Y. Red, 26 May 2025

 

 

 

Democratic Party Leader Yair Golan attacked the pictures from the flag parade: "Shocking images. This is not what the love of Jerusalem looks like. This is what hatred, racism, and bullying look like. This is not our Judaism. This is not the Zionism we believe in. We will fight for the Jerusalem of all of us – Christians, Jews and Arabs, secular and religious."

 

For a Zionist, this is not a bad position, but the problem is that he does not understand what Zionism is, and if he does, he is a hypocrite. To understand what it is, it must be followed from its inception to the present day. The father of Zionism was, of course, Theodor Herzl, a journalist and playwright who embraced the fundamental elements of anti-Semitism combined with colonialist settlement.

 

Theodor Herzl wrote in his diary in 1895:

 

“When we occupy the land, we shall bring immediate benefits to the state that receives us. We must expropriate gently the private property on the estates assigned to us. We shall try 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.The property owners will come over to our side. Both the process of expropriation and the removal of the poor must be carried out discreetly and circumspectly.”

 

Israel Zangwill, another important political Zionist said in a talk in 1905, “(We) must be prepared either to drive out by the sword the (Arab) Tribes in possession as our forefathers did or to grapple with the problem of a large alien population, mostly Mohammedan and accustomed for centuries to despise us.”

 

Around 1928, Shabtai Levi, a land purchasing agent for Baron de Rothschild wrote in his memoirs, “He (the Baron) advised me to carry on in similar activities, but it is better, he said, not to transfer the Arabs to Syria and Transjordan, as these are part of the Land of Israel, but to Mesopotamia (Iraq), He added that in these cases he would be ready to send the Arabs, at his expense, new agricultural machines, and agricultural advisers.”

 

Around 1930, Zionist Socialist (Mapai) leader, David Hacohen wrote, “… I would not accept Arabs in my trade union, the Histadrut; to defend preaching to housewives that they not buy at Arab stores; to prevent Arab workers from getting jobs there… To pour kerosene on Arab tomatoes, to attack Jewish housewives in the markets and smash the Arab eggs they had bought; to praise to the skies the Keren Kayemet that sent Hankin to Beirut to buy land from absentee effendi (landowners) and to throw the fellahin (peasant farmers) off the land – to buy dozens of dunams – from an Arab is permitted, but sell, God forbid, one Jewish dunam to an Arab is prohibited.”

 

Menahem Ussishkin, chairman of the Jewish National Fund, and member of the executive of the Jewish Agency, said in a 1930 speech to journalists, “We must continually raise the demand that our land be returned to our possession … if there are other inhabitants there, they must be transferred to some other place. We must take over the land. We have a greater and nobler ideal than preserving several hundred thousand of Arab fellahin.”.

 

So, show me a Zionist who is not a racist, and who does not justify the formation of Israel by the ethnic cleansing.

 

David Ben-Gurion, Israel's first Prime Minister (1948-1953, 1955-1963):

 

"We must expel Arabs and take their places...and, if we have to use force... then we have force at our disposal." (from Nur Masalha, Expulsion of the Palestinians, p. 66)

 

"The compulsory transfer of the [Palestinians] from the valleys of the proposed Jewish state could give us something which we never had, even when we stood on our own during the days of the first and second Temples. We are given an opportunity which we never dared to dream of in our wildest imaginings." (from Benny Morris, Righteous Victims, p. 142)

 

"In many parts of the country new settlement will not be possible without transferring the [Palestinian peasants] ... Jewish power, which grows steadily, will also increase our possibilities to carry out the transfer on a large scale." (from Righteous Victims, p. 143)

 

"With compulsory transfer we [would] have a vast area [for settlement]. I support compulsory transfer. I don't see anything immoral in it." (from Righteous Victims, p. 144)

 

"After the formation of a large army in the wake of the establishment of the [Jewish] state, we shall abolish partition and expand to the whole of the Palestine" (from The Birth of Israel: Myths and Realities, p. 22)

 

Last Saturday, Yair Golan gave his first interview following a wave of criticism over his recent controversial statements that a sane state does not kill babies as a hobby. He said:

 

“Of course, Israel doesn’t kill babies for a hobby. Israel has not committed war crimes in Gaza. My comments were directed at the political leadership. The goal of the war is political. Hamas has been militarily defeated – we must bring the war to an end and secure the release of all the hostages in one decisive move.”

 

Israeli Jews have a place in this country if they break with the racist ideology and practice of settler colonialists and build with the Palestinians a new democratic and secular state on the ruins of the Zionist state that will include the Palestinian refugees.

 

Exchange all for all!

 

Israel out of Gaza, West Bank, Lebanon, and Syria!

 

For one Palestinian state from the river to the sea!

 

For a worker's government supported by the Fellahin!