Revisionist Zionism

Early history of Revisionist Zionism within the borders of the British Mandate for Palestine, at the same time excluding it from Jewish settlement. Revisionist Zionism was based on a vision of "political Zionism", which Jabotinsky regarded as following the legacy of Theodor Herzl, the founder of modern political Zionism. His main demand was the creation of Greater Israel on both sides of the Jordan River, and was against partitioning Palestine with the Arabs, such as suggested by the Peel Commission. The 1921 British establishment of Transjordan (the modern-day state of Jordan) adversely affected this goal, and it was a great setback for the movement. Before Israel achieved statehood in 1948, Revisionist Zionism became known for its advocacy of more belligerent, assertive postures and actions against both British and Arab control of the region. Criticism of the Churchill White Paper of 1922 sparked the establishment of the Revisionist Union. The central committee of the Revisionist Union defined its relationship with Great Britain as one of mutual loyalty but it was at odds with the mandatory administration. In the 1920s, Revisionist leadership wanted clearly to define the relationship of the Revisionist movement and the British Empire. It supported the proposal of British MP Josiah Wedgewood to make Palestine a Seventh Dominion of the British Empire. The proposal was ratified at the third Revisionist world conference which took place from 26 December 1928, to 30 December 1928. A year later, the proposal was approved by the executive committee as part of its working plan. Jabotinsky established the Revisionist Party in 1925 with the intention of replacing the General Zionists. The 1929 riots by Arabs in Palestine led to the radicalization of the Zionist movement. This led to the dwindling of the General Zionist movement and the struggle for leadership in the 1931 elections to the 17th Zionist Congress between Revisionist Zionists and Labor Zionists. In the 1929 elections to the 16th Congress, the Revisionists won only 7% of the votes, but in the 1931 elections, they won 21% of the votes. In 1931, Jabotinsky forced Chaim Weizmann to resign as president of the World Zionist Organization. Jabotinsky attempted to get a motion passed to support an anti-Nazi boycott which was defeated 249 to 43. Jabotinsky became head of Betar in 1929, but the actual organization was founded by Aron Propes in 1923. Menachem Begin joined Betar in 1929 in Poland and was head of the national unit, which was the largest branch of Betar in the world. The Herut party in 1948 won 14 seats in the 1949 elections. When Begin finally came to power in the 1977 election, his overriding concern as Prime Minister (1977–1983) was to maintain Israeli control over the West Bank and Gaza. In 1983, following criticism of the Israeli war in Lebanon in 1982 and the Sabra and Shatila massacre carried out by Israel's Lebanese Christian allies, Begin resigned as prime minister of Israel. Begin was replaced by Yitzhak Shamir who was also a member of Likud in 1983. Another member of Likud, Benjamin Netanyahu, came from a family of Revisionist Zionists. He was elected prime minister of Israel in 1996. ==Jabotinsky and Revisionist Zionism==

, founder of Revisionist Zionism After World War I, Jabotinsky was elected to the first legislative assembly in the Yishuv, and in 1921 he was elected to the Executive Council of the Zionist Organization (known as the World Zionist Organization after 1960). He quit the latter group in 1923, thanks mainly to differences of opinion with its chairman, Chaim Weizmann. In 1925, Jabotinsky formed the Revisionist Zionist Alliance, in the World Zionist Congress to advocate his views, which included increased cooperation with Britain on transforming the entire Mandate for Palestine territory, including Palestine itself and Transjordan, on opposite sides of the Jordan River, into a sovereign Jewish state, loyal to the British Empire. To this end, Jabotinsky advocated for mass Jewish immigration from Europe and the creation of a second Jewish Legion to guard a nascent Jewish state at inception. Jabotinsky wished to convince Britain that a Jewish state would be in the best interest of the British Empire, perhaps even an autonomous extension of it in the Middle East. When, in 1935, the Zionist Organization failed to accept Jabotinsky's program, he and his followers seceded to form the New Zionist Organization. The NZO rejoined the ZO in 1946. The Zionist Organization was roughly composed of General Zionists, who were in the majority, followers of Jabotinsky, who came in a close second, and Labour Zionists, led by David Ben-Gurion, who comprised a minority yet had much influence where it mattered, in the Yishuv. Despite its strong representation in the Zionist Organization, Revisionist Zionism had a small presence in the Yishuv, in contrast to Labour Zionism, which was dominant among kibbutzim and workers, and hence the settlement enterprise. General Zionism was dominant among the middle class, which later aligned itself with the Revisionists. In the Jewish Diaspora, Revisionism was most established in Poland, where its base of operations was organized in various political parties and Zionist Youth groups, such as Betar. By the late 1930s, Revisionist Zionism was divided into three distinct ideological streams: the "Centrists", the Irgun, and the "Messianists". Jabotinsky later argued for establishing a base in the Yishuv and developed a vision to guide the Revisionist movement and the new Jewish society on economic and social policy centered around the ideal of the Jewish middle class in Europe. Jabotinsky believed that basing the movement on a philosophy contrasting with the socialist-oriented Labour Zionists would attract the support of the General Zionists. In line with this thinking, the Revisionists transplanted into the Yishuv a youth movement, Betar. They also set up a paramilitary group, Irgun, a labour union, the National Labor Federation in Eretz-Israel, and health services. The latter were intended to counteract the increasing hegemony of Labour Zionism over community services via the Histadrut and address the Histadrut's refusal to make its services available to Revisionist Party members. ==Irgun Tsvai Leumi==

The paramilitary organization of the Revisionist movement was called the National Military Organization, or the Irgun. The Irgun (short for , Hebrew for "National Military Organization" ) had its roots initially in the Betar youth movement in Poland, which Jabotinsky founded. By the 1940s, they had transplanted many of its members from Europe and the United States to Palestine. The Revisionists split from the Haganah in 1931 because they opposed its domination by the Histadrut. They formed the "Haganah-B" which was commanded by a Revisionist Zionist, Abraham Tehomi. "Haganah B" was founded by Avraham Tehomi in 1931. Tehomi led "Haganah-B" until December 1936 when he agreed to give the leadership position to Jabotinsky. The group did not became completely Revisionist until April 1937 when Tehomi and about a quarter of the 3,000 men in "Haganah-B" returned to the Haganah due to their support for the Mizrachi, General Zionists, and Jewish State Party. "Haganah B" was transformed into the Irgun after Tehomi split from the group to join the Haganah. Jabotinsky initially adopted the Haganah's doctrine of self-restraint because he wanted a legal legion that was formally affiliated with the military and he thought that an illegal counterinsurgency would make that impossible. However, once "Haganah B" became the Irgun, the organization became an independent underground organization. The Irgun carried out a number of attacks against the British and Arabs. In September 1937, the Irgun killed 13 Arabs which was said to be in retaliation for the deaths of three Jews. The summer of 1938 was the high point of the Irgun's campaign. On 6 July 1938, the Irgun set off a bomb in a milk can in the Arab market in Haifa which killed 21 and injured 52. On 15 July 1938, an electric mine in David Street in Jerusalem killed 10 and injured 30. On 25 July 1938, the Irgun set off another bomb in the Arab market in Haifa which killed 35 and wounded 70. On 26 August 1938, the Irgun set off a bomb in the market in Jaffa which killed 24 and injured 35. In response to the White Paper in 1939, the Irgun bombed British facilities. The British responded by arresting Irgun commander David Raziel in May. In addition, on 31 August 1939, the rest of the Irgun high command was apprehended while discussing Jabotinsky's plan to invade Palestine. The Irgun was commanded by Jabotinsky until his death in 1940. Menachem Begin commanded the Irgun from 1943 until the organization was dissolved in June 1948. In 1939, the Irgun called off their campaign against the British mandatory authorities for the duration of World War Two as the British fought against the Axis powers with the other Allied powers. Acting often in conflict (but at times, also in coordination) with rival clandestine militias such as the Haganah and the Lehi (or Stern Group), the Irgun's efforts would feature prominently in the armed struggles against British and Arab forces alike in the 1930s and 1940s, and ultimately become decisive in the closing events of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. ==Lehi==

A group of fighters with particularly militant views in the Irgun formed an underground movement called "The Fighters for the Freedom of Israel" or the Stern Gang. This group used terrorism and political assassinations to try to expel the British from Palestine. Following Israel's declaration of independence in May 1948, both the Irgun and the Stern Gang were dissolved and many of the organization's members joined the Israel Defense Forces. The movement called Lehi, and nicknamed the "Stern Gang" by the British, was led by Avraham "Yair" Stern until his death. Stern did not join the Revisionist Zionist party in university but instead joined another group called Hulda. He formed Lehi in 1940 as an offshoot from Irgun, which was initially named Irgun Zvai Leumi be-Yisrael (National Military Organization in Israel or NMO). Following Stern's death in 1942—shot by a British police officer—and the arrest of many of its members, the group went into eclipse until it was reformed as "Lehi" under a triumvirate of Israel Eldad, Natan Yellin-Mor, and Yitzhak Shamir. Shamir became the Prime Minister of Israel forty years later. Stern viewed Zionism as a national liberation movement and supported armed struggle to achieve independence. He did not want to wait until Britain's war against Nazi Germany was over to begin an armed revolt against the British occupation of Palestine. While the Irgun stopped its activities against the British during World War II, at least until 1944, Lehi continued guerrilla warfare against the British authorities. It considered the British rule of Mandatory Palestine to be an illegal occupation, and concentrated its attacks mainly against British targets (unlike the other underground movements, which were also involved in fighting against Arab paramilitary groups). Stern reached out to Nazi Germany under Hitler and Italy under Mussolini since both of these regimes opposed the British. After World War II, the triumvirate that replaced Stern reached out to the Soviet Union to try to find an ally against Britain. == Ideology ==

Ideology of pre-state Revisionist Zionism The Revisionist Zionist movement did not have a clearly defined ideology which was more of a feature of Zionists on the left. Initially, the stance of the movement was to reject the policies of the contemporary Zionist leadership under Chaim Weizmann. The lack of a coherent ideology was something the movement took pride in since it removed them from the brand of traditional party politics and did not emphasize identification with religion or social class. However, despite the lack of a clear ideology, one clear belief of the original Revisionist leadership was the need to create a Jewish majority in Palestine despite the protests of the indigenous Arab population in the land. Jabotinsky would not accept the partition of Palestine into two states. On the topic of "transfer" (expulsion of the Arabs), Jabotinsky's statements were ambiguous. In some writings he supported the notion, but only as an act of self-defense, in others he argued that Arabs should be included in the liberal democratic society that he was advocating, and in others still, he completely disregarded the potency of Arab resistance to Jewish settlement, and stated that settlement should continue, and the Arabs be ignored. Jabotinsky believed Arab opposition to Zionism was inevitable and that any efforts at reconciliation with Arabs would be unsuccessful. This military force would protect Jewish immigration to Palestine and would allow the goals of Zionism to be achieved. Despite this belief, he still promised that the bourgeois regime that he wanted to take power in the Jewish state would eliminate poverty. While the initial core group of Likud's leaders such as Israeli Prime Ministers Begin and Yitzhak Shamir came from Likud's Herut faction, later leaders, such as Benjamin Netanyahu (whose father was Jabotinsky's secretary) and Ariel Sharon, have come from or moved to the "pragmatic" Revisionist wing. The Revisionist idea of establishing a Jewish homeland over all of the Land of Israel played a role in shaping the ideas of members of Likud. Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir, two former Israeli prime ministers and members of Likud, were both inspired by Jabotinsky's ideas. Menachem Begin opposed relinquishing the West Bank after Israel's victory in the Six-Day War. In addition, he opposed UN Resolution 242 because it would mean relinquishing Israeli control over part of the Land of Israel. Begin believed that the historic right of Jews to the Land of Israel came before the Palestinian claim to the land. Shamir would not compromise on the issue of the borders of the Land of Israel and opposed the Camp David Accords. Another member of Likud and prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, accepted the Oslo Accords, which was a diversion from the Revisionist idea of establishing a Jewish homeland over all of the Land of Israel. ==See also==