Abba Ahimeir

Ahimeir was born in Dolgi, near Bobruisk in Belorussia, and grew up in the Bobruisk milieu in which he became close to Berl Katznelson.[1][2] His original name was Abba Shaul Heisinovitch, also rendered Geisinovich, before he adopted the surname by which he became known in journalism and politics.[1][5] The name Ahimeir means “brother of Meir” and commemorated his brother Meir, who died in fighting involving Poland.[2][5]

His recollections of childhood in Doly included encounters with antisemitism as well as vivid impressions of the local landscape.[6] He remembered watching other children spear fish and throw them into a fire; those children sometimes chased him while shouting antisemitic insults.[6] In another remembered scene, a wild rose bush on the riverbank cut his fingers, prompting him to wonder whether it might constitute his only connection to his physical homeland.[6]

Between 1912 and 1914, Ahimeir attended Herzlia High School in Tel Aviv.[1] He subsequently returned to Russia and joined Ẓe'irei Zion, participating at this stage of his life in a Zionist-socialist environment rather than the nationalist right with which he later became associated.[1] His early connections included work as a correspondent for Izvestia and a close relationship with Katznelson.[2] The Russian Revolution contributed to his turn away from Lenin and toward the ideas of Ze’ev Jabotinsky.[2]

After World War I, he studied history at the universities of Liège and Vienna.[1] He returned to Palestine in 1924 and joined Ha-Po'el ha-Ẓa'ir.[1] During this period, he also taught in Nahalal and at Kibbutz Geva.[5] His political position gradually changed into strong opposition to communism and socialism, and in 1928 he joined the Revisionist movement.[1] He encountered Jabotinsky’s ideas during this transformation and embraced the conviction that Jews should fight for their country.[5]

After joining the Revisionists in 1928, Ahimeir advocated active opposition to the British Mandatory government rather than reliance on established political channels alone.[1] His principal associates included poet Uri Zvi Greenberg and writer Yehoshua Yevin, with whom he developed the activist current that became Brit HaBiryonim.[3] Benzion Netanyahu also belonged to an activist alliance with these three men and served as Jabotinsky’s personal secretary before Menachem Begin arrived in Mandatory Palestine.[7]

Journalism was a central part of Ahimeir’s public activity.[1] After Jabotinsky left Palestine in July 1929, Ahimeir, Wolfgang von Wiesl, and Yehoshua Yevin took control of editing the Jerusalem newspaper Do’ar ha-Yom.[8] Their editorial involvement belonged to a particular phase in a newspaper whose continuous publication extended from August 1919 to June 1936, followed by a brief, limited-format revival in January 1940.[8] Its surviving online archive spans August 8, 1919, to February 16, 1940.[8]

The Revisionist lease of Do’ar ha-Yom lasted two years and expired in January 1931.[8] Its owner, Itamar Ben Avi, then sought to restore the newspaper to a commercial format, but members of the Revisionist movement refused to surrender editorial control.[8] They relinquished their hold only after a violent confrontation, after which Ben Avi resumed his position as chief editor.[8] The first issue following his return appeared on February 22, 1931.[8]

Ahimeir’s public arguments increasingly emphasized national self-reliance.[9] In October 1930, he argued that Zionism had made a mistake by trusting the “kindness of nations” and urged it to learn from Sinn Féin’s principle of relying on one’s own resources.[9] This appeal to Irish nationalism formed part of the development of a more militant Zionist position after the killings of Jews in Hebron and Safed in 1929.[9] His criticism of dependence on external goodwill accompanied his advocacy of direct opposition to the Mandatory regime.[1][9]

In 1930, Ahimeir organized an anti-British demonstration in Jerusalem during the visit of Drummond Shiels, the British Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies.[10] He was arrested at the demonstration, an episode identified as the beginning of his political imprisonment under the Mandate.[10] From 1930 onward, he was arrested several times in connection with illegal public action and opposition to British rule.[1] British authorities repeatedly arrested and harassed both Ahimeir and his associates during their campaign.[10]

Brit HaBiryonim, also rendered Berit ha-Biryonim, operated against the Mandatory regime from 1930 to 1933, with Ahimeir as its founder and chief ideologue.[3] Greenberg and Yevin were its other leading figures.[3] The organization took its name from the Zealots who fought the Romans in the first century CE, invoking an earlier example of Jewish resistance to foreign rule.[10] Despite its underground character and dramatic public gestures, it remained a small association, with approximately 30 active members and a few score sympathizers.[3]

The group’s activities included demonstrations against Shiels’s visit and calls for a boycott of the official census.[3] Members also arranged for a shofar to be sounded at the conclusion of the Day of Atonement service at the Western Wall.[3] These actions were limited in scope, and the group’s direct-action campaign did not amount to military resistance.[3][10] Its demonstrations nevertheless reverberated beyond its small membership, attracting attention in Palestine and the Diaspora.[10]

Ahimeir’s association with Jabotinsky combined personal respect with substantial ideological differences.[2] Jabotinsky approved enthusiastically of Ahimeir’s direct-action activity and referred to him as “Moreny verabenu,” meaning “our teacher and mentor.”[10] Yet the revolutionary philosophy associated with Ahimeir differed from Jabotinsky’s emphasis on party activity, moral pressure, and the perceived common interests of Zionism and Britain.[11] Jabotinsky rejected that revolutionary philosophy while understanding its roots and motives.[11]

Ahimeir’s own diary expressed a “deep ideological opposition” between the two men.[2] He contrasted Jabotinsky’s democratic rationalism with his own belief that the age in which they lived was governed by emotion.[2] Their disagreement also extended to relations with the labor movement: Ahimeir strongly opposed Jabotinsky’s agreement with David Ben-Gurion, intended to end violence between Labor and Revisionist supporters, and considered leaving the Revisionist movement over it.[2]

Following the loss of Revisionist control over Do’ar ha-Yom, Hazit ha-Am was established in 1931 as the main organ of Brit HaBiryonim.[12] Ahimeir edited the paper, while Dr. Hareven served as its “editor in charge” under Jabotinsky’s supervision.[12] The maximalist faction led by Ahimeir, Yevin, and Greenberg used the newspaper as its own platform in the early 1930s.[11] It opposed British rule, Mapai, and the leadership of the Yishuv.[13]

Hazit ha-Am appeared weekly or biweekly but used the format of a daily newspaper.[12] Its available online issues run from January 29, 1932, to June 12, 1934.[13] The newspaper was subsequently renamed Ha-Yarden and later, in the late 1930s, Ha-Mashkif and Ha-Yom.[12] Alongside street demonstrations and other public actions, newspaper editing gave Ahimeir a continuing means of advancing the positions of his political circle.[11][12]

Opposition to Nazi Germany became a conspicuous element of Brit HaBiryonim’s activity in 1933.[14] On May 5, Hazit ha-Am supported the boycott of Nazi Germany.[12] That month, members of the group removed Nazi flags from the German consulates in Jerusalem and Jaffa.[14] Ahimeir and his associates opposed the Nazi regime’s treatment of Jews and campaigned for a worldwide boycott of Germany.[14]

Ahimeir and Jabotinsky also opposed the proposed negotiations in Berlin concerning the transfer of German Jews and their property to Palestine.[14] They argued that the arrangement would finance Germany’s war machine.[14] The boycott campaign and the removal of swastika flags were among the group’s most prominent actions against German official institutions, alongside its earlier demonstrations directed at British authority.[3][14]

The assassination of Chaim Arlosoroff on Tel Aviv beach on June 16, 1933, brought a decisive interruption to Ahimeir’s political activity.[15] He was arrested along with Abraham Stavsky and Zvi Rosenblatt, and was accused in connection with the killing.[15] Ahimeir vehemently denied involvement.[1] He was acquitted on May 16, 1934, for lack of evidence, and evidence placing him in Jerusalem at the time of the murder formed part of the account of his clearance.[4][15]

His acquittal in the assassination case did not bring an end to his imprisonment.[1] He was detained again and charged separately with organizing Brit HaBiryonim.[1] In July 1934, he received a sentence of 21 months, subsequently reduced to 18 months, and he was released in August 1935.[14] Brit HaBiryonim itself disintegrated shortly after Arlosoroff’s murder under pressure and persecution from the Mandatory authorities.[3]

Family responsibilities accompanied these years of political activity and imprisonment.[2] Ahimeir’s daughter Ze’evah was born in 1930, and after her mother, Hasiya, was hospitalized, he placed the infant with his sister Bluma and her husband in Degania Bet.[2] They raised the child, and Bluma later refused Ahimeir’s request to bring his daughter back to live with him.[2]

In his later life, Ahimeir withdrew from politics and devoted himself to research and work on the Encyclopedia Hebraica.[2] He preferred writing to public speaking and continued to work as a journalist, historian, and commentator on political and strategic affairs before and after Israel’s establishment.[2][5] As a member of the Hebrew Encyclopedia’s editorial board, he wrote entries that included an account of Bobruisk and its Jewish community, signed with the initials “A.Ah.”[5]

His books presented his views on Judaism and Zionism over several decades.[1] They included Reportazhah shel Baḥur “Yeshivah” in 1946, Im Keri’at ha-Gever, translated as “When the Cock Crows,” in 1958, and Judaica in 1961.[1] He also produced numerous articles, many of them sharply polemical.[1] His final article appeared in the newspaper Herut on the day after his death.[2]

Ahimeir died on June 6, 1962.[2] On his last day, he walked from his home in Ramat Gan to his daughter’s home in Ramat Aviv and collapsed while visiting his infant granddaughter.[2] His funeral procession began at Jabotinsky House.[2] Knesset Speaker Kadish Luz, a former companion from Bobruisk who belonged to the labor movement, delivered a eulogy.[2]

Ahimeir’s ideas contributed to the ideological foundations of both the Irgun Ẓeva’i Le’ummi and Loḥamei Ḥerut Israel, or Lehi.[1] His influence, together with that of Uri Zvi Greenberg, was particularly significant within the Irgun.[11] The small organization he founded was active for several years before giving way to organizations with a more strictly military character.[10] Its demonstrations, opposition to Mandatory authority, and insistence on Jewish self-reliance thus preceded a different phase of organized resistance.[9][10]

The 1930 demonstration during Shiels’s visit occupies a particular place in accounts of the origins of Hebrew resistance under the Mandate.[10] Ahimeir’s arrest at that event has been identified as the first political imprisonment under British Mandatory rule, and the demonstration as the chronological starting point of the resistance movement.[10] The ideological and political origins of that movement were less clearly defined than this chronological marker.[10] Brit HaBiryonim’s immediate activities remained limited in scale and did not constitute a military campaign.[3][10]

His legacy also rests on a substantial body of writing rather than underground organization alone.[1] Newspaper columns, historical work, books about Judaism and Zionism, and encyclopedia entries occupied different stages of his career.[1][5] His later contribution to the Hebrew Encyclopedia included the Jewish history of the Bobruisk community from which he came.[5] Following his death, a committee was established to publish his writings as Ketavim Nivḥarim, or “Selected Works.”[1]

The Arlosoroff affair continued to shape the political memory surrounding Ahimeir and his associates long after their acquittals.[16] The trial aggravated relations within the Yishuv and the Zionist movement without resolving the identity of the murderer.[16] A state commission established in 1982 and reporting in 1985 could not determine who had killed Arlosoroff or establish the motive, and could not attribute the killing to a political organization.[14] It also found the sole eyewitness identification by Sima Arlosoroff inadmissible.[14]

Later public recollections linked Ahimeir’s case to the wider Revisionist circle that had supported him.[17] In a 2012 speech, Benjamin Netanyahu recounted his father Benzion’s recollection of meeting Ahimeir in Zion Square on the evening of the murder.[17] In that retrospective account, Benzion believed that the timing and available transportation made it impossible for Ahimeir to reach the beach in time, and urged his own father to ask Rabbi Kook to speak against the accusation.[17] The speech preserved a family recollection of the affair rather than a new finding by the investigation.[17]

Ahimeir’s relationship to fascism is a significant subject of historical disagreement.[18] His Do’ar ha-Yom column bore the title “From the Notebook of a Fascist,” and he and his fellow editors held more extreme political views than Jabotinsky.[8] Historian Amir Goldstein described Brit HaBiryonim as a radical maximalist wing whose members and supporters expressed support for Italian fascism, while Encyclopaedia Judaica places the group on the extreme right of the Revisionist movement.[14][3] In a 1928 column, Ahimeir included Atatürk, Mussolini, Piłsudski, de Valera, and Hitler among “illustrious” names.[2]

His son Yossi explained that the wording meant “great” or “famous” and preceded fascism’s later development.[2] Ahimeir himself subsequently called fascism “narrow-minded nationalism” and credited Jabotinsky with curing him of this “youthful illness.”[2] A Jerusalem Post review, discussing historian Dan Tamir’s interpretation of “Hebrew fascism,” places Ahimeir among Revisionists associated with fascist tendencies and reports that Jabotinsky demanded in 1933 that he stop seeking positive value in Nazi Germany.[18] These ideological disputes coexist with documented actions by Ahimeir’s circle against Nazi flags and in support of a boycott of Germany.[12][14]

The Arlosoroff accusation generated a separate, deeply polarizing controversy.[16] Sources variously describe the charge against Ahimeir as plotting or incitement to murder, but agree that he was cleared rather than convicted of the killing.[1][4] Labor circles and Revisionists interpreted the affair in sharply opposed ways: many Labor supporters regarded the widow’s identification as evidence of criminal fascist tendencies among Revisionists, while Revisionists and other non-Labor figures, including Rabbi Kook, defended Stavsky’s innocence and denounced the affair as a “blood libel of Jews against Jews.”[16]

Stavsky was convicted at trial but acquitted on appeal for lack of corroborating evidence; Rosenblatt was acquitted at trial.[16] Competing explanations implicated two Arab men in an intended sexual assault or proposed British or Nazi involvement, but none established responsibility for the murder.[4][19] One imprisoned Arab man twice confessed and twice retracted his confession, while the later commission could not establish that he and an accomplice had committed the crime.[14][16] The unresolved murder must therefore be distinguished from Ahimeir’s separate imprisonment for organizing Brit HaBiryonim.[1][14]