Abstract
While many historians have studied Turkey’s treatment of its minorities, and Israel’s treatment of Jewish immigrants from Middle Eastern and North African countries, Israeli attitudes and policies on Turkish Jews have remained as mere footnotes in scholarly literature. This chapter aims to fill this gap by focusing on Israel’s approach to Turkish Jewry and its immigration to Israel in the crucial decade after the founding of the Israeli state. It concentrates on the less-studied question of how the Israeli government saw the initial Turkish immigration to Israel and how the state treated or considered these Jews. How did the Israeli government view Turkish Jews, who chose to remain in Turkey, especially after the pogrom of September 6–7, 1955? I argue that two major factors determined the nascent state’s approach toward and perception of Turkish Jews, both inherited from its predecessor, the Yishuv. The first was the value Israel placed on its relations with Turkey, and the second was the hierarchical nature of the Israeli state, one governed by a well-ensconced and tightly interlocked Ashkenazi establishment, which displayed an Orientalist and discriminatory approach towards non-Ashkenazi Jewish communities.
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Notes
- 1.
Central Bureau of Statistics. http://www.cbs.gov.il/shnaton53/st04_04.pdf (accessed March 1, 2018).
- 2.
Rıfat N. Bali, Aliya: Bir Toplu Göçün Öyküsü (1946–1949) (İstanbul: İletişim Yayınları, 2003), 40.
- 3.
Sh. Kushtai, “Yehudei Turkiya u-memshalta,” Hamashkif, November 21, 1947.
- 4.
Sh. Kushtai, “‘Ha-Anusim’ be Turkiya,” Hamashkif, September 5, 1947.
- 5.
Kushtai, “‘Ha-Anusim’”.
- 6.
Ibid.
- 7.
Kushtai, “‘Ha-Anusim’”.
- 8.
Bali, Aliya: Bir Toplu Göçün Öyküsü, 97.
- 9.
ISA, Gimel 5560/11, Letter from Merkaz Hehalutz in Istanbul to Prime Minister David Ben Gurion, dated September 14, 1949.
- 10.
See Bali, Aliya: Bir Toplu Göçün Öyküsü, 92–96.
- 11.
ISA, Gimel 5560/11, Letter from Merkaz Hehalutz in Istanbul to Prime Minister David Ben Gurion.
- 12.
Ibid.
- 13.
“Hamonei Yafo ha-Ivrit mafginim et haaratzatam le-David Ben-Gurion,” Davar, July 25, 1951.
- 14.
ArkadasTV, “Rachel Rina Benvenisti.” www.arkadas.org.il [Due to the discontinuation of the Arkadas Association’s website, the interview videos quoted here are no longer available.]
- 15.
ArkadasTV, “Ester Adato.”
- 16.
ArkadasTV, “Roza Cohen.”
- 17.
ArkadasTV, “Roza Sara.”
- 18.
Walter F. Weiker, The Unseen Israelis (University Press America, 1988): 1.
- 19.
“Nishveti le-vein ‘Turkim’,” Davar, June 14, 1949.
- 20.
“Nishveti le-vein ‘Turkim’,” Davar, June 14, 1949.
- 21.
Ibid.
- 22.
Ibid.
- 23.
The term “Arab Jew” first emerged among Mizrahi critics of Zionism, who insisted on being identified as Arab Jews instead of other common designations such as Mizrahi (Eastern). In scholarly literature, Ella Shohat pioneered the usage of the term, fundamentally challenging the commonplace Zionist understanding of Arabs and Jews as two binary categories.
Ella Shohat, On the Arab Jew, Palestine, and Other Displacements: Selected Writings (London: Pluto Press, 2017).
Another very important work on this topic is Yehouda Shenhav’s The Arab Jews: A Postcolonial Reading of Nationalism, Religion, and Ethnicity (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2006).
- 24.
Shenhav, The Arab Jews, 22.
- 25.
For a selection of statements by leading Israeli politicians illustrative of the racist view of Mizrahim, see Tom Segev, The First Israelis 1949 (London: Macmillan, 1986); Joseph A. Massad, The Persistance of the Palestinian Question: Essays on Zionism and the Palestinians (London: Routledge, 2006), 59–61.
- 26.
“Mesiba li-khvod tzirei ha-Kongres ha-Ivri mi-artzot ha-Mizrah ve Tsafon Afrika,” Hed Hamizrah, August 18, 1950.
- 27.
See Walter P. Zenner, “Sephardic Communal Organizations in Israel,” Middle East Journal 21, no. 2 (1967): 173–186.
- 28.
“Sephardim ve-Edot ha-Mizrah,” Knesset, http://www.knesset.gov.il/faction/heb/FactionPage.asp?PG=89 (accessed 1 August 2018).
- 29.
Eliyahu Elyashar, “Mahuta shel ha-Reshima S. Tz,” Hed Hamizrah, July 20, 1951.
- 30.
“Le-darko shel haver ha-Knesset A. Elmalih,” Hed Hamizrah, November 10, 1950.
- 31.
Dvora Hacohen, Immigrants in Turmoil: Mass Immigration to Israel and Its Repercussions in the 1950s and After (New York: Syracuse University Press, 2003), 95.
- 32.
Ibid., 103.
- 33.
“Le-darko shel haver ha-Knesset A. Elmalih,” Hed Hamizrah, November 10, 1950.
- 34.
Ibid.
- 35.
Avraham Elmalih, “Turkiya mitrokenet mi-Yehudeiha,” Maariv, March 29, 1950.
- 36.
“Mesiba li-khvod orhim me-hul,” Hed Hamizrah, May 12, 1950.
- 37.
Bali, Aliya: Bir Toplu Göçün Öyküsü, 313–314. For the restrictions on Turkish Jews’ return to Turkey, see ibid., 339.
- 38.
Michael Assaf, “Yehudei Turkiya,” Davar, November 27, 1950.
- 39.
On Operation Ezra and Nehemiah, see Moshe Gat, The Jewish Exodus from Iraq 1948–1951 (New York: Frank Cass, 1997), 165, 195; Orit Bashkin, Impossible Exodus: Iraqi Jews in Israel (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2017).
- 40.
On the immigration of North African Jews and the policies of Israel and the Jewish Agency toward their aliyah between 1951 and 1956, see Avi Picard, Olim bi-mesorah: Mediniut Yisrael klapei aliyatam shel Yehudei Tsafon Afrika, 1951–1956 (Kiryat Sde Boker: Makhon Ben Gurion le-Heker Yisrael ve-ha-Tzionut, 2013).
- 41.
Dalia Ofer, “Emigration and Aliyah: A Reassessment of Israeli and Jewish Policies,” in Terms of Survival: The Jewish World since 1945 ed. Robert S. Wistrich (London: Routledge, 1995), 66–67.
- 42.
ISA 2397/24 – Het-Tzadi, Letter from the Temporary Appointee to the Israeli Legation in Ankara to the First Deputy to the Chief Executive Officer in the Israeli Government Offices (Ha-Kiryah), dated May 13, 1953.
- 43.
Ibid.
- 44.
Ibid.
- 45.
Ibid.
- 46.
Ibid.
- 47.
Ibid.
- 48.
“Ha-aliyah le-Yisrael holela tmura gdola ba-kehilot ha-Yehudiyot be-Turkiya,” Davar, January 15, 1950.
- 49.
“Rosh memshala u-sar ha-hutz be Turkiya lo nivheru: Ha-opozitzia la-shilton,” Al Hamishmar, May 16, 1950; “Memshelet Turkiya tahzir le-Yehudim et ha-mas ‘Varlık’,” Davar, July 16, 1950.
- 50.
“Mifne pro-Yisraeli ba-itonut ha-Turkit,” Herut, June 24, 1949.
- 51.
Ibid.
- 52.
Amikam Nachmani, Israel, Turkey and Greece: Uneasy Relations in the East Mediterranean (London: Frank Cass, 1987), 64.
- 53.
ISA, 5557/3878 – Gimel, Letter from Sh. Z. Shragai to Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Moshe Sharett, dated October 8, 1954.
- 54.
ISA, 5557/3878 – Gimel, Letter from Sh. Z. Shragai to Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Moshe Sharett, dated February 14, 1955.
- 55.
Ibid.
- 56.
ISA, 5557/3878 – Gimel, Letter from A. Najar to Sh. Z. Shragai, dated February 28, 1955.
- 57.
Ibid.
- 58.
Dilek Güven, “Riots against the Non-Muslims in Turkey: 6/7 September 1955 in the Context of Demographic Engineering,” European Journal of Turkish Studies 12 (2011): 4.
- 59.
Weiker, The Unseen Israelis, 22.
- 60.
ISA, 1916/17 – Pe, Letter from M. U. Bassan to Foreign Ministry’s Western Europe Division, September 7, 1955.
- 61.
Ibid.
- 62.
“1955. The Aftermath of the Istanbul Pogrom,” billdownscbs.blogspot.com, November 4, 2016. https://billdownscbs.blogspot.com/2016/11/1955-aftermath-of-istanbul-pogrom.html (accessed June 3, 2018).
- 63.
ISA, 1916/17 – Pe, Letter from the Israeli Representation in Athens to Foreign Ministry, October 6, 1955.
- 64.
ISA, 2387/19 – Het-Tsadi, Letter from Vice-Consul Memisrael Uriel Bassan to Foreign Ministry’s Western Europe Division, dated September 29, 1955.
- 65.
ISA, 2387/19 – Het-Tsadi, Letter from Vice-Consul Memisrael Uriel Bassan to Foreign Ministry’s Western Europe Division, dated September 29, 1955.
- 66.
Herut was the daily newspaper of the right-wing Herut movement, which was the political successor of Etzel (Ha-Irgun ha-Tzvai ha-Leumi), the underground organization active during the pre-state period. Herut’s political philosophy was shaped by its belief in the “inalienable rights of the Jewish people to Eretz Yisrael” and its rejection of the “possibility of normalizing Jewish life in the Diaspora.” As such, Herut avidly advocated for Jewish immigration to Israel.
Yehuda Benari, “The Herut Movement: Israel’s Right Wing,” Patterns of Prejudice 7, no. 1 (January 1973): 1.
- 67.
“Meerat ha-galut,” Herut, September 12, 1955.
- 68.
For more on the varying views of the Diaspora in classical Zionist thinking, see Eliezer Schweid, “The Rejection of the Diaspora in Zionist Thought: Two Approaches,” in Essential Papers on Zionism eds. Jehuda Reinharz and Anita Shapira (New York: New York University Press, 1996), 133–160.
- 69.
Yitzhak Conforti, “‘The New Jew’ in the Zionist Movement: Ideology and Historiography,” The Australian Journal of Jewish Studies 25 (2011): 87.
- 70.
Yaakov Nitzani, “Eda Yehudit mefoeret be-elbona,” Davar, September 1, 1955. Davar was founded in 1920 by Berl Katznelson, one of the founding fathers of Labor Zionism and the founder of many major Labor Zionist institutions, which became building blocks for institutions in the future State of Israel. As the official publication of the Yishuv leadership in Palestine and later that of Mapai, Davar served both as a platform for the party leaders to showcase their views, as well as a means for them to shape and influence public opinion.
- 71.
Ibid.
- 72.
Ibid.
- 73.
“Peula le-hagbarat ha-aliya me-Turkiya,” Davar, September 20, 1955.
- 74.
“Yehudei Turkiya mitanyenim ba-aliya ekev hapraot ve krazot anti-Shemiyot,” Maariv, October 17, 1955.
- 75.
Ibid. See also “Turkiya timna me-hitpartzuyot neged Yehudim,” Davar, October 20, 1955.
- 76.
Ibid.
- 77.
Ibid.
- 78.
ISA, 1916/17 – Pe, Letter addressed to the Foreign Ministry by the Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality Secretariat, dated October 9, 1955.
- 79.
ISA, 1916/17 – Pe, Letter from E. Ruppin to Municipal Secretary, dated October 28, 1955.
- 80.
Ibid.
- 81.
ISA 2387/19 – Het-Tzadi, Foreign Ministry memo on “Compensating Damages Caused to Israelis during the September 6 Riots in Turkey,” dated October 12, 1955.
- 82.
ISA 2387/19 – Het-Tzadi, “Nosah hodaat dover Misrad ha-Hutz she-nimsera le-firsum be-18.9 ba-erev,” dated September 19, 1955.
- 83.
Many prominent intellectual figures were among those detained such as writer and humorist Aziz Nesin, novelist Kemal Tahir, poet Hasan İzzettin Dinamo, and Mustafa Börklüce, one of the founders of the Communist Party of Turkey (Türkiye Komünist Partisi, TKP).
Güven, “Riots against the Non-Muslims of Turkey,” 6.
- 84.
Dan Arbell, “The U.S.-Turkey-Israel Triangle,” Brookings Analysis Paper, no. 34 (October 2014): 5. https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/USTurkeyIsrael-TriangleFINAL.pdf.
- 85.
The only article criticizing the Israeli government for its silence on the September 6–7 Riots (as far as I could find) was published in Kol Haam, the newspaper of the Communist movement in Israel known for its oppositional voice and harsh criticism of Mapai. The article slammed the government for “covering up” the damages sustained by Turkish Jews and not properly responding to the riots. According to the author of this article, the reason behind the Mapai government’s silence was its desire to avoid “causing damage to the Turkish democracy or besmirching the [reputation of] its current leaders” so as to maintain the friendly state of its relations with Turkey. “Turkey has been called by leading policy-makers in Israel ‘our great friend’ and a ‘fortress of democracy,’” it was sarcastically noted.
“Ha-hugim ha-shalitim be-Yisrael maalimim et ha-pgiot ha-hamurot be-Yehudei Turkiya,” Kol Haam, September 29, 1955.
- 86.
Michael Menachem Laskier and Eliezer Bashan, “Morocco,” in The Jews of the Middle East and North Africa in Modern Times ed. Reeva Spector Simon, Michael Menachem Laskier, and Sara Reguer (New York: Columbia University Press, 2003), 501.
- 87.
Joel Beinin, The Dispersion of Egyptian Jewry: Culture, Politics, and the Formation of a Modern Diaspora (Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 2005), 87.
- 88.
Rafael Medoff and Chaim I. Waxman, Historical Dictionary of Zionism (New York: Routledge, 2012).
- 89.
András Kovács, Communism’s Jewish Question: Jewish Issues in Communist Archives (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2017), 23.
- 90.
Quoted in Hagai Tsoreff, ed., Zalman Shazar ha-nasi ha-shlishi: Mivhar teudot mi-pirkei hayav (1889–1974) (Yerushalayim: Ginzakh Ha-Medina, 5768), 411.
- 91.
Ibid.
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Atlas, D. (2022). The Founding of the State of Israel and the Turkish Jews: A View from Israel, 1948–1955. In: Öktem, K., Yosmaoğlu, I.K. (eds) Turkish Jews and their Diasporas. Modernity, Memory and Identity in South-East Europe. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-87798-9_6
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