Ottoman Brothers: Muslims, Christians, and Jews in Early Twentieth-Century Palestine (42 page)

Only the Greeks and Bulgarians and Armenians and also the Albanians have the right to be called by the name of “nationalists.”…Only they can work for their people and their language with their heads held high and openly! Only they can show their origins, declare their nationalism and raise their heads! And because of that no one will raise the call of betrayal of the homeland against them, no one will dare say to them that they want to conquer lands of the empire…. But, we the Jews, we have to be different from them, to be denied of that right.
⁶²

As Elmaliach put it, Zionists want “to establish in Palestine a gathering of citizens as loyal to Turkey [
sic
] as the Armenians and the Greeks,” a curious argument considering the fact that the growing national problem within the empire was widely covered in the press (including in Elmaliach's own newspaper).
⁶³

As well, the disappointing lack of true equality in the Ottoman Empire along with the rise of intercommunal conflict in Palestine led the Judeo-Spanish
Liberty
to link consciously the failure of Ottomanism with the surging popularity of Zionism. Challenging the basic slogans of the 1908 revolution—brotherhood, equality, and liberty—the press upbraided the local administration and fellow Palestinians for pushing the
Jews toward Zionism. “The rise in anti-Semitism in the Arabic press—is this fraternity? The Red Passport for Jewish immigrants into Palestine—is this equality? In fact, if the Jews had known real liberty they would not be turning to the ‘mortal enemy'—the Zionist movement.”
⁶⁴
In other words, if Zionism had gained adherents in recent years, it was because Ottomanism was fast losing them.

OTTOMANIST ANTI-ZIONISM, ROUND II

The verbal sparring in the press in early 1909 was only a prelude to the virulent attacks that would follow against David Fresco, labeled by
Liberty
as the “most dangerous internal slanderer.”
⁶⁵
Fresco, who as the editor of the Istanbul Judeo-Spanish mass newspaper
El Tiempo
was extraordinarily influential in the Ottoman Jewish world, came out squarely against the Zionist movement in September 1909. In a series of articles entitled
Is Zionism Compatible with Ottomanism?
Fresco accused Zionism of being primitive, exclusivist, utopian, and exploitative.
⁶⁶
Fresco's attack was twofold: first, against the basic premise of the Zionist movement, he fiercely denied that the Jews were a nation-people, claiming instead that they were only a religious community. Fresco argued that “assimilation” was not an insult, as the Zionists intended, but rather was a sign of progress. He sought to preserve the Ottoman spirit alongside the Jewish origins of his community.

Fresco also attacked the so-called benign aims of the Zionist movement. He accused the Zionist movement of hiding Wolffsohn's and Nordau's speeches to the Ninth Zionist Congress, where they spoke of concentrating Jews exclusively in Palestine. Fresco called the Zionists “liars and untrustworthy,” while their leaders were “crooks and scoundrels,” who, he said, were “inciting” the Ottoman Jews against their religion and state.
⁶⁷

I think the central leadership of Zionism is committing a huge crime in its desire to drag the Ottoman Jews after their crazy movement…. The Zionist shelter must be in Turkey [sic] itself, and because of that Ottoman Jews cannot participate in this movement without being traitors in the eyes of their friends who belong to the other peoples. The heads of Zionism should think a little about the existence of half a million Jews who live quiet and peaceful lives without any pressures, faithful to their homeland.
⁶⁸

In order to correct the misinformation the Zionist movement was disseminating, Fresco published his own pamphlet in French about the dangers of the Zionist movement, aimed at a Jewish audience (for the misguided youth following Zionism) as well as at a broader Ottoman
audience (so that “our brothers of the other religions will be convinced that the Ottoman Jew, like his brother in all the lands of exile, is loyal to his homeland”). Later, as a defendant in a lawsuit accusing him of libel, Fresco translated the Zionist anthem “Ha-Tivka” to prove his assertion that Zionism was a particularistic and revolutionary movement.
⁶⁹

In response,
Liberty
and its allies went on the attack. First, they attempted to discredit Fresco personally, claiming that his anti-Zionist tirade was nothing more than greedy self-interest. Along with several other Jewish and non-Jewish newspapers empire-wide,
El Tiempo
had received regular subsidies from the Zionist movement in exchange for committing to work for the good of the Zionist movement, promoting Jewish entry to the empire and Palestine, the cancellation of Ottoman restrictions, and the revival of Hebrew. According to the Zionist account of the agreement, “Fresco is an energetic man, who can wield great influence, and he can be of great service for winning over this community.” He was to “concern himself in his articles—alongside his Turkish-patriotic sentiment—with expressing a nevertheless friendly orientation to the Jewish-national tendencies and to Zionism.”
⁷⁰
In exchange, the Zionist movement was to provide his paper with friendly articles and new subscribers.

Despite
Liberty's
energetic defense of Zionism, by the winter of 1909 the cumulative effect of the anti-Zionist expressions in the Sephardi Jewish press had borne fruit. At a meeting with the Istanbul rabbinical council, three of the four Jewish members of parliament declared that they “oppose with all their abilities the Zionist movement.”
⁷¹
According to the account, the three said they were first of all Ottoman representatives whose chief responsibility was to guard the affairs of the Ottoman homeland. Only secondarily were they Jews, but they intended to protect the interests of all Jews and not just those of the Zionist minority. In response,
Liberty
issued “Open Letter to the Honorable Jewish Deputies,” decrying them as non-Jews, inhumane, and antinational.
⁷²
They were betraying the values of liberty and the rights of man, as they were turning their backs on thousands of Jews in need. The paper was certain that the deputies were in line with the aims of most Zionists, chief among them which were “revival of the Jewish people and the revival of Turkey [
sic
] itself.”

At the outbreak of the Fresco affair, Chief Rabbi Haim Nahum came out clearly on his side, prompting an open letter to the chief rabbi in the Judeo-Spanish
Liberty
from a reader in Istanbul. The reader, David Grasiani, urged the chief rabbi to speak out against Fresco's “calumny” that the Zionists wanted an independent kingdom on Ottoman national territory—arguing that “Señor Fresco must come before
God and the people and tell what Zionist, or what Zionist publications,” he gets this from. Instead, promised Grasiani, “We will finally raise our voices and say to our Turkish brothers: we return to Palestine as loyal Ottoman co-citizens. We are ready to give whatever guarantees are demanded of us.”
⁷³

Two months later, however, in February 1910, the French translation of Jacobus Kann's book
Eretz-Israel: Le pays juif
(The Land of Israel: The Jewish Homeland) appeared on the streets of Istanbul and provided further support to the argument of Ottomanist anti-Zionists. The book called for Jewish autonomy in Palestine, complete with a Jewish army and police force. Victor Jacobsohn, the ZO's representative in the Ottoman capital, worried greatly about the impact the book would have, seeing how it directly contradicted the watered-down version of Zionism that he and his colleagues had been peddling among Ottoman Jews and Ottoman officials.

The publication of the French translation of Kann's book
Eretz-Israel
and the measures that the author proposed to carry out in Turkey [
sic
] have caused a dangerous and unexpected situation for Zionism in this land. The political thoughts of this book stand in direct contradiction to everything we have said about the founding principles of Zionism, contrary to the official explanations given in the press and in the Ninth [Zionist] Congress. Since the author is one of the three members of the Inner Actions Committee, and the translation came out not only after the proclamation of the constitutional regime but even after the congress, this book appears as an official declaration of the Zionist movement. This book will be useful to our enemies…and will have difficult political consequences…. It is clear that our aims will be seen as “incompatible with the integrity of the Ottoman empire.”
⁷⁴

Jacobsohn's worries were justified, for immediately after, Chief Rabbi Haim Nahum, not a supporter of the Zionist movement even at that time, had a harsh exchange with one of the ZO's Istanbul officers, “N.” According to the report sent to Germany, the chief rabbi stated, “I find that this book is finally a look at the true Zionist views. This is a more sincere Zionism. Now many want to deny this Zionism; that it is the place of Zionism to create a new movement. [But]
this is Zionism
[pointing to the book].”
⁷⁵
In an attempt at damage control, the Istanbul officer tried to tell Haim Nahum that the book was the product of a “private man”—but the chief rabbi knew better, saying, “Kann is no private person. I don't understand why you are able to give a more correct version of Zionism than is Kann, an official and more deserving man.” “N.” was concerned with whether Fresco would write about the translation in his newspaper,
El Tiempo;
although Haim Nahum said he thought Fresco was “taking a break” from his attacks on the Zionists, he was clear that “others would write about it.”

Indeed, though the Sephardi press quieted down for a few months, Fresco resumed his attacks by the fall of 1910, this time taking aim at the “practical Zionist” program in Palestine:

Not one of our five hundred thousand Ottoman Jews and not a single Ottoman Jewish child that will be born tomorrow [!!—editor's note] will agree to that [Zionist] program. The Ottoman Jews do not have, and will not have, another homeland other than the Ottoman homeland. Every part of the national land must be sacred to him without any difference.…

To work against this truth is to betray the homeland [!!], betray the Ottoman Jews, since the land belongs to the Muslims, to the Christians, to the Jews, all of them partners and related in the same social tie, and when one insists on ignoring this truth then not only will he be seen as disregarding the social tie through injustice, but he will also be seen as a rebel against the state and traitor to his partner brothers; he will cause shame and dishonor and provoke an awful hatred against the Jewish people in the empire. All the Ottoman Jews and Arabs are related to each other so it is incumbent upon us to prevent this rebellion, to ban this disgrace, and to take refuge from the catastrophe that can fall on our heads.
⁷⁶

A week later, Fresco followed up on this theme in his article “The Great Danger!” where he argued that the struggle in Palestine and Syria expressed in the newspapers “is very dangerous and can bring many troubles, and a real disaster.” Fresco argued that the Erez-Israeli delegate to the previous Zionist congress in Hamburg had warned that “even the peasant reads
Die Welt!”
and as such, was aware of the Zionist movement's call for Jews to support the Jewish National Fund's efforts to buy land for Jews in Palestine. According to Fresco, it was only logical that the peasant would want to defend his homeland and organize against the Jewish occupation that would worsen his status. “Today, the peasant defends himself with words, but tomorrow, he can move from words to deeds, and then that will be a great sorrow not only to the Jews of Palestine but also to all Syria and maybe even to the whole empire.”
⁷⁷

This proved the last straw for Fresco's Sephardi brethren in Jerusalem; from then on, Fresco became a bitter enemy for
Liberty
, someone who not only sought to assimilate but who had become an enemy of the Jewish people. He was attacked for bringing non-Jewish attention to an internal Jewish debate and for inciting Jews and non-Jews against Zionism and the Hebrew community in Palestine. A few days later Betzalel Saʻadi ha-Levi, editor of the Salonica newspaper
La Epoca
, also came out squarely against the Zionist movement, saying that Palestine belonged to the Arabs and all Ottomans should oppose the settlement of Jews there.
⁷⁸

It was rumored that Fresco was planning on establishing additional newspapers in Ottoman Turkish and French to battle against Zionism—a plan that threatened to make his influence much stronger. As a result,
Liberty
warned its readers, Fresco deserved to be cursed in the pages of history “among the people of Israel.” The paper tried to organize public rallies against Fresco in Palestine and Istanbul, but it seems that little came of these efforts other than small rallies in Haifa and Jaffa.
⁷⁹

In one of the translations offered by
Liberty
to show its readers the direct damage Fresco was causing, an article from the Istanbul paper
İkdam
was cited, claiming that while the Ottoman Jews were trustworthy the foreign Jews were bringing a new danger to the empire. Unlike the Ottoman Jews, the Ashkenazi immigrants refused to integrate into Ottoman society, did not serve in the army, and caused problems with the locals. “What use will come to our country by immigration of those people?”
İkdam
complained. “We are not enemies of the Jews…the Ottoman Jews are wonderful nationalists who love their state with a boundless love, participate in legal commerce, and in the hour of need also take part in battle, and we do not want the Ottoman Jews…to follow those delusions…. Jerusalem is not of the Jews alone. Jerusalem is a holy place that belongs also to Muslims and to Christians.” In conclusion,
İkdam
argued that Zionism “is a new disaster for us, and we hope that Turkey [
sic
] will be preserved from that great tragedy that will come upon her as a holocaust.”
⁸⁰