Lioness: Golda Meir and the Nation of Israel

847 Pages·2017·38.75 MB·English

by  Francine Klagsbrun

Also by Francine Klagsbrun
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Mixed Feelings: Love, Hate, Rivalry, and Reconciliation Among Brothers and
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Contents
Cover
Also by Francine Klagsbrun
Title Page
Copyright
Epigraph
Dedication
Cast of Characters
Introduction: “Call Me Golda”
Part One: Stubborn Roots
Chapter 1: The Carpenter’s Daughter
Chapter 2: An American Girl
Chapter 3: “Dearest Gogo”
Chapter 4: The Path to Palestine
Part Two: Ascent
Chapter 5: “New Jews”
Chapter 6: The Dark Years
Chapter 7: A Star Is Born
Chapter 8: Pioneer Woman
Chapter 9: Black Clouds Rising
Chapter 10: “And the Heart Breaking”
Chapter 11: Life and Death
Chapter 12: Ein Breira—No Alternative
Chapter 13: “Nevertheless: A Woman”
Chapter 14: 1947: The Turning Point
Chapter 15: “The Time Is Now”
Part Three: Madam Minister
Chapter 16: Moscow
Chapter 17: “Either Immigrants or Shoes”
Chapter 18: The Politician
Chapter 19: “Golda Meir”
Chapter 20: Conflict and Charisma
Chapter 21: “A Mutual Distancing”
Chapter 22: Seat of Power
Part Four: Premier
Chapter 23: The Chosen
Chapter 24: A Different Kind of War
Chapter 25: “What Has Happened to Us?”
Chapter 26: Terror, Territories, and the Palestinian Question
Chapter 27: Premier Meir and President Sadat
Chapter 28: “I Will Never Again Be the Person I Was”
Chapter 29: An “Irrevocable” Decision
Chapter 30: “My Only Fear Is to Live Too Long”
Endings: “I’ve Always Been a Realist”
Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
Illustrations
What a lioness was your mother
Among the lions!
Crouching among the great beasts,
She reared her cubs.
—Ezekiel 19:2
For Sarah and Eric,
Eliana, Benji, and Ari.
And for Sam.
Cast of Characters
ABDULLAH BIN HUSSEIN. First king of Jordan, 1946–1951.
YIGAL ALLON. Israeli general during the 1948 Israeli-Arab War; held a variety of
ministerial positions during the 1960s and 1970s, including deputy prime
minister and minister of education and culture in Golda’s government;
architect of the Allon Plan for territories captured during the 1967 Six-Day
War.
SHULAMIT ALONI. Feminist and civil rights advocate; member of the Knesset and
founder of the Ratz Party; held a variety of ministerial positions in the
1990s.
MEIR AMIT. Director of the Mossad, 1963–1968.
YASSER ARAFAT. Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization, 1969–2004;
leader of the Fatah political party.
ZALMAN ARANNE. Labor leader; minister of education and culture, 1955–1960,
1963–1969; close colleague of Golda’s.
MOTTI ASHKENAZI. A captain in the Israel Defense Forces who led a protest
movement against Golda’s government after the 1973 Yom Kippur War.
HAFEZ AL-ASSAD. President of Syria, 1971–2000.
SHAUL AVIGUR. Commander of Mossad l’Aliyah Bet, which smuggled Jews into
mandatory Palestine; a founder and head of Nativ, an underground
organization that maintained contact with Soviet Jews.
MENACHEM BEGIN. Leader of the right-wing political parties Herut, Gahal, and
Likud; Israel’s sixth prime minister, 1977–1983.
DAVID BEN-GURION. Chairman of the executive committee of the Jewish Agency in
pre-state Israel; first prime minister of Israel, 1948–1954 and 1955–1963;
considered its founding father.
RACHEL YANAIT BEN-ZVI. Zionist leader in pre-state Israel and together with her
husband, Yitzhak Ben-Zvi (Israel’s second president, 1952–1963), an
important early influence on young Golda.
ERNEST BEVIN. British Labour Party leader; foreign secretary during the last days
of the British mandate in Palestine.
WILLY BRANDT. Chancellor of West Germany, 1969–1974.
HANNA CHIZICK. Pioneer and agricultural laborer in pre-state Israel; member of the
kibbutz Merhavia; wife of Meir Dubinsky.
SIR ALAN CUNNINGHAM. The last British high commissioner in mandatory
Palestine, 1945–1948.
MOSHE DAYAN. Charismatic Israeli general; minister of defense in the governments
of Levi Eshkol (during the Six-Day War) and Golda Meir (during the Yom
Kippur War).
SIMCHA DINITZ. Close aide to Golda; director general of the prime minister’s
office, 1969–1973; ambassador to the United States, 1973–1979.
MEIR DUBINSKY. Member of the Milwaukee Poalei Zion; ardent early suitor of
Golda’s.
ABBA EBAN. Diplomat and Israeli spokesman; Israel’s first ambassador to the
United States and the United Nations; minister of foreign affairs, 1966–
1974.
ILYA EHRENBURG. Soviet Jewish journalist.
ADOLF EICHMANN. Nazi war criminal captured by Israel in 1960; executed
following trial in 1962.
DAVID “DADO” ELAZAR. Chief of general staff of the Israel Defense Forces during
the Yom Kippur War; forced to resign in its aftermath.
ARIE LOVA ELIAV. Secretary-general of Israel’s Labor Party; proponent of
Palestinian nationalism.
LEVI ESHKOL. Third prime minister of Israel, 1963–1969.
ISRAEL GALILI. Chief of staff in the pre-state Haganah; minister without portfolio
in Golda’s government and one of her closest advisers.
LEONARD GARMENT. American attorney who served in the Nixon and Ford
administrations; liaison between the government and the American Jewish
community during the 1970s.
MORDECHAI GAZIT. Director general of the prime minister’s office during Golda’s
premiership.
NAHUM GOLDMANN. President of the World Jewish Congress, 1948–1977.
ELIYAHU GOLOMB. Leading statesman in pre-state Israel; a founder of the Haganah
and commander in it.
REGINA HAMBURGER-MEDZINI. Golda’s best childhood friend; immigrated to
mandatory Palestine with her and maintained lifelong ties.
DAG HAMMARSKJÖLD. United Nations secretary-general, 1953–1961.
ISSER HAREL. Director of Mossad, 1952–1963; replaced by Meir Amit.
HUSSEIN BIN TALAL. King of Jordan, 1953–1999.
VLADIMIR “ZEEV” JABOTINSKY. Right-wing Zionist leader and theoretician; founder
of the Revisionist Party in 1925.
LOU KADAR. Golda’s assistant, secretary, and confidante for almost thirty years.
BERL KATZNELSON. Visionary and moral authority in pre-state Israel.
HENRY KISSINGER. U.S. national security adviser and secretary of state during the
Nixon and Ford administrations.
ABRAHAM ISAAC KOOK. First Ashkenazi chief rabbi of mandatory Palestine and
influential religious thinker.
ZVI YEHUDAH KOOK. Son of Abraham Isaac Kook and the spiritual force behind the
Gush Emunim settler movement.
YOSSEL KOPILOV. Philosopher-barber, close friend in Golda’s youth, immigrated to
mandatory Palestine with her and remained a family friend until his death.
SHEYNA MABOVITCH KORNGOLD. Golda’s older sister (1889–1972).
BRUNO KREISKY. Chancellor of Austria, 1970–1983.
PINHAS LAVON. Served in several ministerial positions in the 1950s; as minister of
defense was accused of running a failed covert operation in Egypt that
became known as the Lavon Affair.
BLUMA NAIDITCH MABOVITCH. Golda’s mother (1867–1951).
MOSHE YITZHAK MABOVITCH. Golda’s father (1864–1944).
ADA MAIMON-FISHMAN. Politician, feminist leader in pre-state Israel; head of
Women Workers’ Council; director of Girls’ Training Farm at Ayanot.
AYA PINKERFELD MEYERSON (MEIR). Menahem’s second wife; mother of Amnon,
Daniel, and Gideon.
CHANA LUTSKY MEYERSON (MEIR). Menahem’s first wife; mother of Meira.