Hashomer Hatza'ir: The Interplay of Fundamental Zionism and Revolutionary Socialism

• In Event: Socialist Revolution and Zionism between the World Wars

Abstract

Hashomer Hatza'ir [HH] was founded in Eastern Europe before the First World War as a Zionist youth movement. In 1927 graduates of HH who had immigrated to Palestine founded a kibbutz movement, Kibbutz Artzi [KA]. The ideological core of HH was maximalist Zionism, based on negation of the exile. At some point in the 1920s the movement, under the leadership of Meir Yaari, grafted Marxist-socialism onto this base. In order to defuse the tension between the nationalist-Zionist aspect, which had always existed in HH, and the recently acquired revolutionary socialist-Marxist ideas the founding council of the KA adopted the “theory of stages (étapes),” which stated the primacy—in time—of the nationalist-Zionist stage and postponed the socialist revolution until the national goal had been realized.
The proposed paper will describe and analyze how HH navigated between fundamental Zionism and revolutionary socialism in two fronts: in Palestine and in Poland, focusing on the 1930s. It will elaborate on the claim that there was a “tragic contradiction” between Zionism and Socialism, and will relate to the role played by the Soviet Union in formulating the ideology and praxis of HH.
One of the main contentions of the paper is that HH adopted a unique socialist-Zionist ideology for the sake of distinguishing itself from other political bodies of the Jewish labor movement, in order to remain a distinct kibbutz movement and to frustrate any chance of merging into another organization. In other words, its revolutionary Marxism was to a great extent instrumental whereas its Zionism had always been fundamental component of its ideology and praxis.
Another central contention of the paper is, that contrary to a common notion, verging on accusation, that HH was leaning towards communism and often was a step on the road out of Zionism, HH was primarily a Zionist movement and actually prevented the leftward drift of radical Jewish youth out of the Zionist realm.

Author

• Aviva Halamish, The Open University of Israel