Read Palestine

Jewish Labour Only

Properties2
tags
aliasesJewish products only

3 min read

Summary

The slogan and policy of employing only Jewish labour (and preferring Jewish products) in the settler economy, which Kanafani treats as a central mechanism of Arab workers’ and peasants’ dispossession and of the emergence of fascist patterns in settler society.

Details

  • The policy that raised the slogan of Jewish labour only is said to have had grave consequences, leading to the rapid emergence of fascist patterns in the society of Jewish settlers, and to a competitive struggle between the Arab and Jewish proletariats (The 1936-39 Revolt in Palestine, PDF p.7 / printed p.12-13).

  • Kanafani quotes the Histadrut’s own rationale against allowing Arabs to penetrate the Jewish labour market (The 1936-39 Revolt in Palestine, PDF p.9 / printed p.16).

  • The dismissal of Arab workers from firms and projects controlled by Jewish capital initiated violent clashes, and Arab employment in four named settlements fell from 6,214 in February 1935 to 617 within a year (The 1936-39 Revolt in Palestine, PDF p.8 / printed p.14).

  • Small and middle peasants were likewise victims of the slogans Jewish labour only and Jewish products only, Jewish industrialists employing only Jewish workers at higher wages and selling at higher prices (The 1936-39 Revolt in Palestine, PDF p.12 / printed p.23).

  • Zionist violence, including the armed bands and the slogan of Jewish labour only, is named as one of the factors that induced the Palestinian leadership to adopt armed struggle in 1936 (The 1936-39 Revolt in Palestine, PDF p.19 / printed p.37).

  • Al-Kayyali’s candidate for the first spark of the revolt is a February 1936 armed band around a Haifa school built by Jewish contractors employing Jewish-only labour (The 1936-39 Revolt in Palestine, PDF p.18 / printed p.35).

  • Sayegh treats the principle as foundational and ideological: from the earliest days of Zionist colonisation only Jewish labor would be employed in Zionist colonies, and the Jewish Agency, the Jewish National Fund, the Palestine Foundation Fund and the Jewish Federation of Labor vigilantly ensured its observance (Zionist Colonialism in Palestine, PDF p.11 / printed p.216).

  • For Sayegh, boycott of Arab produce and labor was the form racial exclusiveness took while Zionists were powerless to dislodge the Arabs: a tactical and temporary suspension of the dogma, a necessary evil, while the ultimate aim of ousting the Arab inhabitants was never abandoned (Zionist Colonialism in Palestine, PDF p.11-12 / printed p.216-217).

  • In stage (2) of his Palestinian response, the methodical ouster of Arab farmers, labourers and watchmen from the new Zionist colonies and the systematic boycott of Arab produce were what first aroused Arab anger at the second wave of colonisation from 1907/1908 (Zionist Colonialism in Palestine, PDF p.16 / printed p.221).

  • In Said, through Amos Elon: Avoda Ivrit (Jewish Labor) aimed at the establishment of a completely separate economic sector for the newcomers, in which native labor must not be exploited and Jews must do everything themselves, so that, there being no exploitation of Arab labor, Arab laborers could not objectively be opposed to the Zionists; in effect it created a subculture enjoying immunity from Turkish, British or Arab reality, and its principal and direct benefit to the natives was the loss of their country (The Question of Palestine, PDF p.42-43 / printed p.21-22).

The 1936-39 Revolt in Palestine, Histadrut, Zionism, Settler Colonialism

Graph View

Backlinks