“CONCerNING Our ARAb QuESTIOn”? • 129created for itself (including a flag, an anthem, and postage- like stamps)
were dismissively and derisively labeled “the enemies” (ha-ẓorerim)
and “the informants” or “the libelers” (ha-malshinim). Consider, for in-
stance, a November 1910 ha-Ḥerut report entitled “the Libel of our
enemies.” the author explains:
It has come to our attention from a trusted source that, following
the celebration of the anniversary [of the arrival in palestine] of
Mr. [Eliezer] Ben- Yehuda, a telegram was sent from here [Jeru-
salem] to haifa, to the newspaper al-Karmil, saying: “In the beit
ha-ʿam [house of the Nation] of the Jews an anniversary party
was organized in honor of Ben- Yehuda, one of the scholars of
the Jews. There, they raised the flags of the Zionists, sold Zionist
stamps, and sang the Zionist national anthem. as the Zionists are
arousing this movement (?), the residents of the Land of Israel are
slumbering in a deep sleep.”^129here ha-Ḥerut cites an arabic newspaper from haifa that fairly accu-
rately described the celebration of the anniversary of this most promi-
nent Zionist’s immigration to palestine. Some of the details are corrob-
orated just one page earlier in the same issue of ha-Ḥerut; the rest, in
Ben- Yehuda’s own paper, ha- Or.^130 the description recorded in the tele-
gram to al-Karmil was, if anything, understated in its portrayal of the
nationalistic nature of the party for Ben- Yehuda; ha- Or described the
festivities as “the first national, living celebration after two thousand
years of exile and destruction” at which, inter alia, Ben- Yehuda “cried
tears of joy” on hearing the singing of the Zionist national anthem ha-
Tikvah. What is clear, then, is that it was not any inaccuracy in the de-
scription of the event that disturbed ha-Ḥerut’s writer; it was rather the
arabic newspaper’s cautionary rhetorical conclusion, that while the
Zionists were pursuing their national plans, Palestine’s (non- Jewish)
residents were “in a deep sleep.”Ha-Ḥerut thus challenges the reader:
“now . . . do you still doubt our words? Do you still not wish to under-
stand the deep disaster [ha-shoʾah] that can come upon us if we do not
act preemptively? Will we be deaf and pass silently over these vulgar
lies that have the potential to destroy our standing here in the land?”^131
Ha-Ḥerut’s editors were offended by any criticism of Zionism; it was the
(^129) ha-Ḥerut 3:7 (november 7, 1910), 3. This anonymous article was probably written
by the then- editor, Hayyim Ben- Attar. The parenthetical question mark is found in the
ha-Ḥerutarticle, indicating the author’s or editors’ apparent (if perhaps feigned) bewil-
derment as to what is meant by “this movement.”
(^130) See ha- Or (november 7, 1910).
(^131) For an analysis of the Ben- Yehuda anniversary celebration, see Saposnik, Becoming
Hebrew, 202ff.