A Brief Introduction
We have dedicated this page as a repository for Zionists’ and Jewish organizations' communications during the pre-Nakba period, showing their fixation on Palestine as the ONLY destination for persecuted European Jews, and how they lobbied like hell against any viable third alternative. Shamelessly, many Jewish and Zionist so-called historians keep repeating this big lie that Palestine was the only viable destination for Europe's Jewish refugees, here is our detailed rebuttal to this unfounded myth.
Between 1936 and 1939, the Palestinian people started one of the largest anti-colonial struggles at the time in what became known as the Great Arab Revolt of 1936, and it was ignited by the increase of Jewish immigration to their country. Palestinians, like all colonized Indigenous peoples, feared imminent replacement and dispossession, which later became known as the Nakba. In return for terminating the revolt and for Arab support during WWII, the British agreed to impose severe limits on future Jewish immigration based on the White Paper of 1939 (which effectively reversed the Balfour Declaration). Thus, from the start, the indigenous people (who made up over 90% of citizens and to this date still owns 94% of the lands) made it clear that those who are plotting to replace them are never welcome. On top of the that the colonial occupying power, Great Britain, promised Palestinians a complete independence after the war ends.

This explains why Zionists of all shades made defeating the White Paper their top priority, and for that to happen, Jews had to become a majority by any means possible. But how could Zionists direct Europe's Jews to Palestine? Simple, Theodor Herzl provided the blueprint three decades earlier in the late 19th century: 1) Instigate and exploit Jewish refugee crises to the maximum, 2) foment antisemitism where it didn't exist, and 3) close any viable exits unless Palestine was the ONLY destination; that is how the "Jewish state" could be built in a record time.

In a nutshell, Zionist leaders worked hand over fist to close all windows in a burning house, and they left one exit (Palestine) to Europe's Jews to maximize their political gains to defeat the White Paper of 1939. Actually, David Ben-Gurion referred to such a process as the LEVER that would create the "Jewish state". Ironically, Ben-Gurion used to refer to saving Jews outside of Palestine as more like "Witch Doctor's Medicine"! In layman's terms, those Jews who saved themselves in countries other than Palestine were doomed anyhow, therefore, that was a waste of resources and money. As will be proven shortly below, Zionist leaders made sure that Europe's Jews were left with two options: either they made Aliyah to Palestine to join the yishuv or go to Auschwitz, and lobbied feverishly like hell against any viable third alternative. Sadly, this evil policy continued even after WWII ended in the DP camps. Just in case you think our characterization is over the top, wait until reading it from ChatGPT (who framed the two options as: land or coffin), or reading it from Ben-Gurion himself when the Holocaust was in its infancy:

At the Biltmore Conference in May 1942 Ben-Gurion said: “The meaning of these two ships [Patria and Struma -- both were sunk during WWII with Jewish refugees onboard] is simple: Eretz-Israel or death-- and as soon as the war ends, many ships like these will stream to Eretz Israel.” (Beit-Zvi, p. 259)
[Two important points to keep in mind: A) When Ben-Gurion said this statement, he knew that Patria was sunk by the Haganah based on Moshe Sharett's orders in Nov. 1940 (almost 16 months earlier ). That by itself was very telling. B) The mass majority of Europe's Jewry after WWII ended immigrated to the Americas and preferred to live with the Gentiles even after Palestine was emptied of its people.]
Therefore, in practice, Zionists executed David Ben-Gurion's infamous antisemitic hate speech to the maximum to increase their political leverage, which he articulated a month after the Kristallnacht pogrom. We believe it is worthwhile watching Peter Bergson for two and half minutes talking about the Rabbis' march in the Fall of 1943 (the only protest by Jews in DC during WWII), the obstetrical they faced from Zionists (which he referred to as "monkey wrenches"), how the Bergson Boys lobbied to rescue Europe's Jews in the US Congress, and most importantly how Zionists fought his group with tooth and nail because they didn't advocate saving Europe's Jews ONLY to Palestine. Make sure to watch Mr. Bergson to the last second and remember this happened when the last million and a half were alive:

When confronted with the facts, Zionist Jews (especially those in America) claim that the rescue schemes during the war were limited, and America's power was marginal at best; which were true. On the other hand, this argument ignores the fact that FDR authorized the War Refugee Board (WRB) in a hurry in early 1944, which was credited by saving 200,000 Jews! Now imagine how many more would have been saved if Zionist and American Jewry's leaders didn't attempt to torpedo their efforts! It is worth noting that the WRB wouldn't have been possible not for the efforts of the few active brave Jews, especially the non-Zionist ones in the FDR administration and with help of a handful of Zionists in Bergson Group. God forbid if the WRB didn't exist; still, Zionists shouldn't have tried to scuttle rescue efforts because first, no one knows what the result would have been unless serious rescue attempts were tried. Second, it was European Jewry's wish; they wanted everything possible to be done to save them. Third, playing God in such circumstances was morally reprehensible. To get into Zionists' minds to understand why they have implemented this policy, we have to ask: what if rescuing Jews was successful and much of the Holocaust was avoided, wouldn't saving Europe's Jews would have rendered the Zionist project mute? In depth, we have addressed that in another section.
As you read our research, please note that A) we did our best to use Zionist, Israeli, and notable newspapers as our primary sources as much as possible. When possible, we evan scanned the relevant pages. B) All communications and documents have been sorted by date in ascending order. As you shall see soon, this fixation was like an obsession that consumed all Zionist political movements (liberal left, Mapai-labor, and revisionists right) who worked tirelessly to close all possible options to rescue Europe's Jews unless Palestine was THE ONLY destination! C) Based on our research, Zionists' fixation on Palestine started way early when the founding fathers of the "Jewish state" opposed Theodor Herzl's Uganda Scheme with their teeth and nails, and that was the canary in the coal mine.
Until now it has been a mystery: why the founders of the "Jewish state" were fixated on Palestine when other rescue schemes were available? Here are possible answers.
The Evidence

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The text of the Haavara Agreement enshrined that German Jews would receive their compensation only when they arrived in Palestine. On the other hand, Zionists marketed Nazi goods all over the Middle East & North Africa (The Transfer Agreement, p. 373-4):
"Consent for the utilization of the credit cannot be given for any other purposes than for use in Palestine" (51 Documents, p. 49 and Jewish Daily Bulletin Sept 3rd, 1933)
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To prove how the German Jewish wealth (valued at 10-12 billion Reichsmarks which was more than Mefo bills' total size as of mid-1938) was front and center on the minds of Zionists when Hitler rose to power from the beginning, they lobbied the Nazis to make sure that if German Jews wished to save their wealth, then their wealth must be invested in Zionist communal enterprises (where the capital is locked in for decades) in Palestine:
The attitude of the Histadrut officials was typical of Mapai leadership and their allies, who saw the wealth of German Jews as the most precious hostage held by the Third Reich. As part of this thinking, Georg Landauer and the ZVfD fought for German regulations that would prevent German Jews from saving their wealth by any means other than investing it in Palestine.
Just in case you made the mistake of thinking that German Jews were left with nothing after being milked (by Nazis and Zionists), then think twice. Only a fraction of the assets were available in cash, and only after several years or decades; here are the boring details.
Landauer recommended that ZVfD certification of emigrants be contingent upon purchasing land in Palestine, extending a loan to Nir [some Zionist communal enterprise], or participating in any approved Palestinian investments. Landauer's words: "therefore I would like to suggest that Emigrant Advisory Office....receive instructions whereby emigrant applications based on contracts with Palestinian colonization companies [i.e. JNF] receive priority status" (The Transfer Agreement by Edwin Black, p. 258-59). - As Hitler rose to power and persecution of German Jews increased, Australia, the Soviet Union, and Japan offered to resettle German Jews. You would think Zionists welcomed such generous proposals? On the contrary, they were vehemently against:
But the Australian, Russian, and Manchurian settlement opportunities were rejected by the Zionist Organization. Resettlement meant further dispersion and little more than another scenario for persecution, as Jews would again become guests ofa host nation. A return to their own land in Palestine constituted the only end to centuries of catastrophic nomadism.
The Zionist stance made it clear: Palestine or nothing. Now or never. (The Transfer Agreement, p. 260). When German and Austrian Jews were endangered in the late 1930s, and 32 countries gathered to help them at Evian - France to deal with the Jewish refugee crisis, you would think Zionists gave them a helping hand?
On the contrary, the evidence from Israeli and Zionist sources shows that Zionists did the exact opposite by discouraging any German Jewish emigration except to Palestine (The Jewish Trail of Tears, p. 149-50, 264, 267, and 268). Actually, we shall prove soon that Zionist leaders hoped and plotted to make Evian a failure. Sadly, the mainstream media and many historians framed the Conference as a failure and pinned the blame on FDR, which we shall address in detail at the end of this section.
To quickly make our case, we are compelled to cite Wikipedia (by far a pro-Zionist platform) directly in the following paragraph, which shows an assessment of the memorandums submitted at the conference by the five leading American Jewish organizations plus the Jewish Agency. Honestly, Wikipedia's articulation is second to none:According to the JTA, during the discussions, five leading Jewish organisations sent a joint memorandum discouraging mass Jewish emigration from central Europe. Reacting to the conferences' failure, the AJC declined to directly criticise American policy, while Jonah Wise blamed the British government and praised "American generosity". Zionist leaders Chaim Weizmann and David Ben-Gurion of the Jewish Agency were both firmly opposed to Jews being allowed entry into Western countries, hoping that the pressure of hundreds of thousands of refugees having nowhere to go would force Britain to open Palestine to Jewish immigration. In a similar vein, Abba Hillel Silver of the United Jewish Appeal refused to assist the resettlement of Jews in the United States saying he saw "no particular good" in what the conference was trying to achieve. The guiding principle of Zionist leaders was to press only for immigration to Palestine. Yoav Gelber [a notorious Nakba denier and a big Zionist] concluded that "if the conference were to lead to a mass emigration to places other than Palestine, the Zionist leaders were not particularly interested in its work." Years later, while noting that American and British Jewish leaders were "very helpful to our work behind the scenes, [but] were not notably enthusiastic about it in public", Edward Turnour who led the British delegation recalled the "stubbornly unrealistic approach" of some leading Zionists who insisted on Palestine as the only option for the refugees. [Here is the saved Image grab just in case Wikipedia censorship kicks in on high gear.]
[If you are interested in reviewing Wikipedia's Zionist sources, the presentation is damning which you can review online for free: Here is Yoav Gelber's presentation, and here is Michael Laitman's. If you have the time, you may find it interesting to review what Allan Wells wrote in Tropical Zion as well.]
The renowned hardcore Zionist, Edwin Black, wrote a very similar assessment of Zionist leaders' thought processes in the 1930s. Frankly, it can not be clearer:
During the first days after Hitler's boycott against Germany's Jews [early 1933], the Zionist movement's hierarchy in Europe and America was busy trying to plot a course of action. Their objective was not to mobilize Jewish and non-Jewish resources for the preservation of Jewish rights in Germany. Rather, they sought a means of turning the miseries of German Jewry into a new impetus for a Jewish Homeland in Palestine.
Zionist leadership had, in fact, refused to oppose the Nazi expulsion ideology from the outset. (The Transfer Agreement, p. 78-9)
[Actually, David Ben-Gurion described the process of exploiting Jewish pain and suffering while appeasing the Nazis as the LEVER, and that by itself is very telling. Allow that to sink in for a minute and think!]Oddly, Mr. Black while discussing the Evian Conference at the end of his book, he didn't even allude to offers from Peru, Bolivia, Mexico, British Guiana, Mandano-Philippines, Rodisia, British and Portuguese African colonies, and Dominican Republic to receive German and Austrian Jewish refugees, and portrayed Palestine as the ONLY available and viable destination, which was and still is big lie! (The Transfer Agreement, p. 377). Based on our research, we've found that this big lie is very widely spread among Jewish historians although Latin America alone saved close to 100,000 German and Austrian Jews as of 1939 (see Simone Gigliotti, p. 24-5). On top of that Palestinians revolted for three years in the 1930s against Jewish immigration and the British Mandate relented to their demand in the White Paper of 1939 (which effectively reversed the Balfour Declaration). In a nutshell, the indigenous people and the occupying colonial power made it clear that Palestine cannot be a refuge for those who are plotting to replace Palestinians. Thus, Palestine was neither available nor viable, especially to Europe's Jews; period.
To dig further into Zionists' mindset just before WWII was underway, you've to contemplate Ben-Gurion's reaction when he heard that Great Britain would accept 10,000 German Jewish children refugees in late 1938 (only four months after Evian and a month after the infamous Kristallnacht pogrom). It was chilling to read Ben-Gurion's infamous antisemitic hate speech in December 1938:
"If I knew it was possible to save all [Jewish] children of Germany by their transfer to England and only half of them by transferring them to Eretz-Yisrael, I would choose the latter----because we are faced not only with the accounting of these [Jewish] children but also with the historical accounting of the Jewish People." (Righteous Victims, p. 162 and The Burning Ground by Shabtai Teveth) Ben-Gurion was so concerned that the "human conscience" might bring various countries to open their doors to those persecuted German Jews [God forbid]. He saw this as a threat and warned: Zionist is in danger. (The Seventh Million p. 28 & NY Times, July 12th, 1987)
Why did Great Britain indict two of Israel's future PMs on charges of terrorism? Those evil British must have been "Jew-hating" antisemites!
Pay attention to: A) How Ben-Gurion used the word "save" four years before the Final Solution was in the picture, which confirms that Zionist leaders spoke of Shoah in the past tense before it happened. Thus in Zionists' mind, the calamity is happening and nothing could stop it; therefore, it should be exploited. B) How Ben-Gurion didn't even thank the British people for helping the refugees. C) Hitler's infamous hate speech at the Reichstag on Jan. 30th, 1939, almost immediately followed Ben-Gurion's speech by two months; which leads us to believe that David was speaking to Hitler because he (referring to David) refused to retract his antisemitic hate speech although he was heavily criticized for it.
Refusing to take back his antisemitism is very telling. That by itself proves David's contempt for diaspora Jews! Actually, it has been documented that Be-Gurion doubled down on his earlier antisemitism tens days later when he repeated a very similar statement. Anyhow, if you are interested, here is our complete analysis about this infamous speech! We have dissected it from multiple angles.John Quigley (whom Wikipedia cited earlier) wrote the following jaw dropping paragraphs. He exposed us to many details about Evian; here are the relevant portions. Honestly, we highly recommend reading the whole book, it will prove how much Zionists cared about saving Jews, and how recklessly Zionists endangered Jews to save their skins. We have inserted our comments in brackets and italics to give an added context:
How did Zionist leaders respond when British people rescued 10,000 German Jewish children after the Kristallnacht pogrom?
Representing Britain, Lord Winterton (Edward Tournour) noted, “It has been represented in some quarters that the whole question, at least of the Jewish refugees, could be solved if only the gates of Palestine were thrown open to Jewish immigrants without restriction of any kind.” That was an obvious reference to the Zionist view. But Lord Winterton explained that “Palestine is not a large country,” and “there are special considerations arising out of the terms of the mandate.” That was a reference to the need to protect the existing population of Palestine. Lord Winterton told the delegates that “the question of Palestine stands upon a footing of its own and cannot usefully be taken into account at the present stage in connection with the general problems that are under consideration at this meeting.”3
Weizmann’s approach was precisely the opposite of Britain’s. Addressing the Zionist-oriented World Conference for Palestine a few weeks after the Evian conference, Weizmann said that Palestine must be the destination for emigrants leaving Europe. “Our position today has become so acutely critical,” said Weizmann with reference to the Jews of Europe, “we must demand a permanent solution to our problem. That solution can be found only in Palestine the national home of a homeless people.” For Weizmann, the immigration of displaced Jews into Western countries was no solution. [similarly, around the same time, David Ben-Gurion described saving Jews outside Palestine as Witch Doctor's Medicine]In May 1939, MS St. Louis in Havana was refused to unload its Jewish passengers in Cuba & US, and it was forced to go back to Antwerp. Jewish Agency refused to give any of its passengers immigration visas to Palestine. Over 250 of the passengers perished during the Holocaust.
Ben-Gurion feared that resettling Jews outside Palestine would erode support for Zionism among world Jewry. In a December 17, 1938 letter to the Zionist Executive, Ben-Gurion wrote, “If Jews will have to choose between the refugees, saving Jews from concentration camps, and assisting a national museum in Palestine, mercy will have the upper hand and the whole energy of the people will be channeled into saving Jews from various countries.” In that eventuality, Ben Gurion wrote, “Zionism will be struck off the agenda.”[Note how Zionists ONLY cared about their survivor, MOST IMPORTANTLY how Jewish suffering was only the LEVER to save their skins]
In the letter, Ben-Gurion castigated Britain for seeking to deal with the issue of Jewish refugees separately from the issue of Palestine. “Britain is trying,” he wrote, “to separate the issue of the refugees from that of Palestine.” Ben-Gurion feared, “If we allow a separation between the refugee problem and the Palestine problem, we are risking the existence of Zionism.”
A leading Zionist who, after the Second World War, would chair the American Section of the Jewish Agency, Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver, was of the same mind. Shortly after the Evian conference, Rabbi Silver was approached by James McDonald, whom President Roosevelt had appointed to advise him on refugee issues. McDonald asked Rabbi Silver, who then headed the United Jewish Appeal, for help in resettling European Jews in the United States. Rabbi Silver turned him down flat. “I was shocked,” McDonald recounted, by his attitude “toward the Evian effort.” Rabbi Silver told McDonald that he saw “no particular good” in what Roosevelt was trying to do at Evian.
The refusal to encourage the West to take in Jews at risk in Europe continued even as wartime atrocities unfolded. At the Extraordinary Zionist Conference held at the Biltmore Hotel in New York in 1942, Nahum Goldmann expressed alarm at what the Nazi government might do to the Jews if it were to find itself on the edge of defeat. Goldmann spelled out a doomsday scenario. “Who can foretell what the Nazi regime, once brought into the position of the surrounded killer, will do in the last moment before it goes down to shame?” Like Ben Gurion in 1938, Goldmann focused exclusively on Palestine as a venue for Jews seeking to leave Europe. Historian Aaron Berman (see p. 99-102), recounting Goldmann’s Biltmore speech, commented, “Surprisingly, Goldmann didn’t propose any program to come to the immediate aid of those threatened with annihilation. Instead, he called for the establishment of a Jewish Commonwealth that could absorb two million Jewish refugees in the decade following the war.”[Therefore, although Zionists knew the calamity is near (the Holocaust started just after the Baltimore conference) and actually could happen any moment, still they didn't waver from their fixation on Palestine!]Fake Valore: Why did two of Israel's future PMs, Menachem Begin and Yizhak Shamir, bomb WWII war efforts while their families were being gassed in Poland?
There was logic to the Zionist Organization’s position if one accepts the premise that Jews would be safe only if they had their own state. [This was the biggest lie Zionists sold to others and to themselves: The mass majority of Jews were saved outside of Palestine even after Palestine was ethnically cleansed out of its people to make room for persecuted European Jews. Despite of Zionists assertion (that "Jews could be only saved in Palestine"), Europe's Jews STILL refused to immigrate in mass to Palestine who mostly voted with their feet and immigrated to the Americas to live with the Gentiles, not to Palestine. More often than not, Jews only chose Palestine when no other option was available; which is a fact that still persists to this date. That is why Ben-Gurion airlifted Arab Jews after Nakba in early 1950s and 1960s to populate the emptied country] At the Biltmore Hotel conference, a coalition of Zionist groups came out publicly to declare their aim as being a “commonwealth” to encompass the territory of Palestine. This became the position of the Zionist Organization. But Palestine was clearly not large enough to handle more than a small percentage of the world’s Jews, even if they all felt the need to settle there. Even so, the Zionists could argue, a safe haven should be available for Jews.
At the same time, the position of the Zionist leadership opened them to the criticism that they were leaving Jews to die in Germany, for lack of an immediately available destination for their resettlement. The Zionists purported to be champions of world Jewry, yet their policy arguably left Jews in unnecessary jeopardy. To be sure, the Western governments were not anxious to take in large numbers of Jews, even as the clouds of genocide were gathering in Germany. But the Zionist movement contributed to the reluctance of the Western governments. In upholding strict immigration quotas, those governments could take comfort in the fact that their policy was approved by the Zionists. (The International Diplomacy of Israel's Founders by John Quigley, p. 50-51, 51-52 & 52-53)Shukri al-Jamal's Palace in the Talibiya neighborhood in Jerusalem two days after its completion and just before Zionist Jews looted it from him and his family
[Even in the law of the jungle and in the best-case situation, Zionists' conduct could only be characterized as intentional reckless endangerment. How Jews (especially American Jews) slurp their garbage is truly mind-boggling! How Jews are not anti-Zionists hundreds of times more than Palestinians is surprising. It should be noted that when Trump was the US President, Zionist leaders replicated this dangerous pattern not only with Trump but also with other fascists and known antisemites around the world! Honestly, we wonder: which European antisemites Zionists didn't sleep with! When fomenting antisemitism wasn't good for Zionism! We wonder; why change a winning formula!!]Hoarding Resettlement And Rescue Funds
For Zionist leaders to ensure that Palestine stayed as the ONLY haven for European Jewry, they had to starve resettlement funds and to hoard as much as possible of the rescue budget (for the most part, Zionists got their way). For example, in preparation for the Evian Conference, a few Zionists at the Jewish Agency dared to suggest a non-Zionist solution to save German and Austrian Jewry; however, the proposal was nixed immediately by the leadership; here are the details from the Israeli historian Aviva Halamish:
The discussion reveals a clear awareness of the limited potential of Palestine as a destination for German Jews. Having admitted that Palestine was unable to solve the problem of the Third Reich’s Jews, some members of the Executive were willing to have the Jewish Agency be involved in non-Zionist solutions, and proposed to ask the conference to work out an agreement with Germany on the orderly exit of the Jews with some of their property over ten years. One third of these would emigrate to Palestine, one third to the U.S., and the rest to other countries. Most of the members, however, insisted on limiting Jewish Agency involvement to Palestine, leaving other agencies to deal with other destinations.
Kastner Saved Lives Too: How does justifying Haavara after the fact not resemble Rudolf Kastner's defense of what happened on his famous train but at a much larger scale? Kastner train passengers on their way to Switzerland, 1944The discussion also exposes the concerns about the irrelevancy of Palestine as a solution to the crisis of German Jews, not only because of the political restrictions imposed by the British and the severe economic situation, but also because of the Arab Revolt, which had then reached its peak. The chairperson of the Zionist Executive, David Ben-Gurion, phrased it thus: "In the eyes of the world, the situation in Palestine seems similar to that of Spain [afflicted by civil war]. A country experiencing riots, where bombs are thrown every day, people are killed, and the unemployment and economic stagnation prevail -- a country like that is no place for solving the refugee question." Knowing that Palestine could not provide a meaningful answer to the plight of the Jews of the Reich, members of the Executive worried lest the conference might totally eliminate Palestine from the list of immigration destinations, with the result that Jewish organisations would divert the contributions for aiding their refugee brethren to other countries. (Palestine as a Destination for Jewish Immigrants By Aviva Halamish, p. 131-2 and see also Beit-Zvi who provided the JAE's leaked CCed meeting minutes -- which Aviva summarized, it is quite chilling to read, p. 155-58 and the same thing was repeated in late 1941, see p. 222)
[Aviva's earlier assessment referred to some Zionists who dared to suggest non-Zionist solutions for the refugee crisis. After reading Beit-Zvi's work (see chapters 7 & 8), we can safely assume she was referring to Arthur Ruppin who reluctantly executed Weizmann's and Ben-Gurion's evil mission at Evian (e.g. resisting any haven except for Palestine), see page 161 for the details.]
Kastner Saved Lives Too: How does justifying Haavara after the fact not resemble Rudolf Kastner's defense of what happened on his famous train but at a much larger scale? Kastner train passengers on their way to Switzerland, 1944Just in case you think this was a one off thing and it didn't reflect Zionists' policy during the pre-Nakba period; please think twice. Here again is the renowned big Zionist, Edwin Black, spelling out Zionists' policies in clear English. Please be seated first:
"All of the non-Zionist schemes for relieving the plight of German Jews required vast amounts of donations, which Jews and non-Jews alike were willing to give. But the Zionist movement saw these relief efforts as a threat because the solutions excluded Palestine. More importantly, the donations would divert funds from the Zionist movement. In other words, here was a Jewish crisis, and not only would the answer lie in lands other than Palestine, but the Zionist movement would suffer economic ruin in the process" (p. 90)
David Ben-Gurion envisioned that Nazis' Nuremberg Race Laws would become the LEVER that would end up creating the "Jewish state," but how? Click the image for the details
Zionist leaders behaved the same way when the Bergson Group attempted to mobilize American public opinion to fight the Nazis and to rescue Europe's Jews. Zionist leaders were worried that Bergson Group's plans would divert donations and other resources from building their future state (Aaron Berman, p. 130-31 & 118-123). To torpedo the Group's efforts, they even weaponized antisemitism against them.
A similar response happened from Zionists when Great Britain promoted British Guiana as a haven for European Jewry; they ripped it a apart because they were terrified that would divert funds from their colonization activities in Palestine (see Politics of Rescue by Henry L. Feingold, p. 110-111).
To our surprise, the policy of hoarding rescue funds was even implemented to a level we could have imagined. This policy was also implemented to disrupt the flow of food parcels entering the ghettos through the Red Cross in early 1943. Haim Greenberg, a prominent American Zionist leader and intellectual, wrote an article titled "Break the Siege" in protest against the Zionists' efforts that contributed to the starvation of Europe's Jewish population during this critical time (see Beit-Zvi, p. 282). It seems that the Zionists' betrayal knew no bounds. In their "defense": why spend money on those who were going to die anyhow? We are certain many Zionists to this date still would rationalize their treason as such!Chaim Weizmann's Infamous Letter To Rabbi Stephen Wise In June, 1938 Before The Evian Conference
Herzl Died Thinking Israel Would Have Been in Uganda, not in "empty" Palestine
Aviva Halamish's and Edwin Black's earlier assessments (on hoarding resettlement and rescue funds) are in sync 100% with a letter (written in preparation for the Evian Conference) addressed to Rabbi Stephen S. Wise of the World Jewish Congress and distributed to all Jewish Agency Executives (JAE) from Dr. Weizmann (although written by Dr. Georg Landauer the head of ZVfd). Note how Zionist leadership's top priorities were: A) how rescue and relief donations to refugees could impede Zionist plans; which explains why the word "rescue" had negative connotations to Zionists in the 1930s and 40s, and B) how to turn Jewish suffrage into a political and media lever to force Great Britain to open Palestine for unfettered immigration. No emphasis whatsoever on Jewish suffrage. Simply, Jewish pain was looked upon as a tool; Jewish plight was only the LEVER:
June 13, 1938
Dear Dr. Wise,which it is proposed to be held at Evian at the beginning of July in connection with the Jewish refugee problem. Dr. Weizmann knows that you are associated with the preparations that are being made in America for this Conference, and I presume that you yourself are informed of the preparations that are going on in Gt. Russell Street [the office of the Zionist Executive in London], as well as by the Council for German Jewry. Dr. Ruppin is taking a deep interest in the forthcoming Conference and is preparing a memorandum on the role of Palestine vis-a-vis the refugee problem. I am writing this letter to you at the request of Dr. Weizmann as we are very much concerned in case the issue is presented at the Conference in a manner which may harm the work for Palestine.
Even if the Conference will not place countries other than Palestine in the front for Jewish immigration, there will certainly be public appeals which will tend to overshadow the importance of Palestine. Since our aim is to turn the Conference into a force which would influence the Jews as well as the British Government to do something real for the Jewish people, we must do our utmost to bring Palestine to the fore and stress its importance and its capacity to absorb large numbers of Jewish refugees.
We feel all the more concern as it may bind Jewish organizations to collect large sums of money for assisting Jewish refugees, and these collections are likely to interfere with our own campaigns. It may be that the British delegation to the Conference will receive instructions not to give specific assurances as regards Palestine. Such an eventuality makes it all the more imperative for us to stress the importance of Palestine both during the period of preparation and at the Conference itself. We are convinced that Palestine offers possibilities for the immigration of tens of thousands of Jewish refugees who can be absorbed in agriculture, in new industrial enterprises, and in various public works, provided the necessary number of certificates [entry permits] will be obtained and funds are placed at our disposal. We know that you are watching the situation and would be much obliged to you if you could inform us of the attitude of our American friends towards the Conference, and whether you and any other of our friends from America will be there.
Yours sincerely,Dr. Georg Landauer (Post Uganda: Zionism on Trial, p. 153-154)
Analysis of Wiezmann's Letter
Mr. Weizmann, Ms. Halamish, and Mr. Black could not have made it clearer: devoting much of the rescue funds outside of Palestine would render the whole Zionist project mute. Beit-Zvi's analysis (see p. 154 and 161) is second to none: Zionist leaders hoped and plotted to make Evian an utter failure (note how Arthur Ruppin reluctantly executed Weizmann's and Ben-Gurion's evil mission; see also how Christopher Sykes and others framed it)! Note how Zionist leaders were terrified that European people could become sympathetic to Jewish refugees' plight, which might force European nations to soften their hearts and open their gates to Jewish refugees. As a consequence, Zionists would be deprived of much-needed funds! Yes, saving Jews in countries other than Palestine was considered a disaster to Zionism (actually, David Ben-Gurion worded it as such). As if Dr. Weizmann was trying to say: Zionists are much better off if Evian fails. Well, Ben-Gurion was known to have said something similar around the same time frame as well:
The Jews could have only one destination - Eretz Yisrael. So in June 1938, shortly before Allied representatives met in Evian, France, to seek ways of rescuing Jews, Ben-Gurion frankly voiced his concern to colleagues in the Jewish Agency Executive. He did "not know if the [ Evian] conference will open the gates of other countries [Oh, God forbid]. . . . But I am afraid [ it ] might cause tremendous harm to Eretz Yisrael and Zionism . . . . Our main task is to reduce the harm, the danger and the disaster [Ben-Gurion was referring to harming the yishuv; he was not referring to harming diaspora Jews; the was the LEVER] . . . and the more we emphasize the terrible distress of the Jewish masses in Germany, Poland and Rumania, the more damage we shall cause ." So be silent, Ben-Gurion cautioned his comrades. . . . And in the silence . . . Evian [Conference] failed. (see NY Times -- June 12th, 1987)
[David Ben-Gurion repeated the same argument ten years later when he was so worried that Americans would soften their hearts and let in Jewish refugees in the DP camps. We guess some habits die hard. ]To our surprise, this policy was implemented to the teeth during WWII when 7/8th of the rescue fund was diverted to build the state ahead of its time. This letter reflected Zionists' policies and mindset for decades before Nakba! It should be noted that this fixation on Palestine persisted even during WWII and after the war was concluded in the displaced persons (D.P.) camps. In Ben-Gurion's terminology, he wanted to orchestrate a Jewish refugee crisis in a way Zionists could exploit the crisis by turning it into the lever that would turn Palestine into a Jewish majority, thus clearly the path for the creation of the "Jewish state."
If you have the time, we urge the reader to contemplate the Jewish Agency's nine-page Memorandum submitted at the conference. Although it was written in French, it contains valuable statistics (please let us know if there is a translated version); it will prove our main point: Zionists were not interested in any solution except for Palestine as the destination for Europe's Jews! Is this the reaction of an organization that cares about Jewish lives?
We were stunned to find how Zionists in the US were weaponizing antisemitism as a tool to frustrate receiving Jewish refugees to America by claiming that any further immigration would increase American antisemitism (Alabama Holocaust Education Center: America and the Holocaust, p. 5 )! The same argument was made once Alaska was suggested as a possible haven for persecuted European Jews! This is a classic example that shows how Zionists weaponized antisemitism not only to persecute Palestinians (who were made collectively liable for Mufti's actions during WWII), but also antisemitism was used to increase Jewish suffering as well. Why not! All could be justified in the name of "saving" Europe's Jews!Was the Evian Conference a failure as often it is being portrayed in the media?
The mainstream media and many historians often paint the Evian Conference as a failure. Based on our research below, we found the exact opposite, and such framing only evolved a decade later and way after the Holocaust was concluded! Actually, at the time, Zionists, Non-Zionists, and the Jewish press all praised the conference after it was concluded (see Post Ugandan Zionism by Beit-Zvi, p. 161-163; pay attention to what Beit-Zvi wrote on p. 163), but let us address why the Conference was convened in the first place and based on its objectives it should be judged. That said, be careful not to judge events that happened before WWII from the prism of events that occured during and after the war; otherwise, you fall into the fallacy of judging the past from the present (Zionists are famous for exploiting this fallacy). Thus, Evian had to be judged as if the Holocaust didn't happen; the Holocaust wasn't on the Nazis' minds until late 1941:
In May 1939, MS St. Louis in Havana was refused to unload its Jewish passengers in Cuba & US, and it was forced to go back to Antwerp. Jewish Agency refused to give any of its passengers immigration visas to Palestine. Over 250 of the passengers perished during the Holocaust.
A) FDR's main goal was to increase public awareness of the refugee crisis brewing a year before WWII. Like today in the West, the public was anti-immigration, especially after the Great Depression, and increasing immigration quotas was political suicide. YES, in the late 1930s, the general public didn't approve of increasing immigration to all people, and not just to the Jews (case in point, see how the Americans kicked out over 1.5 million Mexicans, many of whom were US citizens, in the 1930s). That said, Evian and Kristallnacht helped FDR make the case that resettlement solutions had to be found. FDR (and the British, too) must have known that Evian couldn't solve the refugee crisis. FDR's main objective was to change public opinion, which would give him the political capital to propose concrete solutions (many solutions were pursued after the conference, i.e., the Supplemental Jewish Homeland and Alaska scheme, which were all opposed by Zionist leaders). On the other hand, the events were evolving faster than FDR's policies were growing. For more details, please read chapters two and five in Politics of Rescue, and you shall find that our assessment is the closest to what happened. In our humble opinion, FDR was trying to do the right thing (sadly, the mainstream media and Zionists portrayed him negatively; see Beit-Zvi's fair assessment of FDR's policies for more details), but unfortunately, the American Jewish community behaved passively in the best of scenarios who rarely gave FDR a hand. During the war, American Jewry's main focus was creating the "Jewish state," and rescuing Europe's Jews took a back seat. To put it bluntly, any rescue scheme EXCEPT for Palestine was fought tooth and nail by Zionists. As we have proven here, Zionist leaders in practice made sure that Europe's Jews were left with two options: either they made Aliyah to Palestine to join the yishuv or go to Auschwitz and lobbied like hell against any third alternative. Ironically, this continued even after WWII ended in the DP camps. For completeness, we urge you to read our American Jewish Conference section for more details.
"Report On The State of Palestine" issued on Match 28th, 1921 by the Third Palestine Arab Congress to Winston Churchill
B) When Jewish responses to the conference were examined, we were shocked that many Zionists and non-Zionists were satisfied (see Post Ugandan Zionism by Beit-Zvi, p. 161-163). Even the Jewish press was encouraged by the conference's resolutions. We shall prove soon that their optimism was factually based when we examine the number of pledges from the US, GB, Brazil, the Dominican Republic, Mexico, and many others in Latin and South America. This confirms our earlier assessment: Evian aimed to kick the ball, so to speak to make the public opinion more receptive to receiving refugees (meaning Evian was only the first step in a five-year process, see The Intergovernmental Committee). This fact alone implies that Evian was framed as a failure way after the fact by the so-called historians.
Also, keep in mind that it was Zionist leaders who were hoping and plotting to make Evian a failure, as we pointed out earlier. We were shocked to discover that it was the Nazis (along with the Zionist leadership) were first to recognize Evian as a failure because they were looking for an immediate solution, and when that didn't happen that was one of the contributing factors that drove them to formulate the Final Solution four years later (the conference drove Nazis to conclude no one cared which was the prelude for Kristallnacht). Anyhow, to get a clearer picture, we urge you to contemplate how Beit-Zvi had framed the events and how historians fell into the Zionists' narrative way after the fact by judging the past from the present, which is a fallacy:The Zionists, who did not share in the general sentiments, were also not interested in the attainment of the goal the conference had set itself The overwhelming majority of them, with the exception of the leaders at the very top of the movement, hoped for a side-effect--pressure on Britain--which would promote the cause of Zionism and direct to Palestine a flow of refugees which, because of the conditions prevailing in the country, could not possibly assume the dimensions enabling a solution of the problem. Their bitter complaints well reflected their sincere disappointment at an unrealized hope. But their laments concerning the "insult" and the "pain" they felt because the nations of the world were not allowing the Jews into their countries, were remote from truth and from sincerity. It is not difficult to imagine their reaction had those reserved speeches concluded with a call to Britain to open the gates of aliyah to Palestine. In that event the speakers and their governments would have been instantly transformed from indifferent evil-doers into the righteous of the earth.
To adduce the Zionist complaints as the reaction of the Jewish people to the Evian Conference is of course, a complete distortion which perverts reality and rules out any possibility of genuine historical study. As we remarked above, this distortion was abetted in no small measure by the calamitous chain of events which brought about the destruction of German Jewry and which thereby constituted psychological "proof-- a view of the past refracted through the prism of the present. It is a view which is willingly accepted by the preachers of the "all the world is against us" school of thought. Its root source lies in the territorialist fears of post-Ugandan Zionism. (Post Ugandan Zionism, p. 163)
C) Soon after the Kristallnacht pogrom a few months after the Conference, Schacht & Rublee Plans was ironed out in early 1939, but sadly, it didn't materialize and the window of opportunity wasn't exploited (actually, Zionists were against this plan too; see From Boycott To Annihilation, p. 144, and Beit-Zvi, p. 182-96). The international reaction for the 1938 pogrom was so sever to a point that forced Hitler to present a viable offer that was much more favorable than Haavara (see Beit-Zvi, p. 180-96)! Sadly, the vast majority of American Jewry (Zionists, non-Zionists, and anti-boycott Jews alike)- were against it; all dropped the ball (please inspect our detailed research on this little-known subject that could have changed history). Sometimes, the truth is much stranger than fiction! In this regard, it should be emphasized that until August of 1940, Hitler contemplated relocating German Jews to Madagascar. Of course, the simpleton will say: Well, that was before the Holocaust. True, but as we have shown earlier, Zionist leaders NEVER WAVERED from their insane policy, which persisted at the height of the calamity and even after WWII was concluded in the DP camps!David Ben-Gurion's Response to the British Kindertransport a month after Kristallnacht: NY Times, July 12th, 1987, citing Ben-Gurion's official biographers showing how much he "cared" about Europe's Jews who saved themselves by immigrating to countries other than Palestine!
D) We found many countries that were willing to accept Jewish refugees as long they were self-supporting , which was very similar to Palestine's Capitalist visa program during the pre-Nakba period. Therefore, it was not just the Dominican Republic who offered to take in Jewish refugees, but also the British Guiana, Mandano-Philippines, Brazil, Rodisia, British & Portuguese African colonies, former African German colonies, Bolivia, and Peru. Actually, during the conference, Brazil offered to take in 40,000 German and Austrian Jews per year. On top of that, we were shocked to discover that in the critical years between 1938 and 1942, tens of thousands of Europe's penniless Jews (especially from Germany) already found refuge in Mexico, Latin and South America. For instance, Bolivia alone accepted 20,000 refugees between 1938 and 1941, Mexico accepted something similar (NPR wrote an excellent article about this in 2015). Thus, those German and Austrian Jews who were saved in these areas numbered between 9 to 10 times as many as those who made it to Palestine, and the Haavara Agreement played no role in saving them. What was tragic was that when the State Department attempted to find a haven for Europe's Jews in the December 1940s, Rabbi Stephen Wise and Nahum Goldman used their same old tactic (weaponizing antisemitism) to discourage the resettlement of Jews in Latin America and told the state department employees that their activities: "might energize the anti-Semitic feelings" (as if Palestinians were so welcoming of more Jewish immigrants, see Politics of Rescue, p. 101). Just imagine this counterfactual scenario: what if Zionists managed to close Latin and South America to Jewish immigration during those critical years, then the Holocaust would have been much worse! Anyhow, if you are interested in the boring details, we urge you to read Beit-Zvi's account (see p. 223-40) on how the scheme to save Jews in the Dominican Republic (who asked for little financial support in return) was torpedoed via a sham of a so-called study by the Brooking Institute.
We believe it is worthwhile contemplating what Mr. Zvi wrote on page 236. Mr. Zvi made a compelling argument: if the stream of Jewish refugees was arriving in Portugal and Spain during WWII, why were they not directed to the Dominican Republic, especially when the Republic was eager to take them? Since the refugees could not leave fast enough, that impacted how many refugees those two countries would let in new refugees. Mr. Zvi indicated that the Jewish Agency functionaries discouraged and obstructed such a route. He didn't let the Joint get off the hook either; it seems all dropped the ball intentionally or unintentionally. It is strongly suspected that the same evil method was also replicated in Turkey. This means that if the Jewish refugees were not heading to Palestine for one reason or another, the Jewish Agency stifled any efforts to find a haven for them. Honestly, it was chilling to read his assessment; this argument has very serious consequences. Mr. Zvi is making the point that many Jews would have been saved if the refugees had been shipped out fast enough.
Kindertransport children's ID Cards: How did Zionist leaders respond when British people rescued 10,000 German Jewish children after the Kristallnacht pogrom?
To further prove our point, notice how Latin America alone absorbed close to 100,000 German Jews as of 1939 despite the restrictions and obstacles, which was slightly more than what the US had taken in the 1930s (Simone Gigliotti, p. 24-5). If we discover soon that Zionists played a big part in scuttling these schemes, would you be surprised? If they did it at the height of the calamity (even to Alaska and in the DP camps after WWII ended), why would you be surprised? If the subject of the Dominican Republic colony of Sosua interests you, we found this news clip after the war in May 1946, which you might find helpful. Also, Tropical Zion by Allen Wells seems to be a well-written book (Google lets you preview many pages for free) about Sosua; on Amazon.com, it has a lot of great reviews from Jews who knew the author. Based on our little research, we found that many of those German Jews immigrated to the US, but it seems a few decided to stay. Here is Sosua's community official website; you may find it helpful.
In a nutshell, many countries felt it was unfair for them to take in German Jews, especially when Nazis just completely dispossessed them, which was understandable (please note that Nazis offered to drop much of the flight tax in early 1939, as we've outlined earlier). From these countries' point of view, this was like giving the Nazi war machine a helping hand, which is, of course, understandable (for more detail, see Politics of Rescue, chapter two, especially p. 31 - 34, and p. 39; see also Beit-Zvi on p. 182). Therefore, the policy of not taking in Jews wasn't based on antisemitism (as the mainstream media and Jewish historians portray it to be), which sadly enforces the Zionist narrative! During the 1930s and 40s, the majority of countries hadn't recovered yet from the great depression, and simply, they were against mass migration unless they were self-sustaining. In other words, it was precisely like nowadays in the West; they had it with migrants and refugees irrespective of their color and religion (you might find it helpful to see how Beit-Zvi framed it; his analysis came to our attention way after we published our work and both are in sync). At length, we have addressed this subject in depth in another section.
Abla Mohamad Daoud Dajani outside here family's looted house in Baq'ah neighborhood - Jerusalem. Click the image for more such pictures that document Palestinians' dispossession.
E) Beit-Zvi made a very compelling argument. If we judge Evian using the prism of events as of July 1938 (meaning Evian should be considered as if WWII and the Holocaust didn't happen), then actually, Evian looked quite promising, which explains why many Jews (Zionists and non-Zionists alike) welcomed it. The proposals at hand from the 32 countries were enough to find a home for the mass majority of German and Austrian Jewry within four to five years. Sadly, Hitler's wanted a faster solution, the events were developing at a much faster pace than FDR could react to, and much of Europe became Nazi-occupied within two to three years since Evian:
The conference participants, whose primary concern was to evaluate its results in securing places of refuge for the emigrants, were faced with the need to find 400,000 such places within a period of three to five years-let us say, within four years on the average. The number was daunting, but the prospects for implementing the project were deemed realistic. Those at Evian were conscious of the fact that the conference was largely a preparatory stage leading to the substantive work which would be done by the permanent Intergovernmental Committee. Intensive behind-the-scenes lobbying was known to be in progress, backed by American diplomatic pressure. But even in this preliminary stage, behind the somewhat forbidding exterior of mostly non-committal speeches, as described in the previous chapter, promising initial results were achieved.
First, the United States pledged to admit annually the full joint quota of immigrants from Germany and Austria, a total of 27,370 persons, or about 109,000 in four years. Reinforcing this pledge was the fact, undoubtedly known at Evian, that the American consuls in Germany were issuing entry permits to German Jews at twice the rate of the previous year and four times that of 1936.
The Brazilian delegate at Evian, Helio Lobo, indicated in his speech that his country could accept over 40,000 emigrants a year Although he gave no explicit assurance, there was no reason to think that he had voiced this figure solely in order to impress his audience- Brazil it seemed, genuinely intended to admit refugees on a scale at least approaching this number, if not the entire figure. As we saw, this was also the understanding of Ruppin, who met with Lobo and reported to his colleagues on the Jewish Agency Executive on prospects for substantial Jewish immigration to Brazil.Why do you think Zionist Organizations are actively promoting "I Love Hamas" Stickers? How many similar schemes were done, and we are ignorant about who was behind them?
The Dominican Republic indicated that it would agree to accept 100,000 refugees, and submitted an official proposal to this effect two weeks later in London. But it may be assumed, especially after the highly sympathetic speech of the country's delegate to Evian, that the conference was aware of this general intention, if not of the details. These three pledges, if carried out in full, would have provided for three-quarters of Germany's refugees within four years. To this we can add the more reserved pledges of Uruguay and Argentina, the probability that Palestine, all the difficulties notwithstanding, could absorb a few tens of thousands, and the promises of the Western European countries to go on giving the refugees temporary refuge until they could find permanent homes. Taking into account that all this was meant to be only the commencement of the operation, we must conclude that the satisfaction and optimism expressed by everyone interested in the success of the conference were grounded in reality-the reality of July 1938.
The turbulent events of the months and years that followed showed that some of the assessments had been mistaken, and that some of the expectations were not realized. But a close analysis will demonstrate that the success of Evian was not of an ephemeral character. The outcome of the effort made by 32 countries that convened in order to help the Jews held out rescue possibilities on a large scale, and perhaps also the possibility of averting disaster on a vast scale. But all this was dependent on the non-interference of organizations whose affiliation could have been expected to make them the most interested of all in rescue. (Post-Ugandan Zionism, p. 170)Here is the unvarnished truth: Evian was framed as failure way after the fact, and it was part of the conspiracy of shifting the blame from Zionists' policy onto others such as FDR, Churchill, and, of course, Zionists' most favorite patsy Mufti Haj Amin. Instead of praising FDR for bending backward to save the Jews (when many of Zionists did the exact opposite; see also FDR's War Refugee Board that saved 200,000 Jews); Zionists weaponized their hegemony over the mainstream media to pin the blame on FDR (who was known to advocate non-Zionist solutions to the Jewish refugee crisis) and others, which is a complete distortion of the events. To further prove our point, we ask you to contemplate reading how Zionists responded to Bergson Group's attempts to save European Jewry at the height of the calamity; you might lose your marbles. For added context, we urge you to read Beit-Zvi's assessment who reached a similar conclusion; see Post-Ugandan Zionism, p. 171-78 for more details.
What if the Evian Conference was a resounding success?
What would have been the impact of saving European Jewry on Zionism?Catastrophic Zionism at its worst: Zionists often spoke of the Holocaust decades before its time. What did Zionists do to confront it? Zionists were the FIRST to normalize trade with the Nazis!
Let's contemplate this what-if scenario: what if Jewish leaders, along with the rest of the world, communicated to Hitler in action that they cared soon after the Evian Conference? What if they didn't waste over a year dithering after Evian? What if they did exploit Schacht & Rublee plans? What if they quickly responded in kind to Hitler's "generous" concessions (after the Kristallnacht pogrom of 1938 which we outlined earlier)? What if American Jewry didn't interpret Hitler's concessions as weakness? We have ZERO doubts that the Holocaust would have been avoided, and if it had to happen, it would have been mild compared to what occurred. Hjalmar Schacht (the head of Reichsbank who engineered the rescue plan ten months before WWII was started) was known to have concluded a similar conclusion at his trial in Nuremberg (Post-Ugandan Zionism by Beit-Zvi, p. 202).
Were the British so STUPID as to promise COMPLETE INDEPENDENCE to Palestinians in 1939 (who, of course, "didn't exist") while the Indians had been DREAMING of such a thing for 400 years?
As we outlined earlier; the last thing Hitler wanted to do was a genocide; as evil as he was that is the truth that most Holocaust historians agree with. This fact alone explains why the final solution evolved late in the game by mid-1942. On the other hand, let us not kid ourselves too, we all know in that different world, Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria, Italy, Czechoslovakia, and Romania would’ve immediately demanded similar deals to rid themselves of another four to five million Jews too. Actually, Zionist leaders (who mostly subscribed to the Catastrophic Zionism idea) expected the calamity in Poland first, which had a much larger Jewish population than Germany.
NY Times Magazine, April 18, 1982: Zionist leaders admitted there wasn't enough bandwidth to fight both the White Paper of 1939 and Hitler. Thus, fighting the Nazis for the Gentiles so they can focus on defeating the White Paper
Herzl Died Thinking Israel Would Have Been in Uganda, not in "empty" Palestine
Assuming the reasons for the Holocaust were taken off the table by early 1942, and other solutions were available to the "Jewish problem," that implies Jews would have found a haven. On the other hand, saving European Jewry implied that the catastrophe (a.k.a. Nakba in Arabic) would have been transferred from Europe's Jews to Zionism, correct? Hell YES. Just in case you think our interpretations are simple rants by anti-Zionist Palestinians, please think twice. Actually, that is precisely how David Ben-Gurion articulated it just before the Evian Conference was convened:
The Jews could have only one destination - Eretz Yisrael. So in June 1938, shortly before Allied representatives met in Evian, France, to seek ways of rescuing Jews, Ben-Gurion frankly voiced his concern to colleagues in the Jewish Agency Executive. He did "not know if the [Evian] conference will open the gates of other countries [Oh, God forbid]. . . . But I am afraid [ it ] might cause tremendous harm to Eretz Yisrael and Zionism . . . . Our main task is to reduce the harm, the danger and the disaster [Ben-Gurion was referring to harming the yishuv; he was not referring to harming diaspora Jews; the was the LEVER] . . . and the more we emphasize the terrible distress of the Jewish masses in Germany, Poland and Rumania, the more damage we shall cause ." So be silent, Ben-Gurion cautioned his comrades. . . . And in the silence . . . Evian [Conference] failed. (see NY Times -- June 12th, 1987)
[David Ben-Gurion repeated the same argument ten years later when he was so worried that Americans would soften their hearts and let in Jewish refugees in the DP camps. We guess some habits die hard. ]David Ben-Gurion envisioned that Nazis' Nuremberg Race Laws would become the LEVER that would end up creating the "Jewish state," but how? Click the image for the details
Let us be honest, Herr Ben-Gurion was accurate: saving European Jewry as FDR designed it before WWII would have been a disaster to his Zionist program; the math proves it. Therefore, Zionism would be much better of Evian failed. This pressure cooker of a scenario was precisely the moment Zionists were patiently waiting to exploit for four decades! This pressure cooker was the energy source which David Ben-Gurion often referred to as the LEVER that would create his state (Hannah Arendt compared this process to the steam power that moves a locomotive)! Wasn't that exactly the manufactured Jewish refugee crisis Zionists plotted and hoped for at Evian? Wasn't that exactly how Theodor Herzl envisioned the "Jewish state" would have been created four decades earlier?
Just in case you think these evil thoughts were isolated to a few Zionist leaders, we ask you to contemplate again how Chaim Weizmann framed the catastrophe for Zionism around the same period too just before the conference was held. Actually, Chaim's top concern was how to starve and hoard rescue funds since those were harmful to their project. If you read Chaim's letter (which was leaked via a carbon copy), well, you might lose your mind. Levi Eshkol and Moshe Sharitt were known to have said something similar around the same time window as well. For you are curious and you have the time, here are the meeting minutes of the Jewish Agency Executive (a.k.a. JAE) soon after the Kristallnacht pogrom of Nov. 1938, and here is how Ben-Gurion responded when he heard that British people rescued 10,000 German Jewish children a month after the infamous pogrom.
Here is the unvarnished truth: Hitler’s obsession with antisemitism was no aberration; much of European "civilization" was based on such ideologies and beliefs: Jim Crow, apartheid, genocides, colonization, land theft, ethnic cleansing, concentration camps, reservations, national socialism, Zionism, national socialism, fascism,..etc. didn't evolve out of the blue. In other words, what Hitler did in Europe was only a small dose of what Europeans did in the global south for centuries. Let us be honest: only a few European nations wanted their Jewish citizens to remain, and none of those were in Central and Eastern Europe (examine Winston Churchill's antisemitism on full display as late as July 1937). Now, do you understand why all Europeans eagerly voted for partitioning Palestine in 1947? Why wouldn't they when many of them handed their Jewish citizens to the SS just a few years earlier? What is better than dumping their "Jewish problem" onto Palestine, thus, out of sight out of mind. What is the big deal if Palestinians paid for Europeans' antisemitism with their hopes and dreams? Many indigenous peoples were genocided, and Palestinians fared much better; right? Well, that is what Nakba was to Palestinians.
For those reasons, Zionists of all shades lobbied like against any haven for Jews except for Palestine. Saving Jews outside of Palestine rendered their evil project mute; that is why the catastrophe had to happen to enable Zionism! Think about it: why a "Jewish state" is needed when Jews could have been saved somewhere else? When antisemitism wasn't good for Zionism? Never!
Some may think that was an afterthought, that wasn't done with bad intentions, and stuff just happened as such. Well, hang on to your seat. Soon after WWII was under way, Zionist leaders of all shades knew well that they cannot fight Hitler and the British White Paper of 1939 at the same time, and one of them had to give. That is why fighting Nazis was avoided to the bitter end; that was left for the Gentiles. Note how Zionist knew well that fighting Hitler was also correlated with rescuing Jews to places other than Palestine. Thus, such rescue schemes must be hindered as much as possible and their funds diverted to the Zionist projects in Palestine. In a nutshell, that precisely Jewish plight was monetized politically and financially. For the love of God, the word "rescue" to Zionist leaders during the pre-Nakba period had negative connotations; poor Ben-Gurion's stomach used to turn when he used such a word! Much to our surprise, much of American Jewry voted in favor of such an agenda at the height of the calamity and only a vocal minority of them dissented! We are aware that the facts are too much to fathom; but trust us on this one: once you read the details from Israeli and Zionist sources, you may lose trust in humanity.Which hate speech was worse: Hitler's hate speech at the Reichstag on Jan 30th, 1939, or Ben-Gurion's speech (just two months before Hitler's speech) when he incited the murder of German Jews a month after Kristallnacht?
Ironically, Jews and those who ganged upon them are on "good" terms, and bygones became bygones soon after the Holocaust, although the graves were still fresh! You would think Jews, among all people, have six million reasons not be in the same bed with fascists so quickly! If you believe that Germany was quickly denazified after WWII ended, then you need to get your head examined! Much of Nazism was only rebranded in the name of defeating communism! Fascism didn't appear lately all of a sudden; it has been always simmering under the surface since WWII ended, and its ambers (e.g., copycat version of Father Charles Coughlin) have been flaring up all over the "liberal" West. What happened by the Germans could easily have been done by any European nation plus America (see Rachel Meadow's Ultra series if you care). Just imagine several versions of mini-Hitler but with a hundred nuclear warheads! Well, that is a reality; say hello to Bibi! Fasten your seat belts; the future is not going to be pretty, and the system we have is way more fragile than most people think!
Were the British so STUPID as to promise COMPLETE INDEPENDENCE to Palestinians in 1939 (who, of course, "didn't exist") while the Indians had been DREAMING of such a thing for 400 years?
We are obliged to ask: how honing on Palestine as the ONLY destination for European Jewry:
Didn't communicate to Hitler that no one cared about what would happen to Europe's Jews! Even nationalist Jews (a.k.a. Zionists) didn't care!
Didn't make the "final solution" inevitable and the ONLY solution!
Didn't push Hitler over the edge! After all, no one cared; therefore, why would anyone care if Europe's Jews disappeared all of a sudden? Ironically, during the war, that was so true, which was apparent when you inspect how the American and Zionist press downplayed the calamity during this period! (Abraham Burg, p. 74). Or that was done on purpose to keep the so-called Yishuvs out of the war to save them from the upcoming battles with their real enemy: The Evil Arabs. Well, here are the boring details if you are interested!
What is maddening is that when American Jews attempted to investigate these events, and their investigation was nixed and defunded midstream (NYTimes, Jan. 4, 1983). This implies that the Jewish communities around the world know the truth, and on purpose, it is being smothered. To do that effectively, they have made Palestinians their patsies to deflect away from Zionists' treasons.
NY Times, July 10th, 1938: Palestinian Arabs are against the Zionist state because they feel it endangers their aspiration to have Palestine for their own! The same ones who don't exist now!
Finally, we would like to share this finding we stumbled upon by accident. As we were researching the NY Times about the Evian Conference, we were stunned to read the ending of this article that Edwin L. James wrote on July 10th, 1938, that summarized much of the Palestinian struggle for the past century:
Although the Arabs are fighting the British. rather than the Jews, that is simply because the British exercise authority in Palestine. The real Arab resentment is against the Zionist State. Which the industry of the Jews has been building well. In the increased of Jews moving to Palestine. The Arabs see further danger to their aspiration to have Palestine for their own. Whether or not they are being stirred up by Italian or other influence, the fact that not only the Arabs in Palestine itself are making trouble, but Arabs from Trans-Jordan and Syria are trying to get into Palestine with obviously hostile intention. indicates a general movement with general direction. There is small doubt that the British will put down the present uprisings. But the serious question arises as to what will be the situation after that has been done. The chances are that the friction between the Arabs and Jews will not end there. (NY Times, July 10th, 1938, in PDF)
[Now imagine if Mr. James (the one who wrote this article 85 years ago) wrote this article today in the NY Times, do you have any doubts that he will be publicly canceled (maybe fired too) for being "antisemitic"?]Sadly, 85 years after Evian, we still hear the mass majority of Jews, reminding us how Palestinians don't exist. When they "do exist," Palestinians must be anti-Semitic since they are anti-Zionists! To rub salt into the wound, they made Palestinians collectively liable for Mufti's actions during WWII. They expected them to be the first in human history who should love (rather than hate) those who dispossessed them and threw them out! Of course, Nakba "never" happened, and Palestinians abandoned their homes willingly during the war of Nakba. Palestine (the most critical land bridge) was empty and was romantically waiting for 2000 years for Zionist Jews to populate and bloom its Negev desert. Only in Zionists' minds could such a twisted sense of reality be tolerated! Don't even dare to expose the Zionists' contradiction! They will skin you!
- When the Nazis occupied half of Poland in Oct. 1939 (the other half was left to Stalin), the Jewish population under Nazi control increased by seven to eight folds overnight. Such a fact terrified the FDR administration since it signaled an imminent refugee crisis that dwarfed what anyone had imagined a year earlier (at the Evian Conference), which prompted policymakers to come up with a solution. In late October, FDR proposed the "Supplemental Jewish Homeland" to solve the Jewish refugee crisis that sidestepped Palestine (an idea that was started by President Hoover a few years earlier), and Zionists were up in arms against it. You would think at least Zionists had contemplated FDR's proposal! On the contrary, they fought it with tooth and nail (Politics of Rescue, p. 85-86, and more details on p. 102 to 109). Similar response happened when Great Britain promoted British Guiana as a haven for European Jewry; Zionists ripped it a apart who were terrified that it would divert funds from their colonization activities in Palestine. If that wasn't enough, here is more on the same subject and around the same time. When the State Department attempted to find a haven for Europe's Jews in the December 1940s, Rabbi Stephen Wise and Nahum Goldman used their same old tactic (weaponizing antisemitism) to discourage the settlement of Jews in Latin America who told the state department employees that their activities: "might energize the anti-Semitic feelings" (as if Palestinians were so welcoming of more Jewish immigrants), see Politics of Rescue, p. 101. Remind us please, how many Jews were murdered unnecessary because of such of such policies? Who speaks for the dead?
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To paint a picture of how the Zionist leadership behaved and acted in the late 1930s, we find it necessary to quote Peter Grose:
Migration was a troublesome matter on many scores. America of the 1930s was in the grip of isolationism and economic distress. The Immigration Act of '924 had imposed a rigid quota system that discriminated against Jews of Eastern Europe. American Jewish leaders had opposed the legislation, but they subsequently acquiesced, mindful that a renewed flow of immigration would only repeat the social agonies their fathers had known and intensify the crippling unemployment. Native-born Jews were already finding it hard to get jobs, and the word spread that Jewish employees were being fired when non•Jews became available.
Jews who could afford it fulfilled their communal responsibilities, not by pressing for freer immigration to America, but by donating to refugee organizations that would help foreign Jews in need, as long as they stayed where they were or went somewhere other than the United States. Zionism suddenly became attractive once again, for Jewish settlement in Palestine was an obvious and pleasing alternative to a new migration to the Goldene Medine. As late as 1943, when the right of immigration to Palestine had become a rallying cry of a nearly united American Jewry, proposals for the right of immigration to the United States were roundly shouted down. [Sadly, on this point united Zionist, non-Zionist, and anti-Zionist American Jews; only a few who were for increasing the immigration to the US]
Official Zionism began to emerge from the post-Brandeis doldrums with Stephen Wise's assumption of leadership in The growing menace of Nazi Germany stirred new concerns for Jewish survival; Zionism, offering one possible answer, increased in membership and energy. Yet the focus of Zionist attention remained diffuse. Zionists were anti-Nazi [we have zero information that points that Zionists were anti-Nazi; Mr. Grose provided zero examples], of course, but they were also hostile to Britain, where the cause of Arab nationalism was gaining supporters and inhibiting the growth and development of the Jewish community in the Palestine mandate. Zionists did their best to raise money, but in the 1930s, this was not an easy task. Moreover. Many American Jews continued to be troubled by the manners of those unkempt Jews in Palestine, by the high-handed attitudes of Ben-Gurion's labor movement, and by the Zionists' call for a sovereign state. With all the great powers maneuvering and Arab factions increasingly restive, Palestine simply did not seem to be a good bet for ensuring Jewish survival.
One Jewish community, that of San Francisco, held back donations, for fear that "all the sums raised will be spent on Palestinian politics." A $5,000 check to a relief organization from Spokane, Washington, came with the restriction that it not be used "in whole or in part for Zionist or Palestinian purposes." Warburg's Joint Distribution Committee complained about Zionist attempts to politicize its work. "The principle that our help should follow the refugees wherever they may be brought, is being twisted to mean that the only help and the only solution lies in Palestine' wrote one officer of the Committee. Warburg himself complained in 1936 that the Zionists were interested in relief work only if "done through its political organization in Palestine. That group goes so far that, if very important work is done in the economic field, along non-political lines, they love to minimize it and, in fact, interfere with it."
When interest in Jewish resettlement was finally aroused, moreover, it concerned resettlement primarily for German Jews, with whom the American establishment felt some cultural affinity, and most certainly not the more primitive, alien Jews of Poland and Eastern Europe. '*Our program in Eastern Europe [is) primarily devoted to economic reconstruction and relief and support of necessary institutions and organizations in those countries," reported the Joint Distribution Committee in 1937. "It does not cover emigration." Americans committed to this philanthropic endeavor felt little sympathy with the shadowy activities of that Zionist intelligence network known as Aliyah Beth, at work from 1939 onwards trying to organize illegal immigration from Eastern Europe to Palestine.
What, then, to do about the Nazi threat to Jewry, as it gradually became more than a per-election tactic? Some American Jewish leaders proposed an economic boycott of all German trade, "the pinch in the pocket-book region," as Warburg called it. Yet the Jewish establishment opposed such a "provocation," Warburg that success would only confirm the antisemitic charges of an International Jewish conspiracy. Even militant Zionists were inhibited by their knowledge that the Jews in Palestine were themselves actively trading with the Nazis. Blocked funds of recent emigrants from Germany were quietly being transferred, to become a crucial economic buttress in the development of the Palestine community Stephen Wise was at the height of his influence in the late 1930s as the fate of European Jewry under Nazi rule became of acute concern to Americans [How what Mr. Grose wrote here wasn't pro-Nazi by Zionists; earlier he called them anti-Nazi; that was odd!!], Christians as well as Jews. Calling for a mass migration Of historic proportions, the liberal Gentile writer Dorothy Thompson warned in 1938 that "millions of Jews are in danger of becoming pariahs." More than any of his colleagues, Wise was troubled by the dilemma that Nazi antisemitism posed for Americans. And particularly for Zionists. One of the most painful memories burdening the conscience of American Jewry is the resettlement drama of 1938-42.
Zionist doctrine had long required unremitting pressure for Jewish settlement in Palestine-and only Palestine. Proposals over the years for Jewish resettlement elsewhere were regarded as diversions, detracting from the campaign for a national homeland. As the Nazi menace became ever clearer, however, bleak questions arose. Were doctrinaire Zionists still right to insist on their political goals? Or did the imminence of danger to European Jewry justify any rescue and resettlement plans, even at the Cost of deferring the campaign for the building of Palestine? Wise, for one, was ready to moderate doctrine. In 1937, he wrote a friend that, "Being a Semite, I would be willing to do a little bargaining with Britain if we get two things," meaning the British colonies of Uganda and Kenya for unrestricted Jewish settlement. If Arab pressures were making the growth of Jewish Palestine impossible, Wise said the next year, then the Jews should be given "some great additional English colony." These ideas were heresy, of course. Recalling the "territorial" crisis of early Zionism, when Herzl himself had been willing to settle for a Jewish homeland somewhere other than Palestine. [It MUST be noted that Mr. Grose provided ZERO sources when he cited Rabbi Wise for rescue schemes other than Palestine. Rabbi Wise was even against bringing Jews to Alaska during WWII. In the 1930s, he was known to lobby against increasing immigration quotas. Therefore, what Mr. Grose wrote needs verification]
In 1938 was formed the International Colonization Society, to provide endangered Jews of Europe with new homes wherever they could be found. Wise was an early supporter. Something of the same outrage greeted this philanthropic effort as had struck Herzl back in 1902. Abba Hillel Silver of Cleveland, a rabbi Of whom Zionism would soon be hearing much, expressed a typical reaction: he wrote Wise in a fury, refusing to pledge a single dollar for resettlement. lest Palestine get the "short end of the bargain." Weizmann in London fired off warnings to American friends. "Visions of settlements in South America will be conjured up; it will all prove a disappointment . . . but the Assimilationists will catch on to it." And so they did. Bernard Baruch, perhaps the most prominent of the assimilated American Jews, drew up a detailed plan to resettle European Jews in British Africa or Portuguese Angola—prompting the aged Brandeis to remark to President Roosevelt that "Baruch would more likely to consider colonization of Jews on some undiscovered planet than Palestine."
Britain and the Arabs were adamant against opening Palestine to refugees from Hitler. and journalist Dorothy Thompson sadly concluded that "all hopes of anything like Jewish mass migration to Palestine have to be buried." She proposed alternative resettlement in Canada and Brazil; hers was a lonely voice in calling even for increased Jewish immigration to the United States. Wise proposed the development of a Jewish colony in the Dominican Republic, and five hundred families were actually settled there. [Again; we found nothing in the footnotes to back Mr. Groses claim; we found no referrences or sources; all evidence points to the contrary especially with regards to the Dominican Republic.] As late as November, Under Secretary of State Sumner Welles addressed a Jewish audience at length about the Dominican project, making no more than a single reference to Palestine. Zionists in the hall were disappointed and angry.
The strangest of the resettlement proposals came from the military government of Emperor Hirohito's Japan. From early 1939, Japanese diplomats had been intrigued with the possibility of budding sympathetic ties to the American Jewish community. What better bait than an offer to resettle European Jews in the Japanese-controlled territories of Manchukuo or China? And whom better to approach with this offer than the revered Stephen Wise. a humanitarian known for his influence and access in high places? "He goes anywhere the President goes as the shadow follows the form," wrote one Japanese diplomat to his superiors. Wise received an unofficial envoy in his office early in 1940 and listened politely; but to him Japan was "as truly Fasctst a nation as Germany or Itaiv," and as he showed his visitor out the door, he exploded to an assistant, "I have no time for this nonsense!"
The fact remained that even if the ultimate need of world Jewry was a homeland of their own, the immediate need of the Jews of Europe was survival --and Wise was not the only Zionist who recognized it. A splinter group of Jews, loosely allied with a Palestinian underground army, the Irgun Zvai Leumi, dropped the political goal from thc program it argued before the American public. Injecting the idea of Palestine Into the discussion would only harm the refugees, argued one of the Irgun group's well-placed friends, Congressman Will Rogers, Jr. American even devoted Zionists were deeply divided between political and human values. Campaigning singlemindedly for the Jewish homeland in Palestine, Rabbi Silver and his dedicated partisans minimized the "immediate problem" of saving Jewish Iives. For centuries, Jews had ignored the underlying causes of their distress to concern themselves only with "immediate problems," argued one of his associates in 1943. Had there been a Jewish state, "either a Hitler would not have arisen in our time or, if one had we might have had a country under Jewish control in which the Jews of Germany and other lands could have been received--and received in large numbers. It has been our misfortune throughout our history that we have not been able to look ahead, to plan ahead, and to provide this radical solution.
The conflict devastated the sensibility of a generation which had worked hard and grown comfortable in American society. American Jews were "showing signs of cracking up," wrote The Jewish Spectator in May "under the mental and physical strain of news from Europe' " A non-Zionist of the Joint Distribution Committee looked back in bitter rebuke: "If the Zionists had helped in leadership, perhaps tens of thousands could have been saved." Wise himself confessed, long after it was all over, to "a harrowing sense of if perhaps the Zionist movement had been more willing to compromise long-term goals for immediate needs, many of Hitler's victims might have survived. Other Zionists argue to this day, as they did at the time, that none of the alternative resettlement sites stood a chance of success anyway. The sense of guilt lingering among American Jews is not that they failed to rescue their besieged brethren in Europe, for that was clearly beyond their abilities. It is rather that too many were unready or unwilling even to take the risk of trying.
By 1942, the basic human issue had become moot. For millions of Europe's Jews, there was no longer any need for rescue and resettlement in Palestine or anywhere else. (Israel In The Mind of America, p. 108-112) - A month after the Nazi pogrom against Germany's Jews (famously known as the Kristallnacht pogrom), Ben-Gurion provided an interesting mathematical formula for saving German Jewish kids who immigrated to England instead of Palestine. He stated in December 1938:
"If I knew it was possible to save all [Jewish] children of Germany by their transfer to England and only half of them by transferring them to Eretz-Yisrael, I would choose the latter----because we are faced not only with the accounting of these [Jewish] children but also with the historical accounting of the Jewish People." (Righteous Victims, p. 162, The Complete Translated Letter translated by IPS and here is the original in Hebrew)) Ben-Gurion was so concerned that the "human conscience" might bring various countries to open their doors to those persecuted German Jews [of course, God forbid]. He saw this as a threat and warned: Zionist is in danger. (The Seventh Million p. 28) Only in the Zionist mind murder and honer are equated!
Do you wonder if Ben-Gurion sent a thank you cable to the British people? Here are the boring details.
It should be noted that most Zionists' leadership expressed a similar sentiment during the 1930s and 40s. For example, Chaim Weizmann spoke of something similar almost a year earlier and Rabbi Stephan Wise lobbied US Congress against increasing immigration quotas (concerning German Jewish children) in early 1939. Therefore, Ben-Gurion's remarks were not an aberration or taken out of context (Chaim Weizmann again was known to have said something similar to British officials around the same time, too; see Zionism during the Holocaust, p. 298). Zionists' contempt for Europe's Jews drove many to consider Zionists as enemies from within. That is why the mass majority of Europe's Jews voted with their feet and immigrated to the Americas, not the emptied country of Palestine. - When it became clear that Great Britain did not intend to alter its policy on immigration during the Evian Conference in July 1938 into Palestine and would not broach the subject at the Conference, the Zionist delegation at Conference announced that it would not be considered "worthwhile" for Chaim Weizmann to appear before a sub-committee "as one of fifty representatives of other private organizations" (The Jewish Trail of Tears, p. 147-150)
- During the Evian Conference, not only the Jewish Agency was focused on Palestine, but also the World Jewish Congress too:
Palestine, the World [Jewish] Congress held, could absorb an annual quota of sixty thousand to one hundred thousand refugees per year. Thus, it was necessary for the nations represented at the Evian Conference to convince the United Kingdom to honor its commitment to establish a Jewish National Home in Palestine as outlined in the 1917 Balfour Declaration. (The Jewish Trail of Tears, p. 148)
It should be noted the Jewish Agency also suggested marketing Nazi products, not only in the MENA but also around the world, to finance German Jews' resettlement in Palestine! (The Transfer Agreement, p. 377) -
Zionists didn't even follow up on the Dominican Republic's offer to accept 100k German Jews in 1938 (even though it offered land & cattle to German Jewish refugees upon their arrival); see Evian Conference for more details. On the contrary, the evidence shows that Zionists did the exact opposite by discouraging any German Jewish emigration except to Palestine! (The Transfer Agreement, p. 377 & The Jewish Trail of Tears, p. 147-150) What is odd is how Edwin Black didn't even allude to Peru & Dominican Republic's offer to receive German & Austrian Jews and portrayed Palestine as the ONLY available & viable destination! (The Transfer Agreement, p. 377) & To know more about the Zionists' mindset at the time, please contemplate Ben-Gurion's reaction when he heard that Great Britain would accept 10,000 German Jewish children in late 1938. It was chilling to read what he wrote in December 1938:
"If I knew it was possible to save all [Jewish] children of Germany by their transfer to England and only half of them by transferring them to Eretz-Yisrael, I would choose the latter----because we are faced not only with the accounting of these [Jewish] children but also with the historical accounting of the Jewish People." (Righteous Victims, p. 162, The Complete Translated Letter translated by IPS and here is the original in Hebrew)
- What is truly chilling is how Zionists Edwin Black (p. 226) & Tom Segev (p. 102-104) both have found that Zionists used to talk about the Holocaust in the past tense way ahead of its time in the 1930s. Therefore, very little could be done to save Europe's Jews! In the Zionist mind, the Holocaust had already happened, and there was one thing left for them to do, which was to exploit the calamity to be in the service of building the "Jewish state"! Please contemplate how Edwin Black described Zionists' mindset before Shoah:
"In the minds of Zionists, Jewish life in Germany could not be saved, only transferred. Even if Hitler and the German economy were crushed, Jewish wealth in Germany would be crushed with it...[as if Black implies the that crushing Nazi Germany early on doesn't serve the Zionist cause!] ..The wealth had to be saved. Through the speedy liquidation and transfer of that wealth, the Jewish homeland could be built, thus creating the refuge needed for a mass transfer of the people. Zionism had declared from the moment of Herzl that antisemitic regimes were to be opposed. They [antisemitic regimes] were to be cooperated with in the transfer of Jews and their wealth." (p. 226)
Despite these chilling assertions by David, Black & Segev, we believe that Zionists may have envisioned multiple Nakbas (combinations of dispossession & ethnic cleansing) upon the Jews of Europe, and Zionists didn't foresee a genocide. That said, it is strongly suspected that Zionists spoke as such because of their fixation on Palestine as the ONLY solution to the so-called "Jewish problem", and the Jews who immigrated to other safe havens than Palestine meant nothing to them (meaning they were as good as dead or "Witch Doctor's Medicine using Ben-Gurion's terminology). This analysis explains why Ben-Gurion wished death upon those German Jewish children who immigrated to England soon after the Kristallnacht pogrom. For him, they are alive only in "Eretz-Israel"; as if he looked upon their rescue as a betrayal! On the other hand, we agree with Black's & Segev's assessment: Zionists foresaw multiple Nakbas upon the Jews of Europe, positioned themselves for advantage and they all heeded Herzl's advice by turning it into a weapon & piggy bank to build their "Jewish state". Herzl warned Zionists not to resist or oppose European anti-Semites, and he predicted they would become Zionists' best allies.
Abraham Burg (the former speaker of the Israeli Knesset) described the following jaw-dropping encounter with the former Israeli president (Ezer Weizman): What we Israelis know of the lives, dreams, and fears of American Jews? What do we learn about North African Jews who immigrated to France or Latin American Jews? Not a clue, and worse --we simply do not care. "They should either come and live here," the late President Ezer Weizman once told me angrily, "or they should go to hell." This was the thinking when he grew up in the British mandate Palestine. Land of Israel, thus, they were ignored during the Shoah, and this is still the sentiment today. If they are well, they do not interest us at all: if their condition worsens, it only justifies our choices.
This is catastrophic Zionism [Jabotinsky once promoted] at its worst. What is bad for the Jews is better for Zionism. (p. 99-100)
Are you surprised how & why European anti-Semites eagerly voted for the UN partition of 1947?
Are you surprised how Zionists quickly normalized with the same people who killed millions of their family members? - When the State Department attempted to find a haven for Europe's Jews in the December 1940s, Rabbi Stephen Wise and Nahum Goldman used their same old tactic (weaponizing antisemitism) to discourage the settlement of Jews in Latin America who told the state department employees that their activities: "might energize the anti-Semitic feelings" (as if Palestinians were so welcoming of more Jewish immigrants), see Politics of Rescue, p. 101. Remind us please, how many Jews were murdered unnecessary because of such of such policies? Who speaks for the dead?
- You would think Zionist leaders had softened their hearts after WWII was concluded, and they stopped weaponizing Jewish pain & suffering as a lever to build their "Jewish state"? On the contrary, Zionist leadership doubled down on closing off any possible safe havens for Jews in the displaced persons' camps except for Palestine. Don't take our word for it; here it is from the NY Times' editor (Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, one of the most prominent American Jews in New York City) who stated on October 27th, 1946:
"it is unfair to carry on this political controversy at the expense of the miserable tenants of the D.P. Camps," Mr. Sulzberger emphasized.
"Nor will the philosophical and political ideal for Jewish statehood die by reason of delay if it deserves to live; but refugees will die if humanity too long delays their rescue" "I cannot rid myself of the feeling," he added, "that the unfortunate Jew of Europe's D.P. Camps are helpless hostages for whom statehood has been made only acceptable ransom."
"I acknowledge," he continued," that those who view Jews as a race instead of as faith and faith only, as I do, have reasons for national aspirations which I don't share."
"I acknowledge that those to whom a Jewish state has been a life-long goal can be expected to pursue it even when the costs are high, but it seems to me that the cost of statehood today in terms of human suffering is greater than people can be asked to bear." Click here for the full article. Well, you may learn a thing or two about Zionists' fake valor!If the subject of the DP camps after WWII is of any interest, then we recommend reading James D. Clowes 1988 thesis, you might learn how Polish Jews were nudged into leaving as the Iraqi Jews have learned after Nakba!
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We are compelled to directly quote Ariel Lekaditis (a Yad Vashem staff historian & a Holocaust educator) from his blog article at The Times of Israel:
In May 1939, MS St. Louis in Havana was refused to unload its Jewish passengers in Cuba & US, and it was forced to go back to Antwerp. Jewish Agency refused to give any of its passengers immigration visas to Palestine. Over 250 of the passengers perished during the Holocaust.
A second basic axis was the idea of the transfer of Jews from the German territories and their transportation to the land of Israel. These two elements of Zionist ideology and politics lead to the equation of the “values of Jew--hatred” with the values of anti-Semitism. It further resulted in the recognition of the anti-Semites by the Zionists, as allies, and as “their most reliable protectors and sponsors.”
The politics of the Zionist movement and their ideology towards the rest of the German Jews was very explicit. There was no doubt that they separated themselves by the German Jews who were placed in a separate category: they didn’t speak Hebrew; they didn’t belong to the Zionist movement; were too old to have children, or didn’t have the financial resources to support the settlement of Palestine, a purpose which was of course offered the criteria for this separation. Therefore the Zionist movement not only didn't do anything for the confrontation of the Holocaust but also fought strongly any immigration policy which was orientated to the transportation of the German Jews in order to save them.
Feature of this policy was the attitude of the Zionist movement in 1938 towards the possible change of U.S immigration laws which would allow the Jews to find refugee. The movement opposed to this possibility, as it was stated by Rabbi Stephen Wise, leader of the American Jewish Congress: “It was decided that no Jewish organization would, at this time, sponsor a bill which would in any way alter the immigration laws.” The very same politics applied when the U.S. Congress started some initiatives in 1943 regarding the extermination of the Jews that had already began. Once again the Rabbi Wise, who at that time was the principal spokesperson for Zionism, traveled to Washington in order to testify against the rescue bill that the U.S. Congress intended to vote, because it would cause problems to the colonization of Palestine.
For the Zionists, the settlement of Palestine was above and beyond everything. It superseded any other purpose, even the rescue of lives of the German Jews, which had value only to the extent of fulfilling the Zionist goal. According to the words of Chaim Weizmann, a Zionist leader who was to become the first president of Israel: “From the depths of the tragedy I want to save-- young people [for Palestine]. The old ones will pass. They will bear their fate or they will not.” In another statement of Yitzak Gruenbaum, the chairperson of the Zionist committee, between “the rescue of the masses of Jews in Europe” and “the redemption of the land? I vote, without the second thought, for the redemption of the land.” -
During the first days after Hitler's boycott against Germany's Jews [early 1933], the Zionist movement's hierarchy in Europe and America was busy trying to plot a course of action. Their objective was not to mobilize Jewish and non-Jewish resources for the preservation of Jewish rights in Germany. Rather, they sought a means of turning the miseries of German Jewry into a new impetus for a Jewish Homeland in Palestine. Zionist leadership had refused to oppose the Nazi expulsion ideology from the outset. (The Transfer Agreement, p. 78-9)This 1982 NYTimes article seems to imply that American Jewish organizations agonized between two conflicting strategies: Do they prioritize fighting the British White Paper of 1939 or Hitler? Both can't be fought at the same time. Based on what we know of Rabbi Wise's statements in March of 1943, it seems they gave priority to fighting the White Paper of 1939! As if they were fixated on defeating the White Paper & deprioritized saving Jews' lives!
A meeting of the American Emergency Committee for Zionist Affairs, on May 3, 1943, agreed that the Bermuda Conference had made a campaign against Britain's White Paper imperative. But Nahum Goldmann, a Zionist leader, warned them that if they undertook to fight the White Paper, the protest and rescue activities on behalf of the European Jews would have to stop: "There is not enough manpower to engage in two campaigns." Stephen Wise, on an earlier occasion, had once said, "We cannot press the Hitler button and the British and-Palestine button at one and the same time!"
The trouble was that there were really two Palestine buttons. One involved a campaign against the White Paper, demanding unlimited Jewish immigration into Palestine; the other was political, a campaign for a Jewish state.
"We will fight with the British against Hitler as if there were no White Paper; we will fight the White Paper as if there were no war" Cited at JVL, Sept. 1939
On the other hand, Houston: We have a problem! These are conflicting marching orders that were articulated by Rabbi Stephen Wise during the war a few years after:We cannot press the Hitler button and the British and Palestine button at one and the same time! (NYTimes, April 18th, 1982: AMERICAN JEWS AND THE HOLOCAUST By Lucy S. Dawidowicz) Nahum Goldman said something similar.
Ben-Gurion & Co. gave conflicting priorities, and when they came to a head, a choice had to be made; Zionists didn't choose to fight Hitler! They chose to fight the White Paper even at the cost of millions of Jewish lives! Again, this policy persisted during WWII. This policy explains downplaying Holocaust stories in American and Zionist presses! (Abraham Burg, p. 74) This explains how and why Ben-Gurion and his cohorts were not interested in fighting Hitler even at the height of the calamity, Nazis weren't THE enemy, and Rabbi Wise was 100% correct: Hitler and the White Paper cannot be fought at once. To put it simply, there was not enough bandwidth to fight both. Therefore, Zionists' action spoke out loudly: They decided to fight the White Paper, and fighting Hitler was left for others!
To give the reader an idea of how widespread this Zionists' mindset was in the 1930s & 40s, we would like to quote Ariel Lekaditis (a Yad Vashem historian & Holocaust educator), who described Zionist Leaders' behaviors during WWII as follows:
Feature of this policy was the attitude of the Zionist movement in 1938 towards the possible change of U.S immigration laws which would allow the Jews to find refugee. The movement opposed to this possibility, as it was stated by Rabbi Stephen Wise, leader of the American Jewish Congress: “It was decided that no Jewish organization would, at this time, sponsor a bill which would in any way alter the immigration laws.” The very same politics applied when the U.S. Congress started some initiatives in 1943 regarding the extermination of the Jews that had already began. Once again the Rabbi Wise, who at that time was the principal spokesperson for Zionism, traveled to Washington in order to testify against the rescue bill that the U.S. Congress intended to vote, because it would cause problems to the colonization of Palestine. German Zionism and the German Jews
What is maddening is that when American Jews attempted to investigate these events, the investigation was nixed & defunded midstream. (NYTimes, Jan. 4, 1983)Two full-page ads in the NY Times calling for the rescue of millions of European Jews, but ONLY Palestine was cited!
- We were stunned to find these two advertisements speaking of saving 5 million Jews at the beginning of the calamity in 1943. Pay attention to how the ads were laser-focused on ONLY Palestine as the haven for those poor souls. By the way, both ads were both published in the NY Times by Irgunists. Is this the behavior of anyone who cares about saving lives?
- When Irgunists in the US attempted to mobilize the public and the Jewish community to fight Hitler between 1941-43, you would think Ben-Gurion and Co. gave them a big helping hand. Well, you cannot be further from the truth. To discredit Irgunists (a.k.a. the Bergson Groups), Rabbi Stephen Wise and his buddies were quick to point out that Irgunists were neo-fascists (which was true) and the collected funds would be stolen and lobbied the US government to financial audit by the IRS and to draft their leaders into the US army (see Wikipedia for boring details). Although Wise & his cohorts provided zero evidence then and now about Bergson Groups, what is funny is that it was Wise's buddies who diverted much of what was collected away from rescuing Jews! It seems they were terrified that the Irgunists' plans could divert donations and other resources from building the future state (Aaron Berman, p. 130-31 & 118-123). How such policies & actions killed Jews! If you are interested in the boring details from primary sources (as if Wikipedia wasn't good enough), here are the details from primary sources.
- When the Russian Tsar started persecuting the Russian Jewish community in the early 1900s, you would think Zionist leaders at the time were quick to approve a rescue scheme. Oddly, that is exactly what happened. The founder of the Zionist movement, Theodor Herzl, quickly lobbied the Zionist Congress, which approved his proposal (by a significant margin) in Basel on August 26, 1903. Herzl even managed to gain British approval to colonize Uganda. That said, the founders of the "Jewish state" (i.e., David Ben-Gurion, Chaim Weizmann, Ze'ev Jabotinky, ... etc.) quickly torpedoed the Uganda Scheme after Herzl's death in 1904, which could have saved millions of lives. Ever since the Uganda Scheme, Zionist leaders of all shades resisted any rescue scheme EXCEPT for Palestine. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, if Herzl hadn't died early on, Israel would have been created in Uganda and not in "empty" Palestine!
- Just in case you still have your doubts about our presentation, we like to quote Wikipedia's Biltmore conference page (an extremely pro-Zionists platform) as another nail in Zionists' Hasbarah coffin:
The estimates for the destruction of European Jewry grew throughout 1942 and 1943. Chaim Weizmann urged a re-evaluation of the Biltmore program in June 1943. Chaim Weizmann’s earlier estimate of 25% destruction declared at the Biltmore conference now seemed wildly optimistic. Rabbi Meyer Berlin leader of the Mizrahi Zionist party disagreed arguing that no one could know how many Jews would survive and how many would die.
American Jewish conference
At the American Jewish Conference [the prelude to AIPAC] of 29 August 1943 [64 American Jewish groups, by far the largest Jewish voices at the time that was composed of 500 delegates representing some 2,250,000 Jews] the adoption of the Biltmore program was challenged by Joseph Proskauer and Robert Goldman, they argued that the immediate problem was the rescue effort, not the establishment of a Jewish commonwealth. Goldman felt the Biltmore program was unduly weighted in favour of the establishment of a Jewish commonwealth [in Palestine was implied] and that the focus on this as a priority would hamper the efforts to rescue the European Jewry.While Abba Silver [who was against bombing the death camps & railroads into them during the conference] and Emanuel Neumann put forward that the establishment of a Jewish commonwealth [in Palestine] should be the primary aim. [Image grab and if you are interested to read the boring details from the primary source "American Jewish Conference Report On The Interim Committee And Commissions On Rescue, Palestine And Post War", see pages 4-5, 12-13, 16-17, & 18-19]
We were able to track this resolution in the NY Times, which confirms much of what was cited in Wikipedia, including Joseph Proskaur's full statement. Remember, this was adopted at the height of the calamity, and almost all American Jewish organizations and groups adopted it. To add more salt to the wound, we found that Zionists (along with their Christian Zionist friends) were busy trying to get the US Congress to adopt a pro-Zionist Bill which could've undermined the war effort and not for the intervention of the War Departments (in the US and Great Britain) the whole Middle East could've erupted exactly when the war effort needed them the most (The American Zionist Lobby, 1943-1945 by Aaron Berman p. 136-37). Now if you don't see how this wasn't intentional criminal negligent (that's in the best case scenario) by focusing their attention on Palestine as the calamity was happening, then you should have your head examined. Since all had Jewish blood on their hands, then nixing the investigation (that was supposed to report on American Jewish groups' conduct and passivity during WWII) made perfect sense. Why continue an investigation that could risk making American Jews and the Zionist movement at least partially responsible for the Holocaust? Just nix it and keep it quiet, that is why few spoke about it since 1983.
For completeness, here is Faris Yahya's presentation on this subject, which was one of the earliest to be written on this subject. We hope you will find it informative. - If you have the time please read Zionists' presentation to the Committee on Foreign Affairs in early 1944 (yes, before the last million was murdered) nothing whatsoever was said about saving Jews anywhere EXCEPT for Palestine. This is what was front an center to American Jewry; Mazeltov!
- Here is a similar report, but in England, after WWII ended, another one collected $72 million (almost 2/3 of what Haavara transferred with seven years of operation) during war years, much of which went to Zionist causes. If you spend some time on the NY Times' wayback search engine, you will be floored reading how Jewish leaders recklessly endangered Europe's Jews to achieve their political goals!
- Just in case you think that Ben-Gurion was remorseful about his infamous antisemitic hate speech a month after Kristallnacht, and he softened his heart of stone, well, think twice. The head of yishuv's so-called Rescue Committee (Yizhak Gruenbaum, who was famous for his antisemitic remarks during the war) dared to suggest saving Polish Jewish kids by shipping them to South Africa (instead of Palestine) in the summer of 1943, and usual, Ben-Gurion quickly shut it down; it was dead in the water. See Dina Porat, p. 138, and pay attention to Dina's Hasbarah at the top of page 139. This is how Hasbarah is manufactured; in her case, they always start with a "perhaps." To contrast things and to put them into perspective, the same David Ben-Gurion was ready to move heaven and earth around the same period when he heard that Jewish children would come to Palestine (Dina Porat, p. 149). Some people went out of their way to weaponize Jewish pain and suffering to turn it into a LEVER.
- Zionist leaders successfully lobbied against the Baldwin-Rogers Resolution in December 1943 (sponsored by the Bergson Group), which favored rescuing Jews. Zionists were adamant that opening Palestine for unfettered Jewish immigration was a precondition for accepting any rescue resolution (American Jewish Conference Report On The Interim Committee And Commissions On Rescue, Palestine And Post War", see pages 18-19).
- You would think Ben-Gurion and Co. had welcomed Europe's persecuted Jews under any condition in Palestine! Well, you can not be further from the truth. The Jewish Agency refused to accept Jews under the status of refugees.As you absorb the earlier facts; please remember that Jewish Agency's response occured when the last million were alive, and the vast majority of those poor souls perished in the last batch to Auschwitz!
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On July 2nd, 1944, Ben-Gurion heard that Jewish refugees could find haven in Libya at the height of calamity. Here is how Herr Ben-Gurion reacted. We are not making this stuff up, this is for real; but first hang on to your seat:
In a meeting of the Jewish Agency Executive around this time, Ben-Gurion reaffirmed the underlying principle of his attitude toward rescue affairs: “We must do everything, including things that appear fantastic. But on one condition--that the action does not damage Zionism.” And as a topical example of the crucial reservation:
“If we could get the Jews moved to Libya and then to Eretz-Israel, I would agree. But the very mention of Libya is inherently subversive --even if unconsciously-- of Zionism.”
It will be recalled that the War Refugee Board wanted to set up a large refugee absorption center in Cyrenaica, Libya. (Beit-Zvi, page 310)
[Thus, to save the Jews, what is the big deal if a few million sacrificed at the altar! Didn't the Carthaginians sacrifice there babies? For the love of God guys, don't make a big deal out of it. Everyone does it, right? Now please, allow what Ben-Gurion said to sink in for a minute, then reflect: in the World of KAPOs; wasn't this the worst? - Dina Porat stated that the Jewish Agency appealed to Great Britain and the US to receive tens of thousands of Hungarian Jews as of July 20, 1944 (see p. 235-36). On the other hand, she cited no sources (which was very odd, she always cites). It seems such an appeal was heeded by the US & GB, who extended such an offer only as a temporary solution (see NYTimes, Aug 18th, 1944). That said, there was no response from the Jewish Agency whatsoever. The lack of citations in Dina's book leads us to believe that if such an offer existed, it must have been a temporary proposal until the war ended. Then, the Jewish refugees would be transferred to Palestine. In our opinion, even this scenario is highly unlikely because Aaron Berman stated that Zionist leaders were against receiving Jews in Palestine under the status of refugees (yes, Zionists wanted them to have full rights from day one), which was the case in early 1944 and in July 1944 (see The American Zionist Lobby, 1943-1945 by Aaron Berman p. 120-21, 144-45).
- American Jews attempted to investigate this fixation on Palestine & its effect on the Holocaust. However, the investigation was nixed & de-funded in early 1983 since this taboo subject was quickly tabled! Here is an excerpt of their draft:
The draft singled out for criticism one of the dominant figures of the Jewish community in New York, Rabbi Stephen Wise, who was a founder of both the American Jewish Congress and the World Jewish Congress. Rabbi Wise died in 1949.
At one point in 1943, the draft notes, Rabbi Wise told a Congressional panel that he opposed a resolution designed to set up a commission ''to effectuate the rescue of the Jewish people of Europe.'' He opposed the resolution, the draft said, because it failed to include any provision that the British change their policy and open up Palestine to Jews. Earlier Period Recalled
''Jewish organizations and their respective leaders were emotionally as well as ideologically so absorbed with their internecine struggles, rivalries and efforts to achieve hegemony in the Jewish community, that the perception of the urgency of rescue was, if not ignored, at least greatly diminished,'' said the draft. (NYTimes, Jan. 4th 1983)
- Zionists laboriously lobbied US Congress to hinder the reception of any Jewish refugees unless GB re-opens Palestine for Jewish immigration! (NYTimes, Jan. 4, 1983) It is truly chilling that this was their position from the start and continued until WWII ended! It was chilling to read the following from Edwin Black:
"All of the non-Zionist schemes for relieving the plight of German Jews required vast amounts of donations, which Jews and non-Jews alike willing to give. But the Zionist movement saw these relief efforts as a threat because the solutions excluded Palestine. More important, the donations would divert funds from the Zionist movement. In other words, here was a Jewish crisis, and not only would the answer lie in lands other than Palestine, but the Zionist movement would suffer economic ruin in the process" (p. 90)
- You would think late in the game, the Zionist leader had stopped their normal shenanigans. You're mistaken; here are their communications from the Bermuda Conference in late April 1943. Please pay attention to how JA was writing its communications, knowing that millions have been exterminated already! (BBC Fact File: Bermuda Conference & The Detroit Jewish Chronicle: April 23, 1943) What was tragically criminal was that focusing on Palestine as the only destination for Europe's Jews wasn't an afterthought; Zionist leaders discussed it in preparation for the conference, and several suggested they should start contemplating non-Zionist solutions. Despite appeals by Revisionists and other notable Jews for them to reconsider, they double down on their evil policies (Dina Porat, p. 142-43). Perhaps because of such reckless endangerment, Europe's Jews VOTED with their feet and immigrated to the Americas to live with the Gentiles, even after Palestine was emptied. Some people went out of their way to weaponize Jewish pain and suffering to turn it into a LEVER.
- Tony Greestein in Zionism during the Holocaust (p. 308-316) presented a more exhaustive list, we highly recommend reading it.
- Now, if you are still unconvinced of our earlier case against Zionists' policies and actions during the 1930s-40s, we urge you to read Aaron Berman's (a famous Holocaust historian) exhaustive research in The American Zionist Lobby, 1943-1945. Not only were we unable to find any evidence that Zionists attempted to "save" Jews, but they also attempted to torpedo plans to rescue Jews even to Palestine but with the status of refugees rather than immigrants (p. 144-45)! These facts add to Aviva Halamish's conclusion that Jewish suffering was used as the LEVER to create the "Jewish state" (Palestine as a Destination for Jewish Immigrants, p. 128). Mr. Berman also used a similar language (p. 140-41).
We wonder: was the six million worth it?
In practice, how this policy isn't the ultimate antisemitism! Zionism, what a terrible disease of the mind!
All these facts lead us to conclude that Zionist leadership was terrified of enabling any haven(s) other than Palestine:
- Any possible other safe havens were envisioned to be an existential threat to the "Jewish state" to be, which would render their primary project (creating a “Jewish state” in Palestine) mute & useless (The Seventh Million, p. 98-99). Of course, they were proven wrong after Nakba, but that doesn't matter. How did the leaders believe before Nakba and act based on that matter? This was their motive. Why? Because they looked at the situation as a life or death situation. Therefore, any other concern was way secondary!
- Any possible other safe havens would've destroyed Nazis' benefits from continuing with Haavara (an existing strategy for its Jews & as the marketing agent for its goods in MENA), which would cut off Zionists from their primary source of funding, and
- Zionist leadership's fixation on Palestine maximized their share of relief funds and contributions that were allotted to saving Europe’s Jews (The Transfer Agreement, p. 90, 91-3 & Palestine as a Destination for Jewish Immigrants By Aviva Halamish, p. 131-2). For example, we have found a report on the NY Times dated Feb. 1st, 1944, stating that 72 million dollars (almost 2/3 of what Haavara transferred in 7 years) were collected for refugee assistance and Palestine reconstruction. On the other hand, we don't know how much of this fund was spent on rescuing Jews vs. building the state to be (here is the PDF version of the NY Times' article). The reader should not be surprised if refugee funds were deliberately starved based on Dr. Weizmann's earlier letter (that was written in preparation for the Evian Conference, see Post Uganda: Zionism On Trial, p. 153).
This point should not be underestimated since, from Zionists' points of view at the time any money raised for rescue or resettlement of Jews in countries other than Palestine were considered a threat and a waste of resource. This is exactly how and why Ben-Gurion wished death to those poor German Jewish Children who immigrated to England (after Kristallnacht pogrom in late 1938) instead of coming to Palestine. From David's point of view (and to most Zionists at the time), those children were as good as dead. Actually, Ben-Gurion describe such a rescue of Jews outside of Palestine as a "Witch Doctor's Medecine"! Dr. Weizmann was know to have used a similar language (see Catastrophic Zionism for details). If you are interested in the boring details, Dina Porat examined the rescue budget between early 1943 and June 1945. Not only did Zionists contribute zero dollars for rescue operations, but they diverted 7/8th of what was collected for rescue to build their future state at the height of the calamity, which jives with our earlier conclusion. In details, we have addresed hoarding and starving rescue funds in a another section if you care. - All these facts lead us to conclude that Zionist leaders' goal was to foment Jewish pain and suffering as much as possible, hoping that will instigate a Jewish refugee crisis that will act as the lever that will create the "Jewish state".
- Beit Zevi in Post Uganda: Zionism on Trial ( ch. 6, p. 125 - 135) presented a very compelling argument. Zevi argues that Zionists were confronted with a deadly challenge that almost destroyed the whole movement early on, which was the Uganda scheme. He says that Eastern European Zionists (i.e., Jabotinsky, Ben-Gurion, Weizmann ...etc.) vehemently rejected this scheme. If not for Herzl's death and the 7th Zionists Congress walking away from it, the whole movement could've been torpedoed. He argues that this saga burned Zionists and left them emotionally scared, teaching them to fight like hell against whoever threatens Palestine as being the ONLY solution to the "Jewish question"! Emotional scars are often exaggerated and not connected with reality; however, they play a dominant role in decision-making. This point cannot be underestimated. This is a possible viable theory but needs further research and analysis; however, what is baffling is why secular Jews were fixated ONLY on Palestine when the mass majority of the Jewish religious establishment was against creating a "Jewish state." For example, why not Libya or Cypress?
Chaim Weizmann attempted to answer this conundrum in 1939 (just before WWII was underway), and he reasoned it was due to psychological attachment to Palestine (actually he used the word Palestine)! Mr. Weizmann could be correct, but his argument isn't convincing for a simple reason! Even at the height of Nazi persecution before WWII, the mass majority of Europe’s Jews still chose to immigrate to Great Britain & the Americas, but not to British Mandated Palestine. It is stunning that this phenomenon persisted even after Nakba, although most European Jews now identify with "Zionism"! That was the primary reason why Ben-Gurion airlifted Arab Jews to populate the emptied country after the war of Nakba; that was his nightmare: Zionists built it, but Europe's Jews didn't come! (The Seventh Million, p. 113) What was tragically funny was that the last big wave of immigration to Israel happened for Jews from the former Soviet republics who were forced to go to Israel first (instead of to the US or Canada as was usually the case). Soon after, it was "discovered" that over 70% of them weren’t Jews, and they just immigrated for economic reasons!
Conclusion
Therefore, from experience, Zionist leadership inferred that proposing non-Zionist solutions to the European Jewish refugees' problem would negatively impact their political & financial bottom lines! YES; we've every reason to believe that Zionist leadership concluded that easing Jewish suffering wasn't good for Zionism; which was true, especially before Nakba when Zionists in Palestine were limited in numbers & resources (only 174,000 Jews as of 1932); and their Jewish Agency was on the verge of going bankrupt! Therefore, all Zionist & Jewish Organizations (Labor, Revisionists, & US-based Jewish organizations) were unified on this point even at the height of the calamity during WWII. In Zionists’ mindset, Zionists looked at the situation confronting them in the 1930s as a life-or-death one. Whenever they were forced to decide between saving Europe’s Jews or building the "Jewish state," Zionists always chose the latter with little to no hesitations, irrespective of the consequences.
Edwin Black wrote the following assessment of the Zionist mindset when Hitler rose to power; this is accurate:
During the first days after Hitler boycott against Germany's Jews [early 1933], the Zionist movement's hierarchy in Europe and America was busy trying to plot a course of action. Their objective was not to mobilize Jewish and non-Jewish resources for the preservation of Jewish rights in Germany. Rather, they sought a means of turning the miseries of German Jewry into a new impetus for a Jewish Homeland in Palestine.
Zionist leadership had, in fact, refused to oppose the Nazi expulsion ideology from the outset. (The Transfer Agreement, p. 78-9)
Therefore, we are compelled to ask:
- Did Zionist leaders position themselves to profit from antisemitism? Did Zionists foment antisemitism?
- From inception, which fascist, which dictator, which antisemite, Zionists didn't attempt to work with hand over fist?
What were the ramifications of Zionist fixation on Palestine as the ONLY destination for Europe's Jews?
All this data leads us to conclude that the Zionist movement weaponized European suffering to achieve its objectives, and European Jews' lives and assets were risked to build the "Jewish state". It is truly amazing how Zionists were focused like a hawk on building their state irrespective of the cost and risks, period! Therefore, we have every right to ask, how this fixation on Palestine as the ONLY destination:
- Didn't communicate to Hitler that no one cared (inclusive of nationalist Jews, a.k.a. Zionists) what would happen to Europe's Jews!
- Didn't make the "final solution" inevitable & the ONLY solution!
- Didn't PUSH Hitler over the edge! After all, no one cared; therefore, why would any care if Europe's Jews disappeared all of a sudden? Ironically, during the war, that was so true, which was clear when you inspected American & Zionist press during this period! (The Seventh Million, p. 98-99) What was shocking was that Zionists used to talk about the calamity as if it had already happened (i.e., in the past tense) during the 1930s.
It should be noted that until August of 1940, Hitler contemplated relocating German Jews to Madagascar. Of course, the simpleton will say: well, that was before the Holocaust. True, but as we have seen earlier, Zionists NEVER waivered from this policy, even at the height of the killings during WWII. Again, American Jews attempted to find an answer to these questions. However, their investigation was nixed in early 1983. (NYTimes, Jan. 4th, 1983)
Please share any relevant data we may have missed in the comments section below.
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