The first that I thought of when reading about how Jewish Displaced persons used the land of former Nazi’s to build farming communities that could be used to train Jews for living in Palestine is how Israel is known for its military prowess, which I have always understood to be a product of Jews working as partisans against the Nazis and the Soviets. There is a movie called Defiance, starring Daniel Craig as a Jewish Partisan in what is now Belarus. After the war many of the partisans ended up moving to Palestine and fighting what for became Israel. I drew the comparison to the Jews training to be farmers, because it seems that even if it was not a planned method of training people to live in Israel, it appears that the reason that Israel was able to successfully fight for its independence in 1948 is because of the strength of the Jewish people coming out of Europe after the Holocaust. After being incarcerated in the concentration and death camps or having to hide for years as a partisan against the Nazis it is logical that the Jews that did survive would have skills that would make them successful in creating a new state by force.
The farming communities in Germany to train Jews in agricultural techniques were successful in training people to live in Israel, but were especially successful in increasing the followers of Zionism. Before the war most of the young Jews had not be involved in the Zionist movement, but with the conclusion of the war more were converted, which both helped directly and indirectly with the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine. Without much direction after the end of the war, the young Jews were given a purpose with the training farms. Perhaps that farms were not created directly with the idea of preparing the young Jewish people for living in Palestine, but the process of creating more Zionist helped convert more Jews into wishing for a homeland. The increase in Zionist after the war helped to convince the Americans and the British that the Jews were serious about having a state, so directly or not the creation of the training farms had a positive relationship with the creation of Israel. I believe that the farms were good for Jewish unity, which helped with the creation of Israel, and if it didn’t help with its creation then it helped with the survival of the state after its creation, because more of its citizens were skilled in farming techniques and could take advantage of the small land area in Israel to maximize growth of crops in Israel itself.
It is fascinating to me that the leader of the Jewish Agency, David Ben-Gurion, had the respect of the young Jews in Europe that had survived the Holocaust. As shown in “The Jewish Displaced Youths and Zionism” reading, 80% of the immigrants to Palestine were under 40 years of age. It is interesting that even with a population that young, and with so many being survivors of the Holocaust, that they would still look to someone who did not have that shared experience as a leader. The Zionist movement that sought a state of Israel benefitted from the Displaced Person system, because it essentially provided participants that would be willing to move to Palestine. Many Eastern European Jews that were displaced persons had no intention of going back to their homeland, both because they had nothing to go back to and because the Soviets were anti-Semite as well. This provided 22,000 people that migrated to Palestine between 1948 and 1949 after the declaration of independence. The eagerness of the Jewish displaced persons benefitted the people seeking the creation of the state of Israel and benefitted the state after its creation because the population was motivated to work in farming and defending themselves from aggressors.
I like how you connected the movie to the training the Jews did on the farm to show their strength after the Holocaust. I thought you brought up an interesting point on how the Jews saw Ben-Gurion as a hero even though he did not suffer in the camps with the Holocaust survivors. I thought they would have chosen someone who was a survivor of the Holocaust camps as their “hero”. Maybe they chose him because the majority of the surviving Jews were in the younger age range and they were looking for someone who was older and wiser?
Interesting how the survival tactics that the Jews used both during and after the war contributed to their ability to create the nation of Israel. I also like how you used the movie to highlight your point. Haven’t seen it in a while but I remember it being good!
I like how you mentioned that they looked to someone who didn’t experience what they had. I find that unique. I also find the parallels to their “military prowess” to be interesting. Its true that they have been a successful fighting force. I believe that the children under 40 was no mistake. The youth is the future and I think they saw that, also the youth according to the readings became closer to their religion than prior to the war. I think fighting is something that Israel now does out of necessity. They have a mandatory 2 year service in which all youth must participate in. I think that builds a solid sense of statehood. I also believe that they did it out of defense. They (Israel), being in the Middle East are surrounded by a another religion who saw Palestine as their home and they came in and took the area. Your final sentence says it all with the word motivation, I think those who made it through the holocaust saw the worst in humanity and as a result took it upon themselves to defend each other.
It is very interesting how the Jewish DPs established and joined these farming communities. Even Ben-Gurion himself lived in one of these communities when he traveled to British Palestine. I thik it really speaks to the importance of these communities in establishing a sense of self and identity beyond that of the European states that many of these Jewish DPs originated from.