Search Results

The first signs of Palestinian Arab political reorganization appeared at the end of 1943. Independent leaders reestablished the Nation's Fund, operating in three channels: propaganda against selling land to Jews, rescuing land that was in danger, and direct action against sellers. On the eve of the 1948 war, the Palestinian national institutions were unable to unite the country's Arabs. They were vulnerable to intelligence penetration by the Zionists, whom each faction and leader helped in his own way in order to harm his opponents. Many Arabs continued to maintain social and economic ties with Jews in violation of the Higher Arab Committee's instructions. Zionist intelligence recruitment was becoming more and more sophisticated. And the Arabs of Palestine were facing a war that commenced immediately after their leadership announced its rejection of the UN General Assembly decision to partition Palestine into two countries.

Collaboration took different forms during these years, depending mostly on the way Zionist decision makers analyzed the state of the conflict. This chapter highlights the unique feature of the Palestinian national movement. A national movement generally faces the difficulty of disseminating its ideology among an internally divided public. The Palestinian Arabs also had to confront the intensive penetration of their ranks by a rival national movement. The discussion also considers the Zionist ideology and praxis in this regard. After more than a decade of effort, the Zionist movement abandoned its strategy of establishing or encouraging organizations and parties to constitute an alternative leadership for Palestine's Arabs. The Palestinian national movement, for its part, tried from time to time to impose a boycott on Jewish products. It sought to harm the Jewish economy and to prevent the Zionists from depicting the relations between Jews and Arabs as mutually beneficial.

This chapter tells the story of the Towarzystwo Rozwoju Handlu, Przemysłu i Rzemiosł (the Society for the Advancement of Trade, Industry, and Crafts; Rozwój or Advancement for short). Its establishment was the high point of the campaign to put in place a framework for the economic boycott. No advance information about the founding of the organization was published. In mid-June 1913 an announcement was published stating that the governor’s commission on unions and associations had confirmed the society’s statute. The announcement emphasized the significance of the founding of such an organization. A few days later the statute was published. The society’s purpose, as formulated in the statute, was in accordance with its name: ‘The Society has as its aim the cooperative advancement of industry, crafts, and trade among Christian people, mutual aid in this direction for members of the Society, and the support of the industrial, craft, and trading activities of the Society’.

This chapter examines the participation of white women in direct action protests in Memphis in the years 1955–1964. It looks at how Memphis’s white women became involved in the civil rights movement through the back door, through volunteer and religious organizations. It also considers the resistance they encountered from all quarters, whites and blacks, in their journey to civil rights activism and how they challenged segregation and pushed for social reform by joining protests such as sit-ins, freedom rides, and economic boycotts.