traNSLatioN aND coNqueSt • 197ated newspapers in non- Jewish languages, but no Gentiles ever read
them.^51 Similarly, if a Zionist arabic newspaper aimed to influence the
opinion of non- Jewish arabic- readers, it would necessarily fail. One
wonders whether this was less a debate over principle than a turf bat-
tle.^52 after all, were Zionists to establish their own arabic newspaper,
Ludvipol may have feared losing control over his office to the editors
of the new paper.
regardless of the antagonists’ motivations, the debate dragged on for
a couple of years until finally Moyal and Malul succeeded in founding a
short- lived arabic newspaper. in 1913, under Moyal’s leadership, Ṣawt
al- ʿuthmāniyya (the Voice of ottomanism) was created. For Moyal, the
paper was meant to fulfill the desire he articulated the previous year to
explain to the arabs that our ambitions as hebrew nationalists do
not oppose their ambitions, and that we have the necessary qual-
ities to work hard together for the sake of the shared homeland
and to enhance the prestige of the Ottoman nation under whose
shadow we stand at the same time as we seek to be a distinct
Jewish nation concerned for its language, character, past, future,
and customs.^53highlighting the consistency between “hebrew nationalism,” defined in
distinctly cultural terms— language, character, past, future, customs—
and Ottomanism, Moyal hoped, through Ṣawt al- ʿuthmāniyya, to allay
fears about the Zionists’ separatist political ambitions.
Some have seen Moyal and Malul’s effort to create an arabic news-
paper as an emblem of a unique Sephardic respect for their arab neigh-
bors and arab culture (in contrast to an alleged ashkenazic disregard,
or worse, for arab culture). it is worth noting, though, that Malul, in a
1913 series of articles defending his arabic- language activities against
charges of assimilationism, including his work for the Zionist arabic
newspaper, explains that the arabic language could never “penetrate
our hearts and destroy the aim of our souls.” On the contrary, he insists,
“the mind cannot imagine the possibility that this minor culture [tarbut
peʿutah] will act upon us so much so that it would push us backward.”^54
(^51) ha- Or 3:2 (october 4, 1911), 1.
(^52) In contrast, Yosef Gorni presents this controversy as a case of opposed “ideological
outlooks in palestine.” See Gorni, Zionism and the Arabs 1882– 1948 , 53– 54. another
factor in this dispute may be connected to the reason Ludvipol came to palestine in the
first place. he had been sent by hibbat Zion to found a new hebrew newspaper. having
failed to do so, Ludvipol may not have been eager to see the founding of a newspaper in
a different language. on Ludvipol’s hibbat Zion mission, see tidhar, eḤY, 2: 674.
(^53) ha- Ḥerut 4:70 (February 2, 1912), 3.
(^54) ha- Ḥerut 5:221 (June 17, 1913), 2.