Making Israel

378 Pages·2007·2.4 MB·English

by  Benny Morris

Making Israel
Making Israel
Edited by Benny Morris
The University of Michigan Press
Ann Arbor
Copyright © 2007by Benny Morris
All rights reserved
Published in the United States of America by
The University of Michigan Press
Manufactured in the United States of America
(cid:1) Printed on acid-free paper
2010 2009 2008 2007 4 3 2 1
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, or otherwise, without the written permission of the
publisher.
A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Making Israel / Benny Morris, editor.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
isbn-13: 978-0-472-11541-9(cloth : alk. paper)
isbn-10: 0-472-11541-3(cloth : alk. paper)
isbn-13: 978-0-472-03216-7(pbk. : alk. paper)
isbn-10: 0-472-03216-X (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Israel-Arab War, 1948–1949—Influence. 2. Israel—Historiography.
3. Palestinian Arabs—Israel. I. Morris, Benny, 1948–
ds126.985.m67 2007
956.04'2—dc22 2007013227
Contents
Abbreviations vii
Hebrew Journal Titles Translated ix
Benny Morris
Introduction 1
Benny Morris
The New Historiography
Israel Confronts Its Past 11
Mordechai Bar-On
Remembering 1948
Personal Recollections, Collective Memory, and the Search
for “What Really Happened” 29
Yoav Gelber
The History of Zionist Historiography
From Apologetics to Denial 47
Anita Shapira
Hirbet Hizah
Between Remembering and Forgetting 81
Avi Shlaim
The Debate about 1948 124
Yossi Ben-Artzi
The Contribution of Historical Geography to the
Historiography of the Establishment of Israel 147
vi Contents
Moshe Lissak
“Critical” and “Establishment” Sociology in Israel’s
Academic Community
Ideological Clashes or Academic Discourse? 178
Uri Ram
The Future of the Past in Israel
A Sociology of Knowledge Approach 202
Yaron Tsur
Israeli Historiography and the Ethnic Problem 231
Yechiam Weitz
Dialectical versus Unequivocal
Israeli Historiography’s Treatment of the Yishuv and Zionist
Movement Attitudes toward the Holocaust 278
Mustafa Kabha
A Palestinian Look at the New Historians and
Post-Zionism in Israel 299
Bibliography 319
Contributors 355
Index 357
Abbreviations
ACFR Arab Center for Future Research
CSZ Center for the Study of Zionism, the Yishuv, and
the H istory of the State of Israel
CZA Central Zionist Archives
DBGA David Ben-Gurion Archive
DP displaced person
HQ headquarters
HU Hebrew University of Jerusalem
IBA Israel Broadcasting Authority
IbTY Iyunim BiTkumat Yisrael [Studies in the Establishment
of Israel]
IDF Israel Defense Forces
IDFA Israel Defense Forces Archive
ISA Israel State Archives
IST Israel State Television
IZL Irgun Zvai Leumi
JIH Journal of Israeli History: Politics, Society, Culture
JNF Jewish National Fund
JPS Journal of Palestine Studies
JSP Jewish Settlement Police
KMA Kibbutz Me’uhˆad Archives
MK Member of the Knesset
MoD Ministry of Defense
NA National Archives (Washington, DC)
NPA National Police Headquarters Archive
NRP National Religious Party
OBG Ofakim BaGeographya [Horizons in Geography]
PCIR Palestinian Center for Israeli Research
PIAT Projector Infantry, Anti-Tank
PLO Palestine Liberation Organization
viii Abbreviations
POW prisoner of war
PRO Public Record Office (London)
TAU Tel Aviv University
TuV Teoriya U’Vikoret [Theory and Criticism]
UN United Nations
UNRWA United Nations Relief and Works Agency
YM Yalkut Moreshet [Heritage Papers]
YvS Yad VaShem (Jerusalem)
YZ Yahadut Zmaneinu [Contemporary Jewry]
ZOA Zionist Organization of America
ZSC Zalman Shazar Center (Jerusalem)
Hebrew Journal Titles Translated
Alpayim [2000]
Ashmoret [Watch]
BaSha’ar [In the Gateway]
BeEretz Yisrael [In the Land of Israel]
BeTerem [Before]
Bikoret VeUtopia [Criticism and Utopia]
Bitzaron [Citadel]
Cathedra [Chair]
Dapim LeHˆeker HaShoah VeHaMered [Dapim: Studies on the Holocaust
and the Revolt]
Davar [Thing]
Dorot [Generations]
Gesher [Bridge]
HaAretz [The Country]
Hagar [Hagar]
HaTzofeh [The Observer]
Ha’Umma [Nation]
Hazut [Aspect]
HaMizraˆh HeHˆadash [The New East, i.e., Journal of the Israel Oriental
Society]
Jama’a [Group]
La-Merhav [To the Area]
Ma‘ariv [Evening]
Maˆhberot LeMeˆhkar U’LeVikoret [Notebooks for Research and
Criticism]
Medina, Mimshal, VeYaˆhasim Bein-Le’umiim [State, Government, and
International Relations]
Megamot [Currents]
Meˆhkarim Be-Geographya Historit-Yishuvit shel Eretz Yisrael [Historical
Geography Studies in the Settlement of Eretz-Israel]
x Hebrew Journal Titles Translated
Meˆhkarim BaGeographya shel Eretz Yisrael [Studies in the Geography of
Israel]
Merhavim [Spaces]
MiBifnim [From Inside]
MiKedem U’MiYam [From East and West]
Molad [Birth]
Moznayim [Scales]
Ner [Candle]
Orlogin [Timepiece]
Panim [Face]
Pe‘amim [Pulse]
Proza [Prose]
Riv‘on LeKalkala [Economic Quarterly]
Riv‘on LeMeˆhkar Hˆevrati [Social Studies Quarterly]
Shdemot [Fields]
Shivat Tziyon [Return to Zion]
Shorashim BaMizraˆh [Roots in the East]
Siman Kriah [Exclamation Mark]
Sulam [Ladder]
Tikkun [Correction]
Tkhelet [Azure]
Tziyonut [Zionism]
Yalkut Moreshet [Heritage Kit]
Yediot Aˆharonot [Latest News]
Zmanim [Times]
Benny Morris
Introduction
During the past two decades Israel has been undergoing a historiographic
revolution. Scholars in their hundreds have assailed the archives, and a tor-
rent of books, articles, and MA and PhD theses has poured forth. In-
evitably, a substantial part of this revolution has focused on the history of
Zionism and Israel, and particularly on the main foundational crises—the
first Arab-Israeli War of 1948, the Holocaust that preceded it, and the
traumatic waves of immigration that followed Israel’s establishment.
One may link the historiographic revolution to Israel’s growth.
Back in the early 1950s, there were about 1 million Israelis and a state
budget of 250 to 300 million dollars; today there are 6.5 million Israelis,
and a state budget of 30 to 40 billion dollars. Back then, there was one
university; today there are six with an additional two dozen or more un-
dergraduate colleges. The growth in spending on education and research
has been commensurate.
But the revolution also testifies to a radical intellectual change. In
the course of the 1970s and 1980s—as a result of natural processes of so-
cial and political maturation and a series of major political-military up-
heavals, including the 1973October War, the Israeli invasion of Lebanon
in 1982, and the first Palestinian Intifada of 1987–91—hearts and minds
grew more amenable to exploring in depth the history of the Zionist
enterprise and its conflict with the surrounding Arab world.
The revolution was no doubt spurred by the opening of archives and
the declassification of masses of documents in the West (in, among others,
Britain’s Public Record Office (PRO), the U.S. National Archives (NA),
and the United Nations Archives) relating to the Middle East and Pales-
tine/the Land of Israel in the 1940s and 1950s. But the key, of course, has
been the opening of Israeli archives, including the Israel State Archives
(ISA), the repository of the various ministries’ papers; the Central Zionist
Archives (CZA), which houses the Zionist movement’s and institutions’
papers; the Haganah and Israel Defense Forces (IDF) archives; and a host