Poale Zion (also spelled Poalei Tziyon or Poaley Syjon, meaning "Workers of Zion") was a movement of
Marxist–
Zionist
Zionism ( he, צִיּוֹנוּת ''Tsiyyonut'' after '' Zion'') is a nationalist movement that espouses the establishment of, and support for a homeland for the Jewish people centered in the area roughly corresponding to what is known in J ...
Jewish workers founded in various cities of
Poland
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, , is a country in Central Europe. Poland is divided into Voivodeships of Poland, sixteen voivodeships and is the fifth most populous member state of the European Union (EU), with over 38 mill ...
,
Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located enti ...
and the
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the List of Russian monarchs, Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended th ...
in about the turn of the 20th century after the
Bund rejected
Zionism
Zionism ( he, צִיּוֹנוּת ''Tsiyyonut'' after ''Zion'') is a Nationalism, nationalist movement that espouses the establishment of, and support for a homeland for the Jewish people centered in the area roughly corresponding to what is ...
in 1901.
Formation and early years
Ideology
The key features of the ideology of early Poale Zion were acceptance of the
Marxist view of history with the addition of the role of
nationalism
Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the State (polity), state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a in-group and out-group, group of peo ...
, which theorist
Ber Borochov
Dov Ber Borochov (russian: Дов-Бер Борохов; 3 July 1881 – 17 December 1917) was a Marxist Zionist and one of the founders of the Labor Zionist movement. He was also a pioneer in the study of the Yiddish language.
Bio ...
, a leader of Poale Zion, believed could not be ignored as a factor in historical development. A Jewish proletariat would come into being in the
Land of Israel, according to Poale Zion, and would then take part in the
class struggle
Class conflict, also referred to as class struggle and class warfare, is the political tension and economic antagonism that exists in society because of socio-economic competition among the social classes or between rich and poor.
The forms ...
. These views were set out in Borochov's ''Our Platform'', published in 1906.
Early parties and organisations
Poale Zion parties and organisations were started across the Jewish
diaspora
A diaspora ( ) is a population that is scattered across regions which are separate from its geographic place of origin. Historically, the word was used first in reference to the dispersion of Greeks in the Hellenic world, and later Jews afte ...
in the early 20th century. A branch of Poale Zion came into existence in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...
in 1903. Branches were formed in London and Leeds in 1903/04 and 1905 respectively and on a national basis in 1906. An Austrian group was formed in 1904, and published a newspaper, ''
Yidisher Arbeyter''. In November 1905 the Poale Zion (Workers of Zion) Party was founded in
Palestine and a month later the Socialist Jewish Labour Party (Poale Zion) was formed in the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...
and
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tota ...
.
In March 1906 the
Jewish Social Democratic Labour Party (Poale Zion) was created in Russia.
In 1906 a formal Poale Zion party was formed in
Poltava
Poltava (, ; uk, Полтава ) is a city located on the Vorskla River in central Ukraine. It is the capital city of the Poltava Oblast (province) and of the surrounding Poltava Raion (district) of the oblast. Poltava is administrative ...
, Ukraine, under the leadership of
Ber Borochov
Dov Ber Borochov (russian: Дов-Бер Борохов; 3 July 1881 – 17 December 1917) was a Marxist Zionist and one of the founders of the Labor Zionist movement. He was also a pioneer in the study of the Yiddish language.
Bio ...
and
Itzhak Ben-Zvi, and other groups were soon formed elsewhere in Europe. A French group was formed, under the leadership of
Marc Jarblum, which was influential on the
SFIO
The French Section of the Workers' International (french: Section française de l'Internationale ouvrière, SFIO) was a political party in France that was founded in 1905 and succeeded in 1969 by the modern-day Socialist Party. The SFIO was fou ...
and its leader
Leon Blum
Leon, Léon (French) or León (Spanish) may refer to:
Places
Europe
* León, Spain, capital city of the Province of León
* Province of León, Spain
* Kingdom of León, an independent state in the Iberian Peninsula from 910 to 1230 and again fro ...
. By 1907, the party had 25,000 members in Russia.
With the threat of
pogroms
A pogrom () is a violent riot incited with the aim of massacring or expelling an ethnic or religious group, particularly Jews. The term entered the English language from Russian to describe 19th- and 20th-century attacks on Jews in the Russian E ...
and meeting clandestinely the
Warsaw
Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is official ...
Poale Zion formed a commando unit (bojówka) with around sixty guns. They were used to "expropriate" funds from well to do citizens. In March 1906 the entire Warsaw leadership were amongst the 120 delegates arrested attending the Poale Zion conference in
Poltava
Poltava (, ; uk, Полтава ) is a city located on the Vorskla River in central Ukraine. It is the capital city of the Poltava Oblast (province) and of the surrounding Poltava Raion (district) of the oblast. Poltava is administrative ...
. Three months later eighteen gunmen raided Warsaw railway station, stealing cash and leaving "a receipt in the name of Warsaw's Poale Zion".
Global coordination
A World Union of Poale Zion was formed. The first World Congress took place in August 1907 in
The Hague
The Hague ( ; nl, Den Haag or ) is a list of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality of the Netherlands, situated on the west coast facing the North Sea. The Hague is the country's ad ...
. Its second congress in 1909 in
Kraków
Kraków (), or Cracow, is the second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city dates back to the seventh century. Kraków was the official capital of Poland until 159 ...
emphasised practical socialist projects in Palestine, further congresses followed in
Vienna
en, Viennese
, iso_code = AT-9
, registration_plate = W
, postal_code_type = Postal code
, postal_code =
, timezone = CET
, utc_offset = +1
, timezone_DST ...
(1911 and 1920) and
Stockholm (1919).
Palestine
A conference in the name of the ''Jewish Social-Democratic Workers' Party in the Land of Israel'' was held in
Jaffa between 4–6 October 1906. It was organised by
Israel Shochat
Israel Shochat (;1886–1962) was a founder of and a key figure in Bar-Giora and Hashomer, two of the precursors of the Israel Defense Forces.
Biography Russia and Germany
Israel Shochat was born in 1886 in Lyskovo, in the Grodno Governorate of t ...
who over the previous two years had organised an underground group of around 25 Poale Zion followers. About 60 people attended the conference and it was chaired by newly arrived
David Ben Gurion
David Ben-Gurion ( ; he, דָּוִד בֶּן-גּוּרִיּוֹן ; born David Grün; 16 October 1886 – 1 December 1973) was the primary national founder of the State of Israel and the first prime minister of Israel. Adopting the nam ...
.
As a result the following January they produced ''The
Ramleh
Ramla or Ramle ( he, רַמְלָה, ''Ramlā''; ar, الرملة, ''ar-Ramleh'') is a city in the Central District of Israel. Today, Ramle is one of Israel's mixed cities, with both a significant Jewish and Arab populations.
The city was f ...
Program'', a
Hebrew
Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...
version of the ''
Communist Manifesto
''The Communist Manifesto'', originally the ''Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (german: Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei), is a political pamphlet written by German philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Commissioned by the Comm ...
'' with the added declaration: 'the party aspires to political independence of the Jewish People in this country." After much debate they agreed that there should be segregation of Jewish and Arab economies. It was also agreed that all Poale Zion business should be conducted in Hebrew, though this was not the larger group's policy which held that proceedings should be in
Yiddish or
Ladino depending on the community. Hebrew was seen as the language of the
bourgeoisie At the time there were 550 active pioneers, Jews working on the land, in the country.
In Ottoman Palestine, Poale Zion founded the
Hashomer guard organization that guarded settlements of the ''
Yishuv
Yishuv ( he, ישוב, literally "settlement"), Ha-Yishuv ( he, הישוב, ''the Yishuv''), or Ha-Yishuv Ha-Ivri ( he, הישוב העברי, ''the Hebrew Yishuv''), is the body of Jewish residents in the Land of Israel (corresponding to the ...
'', and took up the ideology of "conquest of labor" (''Kibbush Ha'avoda'') and "
Hebrew labor" (''Avoda Ivrit''). The first formal congress of the "Jewish Social Democratic Workers' Party in the Land of Israel–Poalei Tziyon" was held in early 1907. Poale Zion set up employment offices, kitchens and health services for members. These eventually evolved into the institutions of Labor Zionism in Israel.
UK during World War I
During
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...
, Poale Zion was instrumental in recruiting members to the
Jewish Legion. Poale Zion was active in Britain during the war, under the leadership of J. Pomeranz and
Morris Meyer, and influential on the British
labour movement
The labour movement or labor movement consists of two main wings: the trade union movement (British English) or labor union movement (American English) on the one hand, and the political labour movement on the other.
* The trade union movement ...
, including on the drafting (by
Sidney Webb and
Arthur Henderson
Arthur Henderson (13 September 1863 – 20 October 1935) was a British iron moulder and Labour politician. He was the first Labour cabinet minister, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1934 and, uniquely, served three separate terms as Leader of t ...
) of the
Labour Party's War Aims Memorandum, recognising the '
right of return
The right of return is a principle in international law which guarantees everyone's right of voluntary return to, or re-entry to, their country of origin or of citizenship. The right of return is part of the broader human rights concept freedom ...
' of Jews to Palestine, a document which preceded the
Balfour Declaration
The Balfour Declaration was a public statement issued by the British government in 1917 during the First World War announcing its support for the establishment of a "national home for the Jewish people" in Palestine, then an Ottoman regio ...
by three months.
Factions and activity after World War I
Factions, 1920 split and aftermath
Poale Zion was torn between Left and Right factions in 1919–1920, which formally split at the Poale Zion fifth world congress in Vienna in 1920, following a similar division that occurred in the
Second International
The Second International (1889–1916) was an organisation of Labour movement, socialist and labour parties, formed on 14 July 1889 at two simultaneous Paris meetings in which delegations from twenty countries participated. The Second Internatio ...
.
The right wing was less Marxist and more nationalist, and favoured a more moderate socialist program and supported the
International Working Union of Socialist Parties to continue the work of the Second International, essentially becoming a
social democratic party. The left wing faction did not consider the Second International radical enough and some accused its members of betraying Borochov's revolutionary principles (although Borochov had begun to modify his ideology as early as 1914, and publicly identified as a social democrat the year before his death).
Poale Zion Left, which supported the
Bolshevik revolution
The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key mome ...
, continued to be sympathetic to
Marxism
Marxism is a left-wing to far-left method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to understand class relations and social conflict and a dialec ...
and
Communism
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society ...
, and attended the second and third congresses of the
Communist International
The Communist International (Comintern), also known as the Third International, was a Soviet-controlled international organization founded in 1919 that advocated world communism. The Comintern resolved at its Second Congress to "struggle by ...
in a consultative capacity. They lobbied for membership, but their attempts were unsuccessful, as the internationalist communist movement under
Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov. ( 1870 – 21 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin,. was a Russian revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He served as the first and founding head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 to 19 ...
and
Trotsky
Lev Davidovich Bronstein. ( – 21 August 1940), better known as Leon Trotsky; uk, link= no, Лев Давидович Троцький; also transliterated ''Lyev'', ''Trotski'', ''Trotskij'', ''Trockij'' and ''Trotzky''. (), was a Russian M ...
was opposed to Zionist nationalism. The
Comintern
The Communist International (Comintern), also known as the Third International, was a Soviet Union, Soviet-controlled international organization founded in 1919 that advocated world communism. The Comintern resolved at its Second Congress to ...
advised individual members of Left Poale Zion to join their national Communist parties as individuals; at their 1922
Danzig conference, these terms were rejected by the party. The Comintern declared it an enemy of the workers' movement.
Poale Zion Left opposed the decision by Poale Zion to rejoin the World
Zionist Organization
The World Zionist Organization ( he, הַהִסְתַּדְּרוּת הַצִּיּוֹנִית הָעוֹלָמִית; ''HaHistadrut HaTzionit Ha'Olamit''), or WZO, is a non-governmental organization that promotes Zionism. It was founded as the ...
, viewing it as essentially
bourgeois
The bourgeoisie ( , ) is a social class, equivalent to the middle or upper middle class. They are distinguished from, and traditionally contrasted with, the proletariat by their affluence, and their great cultural and financial capital. Th ...
in character, and viewed the
Histadrut
Histadrut, or the General Organization of Workers in Israel, originally ( he, ההסתדרות הכללית של העובדים בארץ ישראל, ''HaHistadrut HaKlalit shel HaOvdim B'Eretz Yisrael''), is Israel's national trade union center ...
as
reformist
Reformism is a political doctrine advocating the reform of an existing system or institution instead of its abolition and replacement.
Within the socialist movement, reformism is the view that gradual changes through existing institutions can ...
and non-socialist. Aside from differing attitudes towards
Zionism
Zionism ( he, צִיּוֹנוּת ''Tsiyyonut'' after ''Zion'') is a Nationalism, nationalist movement that espouses the establishment of, and support for a homeland for the Jewish people centered in the area roughly corresponding to what is ...
and
Stalinism
Stalinism is the means of governing and Marxist-Leninist policies implemented in the Soviet Union from 1927 to 1953 by Joseph Stalin. It included the creation of a one-party totalitarian police state, rapid industrialization, the the ...
, the two wings of Poale Zion parted ways over
Yiddish and Yiddish culture. The Left was more supportive of the latter, similar to the members of the
Jewish Bund, while the Right bloc identified strongly with the emerging
modern Hebrew
Modern Hebrew ( he, עברית חדשה, ''ʿivrít ḥadašá ', , '' lit.'' "Modern Hebrew" or "New Hebrew"), also known as Israeli Hebrew or Israeli, and generally referred to by speakers simply as Hebrew ( ), is the standard form of the He ...
movement in the early 20th century.
Palestine
In
Palestine, the major leaders of Poale Zion since their immigration in 1906 and 1907 had been
David Ben-Gurion
David Ben-Gurion ( ; he, דָּוִד בֶּן-גּוּרִיּוֹן ; born David Grün; 16 October 1886 – 1 December 1973) was the primary national founder of the State of Israel and the first prime minister of Israel. Adopting the na ...
, who joined a local Poalei Tziyon group in 1904 whilst living in
Warsaw
Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is official ...
, and
Yitzhak Ben-Zvi
Yitzhak Ben-Zvi ( he, יִצְחָק בֶּן־צְבִי ''Yitshak Ben-Tsvi''; 24 November 188423 April 1963) was a historian, Labor Zionist leader and the longest-serving President of Israel.
Biography
Born in Poltava in the Russian Empir ...
, a close friend of Borochov's and early member of the
Poltava
Poltava (, ; uk, Полтава ) is a city located on the Vorskla River in central Ukraine. It is the capital city of the Poltava Oblast (province) and of the surrounding Poltava Raion (district) of the oblast. Poltava is administrative ...
group. After the split the two ''Benim'' ("the Bens") continued to control and direct Poale Zion Right in Palestine.
The party in Palestine split into right and left wings at its February 1919 conference. In October 1919, a faction of the Left Poale Zion founded ''Mifleget Poalim Sozialistiim'' (Socialist Workers Party) which became the
Jewish Communist Party in 1921, split in 1922 over the Zionist issues, with one faction taking the name
Palestine Communist Party and the more anti-Zionist faction becoming the
Communist Party of Palestine. The former retained its links to Poale Zion Left. These two factions reunited as the
Palestine Communist Party in 1923 and become an official section of the
Communist International
The Communist International (Comintern), also known as the Third International, was a Soviet-controlled international organization founded in 1919 that advocated world communism. The Comintern resolved at its Second Congress to "struggle by ...
. Another faction of Poale Zion Left, aligned with the
kibbutz
A kibbutz ( he, קִבּוּץ / , lit. "gathering, clustering"; plural: kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1909, was Degania. Today, farming h ...
movement
Hashomer Hatzair
Hashomer Hatzair ( he, הַשׁוֹמֵר הַצָעִיר, , ''The Young Guard'') is a Labor Zionist, secular Jewish youth movement founded in 1913 in the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria, Austria-Hungary, and it was also the name of the gro ...
, founded in Europe in 1919, became the
Mapam party. Poale Zion Right, under Ben Gurion's leadership, formed
Ahdut HaAvoda
Ahdut HaAvoda ( he, אַחְדוּת הַעֲבוֹדָה, lit. ''Labour Unity'') was the name used by a series of political parties. Ahdut HaAvoda in its first incarnation was led by David Ben-Gurion. It was first established during the perio ...
in March 1919. In January 1930 it merged with another party to become
Mapai
Mapai ( he, מַפָּא"י, an acronym for , ''Mifleget Poalei Eretz Yisrael'', lit. "Workers' Party of the Land of Israel") was a democratic socialist political party in Israel, and was the dominant force in Israeli politics until its merger i ...
, predecessor of the modern
Israeli Labor Party
The Israeli Labor Party ( he, מִפְלֶגֶת הָעֲבוֹדָה הַיִּשְׂרְאֵלִית, ), commonly known as HaAvoda ( he, הָעֲבוֹדָה, , The Labor), is a social democratic and Zionist political party in Israel. The ...
.
Bolshevik Revolution and USSR
In Russia, the Poale Zion Left participated in the
Bolshevik Revolution
The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key mome ...
and organized a brigade of Poale Zion activists nicknamed the "Borochov Brigade" to fight in the
Red Army
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (Russian language, Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist R ...
. The party remained legal until 1928 when it was liquidated by the
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (russian: Наро́дный комиссариа́т вну́тренних дел, Naródnyy komissariát vnútrennikh del, ), abbreviated NKVD ( ), was the interior ministry of the Soviet Union.
...
. Most other Zionist organizations had been closed down in 1919, but Poale Zion Left remained untouched because it was recognized as a Communist party. In 1919, the Communists of Poale Zion Left split to form the
Jewish Communist Party which ultimately joined the
Communist Party of the Soviet Union, leading to a sharp loss of membership in Russia. While the Bund was forcibly disbanded in 1921, Poale Zion and
Hechalutz were allowed to operate freely in the Soviet Union until 1928.
Poland
In Poland, for a brief period following the
war, both factions of Poale Zion were reported as legal and functioning political parties. The Polish Left party was the largest Left Poale Zion party in the world. It worked closely with the Bund in developing Yiddish schools in Poland and supporting secular Yiddish culture, although they had political differences (e.g., the Bund was more supportive of the Polish Socialist Party than LPZ). As part of the large-scale ban on Jewish political parties in post-
war Poland by the
Communist
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a ...
leadership, both Poale Zion groups were disbanded in February 1950.
Austria
In
Austria
Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
, the left faction was led by
Michael Kohn-Eber
Michael may refer to:
People
* Michael (given name), a given name
* Michael (surname), including a list of people with the surname Michael
Given name "Michael"
* Michael (archangel), ''first'' of God's archangels in the Jewish, Christian and ...
, who joined the
Austrian Communist Party in 1938. The right faction also remained active until 1938.
United States
The first Poale Zion group in America was established in 1903. In 1915 it was estimated they had fewer than 3,000 members. After the First World War, the American party was led by veteran socialist Zionist thinker
Nachman Syrkin. In America, the right faction was dominant, and initiated the
National Labor Committee for Palestine, raising money for the Histadrut.
United Kingdom
Poale Zion in Britain formally affiliated to the
British Labour Party
The Labour Party is a List of political parties in the United Kingdom, political party in the United Kingdom that has been described as an alliance of Social democracy, social democrats, Democratic socialism, democratic socialists and trade u ...
in 1920.
Worldwide
Globally, Poale Zion, under the leadership of
Shlomo Kaplansky was involved in the 1921 formation of the centrist
International Working Union of Socialist Parties, then between 1923 and 1930 the World Union of Poalei Zion (i.e., the PZ right) joined the
Labour and Socialist International
The Labour and Socialist International (LSI; german: Sozialistische Arbeiter-Internationale, label= German, SAI) was an international organization of socialist and labour parties, active between 1923 and 1940. The group was established through a ...
(as its Palestine section).
As of 1928, it claimed to have 22,500 members in branches around the world; 5,000 in Poland and the United States, 4,000 in Palestine, 3,000 in Russia, 1,000 in Lithuania, Romania, Argentina and the United Kingdom, 500 in Latvia and another 1,000 scattered across countries such as Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Belgium, France and Brazil. The general secretary of the World Union of Poalei Zion at the time was
Berl Locker. The World Union had a women's wing, the Women's Organization for the Pioneer Women in Palestine.
Labour and Socialist International
The Labour and Socialist International (LSI; german: Sozialistische Arbeiter-Internationale, label= German, SAI) was an international organization of socialist and labour parties, active between 1923 and 1940. The group was established through a ...
.
Kongress-Protokolle der Sozialistischen Arbeiter-Internationale - B. 3.1 Brüssel 1928
'. Glashütten im Taunus: D. Auvermann, 1974. p. IV. 100
World Union of Zionists-Socialists (1932)
In 1932, Poale Zion's world federation merged with
Hitahdut Olamit, the World Union of
Hapoel Hatzair and
Zeirei Zion
Tze'irei Zion ( he, צעירי ציון, "Youth of Zion", sometimes spelled as Zeire Zion) was a socialist Zionist youth movement in Eastern Europe in the first half of the 20th century that branched into Palestine. The movement originated at the ...
, to create Ihud Olami, the World Union of Zionists-Socialists. In this period, several well-known Zionist leaders and politicians were active in Poale Zion, including Ben-Gurion, Ben-Zvi, kibbutz movement leader
Yitzhak Tabenkin,
Jewish Agency
The Jewish Agency for Israel ( he, הסוכנות היהודית לארץ ישראל, translit=HaSochnut HaYehudit L'Eretz Yisra'el) formerly known as The Jewish Agency for Palestine, is the largest Jewish non-profit organization in the world. ...
Executive member
Shlomo Kaplansky, and future Israeli politicians
Moshe Sharett
Moshe Sharett ( he, משה שרת, born Moshe Chertok (Hebrew: ) 15 October 1894 – 7 July 1965) was a Russian-born Israeli politician who served as Israel's second prime minister from 1954 to 1955. A member of Mapai, Sharett's term was ...
and
Dov Hoz.
The Holocaust
The Holocaust-era Jewish resistance group
ŻOB was formed from a coalition including
Hashomer Hatzair
Hashomer Hatzair ( he, הַשׁוֹמֵר הַצָעִיר, , ''The Young Guard'') is a Labor Zionist, secular Jewish youth movement founded in 1913 in the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria, Austria-Hungary, and it was also the name of the gro ...
,
Dror,
Bnei Akiva, the
Jewish Bund, various Jewish
Communist
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a ...
groups, and both factions of Poale Zion. Poale Zion was also active in the
Anti-Fascist Bloc
The Anti-Fascist Bloc was an anti-fascist organization of Polish Jews formed in March 1942 in the Warsaw Ghetto. It was created after an alliance between leftist-Zionist, communist and socialist Jewish parties was agreed upon. The initiators of ...
.
Several notable Jewish resistance fighters during the
Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...
, particularly those involved in the
Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising; pl, powstanie w getcie warszawskim; german: link=no, Aufstand im Warschauer Ghetto was the 1943 act of Jewish resistance in the Warsaw Ghetto in German-occupied Poland during World War II to oppose Nazi Germany' ...
, were members of Poale Zion. They include:
*
Adolf Berman, Warsaw ŻOB fighter; Secretary of
Zegota (Poale Zion Left)
*
Hersz Berlinski Hirsch Berlinski was born in 1908. He was member of the Left Poalai Zion party and one of the organizers of the Jewish Combat Organization. In opposition to calls from community leaders in Warsaw Ghetto for accommodation with the invading forces, ...
, member of Warsaw ŻOB Command (Poale Zion Left)
* Yochanan Morgenstern, member of Warsaw ŻOB Command (Poale Zion Right)
*
Emanuel Ringelblum, member of Warsaw ŻOB; chronicler of the Warsaw Ghetto (Poale Zion Left)
Legacy
Mandatory Palestine and Israel
After
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...
,
David Ben-Gurion
David Ben-Gurion ( ; he, דָּוִד בֶּן-גּוּרִיּוֹן ; born David Grün; 16 October 1886 – 1 December 1973) was the primary national founder of the State of Israel and the first prime minister of Israel. Adopting the na ...
integrated most of Poale Zion Right in
Palestine into his
Ahdut HaAvoda
Ahdut HaAvoda ( he, אַחְדוּת הַעֲבוֹדָה, lit. ''Labour Unity'') was the name used by a series of political parties. Ahdut HaAvoda in its first incarnation was led by David Ben-Gurion. It was first established during the perio ...
party, which became
Mapai
Mapai ( he, מַפָּא"י, an acronym for , ''Mifleget Poalei Eretz Yisrael'', lit. "Workers' Party of the Land of Israel") was a democratic socialist political party in Israel, and was the dominant force in Israeli politics until its merger i ...
by the 1930s. The Poale Zion Left merged with the kibbutz-based
Hashomer Hatzair Workers Party of Palestine
The Hashomer Hatzair Workers Party of Palestine ( he, מִפְלֶגֶת פּוֹעָלִים הַשׁוֹמֵר הַצָעִיר בְּאֶרֶץ יִשְׂרָאֵל ''Mifleget Poalim Hashomer Hatzair be'Eretz Yisrael'') was a Marxism, Marxist- ...
and the urban-based
Socialist League of Palestine to form
Mapam in 1948, which in the 1990s merged with two smaller parties,
Ratz and
Shinui, to form
Meretz
Meretz ( he, מֶרֶצ, ) is a left-wing political party in Israel. The party was formed in 1992 by the merger of Ratz, Mapam and Shinui, and was at its peak between 1992 and 1996 when it had 12 seats. It currently has no seats in the Knesset ...
. In 1946, a split in Mapai led to the creation of another small party,
Ahdut HaAvoda – Poale Zion, which united with Mapam in 1948. In 1954, a small group of Mapam dissidents left the party, again assuming the Ahdut HaAvoda – Poale Zion name. That party eventually became part of the
Alignment in a 1965 merger with Mapai (and later included
Rafi and Mapam). In 1992, the Alignment became the
Israeli Labour Party.
Youth movements
Several youth movements have emerged out of Poale Zion: the Marxist
Hashomer Hatzair
Hashomer Hatzair ( he, הַשׁוֹמֵר הַצָעִיר, , ''The Young Guard'') is a Labor Zionist, secular Jewish youth movement founded in 1913 in the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria, Austria-Hungary, and it was also the name of the gro ...
(the largest, with 70,000 members on the eve of the Holocaust), the socialist
Habonim Dror
Habonim Dror ( he, הַבּוֹנִים דְּרוֹר, "the builders–freedom") is the evolution of two Jewish Labour Zionist youth movements that merged in 1982.
Habonim ( he, הַבּוֹנִים, "the builders") was founded in 1929 in the ...
, the Left Poale Zion's
Yugent, and Zeirei Zion.
North America
In North America, Poale Zion founded the
HeHalutz movement, the
Farband and
Habonim Dror
Habonim Dror ( he, הַבּוֹנִים דְּרוֹר, "the builders–freedom") is the evolution of two Jewish Labour Zionist youth movements that merged in 1982.
Habonim ( he, הַבּוֹנִים, "the builders") was founded in 1929 in the ...
, and later the Labor Zionist Organization of America, which merged with other groups into the Labor Zionist Alliance, which rebranded itself in 2007 as
Ameinu. US Poale Zion published a Yiddish newspaper, the ''
Yidisher Kempfer'', and an English journal, ''
Jewish Frontier
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
'', edited by
Hayim Greenberg
Hayim Greenberg ( he, חַיִּים גרינברג 1889, Todirești, Beletsky Uyezd, Bessarabia – 1953) was a Jewish-American thinker and Labor Zionist thinker. He was the head of Poalei Zion and he was the editor along with Marie Syrki ...
and
Marie Syrkin.
United Kingdom
In Britain, Poale Zion rebranded itself in 2004 as the
Jewish Labour Movement. Its original affiliate status with the Labour Party in 1920 was as The Jewish Socialist Labour Party (Poale Zion).
Worldwide
Internationally, the Poale Zion right is represented within the
World Zionist Organization
The World Zionist Organization ( he, הַהִסְתַּדְּרוּת הַצִּיּוֹנִית הָעוֹלָמִית; ''HaHistadrut HaTzionit Ha'Olamit''), or WZO, is a non-governmental organization that promotes Zionism. It was founded as the ...
by the
World Labour Zionist Movement; the group "to the left" of the WLZM within the WZO is Mapam's successor, the World Union of
Meretz
Meretz ( he, מֶרֶצ, ) is a left-wing political party in Israel. The party was formed in 1992 by the merger of Ratz, Mapam and Shinui, and was at its peak between 1992 and 1996 when it had 12 seats. It currently has no seats in the Knesset ...
. Meretz succeeded Mapam as a member of the
Socialist International
The Socialist International (SI) is a political international or worldwide organisation of political parties which seek to establish democratic socialism
Democratic socialism is a Left-wing politics, left-wing political philosophy that su ...
and, since 2013, is also a member of the
Progressive Alliance
The Progressive Alliance (PA) is a political international of social democratic and progressive political parties and organisations founded on 22 May 2013 in Leipzig, Germany. The alliance was formed as an alternative to the existing Socia ...
.
See also
*
Jewish Communist Labour Party (Poalei Zion)
*
Jewish Communist Party (Poalei Zion)
*
Jewish Communist Union (Poalei Zion)
*
Poalei Agudat Yisrael
Poalei Agudat Yisrael ( he, פועלי אגודת ישראל, , Agudat Yisrael Workers) was a trade union and Jewish political party in Poland and a minor political party in Israel. It was also known as PAI or PAGI, its Hebrew acronym (Hebrew: o ...
*
Mifleget Poale Zion VeHaHugim HaMarksistim beEretz Yisrael
*
Labour Zionism
*
Gordonia
*
Farband
*
Jewish left
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
External links
MideastWeb: A brief history of Labor and Socialist ZionismPoale Zion Archive at M.I.A.The Ber Borochov Internet Archive at Angelfire''Der neue Weg'', B311 a digitized periodical published by the organization, at the
Leo Baeck Institute, New York
The Ber Borochov Internet Archive at M.I.A.— founding program of Poale Zion, sets out its analysis, at JewishVirtualLibrary
*
Ber Borochov: The Economic Development of the Jewish People, 1916
Poalei Tziyon Peace Manifesto, 1917*
Ber Borochov: Eretz Yisrael in our program and tactics, 1917
Levic Jessel: Biographical note on Borochov, 1935- a description of Poale Zion split
— More detail on the split
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Jewish political parties
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Jewish socialism
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Jewish Polish history
Jewish Russian and Soviet history
Jewish Ukrainian history
Members of the Labour and Socialist International
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