a famous statement of Theodor
Herzl, founder of the Zionist movement, about I 'gently" expropriating Arab property
and trying "to spirit the penniless population across the border by procuring
employment for it in the transit countries, while denying it any employment in our own
country... Both the process of expropriation and the removal of the poor must be
carried out discreetly and circumspectly. "
Kahane functioned as a foil alongside whom others may look more attractive.
Nor should we overlook Chaim Weizmann's hope that "Palestine shall be as Jewish
as England is English and America is American."
That was the theory. It was faithfully carried out in practice. Before and after the
1948
war, Arabs were dispossessed of their land and belongings and driven mercilessly
across the borders. (For details, see Tom Segev's and Benny Morris' excellent work
1949: The First Israelis.) This was repeated in 1967.
What of the treatment of Jews in the Arab countries? Reich didn't say which country
he had in mind, but since the exodus of Jews from Iraq in the early 1950s is well-
known, let's look at that. Iraq, of course, had a large Jewish community that dated
back to antiquity. Despite some bad times, the Jews of Iraq often prospered,
especially as the 19th century dawned. The 1839 Noble Words of the Decree
introduced a new civil code that applied to everyone regardless of religion or sect.
According to Nissim. Rejwan, an Iraqi Jew who emigrated to Israel, beginning in
1876 Jews served in the parliament and were appointed to government courts and
district and municipal councils. Small numbers of Jews joined the civil service. Jews
were free to educate their children and start schools. This is not to say that Jews
suffered no discrimination, but the conditions were so favorable that some central
European Jews moved to Iraq.
The situation changed with the flourishing of Zionism. A prominent member of the
Iraqi Jewish community, Menahem Salih Daniel, confirming predictions of anti-Zionist
Jews in the West, wrote in 1922 that Zionism prejudiced the Jews of the Arab world:
"If [the Jews of Iraq] espouse so publicly and tactlessly ... a cause which is regarded
by the Arabs as not only foreign but as actually hostile, I have no doubt that they
will
succeed in making themselves a totally alien element in this country."
"Initiating That Distress"
The Zionist progress toward statehood, including the above- mentioned aggression
against Palestinians, worsened things for the Jews of Iraq. Some Jews left for Israel,
but apparently not enough for the Zionists. They decided to give them a shove,
because, as an Israeli agent put it, "Mass immigration [to Israel] will pour in only
as a
result of distress ... We must consider the possibility of initiating that distress. "
That
they did. According to a CIA man in Iraq at the time, Wilbur Crane Eveland, the
Israelis transferred weapons to Zionist operatives in Iraq. This was later confirmed by
Yigal Allon. "In attempts to portray the Iraqis as anti-American and to terrorize the
Jews, the Zionists planted bombs in the US Information Service library and in
synagogues, " Eveland wrote. The US Embassy was furnished evidence that the
terrorism was committed by an underground Zionist organization. The Iraqi
government tried to discourage the exodus, going so far as to confiscate the property
of fleeing Jews. All but about 5,000 Jews left.
Thus the most celebrated "transfer" of Jews from an Arab country had its roots
wholly in Zionism and in a shameful effort that violated the Balfour Declaration's
caveat about actions "which may prejudice the right and political status enjoyed by
Jews in any other country."
Sheldon Richman is a writer and editor based in the Washington, DC area.
Living Under Israeli Occupation
A three-year toll of human tights violations by Israeli forces and Israeli settlers
since
the beginning of the intifada Dec. 8, 1987:
Deaths 892
Injuries requiring hospitalization 106,000
Expulsions 58
Administrative Detentions 12,500
Curfews (days that areas with 10,000 +
population faced 24-hour curfew) 8,676
Tree uprootings 94,574
House demolitions/sealings 1,726
Source: Palestine Human Rights Information Center,
Jerusalem. Figures through Dec. 8, 1990
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