The Education Of A Zionist

We were taught the songs and dances of the first Israeli settlers from Eastern Europe and learned them well enough to demonstrate them for Israeli youth, who had never heard or seen them, preferring the latest international pop hits. I fully expected to make "aliyah" to Israel when I finished college, just as my cousin Zippy had done. While this was not the goal my parents held for me, everything I knew about Israel drew me in, almost irresistibly. As I collected money for the Jewish National Fund, a weekly school assignment, passing around the pale blue tin boxes that were ubiquitous in Jewish neighborhoods, I imagined myself planting trees bought with money I collected around new settlements in the Negev, the southern wilderness. My older brother was a terrorist. At fifteen, he joined the ranks of the smallest and most radical of the three underground groups committed to chasing the British out of Palestine and creating the Jewish State. Known as the Stern Gang, or more formally, Fighters for the Freedom of Israel (FFI), they were specialists in assassinations and surprise attacks on Arab and British foes. They competed for money and attention with the Irgun, the oldest of the three resistance groups, and Haganah, the largest and the least radical of the three. It was rumored that the Stern Gang was responsible for the assassination of General Allenby on the streets of London. He had been in charge of British forces in Palestine, and was hated for torturing captured Jewish prisoners. The group also was implicated in car bombings, terrorist attacks on British barracks and revenge killings of Arab leaders. My brother's job was to raise funds from the Jewish communities of the Eastern seaboard and collect armaments that were later trans-shipped to Israel. We knew about this because my father found boxes of guns and explosives in the basement of a small apartment building he owned in Brooklyn. Confronting my brother, he ordered him to remove these illegal and dangerous contents from the building within 48 hours or he would call in the police. Two days later, two toughs appeared at the door of our apartment, asking for my father. They threatened his life if he didn't forget he knew about the guns and explosives, allowing them to be removed when "the boys" were ready. My father was terrified and followed orders. My brother sometimes confided in me about his work. I idolized him as a hero of the Jewish people, although the real impact of his bloody work was obscured by the haze of my romantic notions about Israel. One day, my brother called me into his room and told me he needed my help. He said he was running a fever and might be too sick to bike a package of nitroglycerin over the George Washington Bridge the next morning. If he couldn't do it, he told me, I might have to take his place. I told him I was prepared, reminding him that I was trained as a scout at Camp Cejwin. My eyes filled with tears of pride. In the end though, my brother decided that he couldn't let his kid sister take that risk and although sick, he managed to carry out the task himself. At seventeen, just shy of his high school graduation, my brother left school and worked his way to Brazil on a freighter, washing pots big enough for him to stand in. He jumped ship in Rio and was taken in by members of the Jewish community there. The next thing we knew the military government of Brazil had thrown him in jail and was considering either throwing away the key or kicking him out of the country. My parents, through the efforts of New York's Congressional delegation and a satchel of money, arranged for him to be flown to Miami by a Brazilian general. There, he was met by my parents and various U.S. officials who were prepared to arrest him. Fortunately, that didn't happen for reasons never clear to me. I didn't see much of my brother after that. He was drafted and sent to fight in the Korean War where he was made an explosives expert and spent much of his time dismantling bombs that failed to explode. When he finished his army stint, he enrolled in college under the GI Bill, and then in graduate school where he earned a doctorate in clinical psychology. I was planning my college career while my brother was getting ready for graduate school. I wanted to go to a small liberal arts college strong in literature and writing, my areas of interest, but my parents offered me a different deal. If I would agree to go to the City University of New York, which offered a free college education, I could have a year abroad, all expenses paid, in the country of my choosing. In the end, I accepted the deal and chose to go to Israel. I couldn't pass up the chance to visit the Jewish homeland. It was the refuge where Jews could feel safe, protected by our own Jewish army. For hundreds of years, Jews had been thrown out of countries or proscribed in what careers they could pursue. In Europe, they had been targets of pograms, disenfranchisement, and bigotry for hundreds of years. The Holocaust showed us that we were not safe anywhere, even in the countries where once we had prospered and were socially successful. My maternal grandfather had been a prominent toymaker with a large factory near Berlin. He had been given the title of Baron by the Kaiser for services to the State. But when he fled the Nazis and came through Ellis Island, grandfather Louis left everything behind, his title, his business, his home and lands, and became a simple, poor tailor in Richmond, Virginia. It was the Holocaust that woke up American Jews to the cold reality of a world prejudiced against them. We felt morally committed to Israel as a safe haven where Jews could live in peace, no matter how our social and political conditions changed or turned against us. Given a time-honored commitment to civil rights and human dignity, it now seems odd to me that in the many discourses and orientations I received about Zionism, it was never mentioned that the homeland had been seized from its Arab owners who were driven off their lands to make way for the State of Israel. Arabs became known as the enemy of the people of Israel. They stood in the way of Israel's return to their birthright and historic home. Those who did not flee their homes and remained in Israel were told that they could live in peace with their Israeli neighbors, with the rights and privileges accorded to Israeli Jews, including the right to run for Parliament, attend the University, and receive social, medical and economic benefits. More at: http://www.rense.com/general78/swn.htm

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