Hebron: The 1929 pogrom and The Dhimmi Syndrome in Our Times[[1]]
By Attorney Elyakim Haetzni.
HaEtzni lives in Kiryat Arba and was a member of the Knesset. He is
one of the eight pioneers who initiated the re-establishment of the
Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria. Presently he is a member of
the board of the Yesha Council , the organization responsible for
Jewish communities in Judea, Samaria and Gaza. He has a regular
weekly column in Israel's largest newspaper, Yediot Aharonot (Latest
News).
On the 8th of August this year, it will be 80 years since the Arabs
started the pogroms against the Jews in Israel, in Hebron, Jerusalem,
Safed, Ber Tuvia and Hulda. The year was 1929 and the day was a
Jewish holy day, the Sabbath. Despite a wave of 12 massacres in the
country, the massacre in Hebron remains in the nation's collective
historical memory, and that not just because of the 67 victims. In
Jerusalem there were 34 killed, in Safed 17 and seven in Motza.
The pogrom in Hebron left an indelible impression, because it was a
pogrom with a similar connotation as in Chisinau, which the Jews
remember as "Slaughter City," Kishinev.[[2]] Hebron was a pogrom in
carried out in Eastern European style, a horror which shocked all
Jews who never expected such an atrocity could happen in Israel.
Arab violence against Jews in Israel took the the form of attacks,
arson and assassinations.[[3]] To confront this Arab terror, various
defense units were established, such as HaShomer.[[4]] However
people refused to realize, even in Israel, just as in the diaspora,
that Jews were murdered for no reason other than that they are Jews.
Accordingly they redefined reality and rather then refer to Arab
terror; they labeled the violence as "Arab riots". This terror was
excused as a reaction to the fulfillment of Zionism and was therefore
accepted as a 'political collision' between two peoples: the Arabs
and the Jews.
The defense units were regarded as a part of the Zionist-Israeli "new
Jewish syndrome." Jews move to Israel, settle the land, plow and
build, while simultaneously fighting to protect the Zionist project
"....who built the wall. When the pioneers took up their burden,
they worked with one hand, while holding a weapon in the other."
(Nehemiah 4:11)[[5]] This is the entire Zionist ethos in a nutshell:
the new Israeli continues his ancestor's heritage in the Land of
Israel. The Diaspora comes to an end: for thousands of years Jews
did not and could not carry weapons to defend themselves; they were
therefore treated as "sheep to slaughter" by their enemies.
This new self-image of the Jew who defends himself did not fit in the
pogroms of 1929. Therefore it was not easy to accept the fact that
the pogroms in Hebron were identical to the diaspora pogroms. The
result was denial of reality.
The non-Zionists and the anti-Zionists from the established Jewish
society also allowed themselves to be surprised. They saw the Arab
reaction as an uprising against Zionism, and something which was
primarily aimed against the "new" Jews who came to Israel for
political reasons. Therefore the Jews from the established Jewish
society did everything within their power to separate themselves from
"the other Jews" and thus distanced themselves from the essential
self-defense (Ha Shomer and Haganah), which were established by the
Zionists. They failed to let themselves be protected by the Haganah
and instead depended on the British police and on the good relations
with their Arab neighbors. They were very sure that the Arabs
differentiated between the anti-Zionists and the Zionist Jews.
The massacres on the established Jewish society as in Hebron,
Jerusalem and Safed, and the murder of Arab-speaking Jews and
Jewesses, who had Arabs as neighbors and business partners, shocked
the established Jewish community so deeply that none of them dared to
come back home to Hebron after the liberation in 1967, despite the
fact that their families had lived their from time immemorial.
A short time after moving to Kiryat Arba, I talked to an 80 year old
Arab in the Kasba sector of Hebron. We talked of the massacres of
1929. The man talked honestly. One proof of this was that he did
not use the "official" claim that the British had arranged the
pogroms by the mobs brought in from outside areas. He stated clearly
that the Arabs lived peacefully with the small Jewish religious
community, but at the same time ensured that the Jews "did not hold
their heads too high". He said further that when the new Yeshiva
(Bible school) was established ('Slobodka - Knesset Israel',
1924[[6]]) and when even students from the USA came there, the Arabs
felt that the "Zionist threat" had reached Hebron and therefore they
decided to put a stop to it. "I personally," said the Arab in a
serious and matter-of-factly way, like a mafia godfather, "had
nothing against the Jews in Hebron. One of the survivors, who fled
to Jerusalem, owed me a lot of money. The Jew arranged to send me
the money to last penny". I did not ask him why they felt the need
to massacre a non-zionist religious community. I could see that for
him all Jews were the same.
It looks like this apparent fact is still not understood by the Jews
in Israel, even today, 80 years after the massacre. I point this at
both the Jews who remain Zionists and the ultra-orthodox
proto-Zionists, those who belong to the established population and
the secular post-Zionists who today adopt the philosophy of the
establishment.
The Pogroms
The Hebron massacre was unique, primarily because the Jewish
religious community was completely wiped out as a result of the
pogrom (even though some Jews came back after the pogrom and were
there for a short period until the riots in 1936). The British
mandate's behaviour resembled very much the Czar's pogroms in
1881-1882 (called by the Jews "Sufot BaNegev", Desert Storm).
In both cases it was known beforehand that the pogroms were coming,
but nobody helped the Jews. In both cases the murderers were not
punished, but the Jews who tried to protect themselves were punished.
Everything that was stolen remained with the mob and the Jewish
possessions were regarded as ownerless. The compensation from the
British mandate authorities was an insult: The family of Rabbi
Hasson, whose house was plundered and destroyed, received 11.1 pounds
as compensation.
The religious Jewish community received 54 pounds for all their
buildings and possessions, whereas Asher Kalinsky, whose house was
razed to the ground, received 14 shillings, and Rabbi Dvortz received
2 pounds for his house which was burnt down and for one of his arms
which was hacked off. Very few received reasonable compensation. On
the other hand, 348 pounds was paid to advocate Hasan Albodeiri, an
Arab from Jerusalem, as compensation for his claim to a few private
possessions.[[7]] After this pogrom the Jewish graveyard was
desecrated and destroyed, the gravestones used as building materials.
Most of the houses and the land owned by the Jews were stolen by the
Arabs.
A similar phenomenon happened after the Holocaust: East European
countries still refuse to return plundered Jewish properties.
Museums in the "enlightened" western world keep the stolen art works
belonging to the Jews. Insurance companies and business enterprises
have enriched themselves on the plundered goods. Everybody treats
Jewish property as ownerless objects.[[8]]
Just as in the diaspora, a few just and honest people are found.
These are in both Ishmael and Esau. According to a list of the
massacre in Hebron, 19 Arabs were found to have saved 270 Jewish
lives. On a different list, confusingly similar to the first list,
28 Arabs are mentioned to have saved 435 lives. Malka Slonim and her
family were saved by a 75 year old neighbor, Abu Shachar: "He used
his body as a living shield against the murderers. The mob arrived
at our house and we heard Abu Shachar's voice: "Go away, you cannot
come here! You must kill me first." He was 75 years old but a strong
man. One of the mob took his sword and said: "I shall murder you,
traitor." Abu Shachar replied: "Go ahead and kill! Here is a Rabbi's
family and that is my family." The sword pierced Abu Shachar's foot,
but he did not move, even when the mob left the place. When we tried
to bring him inside for treatment, he refused for fear that they
would come back."
On the other side were the many so-called partners, "friends" and
neighbors who both plundered and murdered the Jews. Just as in the
diaspora, the thirst for Jewish blood in Hebron was beyond all
imagination. The poem by Hayyim Nahman Bialik, "City of Slaughter"
from 1904, could just as well have been written in 1929[[9]]:
[.] When you have come into the courtyard,
Shall you with your eyes see and with your hands feel.
On the fences, on the trees, on the stones and on the plaster of the walls
The dried blood and the brain matter of the massacred.
Your feet shall wade through piles
Of remains of destroyed books and [Torah]-scroll [.]
In Ze'evi's book about the Hebron massacre, quotes from 1929
newspaper clippings are found: In a memo that the Jewish religious
community sent to the British Chief Commissioner, it states:[[10]]
"... Rabbi Meir Castel, 69 years age and rabbi Zvi Dribkin 67 years
age, and five young men were attacked, castrated and murdered under
inhuman torture. The baker Noach Immerman was grilled alive over an
open fire. . The rabbi of Zichron Ya'akov, Avraham Ya'akov Orlansky
Hacohen, who came to pray in Hebron, was taken away in the middle of
prayer still wearing his prayer shawl. His brain was cut out and his
wife murdered by hacking her bowels to small pieces. [the doctor and]
pharmacist Gershon Ben Zion, who was dependent on the wheel-chair,
who had worked in Hebron for more than 40 years and who had
extensively helped the Arab population, got his nose and fingers cut
off before he was murdered. His daughters were raped and murdered
under cruel torture. Both of his wife's hands were hacked off and
she died in the hospital in Jerusalem. The 2 year old Menahem Segal
was beheaded. The teachers Haim-Eliezer Dobnikov and Yitzhak
Abushadid were murdered by hanging.
Eighteen year old Moshe (Ben Ya'akov) Gozlan was pierced through the
mouth (with a sword) and murdered. Six synagogues, two of which were
extremely old with 80 Torah rolls, were plundered and destroyed. The
ancient library, with many expensive and rare books, was plundered
and burnt. Many of the works were treated as rubbish...."[[11]]
In this book on Hebron there is a description about the baby boy
Menahem Segal. The father, Rabbi Nachman, held the boy in his arms.
The father's hand was hacked off, and then the father and the son
murdered with a sword. The mother lost three fingers. A yeshiva
student, Simcha-Yitzhak Broida, was hung by his legs from a window
and afterwards murdered.
In Haichal's house, where 10 Jews were hiding, the two Haichal
brothers came out and requested help from a British policeman. They
received no help, but a mob surrounded them and one of them, Israel
Haichal, was murdered on the spot, despite the fact that he was
surrounded by 5 policemen. His brother, Eliyahu Dov, ran towards a
police officer and held onto the neck of the horse. He was attacked
and killed with a sword and knives with the Arabs shrieking: "Does it
hurt, yes Jew?"
Alter Palatzi was murdered right before his daughter's eyes. His
mother tells about an Arab policeman who was standing nearby and
said: "Let them slaughter some Jews..." Human stomachs were opened.
The intestines cut into pieces. The heads were smashed and the
brains removed. Men were castrated before they were murdered. A
woman from Tel Aviv was hung upside down and her hair ripped from her
head. Rabbi Grodzensky's eyes were cut out before his head was
smashed. A girl was raped by 13 Arabs, right in front of her father,
before he too was murdered. Her mother and sister were seriously
mutilated. In the house of Abushadid's family, a baby was held by
the legs and struck against the wall smashing his head. Many people
had their eyes cut out before they were murdered. The description of
these misdeeds are found in above mentioned poem 'City of Slaughter':
In this violence two were beheaded: A Jew and his dog
And on the roofs shall they climb.here they found the axe.
A stomach which was opened and filled with feathers
Cases of noses nailed through, smashed in skulls
Cases of people hung from beams to be slaughtered
A woman under seven uncircumcised men
A daughter before her mother and a mother in fornt of her daughter
Before the slaughter, during the slaughter and after the slaughter.
O look at the dark nook
The men, the fiances and the brothers lay there and saw through the
hole in the wall
they lay there with their shame and did not shelter.
Bialik's sorrow could be written as if it was about Hebron's pogrom.
The biggest curse of the diaspora were the pogroms and they still
take place today, in the Land of Israel. This is the reason why many
Jews, from all groups have not been willing to face the reality.
This is because the brutality, the thirst for Jewish blood and the
uncontrolled lust to see humiliated, tortured and dying Jews, is
impossible to understand.
The pogromists in Hebron enjoyed the bloodshed of the Jews, rather
than the Zionist's blood, the old, the new, Ashkenazi and Sephardim,
religious as well as secular, Zionists and non-Zionists. In Hebron
the myth about "Iben el-balad" [Arabic: The country's son, one who
belongs to the country] was completely exploded. The illusion that
the local, Jewish population, which is connected to the Arabs and
their culture, and is secure under the Arabs protection, was
completely destroyed. The massacre undermined the illusion that
Zionism and its fulfillment in the Land of Israel had banished
Jew-hatred during the diaspora. The self-delusion that new, normal
conditions were created where the Jews were a part of the world
community, has proven to be utopic. There is no difference
between"the slaughter cities" Chisinau and Hebron.
80 years later a new wind blows about the "integrating the
countryside", in spite of the fact that thousands of Jewish civilians
and soldiers have been, and are being killed in this country, in this
century and the previous one- by the Arabs. But every effort to
learn by these experiences is defined as "paranoia" or
"Auschwitz-complex". We must take into consideration this phenomenon
and its bright side, more than its dark side. Once again it is
necessary to formulate our thoughts about this country and whether it
is correct that Zionism has created a gentile bastard of a Jew, a
"Jewish goy".
In spite of all the brutality which again and again has been used
against the Jews, and only against the Jews, it has not caused most
of the Jews to realise its true cause. I have therefore dared to
describe parts of the pogrom in detail; despite the fact that
psychologically it has been very difficult for me.
However, this was not understood. On the contrary, the extreme
Jewish left, both in Israel and the diaspora, deny the reality and
ignore the thirst for Jewish blood which is found all over in the
Arab world and in the Islamic East. To speak of this fact is
politically incorrect, regardless of how many Arabs are found with
knives in their hands and with their mouths have said the simple
message: "We wish to murder a Jew"; not a soldier, not a settler, not
an enemy but - "a Jew "!
In one place is found a list of all humanities material and spiritual
needs. Love and hate, food and sex, compassion and revenge, building
and destroying etc. Up high on the list is found the lust for Jewish
blood. A new-born baby has something which many would like to have:
Jewish blood! In many cases this is an uncontrollable lust.
Therefore it is necessary that all who have Jewish blood in their
veins, and who want to survive, to be on guard, suspicious, careful
and all the time awake and to take care of their own blood. This
must be protected like a treasure in a bank vault, without any
illusions. Their country must be armed to the teeth, and there
should be no cutbacks on security. No price is worth it. Not even
the "Peace Prize". " ... and you took care of your souls."
(Deuteronomy 4:15; Joshua 23:11)
The Jewish mutation
Two Israeli film producers, No'it and Dan Geva, have made a film:
"Things I saw in Hebron". They were interviewed by journalist Neri
Livne in connection with this film.[[12]] No'it Geva's grandmother
was the granddaughter of Rabbi Eliyahu Manni, Hebron's past Sephardi
chief rabbi. No'it tells that at her parent's home (her father is
professor in biology and her mother is a lecturer in literature)
"...it was forbidden to speak of Hebron just as it was forbidden to
speak of the Holocaust, because my mother survived the Holocaust...."
Where else in the world can one find a better example which fits a
social anthropological observation like No'it's? She is an "Israeli"
according to the word's leftist-oriented meaning and a synthesis of
the two exterminations - one in Hebron and the other in Europe.
One day No'it found a letter her grandmother Zmira, as a 16 year old
and just after the August massacres in 1929, had written to the
newspaper Ha'aretz. Because of the letter No'it and her husband
decided to make a film about the Arab who saved Zmira's life, with
the aim to strengthen the left wing's views about the Arab-Jewish
conflict. But as No'it states: "The result was something else..."
In the letter, the grandmother Zmira writes what she saw from the
kitchen window on the day of the massacre. A large crowd of Arabs
gathered together, armed with stones, sticks and swords. She
witnessed Arabs returning from Jewish homes, carrying packages which
they gave to the women who ran to hide them. The Jews who hid in
cellars and under ruins survived. Zmira's family lived on the fourth
floor. She heard screams and desperate shouts for help from the
first floor. Stones were thrown into her apartment, and at the same
time an Arab entered with his brother and son, who with a sword in
hand came to help them.
On the way out she stumbled over a body. It was her neighbor, the
teacher Abraham. "His head was thrown down the stairway while the
body was still lying there in convulsions. Blood was squirting out
from the stomach where a dagger had struck."
No'it states that she knew nothing of the Hebron massacre before she
decided to make the film, but now she knows that there were Arabs who
saved Jews.
"But I also know that except for the Holocaust, the Hebron massacre
was the worst which was done to the Jews. . when we made the film we
included the most brutal attacks.and I only said "an odd death" when
I referred to a 13 year old Jewish girl who was raped by 13 Arabs and
then hung with her head above the fire to be burnt alive. We did the
same when it came to describe the castration of the old and the
children, cutting off of limbs and the tearing out of the eyes of
living humans."
So continues No'it and asks the same question I asked: "The pogrom is
one thing, let us assume that the mob was provoked. that many Arabs
were murdered in Jerusalem and that many Ashkenazi Jews came there,
who wanted to steal from them, but why the castrations? Rapes?
Tearing out of eyes? And the hacking off of hands and feet?"
No'it's method of rationalising these cruelties is an explanatory
testimony of the behaviour of many in the Jewish society of today's
Israel: "Also on our side are good and evil people to be found." She
quotes someone who said that "Goldstein's murder of the Arabs
finished the massacre in Hebron." She is not contemplating revenge
with this remark, but criminals are found on both sides!
The film shows one of the survivors of the pogrom, who falsely
alleged that Moshe Dayan had sent a directive forbidding Jews from
returning their homes in Hebron. No'it's film also shows Id Zeiton,
the son of the Arab who helped No'it's grandmother Zimra.
He alleges in the film that the IDF (Israel's military) confiscated
his house for a Jewish kindergarten! "Thus was a family thanked for
saving Jewish lives." With magnanimity he invites No'it to "come and
live in Hebron. If the Jews who earlier lived here continued to live
here, and not the settlers, it would be very nice to live here."
But No'it does not ask questions and the good-hearted Id does not
explain why the Arabs murdered in 1929 "the Jews who lived there at
that time," for they certainly were not settlers. No'it's father, in
a polite way, declines the invitation and identifies himself entirely
with the Arab side:
"In the present political situation.it is not possible to live in
Hebron. He (the father) knows that his prospective return to Hebron
will be considered as a support to the settlers, whom he completely
opposes," says No'it.
Thus we are reverted back 80 years in time. At that time some of the
Jews thought that they and the Arabs were on the same side. At that
time there were no "settlers" on the other side, only the Zionists.
No'it represents the same attitudes as these Jews had, who readily
queued up as lambs to the slaughter.
At that time there were 1,000 Jews in Hebron, today there are more
than 5 million Jews in Israel. Nevertheless we are facing the same
threat. It is neither the Arabs' sword nor the rockets, but it is
the self-destructive Jewish mentality which is bringing catastrophe
after catastrophe. Those who are destroying from the inside have
fortunately not managed to destroy everything. The majority is still
not infected with the Jewish self-hate and love of the enemy.
Eighty years later the "1929 syndrome" still continues. Jewish blood
is still in demand amongst our enemies. The whole world's nuclear
weapons or ballistic missiles cannot help us, if we do not exert
ourselves and fight against this syndrome
Notes
----------------------------------------------------------
----------
[[1]] Ed.: Islam defines non-Muslims as a second-class citizens,
termed Dhimmi. The term Dhimmi also describes a state of mind of
non-Muslims, who mentally accept their oppression by Muslims.
The term 'Dhimmi Syndrome' that Elyakim Haetzni is using in this
paper refers to a slave mentality and the submission that the left
wing in Israel, and in the Western World generally have towards the
Muslims, accepting their dominance, even though Islam (still) doesn't
rule the world.Left wing Westerners fighting against their own people
for the so-called "human rights of the Arabs", are not motivated by
justice and moral, but rather by their own Dhimmi mentality. The
driving force is a slave state of mind which is a result of fear from
the superior Muslim masters, and submission to him. Dhimmi mentality
is a clinical condition that has been embedded in the soul of the
non-Muslims dhimmi over hundred of years.
Bat Ye'or defined dhimmitude as the condition and experience of those
who are subject to dhimma, and thus not synonymous to, but rather a
subset of the dhimma phenomenon: "dhimmitude [...] represents a
behavior dictated by fear (terrorism), pacifism when aggressed,
rather than resistance, servility because of cowardice and
vulnerability. [...] By their peaceful surrender to the Islamic
army, they obtained the security for their life, belongings and
religion, but they had to accept a condition of inferiority,
spoliation and humiliation."
(www.rutherford.org/Oldspeak/Articles/Interviews/Bat-Yeor.html;
www.dhimmi.org)
A Dhimmi is a non-Muslim subject of a state governed in accordance
with Shari'a law. Muslim scholars have formulated the Dhimmi status
for all non Muslims living under Muslim law. This law, also known as
Omar's covenant I (634-644) or Omar's covenant II (717-720), defines
the special taxes (Jizya) non-Muslims are obligated to pay and refers
to their second degree status in the Muslim society, which they could
easily avoid by converting to Islam.
Dhimmi status was in use in North Africa until European colonialists
took over the area. In Persia and in Yemen the Dhimmi status was
applied until the late 19th century. It was not until 1856, and
after pressure from the West, that the Ottoman Empire finally was
forced to abolish the Dhimmi status from its law. In practice, all
non-Muslims, who are classified as infidels, are still defined as
Dhimmis of the Arab and the Muslim world.
[[2]] Ed.: This is a Jewish term dealing with the pogroms in East
Europe and describes the conditiond of the cities after the
massacres. The Jewish author Hayyim Nahman Bialik wrote an important
poem: The City of Slaughter, in 1904, - about the pogroms in Chisinau
(Kishinev; earlier in Russia, now in Moldovia) where 50 Jews were
massacred.
[[3]] Ed.: Haetzni refers here to the situation in Israel around
1900, when the Zionists started returning to the fatherland, Israel,
after the pogroms in East Europe. There they met the established
Jewish community which in Hebrew is called "Hayeshuv hayashan". That
which arose around 1880 is called "hayeshuv hachadash", the new
Jewish community. The anti-Zionists (who today call themselves
post-Zionists) were found in both camps. The Arabs did not
differentiate, and many of the massacred in the pogroms 1929-1936
were Jews who had lived in Israel from ancient times, as well as the
newly-arrived Jews.
[[4]] Ed.: HaShomer was a self-defense organisation which was
established by the Jews in Israel under the Ottoman Empire. Their
objective was to protect the Jewish settlements against the daily
plundering and assassinations, which the Arabs did to the Jews.
Amongst the most important persons who established the group were
Yitzhak Ben-Zvi (later president of Israel), Alexander Zeid, Yisrael
Schochat and Yisrael Galili. HaShomer's motto was: "In blood and
fire Judea fell; in blood and fire Judea will rise". In the First
World War the Turks executed some of the members and forcibly
deported many from Israel. After the British took over in Israel,
the HaShomer was expanded and renamed Haganah. The settlements Tel
Adashim, Tel Hai and Kfar Giladi were established by HaShomer. As
late as 1976 a large weapons arsenal was found hidden under the
carpentry workshop. Today it is open for tourists and school
children.
[[5]] Ed.: In the Hebrew origianal it is found in Nehemiah 4:11, but
in the Norwegian edition it is in 4:17.
[[6]] Ed.: In 1924 a part of the world famous yeshiva, 'Knesset
Israel' moved from the city Slobodka in Litauen to Hebron. The Bible
school, along with its rabbis and students who came from all parts of
the world, meant a lot to the Jewish community's life in Hebron. The
admission requirements were very high and the students prepared
themselves for many years before they got admission. The fact that
the yeshiva chose to establish in Hebron shows how important Hebron
is for the Jews and for the Jewish identity.
[[7]] William B. Ziff, 'The Rape of Palestine', New York, 1940.
[[8]] Ed.: Prominent Norwegians also made good money from the
plundering of the Jews. Even as early as the Krystallnatten the Jews
were plundered by the Nazis. The Jewish properties and artworks were
sold, among other reasons, for financing the armament and the
imminent occupation (including Norway). The paintings, which the
Nazis sold a few weeks later, ended up, among others with shipowners
Thomas Olsen and Niels Werring, cf. Dagens Næringsliv 31.12.2002;
www.dn.no/arkiv/article40050.ece
[[9]] Ed.: Israels national poet.
[[10]] Rehavam Zeevi, Hebron-massacre 1929, Havatzelet, 1994, Hebrew.
[[11]] Ed.: It was found later that at least 80 Torah rolls were
desecrated and destroyed in this pogrom. More Torah rolls than Jews
were destroyed in this pogrom, which indicates the murderers clear
intentions.
[[12]] The newspaper Ha'aretz, 9.7.1999.
Received by email from the author ehaetzni@netvision.net.il
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