Revisionist Zionism

They don't appreciate their political rivals co-opting what they see as their story.

To quote the great scholar, Yael Zerubavel, who writes about Israeli myth-building, quote, "As the socialists saw it, the Revisionists had betrayed the defenders of Tel Hai in a time of need, and therefore had no moral right to use the battle and the names of the fallen heroes as their symbols.

By co-opting the sacred myth of Tel Hai and its major commander, Yosef Trumpeldor, the Revisionists were manipulating the past for their own political purposes." Of course, Jabotinsky saw it differently.

Zerubavel writes, quote, "He maintained that he had shown better judgment and more concern for the settlers by calling for their immediate withdrawal than those who had let them expect help to no avail.

Jabotinsky now went further than he had in 1920, directly blaming the socialists for the death of the defenders of Tel Hai and thereby denying their moral right to the myth." Always fun when two people who are supposedly on the same side start fighting about who history belongs to.

But Zerubavel explains, quote, "The different versions of the myth also had a direct bearing on the immediate political scene.

The Revisionists mobilized Tel Hai in support of their call for armed resistance, maintaining that it was a symbolic expression of armed confrontation, blood and sacrifice as central principles of the Yishuv's national ideology.

The labor movement, in contrast, saw it as supporting their advocacy of restraint on the use of force against the Arabs and the British, and of pursuing the national mission of settling and working the land." To say it for the millionth time, myths are really powerful.