The Stern Gang

The Stern Gang : Ideology. Politics and Terror 1940-1949 (Frank Cass) by Joseph Heller Blood in Zion (Brasseys) by Saul Zadka Jerusalem: Backgrounds or Memory (Biblios) by Amos Elon Jerusalem: the Endless crusade (Century) by Andrew sinclair When Joseph Heller’s comprehensive study of the Stern Group (Lehi) was first published in Hebrew, it aroused the … Read more

Labour Politics through Jewish Eyes

    An Interview with Gerald Kaufman MP 5 August 1992   CS: I believe that you apologized to your constituents shortly after Labour’s defeat in the 1992 elections for not being in a position to do more to help eradicate their poverty. GK: I didn’t apologize. What I said was that those of my constituents who were in a … Read more

On Yitzhak Tabenkin

Yitzhak Tabenkin was, together with David Ben-Gurion and Berl Katznelson, one of three who made the Labour-Zionist revolution in Palestine during the pre-State struggles in the inter-war period. Indeed, Ben-Gurion was said to have joined Poale Zion at Tabenkin’s home in Warsaw at the turn of the century. All were highly influenced by the Marxist-Zionist … Read more

The End of Idealism

Communism was deemed by its adherents to be eternal. Few could contemplate its decay and a final crumbling into the dust of ages. Its meaning was its existence. Most who lived under Communism accepted their lot, avoided trouble and got on with living their lives as best they could. Few possessed the courage and foresight … Read more

Ten Years after the Leningrad Trial 1

Since the Revolution, there have always been Soviet Jews wishing to repatriate to Israel. The trauma of the Holocaust spiritually created small groups of young assimilated Jews blindly searching for an explanation. The establishment of the state of Israel provided an interpretation and a visible goal. Such clandestine groups evolved with the political thaw that … Read more