Hebrew labor
Encyclopedia
Hebrew labor refers to the concept of hiring Jewish workers in Ottoman
and Mandate Palestine.
period many Jewish immigrants to Palestine
sought year round jobs on the agricultural tracts and plantations of their co-religionists who had arrived during the First Aliyah
. Rather than hire their fellow Jews, the immigrants of the First Aliyah were initially inclined to hire local Arabs who provided cheaper labor. Eventually the immigrant laborers of the Second Aliyah successfully unionized and emphasized their Jewish identity and shared nationalist goals in order to persuade the First Aliyah immigrants to hire them and thereby displace the Arab labor. They organized under the banner of “Hebrew Labor” or “conquest of labor”.
The struggle for Jewish labor, for Jews to employ only Jews, signified the victory of Jewish labor in creating a new society. This struggle was constantly pushed by the leaders of the second Aliyah
(1904-1914), who founded Labor Zionism
and in the 1930s became the leaders of the Zionist
movement. Shortly after his arrival in Palestine in 1906 David Ben-Gurion
noted that a moshav
a, a private Jewish agricultural settlement, employed Arabs as guards. He asked himself: "Was it conceivable that here too we should be deep in Galuth (exile), hiring strangers to guard our property and protect our lives?". Soon Ben-Gurion and his companions managed to amend this situation. According to Shabtai Teveth
in these early years Ben-Gurion developed the concept of 'Avodah Ivrit', or 'Jewish labour'.
The leaders of the second Aliyah agreed that Jewish labor was vital for the national revival process as they were convinced that Jews should 'redeem' themselves by building with their own hands a new type of Jewish society. They also thought the use of Arab labor could create a typical colonial society, exploiting cheap, unorganized indigenous labor, and would hamper further Jewish immigration. Finally they considered manual labor a good therapy for Jews as individuals and as a people. In Ben-Gurion's opinion Jewish labor was "not a means but a sublime end", the Jew had to be transformed and made creative.
In 1907 Ben-Gurion called for Jewish labor on lands owned by the Jewish National Fund
. There were difficulties here, because Arabs were prepared to work long hours for very low wages, and most Jewish immigrants preferred to settle in the cities. In this context occurred the development of the concept of the kibbutz
, 'the co-operative settlement based on self-labour and motivated by Zionist ideals'. In a summary made in 1956 Ben-Gurion said the kibuutz movement was not started because of some socialist theory, but as an effective way to "guarantee Jewish labour".
and the 1936 general strike as opportunities to further enforce his drive for Jewish labor. In 1930 the Hope Simpson Report blamed the Jewish labor policy for the grave unemployment in the Arab sector. According to Flapan in 1933 the Histadrut
launched its first campaign to remove Arab workers form the cities. In many cases the removal of Arab workers 'took the form of ugly scenes of violence'. Reports of this in the Jewish and Arab press 'created an atmosphere of unprecedented tension'. According to Flapan this forceful eviction of Arab workers and the 'acrimonious propaganda' which accompanied the operation amplified Arab hostility and ultimately precipitated the outbreak of the Arab revolt in 1936.
In 1947 the UN Special Commission on Palestine summarized the situation:
. In March 2008 in light of the Mercaz HaRav massacre
which was initially reported to have been perpetrated by an Arab employee of the seminary, Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky
ruled “it is completely forbidden to hire Arabs, especially in yeshivas” due to the “concern of endangering lives”.One week later the Chief Rabbi of Hebron
and Kiryat Arba
, Rabbi Dov Lior
ruled that "it is strictly prohibited to hire Arabs, or to rent houses on Israeli land to them. Their employment is out of the question, not only in the yeshivas but also in hotels or factories; basically anywhere." Additionally during the same period (following the aforementioned massacre), a protest march took place on the East-Jerusalem neighborhood where the Israeli-Arabs lived, many of the protestors prominently carried large printed banners calling for Avoda Ivrit indicating the rising popularity of the conviction that only Jewish labor should be used.
preferred to use the word "Hebrew" because they wanted to emphasize the difference between their "new Hebrew" identity and the "old Diaspora Jewish" identity. For them the word "Hebrew" had romantic connotations with the "purity" and "authenticity" of the existence of the "Hebrew nation in its land", like it had been in the past.
Related to the concept of "Hebrew labor" was the concept of "alien labor". Ben-Gurion wrote about the settlers of the First Aliyah
: "They introduced the idol of exile to the temple of national rebirth, and the creation of the new homeland was desecrated by avodah zara". According to Shapira avodah zara means both "alien labor" and, in a religious sense, "idol worship". Along with bloodshed and incest this is one of the three worst sins in Judaism. Application of this concept to the employment of Arab workers by Jews depicted this as a taboo.
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
and Mandate Palestine.
Ottoman era
During the Second AliyahSecond Aliyah
The Second Aliyah was an important and highly influential aliyah that took place between 1904 and 1914, during which approximately 40,000 Jews immigrated into Ottoman Palestine, mostly from the Russian Empire, some from Yemen....
period many Jewish immigrants to Palestine
Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
sought year round jobs on the agricultural tracts and plantations of their co-religionists who had arrived during the First Aliyah
First Aliyah
The First Aliyah was the first modern widespread wave of Zionist aliyah. Jews who migrated to Palestine in this wave came mostly from Eastern Europe and from Yemen. This wave of aliyah began in 1881–82 and lasted until 1903. An estimated 25,000–35,000 Jews immigrated to Ottoman Syria during the...
. Rather than hire their fellow Jews, the immigrants of the First Aliyah were initially inclined to hire local Arabs who provided cheaper labor. Eventually the immigrant laborers of the Second Aliyah successfully unionized and emphasized their Jewish identity and shared nationalist goals in order to persuade the First Aliyah immigrants to hire them and thereby displace the Arab labor. They organized under the banner of “Hebrew Labor” or “conquest of labor”.
The struggle for Jewish labor, for Jews to employ only Jews, signified the victory of Jewish labor in creating a new society. This struggle was constantly pushed by the leaders of the second Aliyah
Aliyah
Aliyah is the immigration of Jews to the Land of Israel . It is a basic tenet of Zionist ideology. The opposite action, emigration from Israel, is referred to as yerida . The return to the Holy Land has been a Jewish aspiration since the Babylonian exile...
(1904-1914), who founded Labor Zionism
Labor Zionism
Labor Zionism can be described as the major stream of the left wing of the Zionist movement. It was, for many years, the most significant tendency among Zionists and Zionist organizational structure...
and in the 1930s became the leaders of the Zionist
Zionism
Zionism is a Jewish political movement that, in its broadest sense, has supported the self-determination of the Jewish people in a sovereign Jewish national homeland. Since the establishment of the State of Israel, the Zionist movement continues primarily to advocate on behalf of the Jewish state...
movement. Shortly after his arrival in Palestine in 1906 David Ben-Gurion
David Ben-Gurion
' was the first Prime Minister of Israel.Ben-Gurion's passion for Zionism, which began early in life, led him to become a major Zionist leader and Executive Head of the World Zionist Organization in 1946...
noted that a moshav
Moshav
Moshav is a type of Israeli town or settlement, in particular a type of cooperative agricultural community of individual farms pioneered by the Labour Zionists during the second aliyah...
a, a private Jewish agricultural settlement, employed Arabs as guards. He asked himself: "Was it conceivable that here too we should be deep in Galuth (exile), hiring strangers to guard our property and protect our lives?". Soon Ben-Gurion and his companions managed to amend this situation. According to Shabtai Teveth
Shabtai Teveth
Shabtai Teveth , is an Israeli historian.Shabtai Teveth began working as a journalist for Haaretz newspaper in 1950, eventually becoming its political correspondent...
in these early years Ben-Gurion developed the concept of 'Avodah Ivrit', or 'Jewish labour'.
The leaders of the second Aliyah agreed that Jewish labor was vital for the national revival process as they were convinced that Jews should 'redeem' themselves by building with their own hands a new type of Jewish society. They also thought the use of Arab labor could create a typical colonial society, exploiting cheap, unorganized indigenous labor, and would hamper further Jewish immigration. Finally they considered manual labor a good therapy for Jews as individuals and as a people. In Ben-Gurion's opinion Jewish labor was "not a means but a sublime end", the Jew had to be transformed and made creative.
In 1907 Ben-Gurion called for Jewish labor on lands owned by the Jewish National Fund
Jewish National Fund
The Jewish National Fund was founded in 1901 to buy and develop land in Ottoman Palestine for Jewish settlement. The JNF is a quasi-governmental, non-profit organisation...
. There were difficulties here, because Arabs were prepared to work long hours for very low wages, and most Jewish immigrants preferred to settle in the cities. In this context occurred the development of the concept of the kibbutz
Kibbutz
A kibbutz is a collective community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. Today, farming has been partly supplanted by other economic branches, including industrial plants and high-tech enterprises. Kibbutzim began as utopian communities, a combination of socialism and Zionism...
, 'the co-operative settlement based on self-labour and motivated by Zionist ideals'. In a summary made in 1956 Ben-Gurion said the kibuutz movement was not started because of some socialist theory, but as an effective way to "guarantee Jewish labour".
Mandate era
Around 1920 Ben-Gurion began to call for Jewish labor in the entire economy, and labor Zionism started striving for an absolute segregation of the Jewish and Arab national communities. In this way 'Jews and Arabs [...] would live in separate settlements and work in separate economies'. Ben-Gurion used the 1929 Palestine riots1929 Palestine riots
The 1929 Palestine riots, also known as the Western Wall Uprising, the 1929 Massacres, , or the Buraq Uprising , refers to a series of demonstrations and riots in late August 1929 when a long-running dispute between Muslims and Jews over access to the Western Wall in Jerusalem escalated into violence...
and the 1936 general strike as opportunities to further enforce his drive for Jewish labor. In 1930 the Hope Simpson Report blamed the Jewish labor policy for the grave unemployment in the Arab sector. According to Flapan in 1933 the Histadrut
Histadrut
HaHistadrut HaKlalit shel HaOvdim B'Eretz Yisrael , known as the Histadrut, is Israel's organization of trade unions. Established in December 1920 during the British Mandate for Palestine, it became one of the most powerful institutions of the State of Israel.-History:The Histadrut was founded in...
launched its first campaign to remove Arab workers form the cities. In many cases the removal of Arab workers 'took the form of ugly scenes of violence'. Reports of this in the Jewish and Arab press 'created an atmosphere of unprecedented tension'. According to Flapan this forceful eviction of Arab workers and the 'acrimonious propaganda' which accompanied the operation amplified Arab hostility and ultimately precipitated the outbreak of the Arab revolt in 1936.
In 1947 the UN Special Commission on Palestine summarized the situation:
The economic life presents the complex phenomenon of two distinctive economies - one Jewish and one Arab, closely involved with one another and yet in essential features separate. [...] Apart from a small number of experts, no Jewish workers are employed in Arab undertakings and apart from citrus groves, very few Arabs are employed in Jewish enterprises [...] Government service, the Potash company and the oil refinery are almost the only places where Arab and Jews meet as co-workers in the same organization. [...] There are considerable differences between the rates of wage for Arab and Jewish workers in similar occupations.
Modern Israel
In recent times there have been attempts at reviving the practice of hiring exclusively Jewish labor in the Land of Israel particularly after the Second Intifada. Selective hiring practices are illegal in Israel under the Act of Equality in Employment, however many employers cite overriding security concerns. In 2004 an Israeli website promoting Hebrew Labor was shut down under pressure from the Mossawa Center for Arab Rights. which is funded by the New Israel FundNew Israel Fund
The New Israel Fund is a U.S. based non-profit organization established in 1979, and describes its objective as social justice and equality for all Israelis.-Ideology:...
. In March 2008 in light of the Mercaz HaRav massacre
Mercaz HaRav massacre
The Mercaz HaRav massacre, also called the Mercaz HaRav shooting, was an attack that occurred on 6 March 2008, in which a lone Palestinian gunman shot multiple students at the Mercaz HaRav yeshiva, a religious school in Jerusalem, Israel, after which the gunman himself was shot dead. Eight students...
which was initially reported to have been perpetrated by an Arab employee of the seminary, Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky
Chaim Kanievsky
Shmaryahu Yosef Chaim Kanievsky, , is an Israeli rabbi and posek. Kanievsky is considered a leading authority in Haredi Jewish society.-Biography:...
ruled “it is completely forbidden to hire Arabs, especially in yeshivas” due to the “concern of endangering lives”.One week later the Chief Rabbi of Hebron
Hebron
Hebron , is located in the southern West Bank, south of Jerusalem. Nestled in the Judean Mountains, it lies 930 meters above sea level. It is the largest city in the West Bank and home to around 165,000 Palestinians, and over 500 Jewish settlers concentrated in and around the old quarter...
and Kiryat Arba
Kiryat Arba
Kiryat Arba or Qiryat Arba , lit. "Town of the Four," is an Israeli settlement in the Judean Mountains region of the West Bank on the edge of Hebron. Its settlers consist of a mix of Russian immigrants, American immigrants, and native-born Israelis numbering close to 10,000...
, Rabbi Dov Lior
Dov Lior
Dov Lior is an Israeli rabbi, who currently serves as the Chief Rabbi of Hebron and Kiryat Arba in the southern West Bank. He is also the rosh yeshiva Kiryat Arba Hesder Yeshiva, and also heads the "Council of Rabbis of Judea and Samaria".-Biography:...
ruled that "it is strictly prohibited to hire Arabs, or to rent houses on Israeli land to them. Their employment is out of the question, not only in the yeshivas but also in hotels or factories; basically anywhere." Additionally during the same period (following the aforementioned massacre), a protest march took place on the East-Jerusalem neighborhood where the Israeli-Arabs lived, many of the protestors prominently carried large printed banners calling for Avoda Ivrit indicating the rising popularity of the conviction that only Jewish labor should be used.
Terminology
"Hebrew labor" is often also referred to as "Jewish labor" although the former is the literal translation of "avoda ivrit". According to Even-Zohar the immigrants of the Second AliyahSecond Aliyah
The Second Aliyah was an important and highly influential aliyah that took place between 1904 and 1914, during which approximately 40,000 Jews immigrated into Ottoman Palestine, mostly from the Russian Empire, some from Yemen....
preferred to use the word "Hebrew" because they wanted to emphasize the difference between their "new Hebrew" identity and the "old Diaspora Jewish" identity. For them the word "Hebrew" had romantic connotations with the "purity" and "authenticity" of the existence of the "Hebrew nation in its land", like it had been in the past.
Related to the concept of "Hebrew labor" was the concept of "alien labor". Ben-Gurion wrote about the settlers of the First Aliyah
First Aliyah
The First Aliyah was the first modern widespread wave of Zionist aliyah. Jews who migrated to Palestine in this wave came mostly from Eastern Europe and from Yemen. This wave of aliyah began in 1881–82 and lasted until 1903. An estimated 25,000–35,000 Jews immigrated to Ottoman Syria during the...
: "They introduced the idol of exile to the temple of national rebirth, and the creation of the new homeland was desecrated by avodah zara". According to Shapira avodah zara means both "alien labor" and, in a religious sense, "idol worship". Along with bloodshed and incest this is one of the three worst sins in Judaism. Application of this concept to the employment of Arab workers by Jews depicted this as a taboo.
External links
- History of Hebrew Labor Zionism and Israel