Magshimey Herut

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Magshimey Herut (Hebrew: מגשימי חרות‎; lit. "achievers of liberty") is a Zionist movement founded in 1999 by a group of Jewish activists who felt the need for a young adult movement dedicated to the ideals of aliyah, social justice and the territorial integrity of the Land of Israel. In Israel, the movement is called Magshimey Herut Yisrael (Hebrew: מגשימי חרות ישראל‎ "achievers of liberty for Israel") and is closely associated with the Revisionist Zionism. In many English speaking countries it is known as the Zionist Freedom Alliance, according to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs.^[1] The movement includes many socialists and capitalists as well as both observant and non-observant Jews. Despite the group's diversity, the movement is generally seen as socially liberal while taking a hard-right stance on issues pertaining to Israel's borders.^[2]

Magshimey Herut is the youngest movement within the World Zionist Organization’s hagshama department.

Contents 1 History 2 Ideology 3 Activities 4 See also 5 References 6 External links

[edit] History

Magshimey Herut was founded in 1999 by a number of Betar activists who were disappointed with what they viewed as a lack of ideological integrity within their movement. When a Likud government led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu relinquished parts of Hebron to Yasser Arafat in 1998, Betar (the youth movement most associated with the Likud) members were uncertain on how to view a Likud Prime Minister betraying one of their most sacred principles. While the Betar leadership passively supported Netanyahu's policies, the organization's director of overseas activities, Karma Feinstein-Cohen, along with a group of ideological purists and veteran activists from chapters throughout the world, left Betar in order to establish a new organization.

Led by a blend of secular and religious activists, the new movement made an effort to be more sympathetic than Betar to the needs and values of religiously observant members. In the years that followed its establishment, a number of graduates from the Bnei Akiva religious Zionist youth movement joined Magshimey Herut, seeing it as a young adult movement most committed to the values that Bnei Akiva instilled in them as youth.

Possibly as a result of its focus on social issues in addition to nationalist Zionist goals, Magshimey Herut attracted many Jews who, although actively left-wing on economic and societal issues, believe strongly in the Jewish people’s right to the entire land of Israel.

In 2006, a number of Magshimey Herut leaders in the United States established the Zionist Freedom Alliance as a grassroots activist movement advocating Jewish rights to the entire land of Israel. Although the ZFA's political positions appear to be on the far right of the Israeli political spectrum, the group frequently espouses seemingly left-wing positions on numerous issues, including globalization and America's Iraq War. According to the ZFA website, the movement supports the establishment of an independent Kurdistan and has called upon the Israeli government to send IDF troops to Darfur.^[3]

[edit] Ideology

Magshimey Herut views the Jewish people as indigenous to the Middle East and the victims of Western imperialism. Leading activists of the movement have often pointed out that Great Britain, the United Nations, and even the United States government did everything in their power to prevent a Jewish state from coming into existence. The Zionist struggle, according to ZFA, is therefore an anti-imperialist struggle aimed at liberating the land of Israel from foreign rule and securing the Jewish people’s right to self determination in their country.

Magshimey Herut views Zionism as the national liberation movement of the Jewish people and a revolution unparalleled by any other in human history. The movement validates this claim by emphasizing that while various revolutions have succeeded in leaving their mark on human development, none have succeeded in reviving a dead language or relocating a scattered nation from dispersion to a central location. Magshimey Herut defines the Zionist Revolution as the liberation of Jewish land from foreign rule, the ingathering of the Jewish people from the exile to their soil, the revival of Hebrew as a spoken language for everyday use, and the creation of a utopian society that will serve as a model of social justice to the world. The movement views itself as the vanguard of this revolution and often calls itself the “voice of Jewish liberation.” The above views have been expressed repeatedly by Yehuda HaKohen, a Magshimey Herut leader, who co-hosts an internet based radio program on Arutz 7 (channel seven).^[4]

Although Magshimey Herut views itself as loyal to the basic Zionist teachings of Zev Jabotinsky, there is evidence that the movement takes great liberty in interpreting Jabotinsky’s views. Due to Magshimey Herut's involvement in social causes and semi-mystical orientation, some critics argue that the group's ideological leanings are closer to those of Israel Eldad, Uri Zvi Greenberg, and Avraham Stern’s Lehi organization than to Jabotinsky and the Irgun underground (with whom Betar closely identifies). While Betar chapters in the United States have in recent years allied themselves with neo-conservative elements of the American political system, Magshimey Herut presents itself as an anti-imperialist movement dedicated to the freedom of all peoples. Magshimey Herut does not call itself a Revisionist Zionist movement but instead uses the terms "Revolutionary Zionism" and "Humanitarian Zionism" (a term linked to Jabotinsky towards the end of his life).

It has been noted that some Magshimey Herut chapters are more religiously observant than others and are therefore not ideologically homogeneous. The Jerusalem branch, for example, is led by religious activists influenced by the teachings of Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook while some other branches project a much less religious image. While some chapters may base their claims on traditional Jewish texts and others on history and international law, all agree that the Jewish people have a moral right to the entire land of Israel.

Although opposed to many policies of recent Israeli governments, Magshimey Herut views the State of Israel as being of great historical significance and deserving of their loyalty independent of the current leadership. The movement places unity amongst Jews of all persuasions on equal footing with the territorial integrity of the land of Israel and therefore works to build dialogue and strengthen the bond between Jews with opposing political and religious opinions.^[5]

[edit] Activities

Magshimey Herut is active in several countries with the primary objective of bringing young Jewish adults on aliyah (immigration) to Israel. Each year, the movement organizes experiential trips for Jewish students to Israel, often for the purpose of leadership training.

As an educational activist movement, many chapters take a leading role in numerous political causes. In addition to promoting Jewish settlement and fighting for the ideal of Greater Israel, Magshimey Herut has been a force in the struggle to free Jonathan Pollard. In some countries the movement has been active against globalization, claiming that it creates unjust working conditions and violates the notion of national sovereignty. Many Magshimey Herut activists express concern that globalization contradicts the basic tenets of Zionism and directly threatens Israel’s existence as a small Jewish state situated in a mostly Arab region.^[3]

In the United States and Canada, Magshimey Herut works through the Zionist Freedom Alliance to advocate the Jewish people’s national rights. Magshimey Herut and ZFA leaders claim that Israel’s case has not been presented since before the start of the Oslo peace process and that this has resulted in the world’s ignorance of Israel’s legitimate claim to the territory between the Mediterranean Sea and Jordan River.

What distinguishes Magshimey Herut and ZFA from other Zionist movements in the Diaspora is that they fight for social causes often associated with the left while maintaining hard right positions on Jewish identity and Israel’s borders. In November 2007, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported the ZFA to be promoting Israeli nationalism on twenty American college campuses and described the group as socially liberal with a hard-right stance on Israeli border issues.^[6] On the organization’s website, ZFA claims to take a revolutionary step in the Zionist world by combining a faithful adherence to Jewish national aspirations with a steadfast commitment to social justice within society.^[7]

As a national liberation movement, Magshimey Herut alleges to advocate freedom for all nations from foreign rule but denies that freedom to a Palestinian nation whom the group claims does not exist. Magshimey Herut argues that a Palestinian national identity was invented in the 1960s by Western powers for the purpose of robbing the Jewish people of their homeland. Magshimey Herut and ZFA both assert that multi-national corporations and Western governments seeking to promote globalization have been using the Palestinian Arabs as a political tool against the State of Israel and that the front line in the battle against globalization is actually the struggle to retain Greater Israel. Unlike movements with similar views on Israel’s political right, Magshimey Herut avoids anti-Arab rhetoric and actually advocates Israel becoming more Middle Eastern in character. Many Magshimey Herut and ZFA leaders have put forward the need for a genuine peace agreement between Israel and the Arabs but have rejected the notion of territorial concessions as this would be – in their view – an historic injustice against the Jewish people.^[8]

In the field of pro-Israel advocacy, Magshimey Herut and ZFA are unique as they speak of Israel's moral right to the land rather than the country's security needs. In February 2008 the ZFA created controversy at the University of Pennsylvania by holding an aggressive demonstration against ex-Israeli soldiers who came to the campus in order to speak against the IDF's presence in territories captured by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War. A front page article^[9] and political cartoon^[10] in the Daily Pennsylvania attempted to portray ZFA activists as unwilling to hear opinions contrary to their own. These accusations were later refuted by local ZFA leader Brian Finkel in a letter to the paper's editor^[11] which explained ZFA's perspective on what had taken place.

In April 2008, ZFA led a week long program called Israel Liberation Week at Hofstra University.^[12] During this week of events, ZFA reached beyond the Jewish community and targeted a wider student public through films, art exhibits and concerts that focused on Jewish rights to the Land of Israel, the Jewish revolt against British rule and the need for the State of Israel to become an independent country.^[13]

In Israel, the movement is called Magshimey Herut Yisrael (Hebrew: מגשימי חירות ישראל‎) or Mehi (מח"י) and is active in social initiatives to help the country's poor while devoting substantial effort to bridging gaps within society through creating workshops for dialogue with left-wing movements.^[14] Mehi organizes weekly programs for young immigrants to Israel and works with youth-at-risk in order to redirect their energies towards Zionist fulfillment.

Following the violent confrontation at Amona between the Israeli police and settler teenagers in early 2006, Mehi activists held a three week hunger strike vigil protesting violence between Jews. The activists displayed banners and handed out flyers calling on both the Israeli government and settler leadership to seek out ways to avoid future bloodshed. Perhaps because this took place just prior to national elections, the hunger strike drew criticism from settlers who had felt victimized by the government and sought to use the tragedy as a means to hurt the ruling Kadima party in the upcoming elections. The government had no official response to the vigil.^[15]

In early 2007 Mehi launched a campaign calling on the government of Israel to cut all diplomatic ties to Russia due to Russia's involvement in Iran's nuclear development program.^[16][17] In a statement to the press, the movement said that "Israel must take a moral stand and send a clear message to the global community that we will not pursue diplomacy or commerce with nations working towards our annihilation." Criticizing the reactions of several Israeli politicians to the campaign, Mehi leader Elie Yossef told Israel National Radio's Yishai Fleisher that "the Jewish People must find the moral courage to stand up to super-powers in such situations."^[16]

In February 2009 World Magshimey Herut helped the Jewish Agency for Israel and Yemenite Jewish Federation of America to bring a group of Jews from the Raida community in Yemen to Israel following an increase in hostility among Yemenite Muslims towards Jews. The special operation was conducted in secret in order to thwart a plan by anti-Zionist Satmar Hasidim in America to bring the Yemenite Jews to the United States. World Magshimey Herut Executive-Director Karma Feinstein-Cohen told Israel National News that:

"The Yemenite Jews are a very special community with special needs. While their situation is precarious, it was not easy to convince them to journey to the new unknown land of Israel, even though they cherish it and refer to it as the 'land of their fathers.'"^[18]

In October 2009 Magshimey Herut was instrumental in bringing Zionist youth movements together despite ideological, political and religious differences in an effort to strengthen Zionist institutions during a time of financial crisis.^[19]

[edit] See also

• Betar
• Elie Yossef
• Israel
• Israel Eldad
• Lehi (group)
• Revisionist Zionism
• Yehuda HaKohen
• Zev Jabotinsky
• Zionism
• Zionist Freedom Alliance
• Zionist youth movement

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Magshimey Herut website
• World Zionist Organization website