"A Place Once Settled is Not to Be Abandoned"

by Dr. Alex Grobman
First Published: 12/20/06

As Israel continues its quest to find a solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict, Jimmy Carter and others are pressing Israel to leave parts of Judea and Samaria. Before even considering such a move, which would repeat the disaster of Gush Katif, Israeli leaders might learn from the experiences of former Zionist leaders.

On March 1, 1920, Joseph Trumpeldor, a political activist, along with five of his men from the Tel Hai settlement, was killed in a fight with Arabs from a nearby village. Historian Anita Shapiro notes that two months before the encounter, Aharon Sher, a settler, wrote an article in which he asked for help to defend the settlements in this lawless and remote northern region. One sentence became a rallying cry to battle:

"A place once settled is not to be abandoned."

In subsequent discussions about whether to defend or desert these communities, leaders of the Labor movement essentially adopted Sher's view. Yitzchak Tabenkin, a leader of the kibbutz movement, argued that if the Arabs terrorized the Jews enough to leave a few settlements, they would not stop until the Jews were forced out everywhere. Only by taking an "obstinate, desperate stand, without looking back," could the Jews guarantee their right to the land.

The moderate, left-of-center HaPoel HaTza'ir party paper asserted that their work in settling the land was based on "mutual understanding and amicable relations" with their neighbors: "Yet, wherever Hebrew soil is drenched with the sweat of Hebrew workers, and with their blood, that place is holy to us, and we have no right to abandon it."

In the 1930s, when the Arabs rioted in Palestine over increased Jewish immigration, David Ben-Gurion thought the Arabs might be more receptive to Jewish settlement if he could demonstrate how it would benefit them economically. In 1934, he went to see Musa Alami, a young "moderate" Arab lawyer, who served as the Private Secretary to Arthur Wauchope, High Commissioner for Palestine.

Alami's response to Ben Gurion was quite telling: "That's true," he said, "but we don't want your blessing. We prefer the land to remain impoverished, barren and empty until we ourselves are capable of doing what you are doing. And if it takes another century, then we will wait a hundred years."

Shortly after the Arab Rebellion began on April 19, 1936, Ben-Gurion didn't even bother trying to convince the Arabs of the morality of Zionism or about the economic advantages that would accrue to them from increased Jewish settlement, according to Shapiro. "It would be extremely naive to assume that the Arabs would determine their attitude toward us from the standpoint of abstract justice," Ben-Gurion declared. "The Arabs are adamant that this country is an Arab country, and they wish it to remain so. That is quite elementary!"

Arthur Ruppin, the foremost authority on Jewish efforts to settle the land, explained the difficulty of reaching an accord with the Arabs. On February 21, 1931, he wrote in his diary, "We are not offered what we need, and what we are offered is of no use to us."

Ruppin, who was chairman of Brit Shalom, which advocated a bi-national state, recognized that the "conciliatory tone" the group took toward the Arabs was "interpreted by the Arabs as weakness."

In November 1929, German Zionist members of Brit Shalom suggested that an appeal for a reprieve be made to the British for the Arabs convicted of killing Jews in Hebron and Safed. On Friday August 23, 1929, the Arabs began a week of rioting, killing and looting. More than 400 Jews were murdered or wounded. In Hebron, eight American Jews were killed and 15 wounded. The dead were students at the Slobodka yeshiva, who were not Zionists and not involved in the Jewish national movement. Neither were those attacked in Safed.

Although "in principle" Ruppin opposed the death penalty, he felt in this case it would be too dangerous to stop the practice. Prisons don't "frighten the Arabs," he said, "since they are relatively better off in jail than they were at home." Furthermore, "they would not regard a prison sentence - with the hope of amnesty after a few years - as a serious punishment, and thus might encourage others to slaughter Jews."

The lessons learned by early Jewish leaders should not be lost on those in power today. The Arabs have not yet accepted the Jewish right to live in the Land of Israel. Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh made this clear when, on December 8, 2006, he declared, "We will not give up our Jihadist movement until the full liberation of Beit Al-Muqqadas [Jerusalem] and Palestinian land."

Israeli leaders would do well to heed the words of Edmund Burke, who said, "The concessions of the weak are the concessions of fear." Appeasement has a place in resolving disputes, he believed, but not in dealing with aggression.

Dr. Alex Grobman served as director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center during its formative years. He has an MA and Ph.D. in Contemporary Jewish History from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and is the co-author of "Denying History: Who Says The Holocaust Never Happened And Why Do They Say It?" (University of California Press, 2000).

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