Poale Zion
Labour Zionist workers' movement founded in the early 1900s; forerunner of Mapai and of the UK's Jewish Labour Movement
| Poale Zion
| |
|---|---|
| Type | Labour Zionist political movement |
| Founded | 1907 (World Union; national parties from 1905–1906) |
| Area served | Eastern Europe, Palestine, the Americas, Britain |
| Key people | Ber Borokhov; Nahman Syrkin; David Ben-Gurion; Yitzhak Ben-Zvi |
Poale Zion (Po'ale Tsiyon, "Workers of Zion") was a Labour Zionist movement that grew out of groups in Eastern Europe in the early twentieth century. It followed the teachings of Nahman Syrkin and Ber Borokhov, and sought to base Zionism on the Jewish working class.[1] National parties formed in the United States and Canada in 1905, in Russia and Austria in 1906, and in Palestine in 1906–1907. They founded the World Union of Poale Zion in 1907.[1]
The movement was Zionist by definition. Its founding groups held that "only a territorial base in Palestine" could end the economic marginality of Diaspora Jewry, and they rejected the anti-Zionist socialism of the Bund.[1] Its Palestinian branch, led by David Ben-Gurion and Yitzhak Ben-Zvi, became part of Mapai. In Britain, where one of its aims was to lobby for a Jewish National Home, Poale Zion affiliated to the Labour Party in 1920. It was renamed the Jewish Labour Movement in 2004.[1][2]
Origins
Writing in the YIVO Encyclopedia, Samuel Kassow says that the movement rejected territorialism, Bundism and assimilationist Marxism as answers to the "Jewish Question". It also rejected the view of the Bund's founders that socialism and democracy would solve the Jewish problem. The Bund's "emphatic rejection of Zionism in 1901" and the Russian Revolution of 1905 sped up the merger of scattered Labour Zionist groups into one movement.[1]
In Russia in 1906 Borokhov founded the Jewish Social Democratic Workers Party–Po'ale Tsiyon, on the basis of his pamphlet "Nasha platforma" (Our Platform). In Austria-Hungary the Jewish Socialist Workers Party–Po'ale Tsiyon took that name in 1906. In 1905 a Po'ale Tsiyon party was organised in the United States and Canada. Activists of the Second Aliyah founded a party in Palestine in 1906–1907.[1] The World Union of Po'ale Tsiyon was founded in 1907, immediately after the Eighth Zionist Congress in The Hague.[1]
Palestine and Mapai
The Russian party rejected work with "bourgeois" Zionists and left the World Zionist Organization in 1909. The Palestinian party, led by Yitzhak Ben-Zvi and David Ben-Gurion, took a more practical line. It worked with other Zionists to build collective agricultural settlements and attract immigration.[1] In 1919 the Palestinian Poale Zion merged with other labour groups to form Ahdut Avodah. In 1930 Ahdut Avodah merged with Ha-Po'el ha-Tsa'ir to form Mapai, which was anchored in the Histadrut labour federation.[1]
Split of 1920
The Russian Revolution and the Balfour Declaration split the movement. At the Fifth Congress of the World Union in Vienna in July 1920, 178 delegates (the Left) voted to seek membership of the Comintern, while 179 (the Right) abstained.[1] The Left welcomed the Russian Revolution and continued to boycott the World Zionist Organization. After a damaging split in the mid-1930s it reversed course and rejoined the WZO in 1937. In Palestine the small Left group merged with Hashomer Hatzair in 1944 and eventually joined Mapam.[1]
The Right won majorities in Palestine, the United States, Britain and Argentina. It supported the Balfour Declaration, worked with non-proletarian Zionists and eventually affiliated with the Second (democratic socialist) International. In 1932 it set up a new world organisation, Ha-Ihud ha-Olami.[1] During the Warsaw ghetto uprising of April 1943, both Right and Left Poale Zion had units in the Jewish Fighting Organization.[1]
Britain
British branches of Poale Zion were founded in Leeds in 1902 and Manchester in 1904. According to a history published by the Jewish Labour Movement, one of their aims was "to lobby for a National Home for the Jews".[2] In 1920 the Labour Party's National Executive Committee accepted the affiliation of the Jewish Socialist Labour Party (Poale Zion).[3] That year the Labour Party conference passed a resolution asking the government to remove restrictions on Jewish immigration and "to allow immediate entry to the large number of suffering Jews in Eastern Europe anxiously waiting to be settled in Palestine".[2] In 2004 Poale Zion changed its name to the Jewish Labour Movement, which remains affiliated to the Labour Party.[2][3]
See also
- Jewish Labour Movement
- Glasgow Poale Zion
- Labour Friends of Israel
- Mapai
- Histadrut
- Zionist movement, Leeds, Yorkshire and the Humber
- Zionist movement, Manchester and the North West
- Zionist Movement Argentina
Notes
- ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 Samuel Kassow, Po'ale Tsiyon, The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe, accessed 23 October 2026.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Derek Taylor, Solidarity and Discord: A brief history of 99 years of affiliation to the Labour Party, Jewish Labour Movement, 2019, accessed 23 October 2026.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Jewish Labour Movement, Celebrating 98 years of affiliation to the Labour Party, accessed 23 October 2026.