122 • CHAPTER 3
in apparently derisive quotation marks^105 ) and thus were prohibited
from joining the military. Ben- Gurion’s single allusion to religion, that
is, points to an intolerant aspect of the Ottoman empire’s Islamic iden-
tity, which he does not appear to take particularly seriously. Overall,
however, he does not conceive of the two “civilizations” in religious
terms. the contrast between the article in ha-Ḥerut and Ben- Gurion’s
piece in ha-Aḥdut thus could hardly be more pronounced.
To be clear, Ben- Gurion, like the authors in ha-Ḥerut, also consid-
ered the Christian- edited arabic press to be exceptionally anti- Zionist.
“Just as freedom had been declared and newspapers were able to write
about whatever they pleased” as a result of the Young Turk Revolution,
he writes, “immediately, the Christian press began strong propaganda
against the Jews.” While this hostility was evident elsewhere in the
Ottoman empire, he contends, it was especially so “in the newspapers
of the Christian arabs,” opposing “the Jewish settlement in the Land of
Israel.”^106 however, when he tries to explain what he perceives to be
anti- Jewish hatred in Palestine, Ben- Gurion has difficulty accounting
for why it has taken root in one religious community more so than in
another. “the source of this hatred,” he insists, is
the Arabs who work in the [Jewish] colonies. Like every worker,
the Arab worker also hates his taskmaster and exploiter. But be-
cause there is not only a class opposition here but also a national
difference between the workers and the farmers— this hatred
takes the shape of a national hatred. In fact, the national ele-
ment dominates the class element and so in the hearts of the arab
working masses, a fierce hatred flares against the Jews.^107there is an obvious disconnect between Ben- Gurion’s class and na-
tional theory of arab opposition to Zionist settlement in palestine, as
he articulates it above, and his perception that Christian arab jour-
nalists and intellectuals (not undifferentiated Arab laborers) were the
ones who most forcefully opposed Zionism. The “Arab workers” about
whom Ben- Gurion writes were, after all, mostly Muslim, not Christian.
(^105) While these quotation marks may merely indicate a borrowing of terminology
(from the arabic muʾminīn), later in the same article Ben- Gurion uses quotation marks in
a way that obviously connotes derision. He refers to “the ‘Zionists’ abroad” (outside of
the Land) for whom “the yishuv is nothing more than a propaganda tool for ‘their Zionist
work.’ ” It would seem that the same sense applies to these quotation marks as well.
(^106) In this sense, I disagree with the assertion that ha-Ḥerut’s insistence on distinguish-
ing between Muslim and Christian arabs was “unique and uncommon.” Jacobson, “the
Sephardi Community in Pre– World War I Palestine,” 24. See, for example, Ben- Gurion,
“Clarifying Our political Situation,” ha-Aḥdut 1:3, 89– 90.
(^107) Ben- Gurion, “Clarifying Our political Situation,” ha-Aḥdut 1:3, 90.