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From the start of political Zionism in the 1890s, Haredi leaders voiced objection to its secular orientation and before the establishment of the State of Israel, the majority of Haredi Jews were opposed to Zionism. This was chiefly due to the concern that secular nationalism would replace the Jewish faith and the observance of religion, and the view that it was forbidden for the Jews to reconstitute Jewish rule in the Land of Israel before the arrival of the Messiah. In 1889, Rabbi Joseph Dov Soloveichik had proclaimed early Zionist initiatives as resembling the 17th-century false messianic sect headed by Sabbatai Zevi. His son Rabbi Hayyim Soloveichik further warned: "The people of Israel should take care not to join a venture that threatens their souls, to destroy religion, and is a stumbling block to the House of Israel." [10] When the Zionists in Brisk claimed that Zionism would stem the tide of Jewish assimilation, Soloveichik felt that what mattered most for Judaism was the quality, not the quantity.[11] Powerful condemnations of political Zionism continued into the twentieth century. In 1903, Rabbi Sholom Dovber Schneersohn of Lubavitch published Kuntres Uma'ayan, which contained a strong polemic against Zionism. He opposed the Religious Zionist movement and was deeply concerned that secular nationalism would replace Judaism as the foundation of Jewish identity. [12] Rabbi Baruch Halberstam (d. 1906) took a leading role in opposing Zionism, in line with the position held by his father, Hayyim Halberstam of Sanz. [13] In 1912, Orthodox leaders in Europe founded the Agudath Israel organisation which hoped to find a "solution to all the problems facing the Jewish people in the Spirit of the Torah." From the outset, the Agudah vehemently opposed the Zionist movement for replacing the historic religious bond to the land of Israel with secular nationalism. [14] Rabbi Isaac Breuer implored Agudah members in 1934 "not to leave Jewish history to the Zionists," Others remained staunchly opposed, chief among them the rabbi of Munkács, Chaim Elazar Spira (d. 1937) who was the fiercest opponent of Zionism among Hasidic rabbis.[17] Spira saw Zionism as a denial of the Divine Redemption and faith in the Messiah. In 1936, he initiated a publication against the Zionist enterprise which was endorsed by 150 rabbis. [18] During the wartime period, Rabbi Elchonon Wasserman (1875-1941) of Baranowicze wrote a pamphlet in which he blamed the Zionists for the persecution of Jews in Europe. [19] He rejected the notion that a secular Jewish state could be considered the "advent of Redemption." *We Jews were driven away from the Holy Land and scattered all over the world because we had fallen short of the task God conferred upon us. We had been chosen by Him to preach his word, but in our stubborn pride, we began to believe that He had made us a chosen nation for our own sake and thus we betrayed Him." Dutch Rabbi Jacob de Haan the first attributed victim of Zionist terrorists in 1924 A Jew should rather give up his life than attempt to end exile by conquering the Holy Land. writes Czechoslovakian Rabbi and pivotal medieval Jewish leader Netzach Yisroel 1525-1609 "During the reign of Hadrian when the uprising led by Bar Kochba proved a disastrous error, it became essential that the Jewish people be reminded for all times of an important essential fact, namely that [the people of] Israel must never again attempt to restore its national independence by its own power; it was to entrust its future as a nation solely to Divine Providence:" Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch (German Jewish leader 1808 - 1888) in Hirsch Siddur, 1965: p.703 Again Rabbi Hirsch writes, "We mourn over that which brought about that destruction [of the Temple] we take to heart the harshness we have encountered in our years of wandering as the chastisement of a father, imposed on us for our improvement, and we mourn the lack of observance of Torah which that ruin has brought about. . . This destruction obliges us to allow our longing for the far away land to express itself only in mourning, in wishing and hoping; and only through the honest fulfillment of all Jewish duties to await the realization of this hope. But it forbids us to strive for the reunion or possession of the land by any but spiritual means." (Horeb 1981: p.461)? Within Palestine itself, the Old Yishuv was alarmed by the influx of non-religious Jews who wished to establish a secular state in the Holy Land. [23] The chief rabbi of the Ashkenazi community in Jerusalem, Rabbi Joseph Hayyim Sonnenfeld, often referred to the Zionists as "evil men and ruffians" and claimed that "Hell had entered the Land of Israel with Herzl." [24] Sonnenfeld did not want the Orthodox Jewish community to become subject to secular Zionist authority. [25] The spokesman for the anti-Zionist Ashkenazi community in Jerusalem, Dr Jacob Israël de Haan, endeavoured to form an alliance with the Arab nationalist leadership and hoped to reach an agreement that would allow unrestricted Jewish settlement in Arab lands in return for the relinquishment of Jewish political aspirations. In June 1924, de Haan was assassinated by the Haganah after having conveyed his proposals to King Hussein and his sons, Faisal and Abdullah.[23] The conflict between the resident orthodox Jews and the ambitions of Zionists increased as Zionist actions became more and more militant and violent exposing the entire Jewish community to reprisals and violence. Below is an account of the Hebron massacre again outlaying the differences between the Jews who lived peaceably in Palestine before the Zionists came and their terrorist ambitions. Account of Rabbi and eminent Jewish scholar Baruk Kaplan present at the yeshiva during the 1929 Hebron massacre. Rabbi Kaplan eventually became the principal of one of the finest Jewish girl's schools in New York and is regarded within the Jewish community as an academic authority beyond reproach or accusations of misrepresentation. "I would like to describe the error that is spread in Jewish communities. A horrible error that accuses the Arabs in Hebron of being killers who attacked the Jews simply because the Arabs were bad people. In order to correct the record this error must be corrected. The Arabs were very friendly people and the Jews in Hebron lived very well with them and had very friendly relations with them. To take just one example I used to have the habit of walking a mile or two out of town all by myself to visit a tree which is believed to be the tree where our patriarch Abraham met the three angels as described in Genesis. I especially enjoyed visiting the tree in the summer time. Along the way I would talk to the Arabs using mostly my hands because I spoke no Arabic. Interestingly enough no one in the yeshiva every told me it was dangerous to go by myself among the Arabs. We just lived with them and got along very fine. I have also seen a letter by the Grand Rabbi of the Ghera Hasidim at that time Rabbi Abram Martray elder who has memory of Poland regarding his trip to the Holy Land during the days when people were talking about emigrating to Palestine. He wanted to find out what kind of people the Palestinians were in order to be able to advise people whether to move there or not. He wrote in his letter that the Arabs were a very fine and friendly people. Therefore it is necessary to set the record straight about the accusation that the Palestinians were terrible people who liked attacking Jews. This was never the situation at all. Today’s wicked Zionists are just like their predecessors who are responsible for causing terrible suffering in Palestine with their wars against the Arabs. May G-d have mercy. At the time in 1929 the Zionists had a slogan arguing that the western wall was a Jewish national symbol. Of course the Arabs disagreed with this idea considering that they had enjoyed control over the location for over one thousand one hundred years. However the Zionist mobs were yelling 'the wall is ours'. It's hard to understand why they felt that way considering to have no connection to the Jewish holy places whatsoever. An argument errupted in the Jewish newspapers about establishing a permanent prayer area for Jews at the wall. This provoked the Arabs and the Rabbi of Jerusalem at the time Chaim Josef Sonderfeld begged them to stop and be appreciative to the Arabs for allowing Jews to pray at the wall for so many centuries undisturbed however the Zionists wanted a permanent set up under their control. This began the conflict at the time between the Zionists and the Arabs. After we were studying at the yeshiva in Hebron and saw a bunch of boys in short pants carrying weapons on bicycles and motorcycles running around the streets of Hebron. We were very worried about this. What were they up to? In brief our Rabbi the supervisor of our religious academy Moshe Hetreps called them for a meeting but they refused. He was forced to go over to them and ask them what they were up to. He accused them of wanting to provoke the Arabs. They responded that they were coming to protect us. We cried out ‘woe are us, G-d have mercy.’ They didn’t want to leave town until it was too late. These arrogant cowards only ran away when the local Arab leaders called for a mass meeting of the people from the surrounding Arab villages but it was too late. The Arabs got organised and the Mufti called upon his people to be ready Friday night when the yeshiva would be attending prayers. At this point the Yeshiva was alone against the Zionists but the Arabs didn’t know to distinguish between us and the Zionists. Sadly they attacked and killed some of our people including the great scholar Joshua Rosenhaus. The next morning we heard the excitement in town and even worse we heard the crying and shouting. I and a friend lived in an apartment that was a part of a three storey building leased by a Jew from an Arab. We could hear all the noise from our apartment on the third floor. We were terrified to let the Arabs in because we knew how angry they had become but a while later things calmed down. In total some sixty five people were killed. On the other side of town however the Jews were spared. Why am I telling you about this story? It’s because I want to expose how the wicked Zionists both today and in those days were the cause of our suffering. They cooperated with the Nazis, Our religion teaches us that a person who causes someone to sin is worse than the sinner who kills. A state (of affairs) that killed the Judaism of the Yemenite and Moroccan Jews of many other Sephardic Jews. This is the work of these thugs and gangsters. Everyone must know that the anger of the Arabs against us is only caused by the Zionists. The Arabs were a friendly people to us and I am a witness to it. We lived very well with them in Hebron and I will attest to this as well. It is the accursed Zionists who caused them to hate us. The Zionists dared to use their power to expel the Arabs and even today in the Lebanon they kill and butcher Arabs. They wipe out whole villages with their aeroplanes, Everyone should know who the murderers are. The Zionists are the biggest murderers in the world who refuse to let the Jews live in peace either spiritually or physically." "I dislike the coercive methods of Zionists who in this country have not hesitated to use economic means to silence persons who have different views. I object to the attempts at character assassination of those who do not agree with them." Arthur Hays Sulzberger in Washington Report on Middle Eastern Affairs 1946 "the honour of Jews throughout the world demands the renunciation of political Zionism" Sir Isaac Isaacs 1946 Isaacs' main objections to Political Zionism were:- 1. "A negation of Democracy, and an attempt to revert to the Church-State of bygone ages. 2. Provocative anti-Semitism. 3. Unwarranted by the Balfour Declaration, the Mandate, or any other right; contrary to Zionist assurances to Britain and to the Arabs and in present conditions unjust to other Palestinians politically and to other religions. 4. As regards unrestricted immigration, a discriminatory and an undemocratic camouflage for a Jewish State. 5. An obstruction to the consent of the Arabs to the peaceful and prosperous settlement in Palestine of hundreds of thousands of suffering European Jews, the victims of Nazi atrocities; and provocative of Moslem antagonism within and beyond the Empire, and consequently a danger to its integrity and safety. 6. Inconsistent in demanding on one hand, on a basis of a separate Jewish nationality everywhere Jews are found, Jewish domination in Palestine, and at the same time claiming complete Jewish equality elsewhere than in Palestine, on the basis of a nationality common to the citizens of every faith."[19] Political Zionism is an agency of big business. It is being used by Jewish and Christian financiers in this country and Great Britain, to make Jews believe that Palestine will be ruled by a descendant of King David who will ultimately rule the world. What seclusion! It will lead to war between Arabs and Jews and eventually to war between Moslems and non-Moslems. That will be the turning point of history. Henry H. Klein, “A Jew Warns Jews,” published 1947. "the Zionist movement as a whole...now places its own unwarranted interpretation on the Balfour Declaration, and makes demands that are arousing the antagonism of the Moslem world of nearly 400 millions endangering world peace and imperiling some of the most sacred associations of the Jewish, Christian, and Moslem faiths. Besides their inherent injustice to others these demands would, I believe, seriously and detrimentally affect the general position of Jews throughout the world.." [20]Sir Isaac Isaacs p.8-9 1946 One of the most notorious acts of terrorism by Zionist forces was the Deir Yassin Massacre but yet again we find them in conflict with orthodox Jews who at considerable risk to themselves were able to prevent further killing. The main difference between orthodox Jews and Zionists seems to be that Jews cannot simply turn their morals off like a switch and find the violence and deceit of Zionism to be morally repugnant and an offence against God when carried out in their name as many of their leaders have made clear. Haredim have always opposed Zionism despite the fact that they were the vast majority of victims of the holocaust. Meir Pa'il, a Palmach intelligence officer visited the village of Deir Yassin on April 9th to observe the operation on behalf of the Haganah: The dissidents [Irgun and Lehi] were going about the village robbing and stealing everything: Chickens, radio sets, sugar, money, gold and more ... Each dissident walked about the village dirty with blood and proud of the number of persons he had killed. Their lack of education and intelligence as compared to our soldiers [i.e., the Haganah] was apparent... In one of the houses at the centre of the village were assembled some 200 women and small children. The women sat quietly and didn't utter a word. When I arrived, the "commander" explained that they intended to kill all of them. [But] in the evening I heard that the women and children had been transported and released in Musrara.[41] "For the entire day of April 9, 1948, Irgun and LEHI soldiers carried out the slaughter in a cold and premeditated fashion...The attackers lined men, women and children up against the walls and shot them ... The ruthlessness of the attack on Deir Yassin shocked Jewish and world opinion alike, drove fear and panic into the Arab population, and led to the flight of unarmed civilians from their homes all over the country." Pa'il writes that *the Haredi people of Givat Shaul came to help the villagers at around 2 p.m., and were able to stop the killing :[42] [A] crowd of people from Givat Shaul, with peyot (earlocks), most of them religious, came into the village and started yelling "gazlanim" "rotzchim"—(thieves, murderers) "we had an agreement with this village. It was quiet. Why are you murdering them?" They were Chareidi (orthodox) Jews. This is one of the nicest things I can say about Hareidi [sic] Jews. These people from Givat Shaul gradually approached and entered the village, and the Lehi and Irgun people had no choice, they had to stop. It was about 2:00 or 3:00 PM. Then the Lehi and Irgun gathered about 250 people, most of them women, children and elderly people in a school house. Later the building became a "Beit Habad"—"Habad House." They were debating what to do with them. There was a great deal of yelling. The dissidents were yelling "Let's blow up the schoolhouse with everyone in it" and the Givat Shaul people were yelling "thieves and murderers—don't do it" and so on. Finally they put the prisoners from the schoolhouse on four trucks and drove them to the Arab quarter of Jerusalem near the Damascus gate. I left after the fourth truck went out. It was Friday afternoon. It must have been about 4:00–5:00 P.M because the religious people had begun leaving to prepare for the Sabbath.[1? When considering the invasion of Palestine David Bengurion and Moshe Sharret realised there would be retaliations made against Jews abroad but their loyalties were to Zionism not Judaism. "I am unwilling to forego even one percent of Zionism for peace" David Bengurion Shabtai Teveth p.70 1925 "The most valuable part of the Jewish nation is already in Palestine, and those Jews living outside Palestine are not too important." Chaim Weizmann in Ten Questions to the Zionists 1942 "If Rabbi Kaplan really wanted to know what happened, we old Jewish settlers in Palestine who witnessed the fight could tell him how and in what manner we, Jews, forced the Arabs to leave cities and villages ... some of them were driven out by force of arms; others were made to leave by deceit, lying and false promises. It is enough to cite the cities of Jaffa, Lydda, Ramleh, Beersheba, Acre from among numberless others." Nathan Chofshi in The Other Exodus 9th February 1959
From the start of political Zionism in the 1890s, Haredi leaders voiced objection to its secular orientation and before the establishment of the State of Israel, the majority of Haredi Jews were opposed to Zionism. This was chiefly due to the concern that secular nationalism would replace the Jewish faith and the observance of religion, and the view that it was forbidden for the Jews to reconstitute Jewish rule in the Land of Israel before the arrival of the Messiah. In 1889, Rabbi Joseph Dov Soloveichik had proclaimed early Zionist initiatives as resembling the 17th-century false messianic sect headed by Sabbatai Zevi. His son Rabbi Hayyim Soloveichik further warned: "The people of Israel should take care not to join a venture that threatens their souls, to destroy religion, and is a stumbling block to the House of Israel." [10] When the Zionists in Brisk claimed that Zionism would stem the tide of Jewish assimilation, Soloveichik felt that what mattered most for Judaism was the quality, not the quantity.[11] Powerful condemnations of political Zionism continued into the twentieth century. In 1903, Rabbi Sholom Dovber Schneersohn of Lubavitch published Kuntres Uma'ayan, which contained a strong polemic against Zionism. He opposed the Religious Zionist movement and was deeply concerned that secular nationalism would replace Judaism as the foundation of Jewish identity. [12] Rabbi Baruch Halberstam (d. 1906) took a leading role in opposing Zionism, in line with the position held by his father, Hayyim Halberstam of Sanz. [13] In 1912, Orthodox leaders in Europe founded the Agudath Israel organisation which hoped to find a "solution to all the problems facing the Jewish people in the Spirit of the Torah." From the outset, the Agudah vehemently opposed the Zionist movement for replacing the historic religious bond to the land of Israel with secular nationalism. [14] Rabbi Isaac Breuer implored Agudah members in 1934 "not to leave Jewish history to the Zionists," Others remained staunchly opposed, chief among them the rabbi of Munkács, Chaim Elazar Spira (d. 1937) who was the fiercest opponent of Zionism among Hasidic rabbis.[17] Spira saw Zionism as a denial of the Divine Redemption and faith in the Messiah. In 1936, he initiated a publication against the Zionist enterprise which was endorsed by 150 rabbis. [18] During the wartime period, Rabbi Elchonon Wasserman (1875-1941) of Baranowicze wrote a pamphlet in which he blamed the Zionists for the persecution of Jews in Europe. [19] He rejected the notion that a secular Jewish state could be considered the "advent of Redemption." *We Jews were driven away from the Holy Land and scattered all over the world because we had fallen short of the task God conferred upon us. We had been chosen by Him to preach his word, but in our stubborn pride, we began to believe that He had made us a chosen nation for our own sake and thus we betrayed Him." Dutch Rabbi Jacob de Haan the first attributed victim of Zionist terrorists in 1924 A Jew should rather give up his life than attempt to end exile by conquering the Holy Land. writes Czechoslovakian Rabbi and pivotal medieval Jewish leader Netzach Yisroel 1525-1609 "During the reign of Hadrian when the uprising led by Bar Kochba proved a disastrous error, it became essential that the Jewish people be reminded for all times of an important essential fact, namely that [the people of] Israel must never again attempt to restore its national independence by its own power; it was to entrust its future as a nation solely to Divine Providence:" Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch (German Jewish leader 1808 - 1888) in Hirsch Siddur, 1965: p.703 Again Rabbi Hirsch writes, "We mourn over that which brought about that destruction [of the Temple] we take to heart the harshness we have encountered in our years of wandering as the chastisement of a father, imposed on us for our improvement, and we mourn the lack of observance of Torah which that ruin has brought about. . . This destruction obliges us to allow our longing for the far away land to express itself only in mourning, in wishing and hoping; and only through the honest fulfillment of all Jewish duties to await the realization of this hope. But it forbids us to strive for the reunion or possession of the land by any but spiritual means." (Horeb 1981: p.461)? Within Palestine itself, the Old Yishuv was alarmed by the influx of non-religious Jews who wished to establish a secular state in the Holy Land. [23] The chief rabbi of the Ashkenazi community in Jerusalem, Rabbi Joseph Hayyim Sonnenfeld, often referred to the Zionists as "evil men and ruffians" and claimed that "Hell had entered the Land of Israel with Herzl." [24] Sonnenfeld did not want the Orthodox Jewish community to become subject to secular Zionist authority. [25] The spokesman for the anti-Zionist Ashkenazi community in Jerusalem, Dr Jacob Israël de Haan, endeavoured to form an alliance with the Arab nationalist leadership and hoped to reach an agreement that would allow unrestricted Jewish settlement in Arab lands in return for the relinquishment of Jewish political aspirations. In June 1924, de Haan was assassinated by the Haganah after having conveyed his proposals to King Hussein and his sons, Faisal and Abdullah.[23] The conflict between the resident orthodox Jews and the ambitions of Zionists increased as Zionist actions became more and more militant and violent exposing the entire Jewish community to reprisals and violence. Below is an account of the Hebron massacre again outlaying the differences between the Jews who lived peaceably in Palestine before the Zionists came and their terrorist ambitions. Account of Rabbi and eminent Jewish scholar Baruk Kaplan present at the yeshiva during the 1929 Hebron massacre. Rabbi Kaplan eventually became the principal of one of the finest Jewish girl's schools in New York and is regarded within the Jewish community as an academic authority beyond reproach or accusations of misrepresentation. "I would like to describe the error that is spread in Jewish communities. A horrible error that accuses the Arabs in Hebron of being killers who attacked the Jews simply because the Arabs were bad people. In order to correct the record this error must be corrected. The Arabs were very friendly people and the Jews in Hebron lived very well with them and had very friendly relations with them. To take just one example I used to have the habit of walking a mile or two out of town all by myself to visit a tree which is believed to be the tree where our patriarch Abraham met the three angels as described in Genesis. I especially enjoyed visiting the tree in the summer time. Along the way I would talk to the Arabs using mostly my hands because I spoke no Arabic. Interestingly enough no one in the yeshiva every told me it was dangerous to go by myself among the Arabs. We just lived with them and got along very fine. I have also seen a letter by the Grand Rabbi of the Ghera Hasidim at that time Rabbi Abram Martray elder who has memory of Poland regarding his trip to the Holy Land during the days when people were talking about emigrating to Palestine. He wanted to find out what kind of people the Palestinians were in order to be able to advise people whether to move there or not. He wrote in his letter that the Arabs were a very fine and friendly people. Therefore it is necessary to set the record straight about the accusation that the Palestinians were terrible people who liked attacking Jews. This was never the situation at all. Today’s wicked Zionists are just like their predecessors who are responsible for causing terrible suffering in Palestine with their wars against the Arabs. May G-d have mercy. At the time in 1929 the Zionists had a slogan arguing that the western wall was a Jewish national symbol. Of course the Arabs disagreed with this idea considering that they had enjoyed control over the location for over one thousand one hundred years. However the Zionist mobs were yelling 'the wall is ours'. It's hard to understand why they felt that way considering to have no connection to the Jewish holy places whatsoever. An argument errupted in the Jewish newspapers about establishing a permanent prayer area for Jews at the wall. This provoked the Arabs and the Rabbi of Jerusalem at the time Chaim Josef Sonderfeld begged them to stop and be appreciative to the Arabs for allowing Jews to pray at the wall for so many centuries undisturbed however the Zionists wanted a permanent set up under their control. This began the conflict at the time between the Zionists and the Arabs. After we were studying at the yeshiva in Hebron and saw a bunch of boys in short pants carrying weapons on bicycles and motorcycles running around the streets of Hebron. We were very worried about this. What were they up to? In brief our Rabbi the supervisor of our religious academy Moshe Hetreps called them for a meeting but they refused. He was forced to go over to them and ask them what they were up to. He accused them of wanting to provoke the Arabs. They responded that they were coming to protect us. We cried out ‘woe are us, G-d have mercy.’ They didn’t want to leave town until it was too late. These arrogant cowards only ran away when the local Arab leaders called for a mass meeting of the people from the surrounding Arab villages but it was too late. The Arabs got organised and the Mufti called upon his people to be ready Friday night when the yeshiva would be attending prayers. At this point the Yeshiva was alone against the Zionists but the Arabs didn’t know to distinguish between us and the Zionists. Sadly they attacked and killed some of our people including the great scholar Joshua Rosenhaus. The next morning we heard the excitement in town and even worse we heard the crying and shouting. I and a friend lived in an apartment that was a part of a three storey building leased by a Jew from an Arab. We could hear all the noise from our apartment on the third floor. We were terrified to let the Arabs in because we knew how angry they had become but a while later things calmed down. In total some sixty five people were killed. On the other side of town however the Jews were spared. Why am I telling you about this story? It’s because I want to expose how the wicked Zionists both today and in those days were the cause of our suffering. They cooperated with the Nazis, Our religion teaches us that a person who causes someone to sin is worse than the sinner who kills. A state (of affairs) that killed the Judaism of the Yemenite and Moroccan Jews of many other Sephardic Jews. This is the work of these thugs and gangsters. Everyone must know that the anger of the Arabs against us is only caused by the Zionists. The Arabs were a friendly people to us and I am a witness to it. We lived very well with them in Hebron and I will attest to this as well. It is the accursed Zionists who caused them to hate us. The Zionists dared to use their power to expel the Arabs and even today in the Lebanon they kill and butcher Arabs. They wipe out whole villages with their aeroplanes, Everyone should know who the murderers are. The Zionists are the biggest murderers in the world who refuse to let the Jews live in peace either spiritually or physically." "I dislike the coercive methods of Zionists who in this country have not hesitated to use economic means to silence persons who have different views. I object to the attempts at character assassination of those who do not agree with them." Arthur Hays Sulzberger in Washington Report on Middle Eastern Affairs 1946 "the honour of Jews throughout the world demands the renunciation of political Zionism" Sir Isaac Isaacs 1946 Isaacs' main objections to Political Zionism were:- 1. "A negation of Democracy, and an attempt to revert to the Church-State of bygone ages. 2. Provocative anti-Semitism. 3. Unwarranted by the Balfour Declaration, the Mandate, or any other right; contrary to Zionist assurances to Britain and to the Arabs and in present conditions unjust to other Palestinians politically and to other religions. 4. As regards unrestricted immigration, a discriminatory and an undemocratic camouflage for a Jewish State. 5. An obstruction to the consent of the Arabs to the peaceful and prosperous settlement in Palestine of hundreds of thousands of suffering European Jews, the victims of Nazi atrocities; and provocative of Moslem antagonism within and beyond the Empire, and consequently a danger to its integrity and safety. 6. Inconsistent in demanding on one hand, on a basis of a separate Jewish nationality everywhere Jews are found, Jewish domination in Palestine, and at the same time claiming complete Jewish equality elsewhere than in Palestine, on the basis of a nationality common to the citizens of every faith."[19] Political Zionism is an agency of big business. It is being used by Jewish and Christian financiers in this country and Great Britain, to make Jews believe that Palestine will be ruled by a descendant of King David who will ultimately rule the world. What seclusion! It will lead to war between Arabs and Jews and eventually to war between Moslems and non-Moslems. That will be the turning point of history. Henry H. Klein, “A Jew Warns Jews,” published 1947. "the Zionist movement as a whole...now places its own unwarranted interpretation on the Balfour Declaration, and makes demands that are arousing the antagonism of the Moslem world of nearly 400 millions endangering world peace and imperiling some of the most sacred associations of the Jewish, Christian, and Moslem faiths. Besides their inherent injustice to others these demands would, I believe, seriously and detrimentally affect the general position of Jews throughout the world.." [20]Sir Isaac Isaacs p.8-9 1946 One of the most notorious acts of terrorism by Zionist forces was the Deir Yassin Massacre but yet again we find them in conflict with orthodox Jews who at considerable risk to themselves were able to prevent further killing. The main difference between orthodox Jews and Zionists seems to be that Jews cannot simply turn their morals off like a switch and find the violence and deceit of Zionism to be morally repugnant and an offence against God when carried out in their name as many of their leaders have made clear. Haredim have always opposed Zionism despite the fact that they were the vast majority of victims of the holocaust. Meir Pa'il, a Palmach intelligence officer visited the village of Deir Yassin on April 9th to observe the operation on behalf of the Haganah: The dissidents [Irgun and Lehi] were going about the village robbing and stealing everything: Chickens, radio sets, sugar, money, gold and more ... Each dissident walked about the village dirty with blood and proud of the number of persons he had killed. Their lack of education and intelligence as compared to our soldiers [i.e., the Haganah] was apparent... In one of the houses at the centre of the village were assembled some 200 women and small children. The women sat quietly and didn't utter a word. When I arrived, the "commander" explained that they intended to kill all of them. [But] in the evening I heard that the women and children had been transported and released in Musrara.[41] "For the entire day of April 9, 1948, Irgun and LEHI soldiers carried out the slaughter in a cold and premeditated fashion...The attackers lined men, women and children up against the walls and shot them ... The ruthlessness of the attack on Deir Yassin shocked Jewish and world opinion alike, drove fear and panic into the Arab population, and led to the flight of unarmed civilians from their homes all over the country." Pa'il writes that *the Haredi people of Givat Shaul came to help the villagers at around 2 p.m., and were able to stop the killing :[42] [A] crowd of people from Givat Shaul, with peyot (earlocks), most of them religious, came into the village and started yelling "gazlanim" "rotzchim"—(thieves, murderers) "we had an agreement with this village. It was quiet. Why are you murdering them?" They were Chareidi (orthodox) Jews. This is one of the nicest things I can say about Hareidi [sic] Jews. These people from Givat Shaul gradually approached and entered the village, and the Lehi and Irgun people had no choice, they had to stop. It was about 2:00 or 3:00 PM. Then the Lehi and Irgun gathered about 250 people, most of them women, children and elderly people in a school house. Later the building became a "Beit Habad"—"Habad House." They were debating what to do with them. There was a great deal of yelling. The dissidents were yelling "Let's blow up the schoolhouse with everyone in it" and the Givat Shaul people were yelling "thieves and murderers—don't do it" and so on. Finally they put the prisoners from the schoolhouse on four trucks and drove them to the Arab quarter of Jerusalem near the Damascus gate. I left after the fourth truck went out. It was Friday afternoon. It must have been about 4:00–5:00 P.M because the religious people had begun leaving to prepare for the Sabbath.[1? When considering the invasion of Palestine David Bengurion and Moshe Sharret realised there would be retaliations made against Jews abroad but their loyalties were to Zionism not Judaism. "I am unwilling to forego even one percent of Zionism for peace" David Bengurion Shabtai Teveth p.70 1925 "The most valuable part of the Jewish nation is already in Palestine, and those Jews living outside Palestine are not too important." Chaim Weizmann in Ten Questions to the Zionists 1942 "If Rabbi Kaplan really wanted to know what happened, we old Jewish settlers in Palestine who witnessed the fight could tell him how and in what manner we, Jews, forced the Arabs to leave cities and villages ... some of them were driven out by force of arms; others were made to leave by deceit, lying and false promises. It is enough to cite the cities of Jaffa, Lydda, Ramleh, Beersheba, Acre from among numberless others." Nathan Chofshi in The Other Exodus 9th February 1959
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