Zionist political violence refers to acts of violence committed by Zionists in the British Mandate of Palestine for political reasons, mainly to advance the creation of Israel, a Jewish state.
Actions were carried out by individuals and Jewish paramilitary groups such as the Irgun, the Lehi, the Haganah and the Palmach as part of a conflict between Zionists, British authorities, and resident Arabs, regarding land, immigration, and Jewish national aspirations.[1]
British soldiers and officials, United Nations personnel, Palestinian Arab fighters and civilians, and Jewish fighters and civilians were targets or victims of these actions. Domestic, commercial, and government property, infrastructure, and material were also attacked.
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Zionism was formally established by the Austro-Hungarian journalist Theodor Herzl in the late 19th century following the publication of "Der Judenstaat".[2] seeking to encourage Jewish migration, or immigration, to the Promised Land. The percentage of world Jewry living in area of the former Palestinian Mandate has steadily grown from around 78,000 in 1900 (12% of the population of the Ottoman Palestine) to nearly 6 million in 2005 (76% of the population of Israel)[3]. As of 2009, roughly 40% of the world's Jews live in Israel.[4][5]
During World War I, Zionist volunteers fought in the Jewish Legion of the British Army against the Ottomans because they expected the British would be less opposed to the Zionist project than the Ottoman authorities.
During the 1920 Jerusalem riots, the 1921 Palestine riots and the 1929 Palestine riots, Palestinian Arabs manifested hostility against Zionist immigration and Jewish communities, which provoked the reaction of Jewish militias, sometimes supported by British troops. In 1935, the Irgun, a Zionist underground military organization, split off from the Haganah.[6] The Irgun were the armed expression of the nascent ideology of Revisionist Zionism founded by Ze'ev Jabotinsky. He expressed this ideology as "every Jew had the right to enter Palestine; only active retaliation would deter the Arabs and the British; only Jewish armed force would ensure the Jewish state".[7]
During the 1936-1939 Arab revolt in Palestine, Palestinian Arabs oppositionists fought for the end of the Mandate and the creation of an Arab state based on the whole of Palestine. They attacked both British and Jews as well as some Palestinian Arabs who supported a Pan-Arab option. Mainstream Zionists, represented by the Vaad Leumi and the Haganah, practiced the policy of Havlagah (restraint), while Irgun militants did not follow this policy and called themselves "Havlagah breakers." The Irgun began bombing Palestinian civilian targets in 1938.[6] While the Palestinians were "carefully disarmed" by the British Mandatory authorities by 1939, the Zionists were not.[6]
After the beginning of World War II, the Haganah and Irgun suspended their activity against the British in support of their war against Nazi Germany.[8] The smaller Lehi continued anti-British attacks and direct action throughout the war. At that time, the British also supported the creation and the training of Palmach, as a unit that could withstand a German offensive in the area, with the consent of Yishuv which saw an opportunity to get trained units and soldiers for the planned Jewish state and during 1944-1945, the most mainstream Jewish para-military organization, Haganah, cooperated with the British authorities against the Lehi and Etzel.[9]
After World War II, between 1945 and the 29 November 1947 Partition vote, British soldiers and policemen were targeted by Irgun and Lehi. Haganah and Palmah first collaborated with the British against them, particularly during the Hunting Season, before actively joining them in the Jewish Resistance Movement, then finally choosing an official neutral position after 1946 while the Irgun and the Lehi went on their attacks against the British.
The Haganah carried out violent attacks in Palestine, such as the liberation of interned immigrants from the Atlit camp, the bombing of the country's railroad network, sabotage raids on radar installations and bases of the British Palestine police. It also continued to organize illegal immigration..
In February 1947, the British announced that they would end the mandate and withdraw from Palestine and they asked the arbitration of the United Nations. After the vote of the Partition Plan for Palestine on 30 November 1947, civil war broke out in Palestine. Jewish and Arab communities fought each other violently in campaigns of attacks, retaliations and counter-retaliations which provoked around 800 deaths after 2 months. Foreign Arab volunteers entered Palestine to fight alongside the Palestinians. In April, 6 weeks before the termination of the Mandate, the Jewish militias launched wide operations to control the territory dedicated to them by the Partition Plan. Many atrocities occurred during this time. The Arab population in the mixed cities of Tiberias, Safed, Haifa, Jaffa, Beisan and Acre and in the neighbouring villages fled or were expelled during this period. During the battle for Jerusalem where the Jewish community of 100,000 people was besieged, most Arab villages of the Tel Aviv – Jerusalem corridor were captured by Jewish militias and leveled. Those members of the Arab population who had not fled were expelled or killed.
At the beginning of the civil war, the Jewish militias organized several bombing attacks against civilians and military Arab targets. On 12 December, Irgun placed a car bomb opposite the Damascus Gate, killing 20 people.[10] On 4 January 1948, the Lehi detonated a lorry bomb against the headquarters of the paramilitary Najjada located in Jaffa's Town Hall, killing 15 Arabs and injuring 80.[10][11] During the night between 5 and 6 January, at Jerusalem, the Haganah bombed the Semiramis Hotel that had been reported to hide Arab militiamen, killing 24 people.[12] The next day, Irgun members in a stolen police van rolled a barrel bomb[13] into a large group of civilians who were waiting for a bus by the Jaffa Gate, killing around 16.[14] Another Irgun bomb went off in the Ramla market on February 18, killing 7 residents and injuring 45.[15] On 28 February, the Palmah organised a bombing attack against a garage at Haifa, killing 30 people.[16]
Irgun was described as a terrorist organization by the United Nations, British, and United States governments, and in media such as The New York Times newspaper,[17][18] and by the Anglo-American Committee of Enquiry.[19] In 1946 The World Zionist Congress strongly condemned terrorist activities in Palestine and "the shedding of innocent blood as a means of political warfare". Irgun was specifically condemned.[20]
Menachen Begin was called a terrorist and a fascist by Albert Einstein and 27 other prominent Jewish intellectuals in a letter to the New York Times which was published on December 4, 1948. Specifically condemned was the participation of the Irgun in the Deir Yassin massacre:
The letter warns US Jews against supporting Begin's request for funding of his political party Herut, and ends with the warning:
Lehi was described as a terrorist organization[22] by the British authorities and United Nations mediator Ralph Bunche.[23]
During the conflict between Arabs and Jews in Palestine before the war, the criterion of "Purity of arms" was used to distinguish between the respective attitudes of the Irgun and Haganah towards Arabs, with the latter priding itself on its adherence to principle.[24] and the Jewish society in the British Mandate Palestine generally disapproved and denounced violent attacks both on grounds moral rejection and political disagreement, stressing that terrorism is counter-productive in the Zionist quest for Jewish self-determination.[9]. Generally speaking, this precept requires that "weapons remain pure [and that] they are employed only in self-defence and [never] against innocent civilians and defenceless people".[25] But if it "remained a central value in education" it was "rather vague and intentionally blurred" at the practical level.[24]
In 1946, at a meeting held between the heads of the Haganah, Ben Gurion predicted a confrontation between the Arabs of Palestine and the Arab states. Concerning the "principle of purity of arms", he stressed that: "The end does not justify all means. Our war is based on moral grounds"[26] and during the 1948 War, the Mapam, the political party affiliated to Palmach, asked "a strict observance of the Jewish Purity of arms to secure the moral character of [the] war".[27] When he was later criticized by Mapam members for his attitude concerning the Arab refugee problem, David Ben Gurion reminded them the events of Lydda and Ramla and the fact Palmah officers had been responsible for the "outrage that had encouraged the Arabs' flight made the party uncomfortable."[27]
According to Avi Shlaim, this condemnation of the use of violence is one of the key features of 'the conventional Zionist account or old history' whose 'popular-heroic-moralistic version' is 'taught in Israeli schools and used extensively in the quest for legitimacy abroad'.[25] Benny Morris adds that '[t]he Israelis' collective memory of fighters characterized by "purity of arms" is also undermined by the evidence of [the dozen case] of rapes committed in conquered towns and villages.' According to him, 'after the 1948 war, the Israelis tended to hail the "purity of arms" of its militiamen and soldiers to contrast this with Arab barbarism, which on occasion expressed itself in the mutilation of captured Jewish corpses.' According to him, 'this reinforced the Israelis' positive self-image and helped them "sell" the new state abroad and (...) demonized the enemy'.[28]
| Participants | Individuals | Violence | Diplomacy |
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Main: Other:
Influence: |
Israelis:
Palestinians: |
1920 Palestine riots |
Hussein-McMahon Correspondence
Israel, Palestine, and the United Nations |