Journal of Israeli History

Politics, Society, Culture

ISSN: 1353-1042 (Print) 1744-0548 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/fjih20

A kibbutz in the diaspora: The pioneer movement

in Poland and the Klosova kibbutz

Rona Yona

To cite this article: Rona Yona (2012) A kibbutz in the diaspora: The pioneer
movement in Poland and the Klosova kibbutz, Journal of Israeli History, 31:1, 9-43, DOI:
10.1080/13531042.2012.660376

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13531042.2012.660376

Published online: 16 Mar 2012.

Submit your article to this journal

Article views: 161

View related articles

Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at

http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=fjih20

Download by: [University of Tasmania] Date: 08 February 2017, At: 04:32

The Journal of Israeli History
Vol. 31, No. 1, March 2012, 943

A kibbutz in the diaspora: The pioneer movement in Poland and the

Klosova kibbutz
Rona Yona*
In the mid-1930s the largest kibbutz movement in the world was in Poland. This article
examines the formation of kibbutzim in Poland by focusing on the largest and most
influential of them all, Hehalutz (The pioneer) movement in Poland. It shows how the
preparation of pioneers seeking emigration to Palestine was transformed into an
extension of the kibbutz movements in Palestine, and examines the implications of this
development. The article examines life in a diaspora kibbutz by focusing on the
Klosova kibbutz, which was one of the leading kibbutzim in Poland.
Keywords: Hehalutz; Poland; Polish Jewry; hakhsharah; aliyah; Hakibbutz
Hameuhad; Klosova kibbutz; Yitzhak Tabenkin; Berl Katznelson

In the mid-1930s, the largest kibbutz movement in the world was, surprisingly enough,
outside Palestine. Though Israel is the place most associated with the kibbutz, from the
summer of 1933 to the autumn of 1935, Hehalutz (The pioneer) in Poland was the largest
kibbutz movement in the world, and the largest kibbutz outside Palestine was in odz, with
380 members.1
The pioneer movement in eastern Europe was the main source of members for
kibbutzim in Palestine until 1939.2 In the peak year of 1935, the World Organization of
Hehalutz in Warsaw, linked to the Histadrut (Federation of Jewish Labor) in Palestine,
claimed it had 21,400 members organized in over 1,000 kibbutzim across 25 countries,
mainly in eastern Europe (excluding the USSR).3 Though the numbers may be somewhat
inflated, they do reflect the remarkable and rapid growth of the movement from 1932,
during the peak years of the Fifth Aliyah (wave of immigration to Palestine, 1932 35).
Together with smaller pioneer organizations affiliated with other political parties such as
the religious Zionist Mizrahi and Revisionist Betar, there were an estimated 34,000 young
women and men living in kibbutzim in the diaspora, preparing to go to Palestine. The heart
of the movement was in Poland and Galicia, which had over half of all pioneers (over
18,000 members in some 550 kibbutzim).4 At the same time in Palestine, the total number
of members in the three kibbutz movements was much lower with only 5,000 in 1933,
increasing to 9,000 in 1935, thanks to the wave of immigration.5 After 1935, when
immigration to Palestine was sharply curtailed, and many kibbutzim in the diaspora
disbanded, Palestine could boast the largest movement worldwide.
Diaspora kibbutzim were fundamentally different from kibbutzim in Palestine. What
were they like when compared to our fixed images of the ideal agricultural commune in the
sunny Holy Land? Research on the kibbutz movement has focused on Mandate Palestine
and the State of Israel, which were at the center of the movement and its goals.6 But most
of the kibbutz members in Palestine in the interwar period began their socialization into

*Email: ronayona@gmail.com

ISSN 1353-1042 print/ISSN 1744-0548 online

q 2012 Taylor & Francis
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13531042.2012.660376
http://www.tandfonline.com
10 R. Yona

kibbutz life well before immigration. Until 1939, the movements in Poland and Palestine
were in fact parts of a greater whole. This study wishes to shed more light on the former.
I will examine here the formation of Polish kibbutzim and what it was like to live on
them. I will focus on the Klosova kibbutz, where the model of the diaspora kibbutz took
shape. Founded in a small village in eastern Poland, Klosova became the leading kibbutz
of Hehalutz in Poland during the above period. In 1932 Hehalutz in Poland was
reorganized into five regional kibbutzim based on the Klosova model, with thousands of
members. During the 1930s Klosovas model was adopted by Hehalutz organizations in
other countries and by the smaller pioneer organizations established by rival movements.
This article deals only with the largest movement, called the General Section of Hehalutz
in Poland. I do not depict the kibbutzim of Hashomer Hatzair and Gordonia, which were
officially part of the Polish Hehalutz in the 1930s, but operated separately for complex
political reasons I cannot elaborate here.7 Nor do I address Galicia, which had separate
Zionist organizations. Like other pioneer organization these movements also adopted the
Klosova model.
I chose to focus on Klosova because it shaped the pioneer movement and was one of its
main symbols. Its story reveals both the unique traits of this new model and the common
experiences shared by members in the hundreds of kibbutzim that followed suit, though there
were important differences between kibbutzim in different places and organizations.
Examining one kibbutz will enable a closer look at internal social practices and everyday life.

Hehalutz and hakhsharah

Hehalutz was established around 1917 in various countries (primarily in eastern Europe)
during World War I, following the collapse of tsarism in Russia. It was founded by young
Jews seeking to come to Palestine as pioneers. As the war was still raging and the roads
to Palestine were blocked, they began preparing themselves for that task. This was
called hakhsharah in Hebrew, which can be roughly translated as self-preparation or
training. The founders wanted Hehalutz to be large and open to any young Jew and set
forth two basic principles. The first was physical hakhsharah, meaning to become
accustomed to hard physical labor; the second was cultural hakhsharah, which mainly
included learning Hebrew, as well as Jewish history and the geography of Palestine.
Anyone who was single, fit, over 18 years old, and engaged in hakhsharah, could join
Hehalutz.8 The movements leadership was joined by the older and famous Joseph (Osia)
Trumpeldor, who would become one of its symbols following his heroic death in Tel-Hai
in 1920.9 During the first years the center of the movement was in Russia (including the
Ukraine) where most members and leading activists lived. Influenced by the Bolshevik
revolution, some organized in communes. By the mid-1920s, however, the movement in
Russia declined due to Soviet restrictions, and the center of Hehalutz shifted to Poland.
The Second Polish Republic, established in 1918, had the largest Jewish population in
Europe. With relatively extensive liberties in the new Polish nation-state, compared to the
previous tsarist rule, Jewish life in Poland flourished, soon becoming the most important
Jewish center in Europe. At the same time, a deteriorating economic situation, coupled
with anti-Semitic policies by the new state and initiatives of local government bodies in
particular,10 drove hundreds of thousands of Polish Jews to seek emigration. After
immigration to the USA was restricted in mid-1924, with limited alternatives, Palestine
became the main option for Polish Jewish emigration, and Poland became the main
source of Jewish immigrants to Mandate Palestine.11 Due to its importance, the World
Organization of Hehalutz relocated in Warsaw, next to Hehalutz headquarters in Poland.
 The Journal of Israeli History 11

Hehalutz was the main option for young Jews without capital to enter Palestine. The
Mandate government restricted Jewish immigration and set economic criteria. Only Jews
with sufficient capital could enter freely and special permits (called certificates) were
required for people without capital who came as workers. Most Jews in eastern Europe
lacked the required means to enter Palestine. The certificates were distributed by the Zionist
Organization, which allocated some to Hehalutz.12 In the 1930s, the number of certificates
provided by the British hardly met the demand, and only a small percentage of the hundreds
of thousands who sought to leave Poland could do so. Still, Hehalutz enabled tens of
thousands of young Jews, who could not have emigrated otherwise, to escape political and
economic persecution and hardship, and inevitably, the Holocaust.13 It brought to Palestine
young men and women who increased the size and power of the Histadrut, the workers
parties, and the kibbutz movements, and the overall growth of the Jewish Yishuv.

The formation of the Klosova kibbutz

How did the pioneers prepare for aliyah? The first years of hakhsharah in Klosova provide
a typical account of the activity of Hehalutz during the first period between 1918 and 1925,
in this case in a tiny Jewish community.
The remote village of Klosova (Klesiv in todays Ukraine, Klesow in interwar Poland),
located among the swamps and forests of Polesia, was a new Jewish settlement. Several
hundred Ukrainian families were living there when the first Jewish families arrived in the
mid-nineteenth century. In 1900, a new railway between Kovel and Kiev connected it to
southwestern Russia, and a station called Klisov (in Russian) was placed three kilometers
from the village. The railroad brought with it economic development that relied on local
natural resources: wood, clay, and above all, granite. More Jewish families settled in the
village and near the train station following the Great War, just west of the new and sealed
border with the USSR, on the eastern edge of the new Polish state. Reaching some 25 in
number, Jewish families developed the local stone quarry and sawmill or worked as
craftsmen. The trains brought newspapers that contained new ideas, including Hebrew
papers, with information about Zionism and pioneering.14
The first pioneers of Klosova organized during the Third Aliyah (1919 23), according
to the romantic agricultural ideals of the time. They leased a plot of land and planted grains
during the summer, like the previous generation of settlers and pioneers in Palestine. This
undertaking did not last long, and apparently none of them arrived in Palestine. Other
places in Poland, with larger communities and a stronger pioneer movement, sent
hundreds of pioneers to Palestine.
Agricultural work, reflecting aspirations to cultivate the Land of Israel, proved
unsuitable and too expensive for large-scale hakhsharah as it required substantial capital
and training, especially on the farms owned by Hehalutz. Poland was undergoing industrial
development in large urban centers, and agriculture was losing its importance in the new
commodities markets. With the beginning of the Fourth Aliyah (1924 25), a new model for
hakhsharah was taken from the pioneers of the Third Aliyah, who had established workers
communes in Palestine. Hehalutz Headquarters now instructed pioneers to organize
hakhsharah of manual laborers in kibbutzim. Like generals who prepare for the previous
war, pioneers were preparing for the previous Aliyah. Some of the youth in Klosova
followed suit.
Unlike today, the term kibbutz did not refer to a communal agricultural settlement.
It meant a commune of pioneers in Palestine, working together, often constructing roads
and houses, draining swamps, and laying foundations for the economic development of the
12 R. Yona

country. This model was created by the Work Battalion (Gdud ha-Avodah), a renowned
commune of workers established in Palestine by pioneers from Russia who were inspired
by the Bolshevik revolution.15
To found a kibbutz, the Klosova youth needed a group of people and a permanent
workplace. They contacted the nearby town of Sarny, 22 km to the west,16 which had a
larger Jewish population and a branch of Hehalutz with a couple of dozen members.
The Sarny pioneers had similar aspirations and were looking for a Jewish employer who
would hire them together, but their town had little to offer. With the help of their Klosovan
counterparts, they contacted Leibush Frimer, the Jewish work manager of the Klosova
quarry. Although Frimer found the whole idea ridiculous at first and thought they were too
weak and unfit for the hard work, he yielded to their pleas and agreed to ask the owners, the
Feinsteins, who were Zionists.17 However, the owners, who employed hundreds of
Christian workers laboring in harsh conditions, were also skeptical that the pioneers would
endure this work and agreed to admit 10 members for trial, assuming they would give up
after a few days. The Sarny members secretly collected their belongings at home and
established the Klosova kibbutz in the summer of 1924. With one girl from Sarny and two
more from Klosova, they found an empty warehouse, cleaned it, and set up boards as
beds on one side, another board for a table, and a kitchen on the other. Someone wrote a
sign in Hebrew, Hehalutz House.18 At a group meeting they chose their name, The
Stonecutters Kibbutz in Klosova. They knew this was an innovation in hakhsharah,
compared to the usual agriculture work, carpentry, and work in sawmills. Stonemasonry
was associated with the heroic efforts of the pioneers of the Third Aliyah, who paved roads
in Palestine. The hard physical labor ignited their imagination and enthusiasm.19
At the quarry, they were offended to discover that they were given easier tasks like
collecting gravel and conveying railcars. They wanted to cut stones and prove they were just
as suited to the work as their non-Jewish co-workers who mocked their white hands. Some
of the workers were former criminal convicts, sentenced to penal labor in the time of the tsar,
who had remained to work in the quarry after the collapse of the Russian empire. The two
groups had nothing in common. But as they proved their competence, attitudes toward the
pioneers gradually changed, especially at work, and they were assigned regular work with
the others. Relations with the non-Jewish villagers, though, remained unfriendly. Rumors of
the kibbutz spread in the area, and members from other branches joined. Though the owners
wanted to limit the number of pioneers at the quarry, the kibbutz managed to sneak in more
comrades, reaching some 40 members. In the winter of 1925 Hehalutz headquarters began
approving members of the kibbutz for aliyah and gave them certificates to enter Palestine.
New members joined from more distant towns and shtetls around Klosova. Kibbutz
members managed to obtain more work in Klosova and the nearby village at sawmills or
loading train cars. The kibbutz was successfully established.20
The young pioneers had only vague notions about the kibbutz and communal living,
and little experience in working and living independently. Zionists and relatives from
Klosova and Sarny helped in many ways. Though the pioneers work productivity was not
always satisfactory, local Jews provided jobs when possible. With expenses exceeding
income, Moishe Sheintuch the grocer often overlooked their debts. Butchers Avraham
Eisner and Shimon Shulner gave cuts of meat, and other Jews helped in whatever way they
could. This was how ordinary Jews supported the Zionist cause. The girls were in charge
of housekeeping, even though they had no previous experience. The landlords wife, Batya
Shapira, allowed them to use the oven as long as they kept kashrut, and taught them how to
cook. Some of them worked in the quarry, smashing stones into gravel.21
 The Journal of Israeli History 13

When the founders of the kibbutz left for Palestine the kibbutz disintegrated. The
departure of experienced and active members created a vacuum in leadership, which
rendered diaspora kibbutzim extremely unstable. In Klosova, work in the quarry was halted
at the height of winter, and living conditions in the kibbutz, somehow bearable during the
summer, became extremely difficult. The hakhsharah season ended. Pioneers returned
home and waited to go to Palestine. When a new season started in the spring of 1925, activity
resumed and the kibbutz was reestablished with the help of Hehalutz. This was easily done
so long as immigration to Palestine continued to flow, and new members joined Hehalutz.
The regional secretary of Hehalutz in Volhynia, Batya Bendersky, helped reestablish
the kibbutz. Like many of the leading activists in Hehalutz in Poland in the mid-1920s,
she was a refugee from the USSR who had fled Soviet persecution of Zionist activists.
Bendersky recognized the quarrys potential as a large employer for pioneers. It employed
up to 2,000 workers at times, almost all year round, something not easily found in the
rural provinces of eastern Poland; it was owned by Jews who were also Zionists and
demonstrated their support; and it was suitable for cultivating a new type of pioneer, an
urban proletarian to work outside the agricultural domain. Bendersky reorganized the
Klosova kibbutz as the Volhynia regional hakhsharah and sent new members from the
entire region. The turnover of people was high, with people leaving after six months of
work, qualifying them for a certificate to Palestine. A constant flow of new members was
essential for maintaining the kibbutz.22
The kibbutz was an unusual sight in the small village and the surrounding rural area an
organized group of Jewish youth working together by day, dancing by night. The local
inhabitants grew accustomed to seeing them march enthusiastically to work and back,
loudly singing pioneer songs. They called them Palestyncy (Palestinians), after learning
they were preparing themselves to go and build Palestine for the Jews. Performing hard
physical labor for low wages was an exception in Polish Jewish society, where most Jews
were self-employed small merchants and artisans. Jewish laborers in agriculture and
industry were rare due to historical reasons, the structure of the Polish economy and anti-
Semitic policies, as well as Jewish cultural tendencies.23 The pioneers were regarded by
both Jews and Christians as working in non-Jewish jobs. On the Sabbath eve, Jews from
Klosova came to watch the pioneers dance. Jews and non-Jews from the surrounding area
would come to marvel at the pioneers work in the quarry. Jewish youth from Sarny would
spend evenings in the kibbutz. When the first group left for Palestine, many came to say
goodbye, calling: See you in our land.24
This somewhat idealized account of Klosovas formation is common. It is repeated with
local variations in hundreds of kibbutzim formed in interwar Poland. It can be found both in
contemporary ideological writing as well as in the nostalgic memoirs of people reminiscing
about their long-gone youth. Still, the account reveals an interesting relationship between the
kibbutz and Jewish society, marked by both cooperation and mutual rejection. On the one
hand, the kibbutz was founded with the help of the Jewish population, which provided work,
credit, and practical assistance. After all, these were the sons and daughters of community
members, often sharing their parents Zionist dreams. On the other hand, kibbutz values
were a negation of Jewish life in the shtetl. They professed hard physical labor and
communal life not the traditional study of religious texts, individual entrepreneurship, and
commerce. The pioneers kibbutz was an alternative Jewish group with revolutionary
potential. There was also ideological opposition to Zionism among Orthodox Jews, as well as
Jewish socialists like the Bundists and communists, or even plain parental resistance to
their children leaving home for an unknown adventure, like in the case of the Sarny group,
who left home secretly.
14 R. Yona

The relationship between the Jewish community and the pioneers depended on the
popularity of Zionism. Zionist activity in Poland fluctuated between periods of growth
and decline, which correlated with the short and ever larger waves of aliyah (1919 21,
1924 26, 1932 35, commonly known as the Third, Fourth, and Fifth Aliyot). There were
short periods of enthusiasm and even hysteria, during which Zionism became a mass
movement and Hehalutz enjoyed increasing membership and public esteem. The waves of
Zionist enthusiasm increased between the two world wars. Between them lay a cemetery,
as one Zionist called it, years of general indifference and even hostility toward Zionism,
when other Jewish movements came to the fore.25 Zionist activity drastically diminished
and was confined to small circles of dedicated individuals who kept the movements alive.26
In these periods Hehalutz was also pushed to the margins of public interest.
The spontaneous formation of the Klosova kibbutz depicted here, and of other
kibbutzim like it, was part of the wave of Zionist enthusiasm among Polish Jewry at the
peak of the Fourth Aliyah. Hakhsharah increased over tenfold, from some 200 to 2,500
people with little help from Hehalutz headquarters.27 But enthusiasm did not last long.
In 1926, when Palestine was hit by an economic crisis, it became clear that the country was
unsuitable for mass immigration. Popular interest in Zionism dwindled, bringing
fundraising and participation to a halt. At the end of 1926, with increasing unemployment
in Palestine, the British government stopped issuing certificates for immigrants without
capital altogether, as previous certificates were left unused. Some immigrants, among
them pioneers, returned to Poland penniless and disappointed, and shattered the reputation
of Zionism even further. Like other Zionist organizations, Hehalutz began to disband.
Thousands of members left and branches ceased to exist. Hakhsharah centers were
abandoned. There was no point in preparing for immediate aliyah. Hehalutz headquarters
had no money, not even for stamps or bread, and could not assist the pioneers. It was at risk
of disappearing altogether like smaller pioneer organizations did in 1927, when the
economic crises in Palestine deepened.28
When Zionist enthusiasm dwindled in 1926, tensions between the kibbutz and the
community intensified, and many left the kibbutz. Parents now opposed their children
leaving for hakhsharah. With no prospects for aliyah, they saw it as unnecessary
hardship. In Klosova, a communist cell was discovered in Passover 1926. The secretary
Israel Waxman and his deputy shifted their support to communism. They withheld the
instructions of the movement headquarters and sabotaged the aliyah of over a hundred
pioneers.29 In times of decline in Zionist activity, rebellious Jewish youth, seeking action,
would often move to other radical movements like the Jewish Socialist Bund or the
underground Polish Communist Party. Those who stayed in the kibbutz were mocked at.
They were seen as wasting their time and energy. But the kibbutz members, now fewer in
number, defied the cynicism of their critics. For example, during Shavuot (spring) 1926,
members of the Klosova kibbutz had no food or money. As workers in the quarry were paid
in stamps usable at the owners canteen, if there was no work, they had no food. They
nonetheless rejected aid from local Jews, who were by now less supportive, preferring to
remain hungry for two days, sing songs, and seek help from fellow pioneers in the nearby
village, demonstrating their Zionist faith and independence.30
By the end of its third hakhsharah season in autumn 1926, the Klosova kibbutz was
disintegrating. Old members were leaving and there was no reason for new ones to join.
It seemed that after this season the kibbutz would cease to exist, as was the case with most
other kibbutzim that were formed during the peak of the Fourth Aliyah. But something else
happened. Klosova was one of four hakhsharah centers that survived the crisis of Zionism
in 1926 28 and continued to train pioneers, even though there was no aliyah for three
 The Journal of Israeli History 15

years.31 During these years of crisis, Klosova became the leading force in the movement,
developing a new model for the pioneer movement in the diaspora. As will be shown,
Klosova replaced the temporary spontaneous kibbutz with a permanent one. The new
model emerged gradually in response to the deepening crisis in Palestine and in Zionism
abroad. By the end of the crisis a new model for hakhsharah and the diaspora kibbutz was
formed, which would reshape the entire pioneer movement.

Klosova: A permanent kibbutz in the diaspora

The young man behind the new model was seventeen-year-old Benny Marshak, later
known as the Politruk [political commissar] of the Palmah, whose main contribution
was to transform hakhsharah into an extension of the kibbutz movements in Palestine.
Marshak reorganized hakhsharah according to the principles of kibbutzim in Palestine and
established permanent ties with the dominant kibbutz movement.32 He represented a new
type of activist in Poland, who had closer ties to a Zionist organization in Palestine than in
Poland. During the 1920s, the Histadrut and kibbutzim in Palestine gradually established
their control over Hehalutz.33 Hehalutz was their main source of members and activists,
which enabled their growth and rise to power in the Zionist Organization. Bennys story
demonstrates their growing influence.
Born around 1909 in the Jewish Pale of Settlement in tsarist Russia, Benny Marshak was
the son of a small-town rabbi in Smorgon (today Smarhon in Belarus), not far from Vilnius.
His father was a member of the religious Zionist Mizrahi Party. The family moved
frequently in search of livelihood, heading south to the developing regions of Ukraine and
southwest Russia. Benny began studying in a traditional Jewish heder and listened to his
fathers rabbinic consultations, but soon the world war broke out, followed by the revolution
and civil war. In Ukraine, the ten-year-old Benny witnessed his fathers assassination by
White Army soldiers, for no reason, as in so many other cases. The family moved to Odessa,
where the exceptionally energetic boy roamed the streets with other children, following
demonstrations, participating in the revolution and breakdown of social order. They burnt
pianos as a symbol of the bourgeoisie. Benny spent some time in a Russian school and then
the family moved back to Smorgon in 1924, which was now under Polish control. There, the
restless youth was drawn to Hehalutz Hatzair (The Young Pioneer), the youth movement of
Hehalutz, which combined both his socialist and Zionist inclinations.34
In 1926, Benny was chosen to participate in the first Hehalutz seminar, which was
headed by Yitzhak Tabenkin, leader of the largest kibbutz movement in Palestine,
Hakibbutz Hameuhad (United Kibbutz Movement).35 Tabenkin had come to Poland with
a group of kibbutz members to help organize the rapidly growing pioneer movement on
behalf of the Federation of Jewish Workers, the Histadrut. They also intended to establish
direct ties with Hehalutz and recruit pioneers for their kibbutz movement.36 Until then
pioneers had joined a particular kibbutz movement only in Palestine, but henceforth direct
ties were maintained between kibbutzim in Palestine and Hehalutz by envoys who were
sent regularly to Poland, thereby strengthening the influence of their movements, and
eventually controlling the pioneer movements abroad during the 1930s.37
Tabenkin and the other envoys were sent to Poland even when Tabenkin was much
needed to help strengthen the new kibbutz movement that had been formed only two years
earlier in Palestine. But as the Fourth Aliyah streamed into Palestine, it became clear that
most immigrants did not join kibbutzim. The first Klosova pioneers, for example, ended up
in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, and Rehovot.38 The young kibbutz movement, numbering only
several hundreds, was desperate for new recruits. The development of the kibbutz relies
16 R. Yona

on establishing our position to prepare a reserve of pioneers [abroad], argued Tabenkin in

internal discussions of the kibbutz secretariat. Others agreed, this is our main hope.39
In Poland, Tabenkin headed a seminar of fifty students training to be local activists in
Hehalutz. Though not the most diligent student, Benny was picked by Tabenkin for his
active, energetic nature and utter devotion. For the seventeen-year-old Benny, fatherless,
uprooted, and eager for action, his meeting with the charismatic 38-year-old Tabenkin
became, as he put it, a deep fatherly-spiritual relation, which lasted until his death in 1975.
He was captivated by Tabenkins vision and would become legendary for his personal
devotion to him, like a Hasid following his rebbe.40
Benny and other participants were very young, 17 18 years old, enthusiastic and
easily influenced. Under Tabenkins leadership, their training included mainly ideological
education in line with his kibbutz movement, which stressed the moral value of physical
labor. Work was not just an economic activity a means to build a Jewish homeland but
an ideal, a goal in itself. At the end of the seminar, which lasted several months, Benny
was fully recruited by Tabenkin and his ideology. He was sent by Hehalutz headquarters to
persuade the remaining members in Klosova not to abandon the place at the seasons end
and to maintain a permanent hakhsharah there.41
Leaders of Hehalutz wanted to sustain the movement even though aliyah had been
halted, and prepare for its renewal by the British.42 Preparation was needed to enable
immediate and maximal use of certificates, leaving no certificate unused. Finding people
and preparing them took time. Dedicated Zionists could not say when exactly aliyah
would be renewed, but they were certain it would, and needed to maintain activity. In the
meantime the economic crisis in Palestine deepened and the distribution of certificates
stopped completely. The question, therefore, was how the Klosova kibbutz could be
maintained without aliyah. New members did not come to replace the ones who had
finished their six months of training and returned home to wait for a certificate. It was
necessary to keep members inside the kibbutz, regardless of their prospects for emigration.
When Benny arrived in Klosova in August 1926, there were 55 members affiliated with
the kibbutz (including those who had finished their training and returned home). Benny
tried persuading members to stay and those who had already left to return, but had little
success. Members went home to celebrate the Jewish High Holidays and the kibbutz
disbanded. Only he and another member, Avraham Bialistozky, stayed.43 After the
holidays, a few members returned and Benny began recruiting new ones to the kibbutz
from Hehalutz branches in small towns across the region. He talked to Zionist youth, came
to the synagogue on Sabbath, and tried to persuade parents to let their children become
pioneers. Some were as young as 15 16 and were often not strong enough to endure the
hard labor in the quarry and harsh conditions in Klosova. They ran back home in shame
after a few days. Benny wrote to the Hehalutz headquarters, requesting that more people be
sent, and even went to his hometown, hundreds of miles to the north, to recruit people he
knew. The headquarters bought a wooden house from a farmer at the end of 1926 and the
kibbutz renovated it. Living conditions were somewhat improved when kibbutz members
left their windowless stable for their newly renovated home.44
During winter, with no work in the quarry and no food, they struggled to endure the
cold and hunger, subsisting on the frozen and rotten potatoes they had bought at the
beginning of the season. They declined assistance from their families. They had a lot of
spare time and a new idea was raised by Benny: this would be a permanent kibbutz, and
they would live there until they could go to the Land of Israel. Benny believed that a big
kibbutz would develop in Klosova and his strong faith encouraged the others. He kept
repeating his motto: this is our home. Some had doubts and left, others could not endure
 The Journal of Israeli History 17

the hardship. Others still were captivated by the idea and stayed. The idea of Klosova as
their home, had profound implications. Although the Hehalutz leadership assumed
that emigration to Palestine the desired homeland would soon be renewed, and
encouraged pioneers to endure a little longer, the crisis in Palestine deepened and there
seemed to be no prospect of aliyah. Staying in hakhsharah had to acquire another
meaning, beyond preparation for immediate aliyah. For Benny, kibbutz life was the
expression of true pioneering. According to this view, the kibbutz was not a temporary
experience of hakhsharah but a way of life to be pursued in Palestine as well. Thus,
hakhsharah became the means for preparing members for kibbutzim in Palestine.45
Once the Klosova kibbutz ceased to serve the short-term, practical goal of aliyah, it
became a radical ideological movement. The envoys from the kibbutz movement in
Palestine strengthened the notion that pioneering was equated with kibbutz life. Benny
viewed hakhsharah as an extension of Tabenkins kibbutz movement in Palestine and
adapted Tabenkins radical ideology to the Klosova kibbutz. Benny claimed that only
kibbutz life could ignite enthusiasm. Perseverance in a kibbutz in the diaspora, in difficult
conditions, would enable the revolutionary transition to a new life and would cultivate
complete pioneers, determined to remain manual laborers in Palestine. In his view
Klosova was suffering for the entire movement.46
Defining hakhsharah as the home of pioneers redefined its relationship with the
surrounding Jewish society. The kibbutz was no longer an expression of popular
aspirations, since Jewish society now rejected Zionism. The marginalization of the kibbutz
led to radicalization. Klosova became an antithesis to Jewish society, creating an
alternative lifestyle that rejected and challenged contemporary Jewish life. Hakhsharahs
new radical outlook reflected, and deepened, the rift between pioneers and their previous
homes and families. The radical ideology of a permanent kibbutz was unacceptable to
most parents. The kibbutz threatened to exert a stronger influence on their children,
diminishing parental authority and traditional family ties. Most hakhsharah members were
now runaways.47 They had no one to rely on but the kibbutz and their own hard labor.
Friendship and solidarity among the members were necessary to make Klosova work.
Bennys deep belief in kibbutz life was contagious. Members were impressed by his
devotion to the kibbutz and the people. He was the first to get up for work and the last to go
to sleep, taking care of others needs and problems, always doing something. He showed
sincere concern for others and was utterly selfless. He continued to work, even when
injured, in order to meet their quotas at the quarry. Benny embodied the total sacrifice he
preached. During Passover, April, 1927, after a long and hard winter, Benny announced
that The kibbutz has decided to stay for the holiday. The reason was simple: [to get]
used to living in the kibbutz not only in everyday life but also during a holiday.48 This
was another step toward establishing a permanent kibbutz. Another reason was not to
relinquish hard-earned positions at the quarry that would ensure the growth of the kibbutz
in the summer. Not everyone agreed. Those who stayed celebrated the holiday in the
kibbutz. Others headed back home to celebrate with their families and enjoy a proper meal
and bed. They were told that going home meant leaving the kibbutz for good. But the
members who stayed were the ones who defined the kibbutz. This was a kind of natural
selection that fostered the radicalization of the kibbutz. Soon after Passover, the kibbutz
organized a May Day celebration in order to attract new recruits.49 Spring had come, and
with it, new members joined hakhsharah for the warm summer months. Klosova had
survived its first full Polish winter and was ready to start growing again.
By now, Benny was at the center of kibbutz life. The Christian peasants called the
pioneers Marshaks (Marshaki in Ukrainian), which also served as the local postal
18 R. Yona

address. Benny was like the rebbe of a small group of young Hasidim. His last name was
humorously referred to as a Hebrew acronym for our teacher and master hear our voice
(Morenu Rabenu Shema Kolenu).50 The following Passover was celebrated in the kibbutz
with less opposition, and a special haggadah was written for the occasion. This is the first
kibbutz haggadah on record.51
The Klosova haggadah shows that the Passover celebration in Klosova had a different
meaning than the first Passovers of pioneers and kibbutz members in Palestine. In Palestine,
pioneers expressed their longing for distant families and traditions. The humorous Klosova
haggadah, on the other hand, written in Yiddish, called for liberation from parental authority.
Being close to home, members needed to distance themselves from their relatives and
communities. In this haggadah, Egypt symbolized hakhsharah, and the hope for next year in
Jerusalem was changed to the hope of becoming a permanent kibbutz in the land of Israel.
The holiday would become a central event in Polish kibbutzim, symbolizing their autonomy.52
Two decisions taken during the winter of 1927 forged the permanent Klosova kibbutz.
First, eligibility for aliyah (receiving a certificate) now required members to remain on the
kibbutz well past the original six-month period. Second, it was decided to keep the sick in
the kibbutz and treat them there. This decision came even though many fell ill because
of the hard work, bad diet, cold, and poor sanitary conditions. Both decisions met with
continuous opposition, but were gradually passed and became binding for the entire
movement in the early 1930s. The decision to keep the sick in the kibbutz was originally a
nave expression of solidarity. According to one account, several girls weakened by the
hard work and poor conditions, wanted to return home. In a discussion at the assembly an
older girl asked about those who had no home to return to would only they remain in the
kibbutz? The sick girls were persuaded that it was unfair, and decided to remain. This
had happened before Bennys arrival.53 The tendency to keep the sick was strengthened
by Bennys ideological position. Since hakhsharah members came from diverse
backgrounds, socioeconomic gaps jeopardized the ideal of equality. Would only those
whose parents had enough money to afford the fare to Palestine, expensive taxes placed by
Polish authorities on emigrants, or daily needs like clothes and healthcare become pioneers
in Palestine? If pioneers were truly committed to equality and kibbutz life, solidarity with
those who could not return home for treatment had to be placed above individual needs.
This principle defined the group, consolidated it. A spontaneous decision made by current
members became binding policy for future members.
In the autumn of 1928, Benny heard of a couple in the kibbutz who had decided to get
married in Palestine. He told them to hold the wedding in Klosova, as a symbol for the
entire movement, which would show that Klosova was a real kibbutz and a home to its
pioneers. The kibbutz rented a separate apartment for the newlyweds. The wedding spread
the word that a family had been established in the kibbutz and that permanent hakhsharah
could take care of all human needs or at least aspire to do so including the challenges
of families and child rearing in the commune, just like kibbutzim in Palestine. However,
the wedding breached one of the original principles of Hehalutz, requiring pioneers to be
single before their emigration. Some of the heads of Hehalutz disapproved of the wedding.
When little Hanna was born, the first and only child of Klosova, Hehalutz headquarters
told Benny that he had gone too far.54
Gradually those who adopted the kibbutz ideology gathered in Klosova, and numbers
increased. The kibbutz found more work in sawmills in nearby towns and sent cells of
veterans to establish extensions of the kibbutz there. This method enabled the growth of
the kibbutz beyond the confines of one place. The veterans were replaced by new members
who joined Klosova and learned the ways of the kibbutz.55 The new communes were
 The Journal of Israeli History 19

called companies (in the military sense), and formed a network of the kibbutz. This
model was taken from Palestine, where groups of pioneers were established wherever
work was found.56 By the end of 1928, with the partial renewal of immigration to
Palestine, Klosova and its companies had 140 members. In 1929, there were 280.57
The new model of hakhsharah as a network of economically independent communes
allowed for unlimited growth with scarce financial means. The companies were self-
sustaining and existed with minimal aid from Hehalutz headquarters. Once Zionism would
appeal to the youth again, they could easily join hakhsharah by duplicating Klosovas
model. It seemed that Klosova had found a solution to the problem of maintaining the
movement in times when there was no prospect of aliyah. In his first visit there, a new
envoy of Hakibbutz Hameuhad to Poland reported when you are between the four walls
of this dining room you forget for a minute that it is snowing outside, and when you listen
to all the conversations you seem to be in one of the kibbutzim in the Land of Israel such
is the similarity . . . the makers of the Hebrew revolution are made of the same
substance.58 Klosovas transformation was completed.
Rumors of Klosova traveled far and it became a symbol of Zionism, within and outside
Hehalutz. It symbolized a stubborn faith in Zionism in face of the Jewish publics
skepticism. Aspiring pioneers from all across Poland came to Klosova. Zionists visited the
remote village to observe the pioneers at work. Many stayed over to converse and dance
with them at night. Even non-Jews would come, curious to witness these atypical Jews.59
When the economic crisis of 1929 hit Poland and unemployment surged, Klosova not only
endured the crisis but also began to spread. The flexible network of companies proved its
viability. In 1931 pioneers wandered in pursuit of work and established companies
wherever it was available. The quest for work spread the movement from eastern to central
Poland, the economic center of the country where pioneering was traditionally weaker.60
The network of kibbutzim expanded all over Poland, across hundreds of miles, and spread
its model throughout Hehalutz. Hehalutz headquarters reorganized the network into five
regional units of companies connected to a central headquarter, based on the Klosova
model. This dissemination made the other pioneer movements aware of the Klosova
model, which they adopted, including the Mizrahi youth, the General Zionists and even
Betar, which strongly opposed socialism.61
But not all was well. Klosova indeed demonstrated resolve and organizational skill in a
time of crisis, and celebrated the faith in Zionism in a time of despair. But the transformation
of hakhsharah into a kibbutz movement immediately raised problems and concerns. We will
focus here on the two central issues. The first problem was that kibbutz ideology was
unsuitable for a large movement, since it appealed only to a few devoted individuals. The
majority of young Jews and Zionists were uninterested in kibbutz life. Would Hehalutz
ignore them? Linking hakhsharah to kibbutz values meant limiting Hehalutz and distancing
it from the wider public, contrary to the aims of its founders.62 Despite reservations, the
kibbutzim in Palestine established their control over Hehalutz and turned the kibbutz into the
binding model in the 1930s.63 So long as Zionism was on the margins of Polish-Jewish life,
kibbutz ideology had advantages, and hakhsharah attracted mainly radical youth. But once
large-scale emigration to Palestine resumed (193235), Hehalutz became a mass
movement. As will be demonstrated below, the diaspora kibbutz faced a serious dilemma.
In the meantime, the second problem was at the center of attention the quality of life
in the diaspora kibbutz. Practicing kibbutz life in Poland was a tremendous challenge
undertaken by very young and inexperienced people in difficult economic conditions.
The results were dubious, as will be shown in the following section, based on accounts
from Klosova.
20 R. Yona

This is our home Klosova as an open kibbutz

Jewish immigration to Palestine was renewed in 1929. Consequently, some pioneers lived
as long as four years on the kibbutz until their aliyah. By the end of the 1930s, when aliyah
decreased again and the growing pressures of Jewish youth to leave Poland could not be
fulfilled, people spent as long as six or seven years there. What was it like? According to
accounts, it was both terrible and exhilarating. One visitor observed: Klosova is the heart
of the pioneer movement in Poland. All that is beautiful and all that is reckless is revealed
here . . . in dim beauty.64 However, another envoy from Palestine remarked that
fundamental corrections need to be made. The living conditions are horrible. The envoy
was troubled by the superficial understanding of pioneering the greater the hardship, the
better the preparation for becoming a pioneer. Pioneering means suffering, even when
there is no need, he noted. The kibbutz managers do not understand the need to organize
more comfortable living conditions. There is a wanton attitude to the individual and his
health. The kibbutz admitted people regardless of accommodation and jobs. According to
his estimate there were forty too many people at the time of his visit and the kibbutz
management wanted to recruit more.65
In its early years, Klosova, led by the young Benny Marshak, is best defined as an
anarchist commune. Going to work was voluntary. There was competition over work spots
in the quarry, and Benny would get up first and rush to the quarry to mark spots for the day.
He would then return and gently wake up every other member and ask if he or she could
work today. Those who said they were sick were left to rest. Some people who came stayed
for days without ever being told to work. Everything is allowed and tolerated, everything
but leaving, one member summarized the principles of Klosova.66 Benny relied on total
trust and free will, creating a highly chaotic and vibrant kibbutz. Eventually, with the
establishment of a routine, the kibbutz grew less anarchic, though it remained quite chaotic.
More discipline was enforced and social pressure was applied to those who did not work,
especially during the late 1930s, when members spent prolonged periods in hakhsharah.
According to the ideals of the large kibbutz championed by Hakibbutz Hameuhad,
Klosova was open to any young Jew, regardless of his/her Zionist background, not just party
members or youth movement graduates as was the case in other pioneer organizations in
Poland. This principle was called faith in man, a belief that anyone could become a pioneer,
whether middle class or poor, educated or illiterate, religious or atheist, with a profession and
work experience or without having worked a single day. New members needed to be
approved by Hehalutz headquarters, but this regulation was often disregarded, and members
were admitted without approval and supervision by the headquarters. This openness turned it
into a general organization of pioneers (though politically affiliated), and the largest of them
all. The openness was both a principle and a practical consideration, geared toward
constructing a mass movement, but it also made it extremely difficult to create a coherent and
functioning movement. There was also a chronic lack of activists to instill its values.

The people
Klosovas revolutionary spirit attracted all sorts of youth: a young woman from a communist
family seeking communal living; a Russian Jewish communist with no Jewish education, the
brother of a local member of the Cheka (early Soviet security organization), who was
traumatized by the arbitrary executions and fled to Poland to renew his connection to
Judaism; a Belzer Hasid from distant Galicia who wanted to quit religious life and found in
Klosova a Hasidic-like liveliness and intimacy of dedicated and impoverished enthusiasts
dancing in ecstasy into the night; graduates of Russian gymnasia; a penniless orphan whose
 The Journal of Israeli History 21

journey to Klosova was her first ever train ride on her own; a yeshiva student; a traditional
heder pupil; a boy with some home schooling; a student of a Polish gymnasium, who had felt
Polish until her teacher began to incite hatred of Jews; a discharged soldier; remnants from
the thousands who had joined hakhsharah during the peak years of 192425 and were still
dreaming of Palestine. Some ran away from Klosova after a day or two, but some stayed in
the kibbutz their entire life.67
They came as groups of friends or forlorn individuals, each one with his or her own
story. Many were uprooted, futureless, traumatized, feeling that the Polish state offered
them no future as Jews, economically or socially. Some had families and opportunities that
they rebelled against by joining the Hebrew Revolution. The diversity was stunning.
They were all looking for a Jewish alternative. Few knew Hebrew, some did not even
know Yiddish. Klosova took them all. But most were youth from rural Volhynia and the
eastern provinces of Poland. Volhynia was far from the centers of both Hasidism and
secular Judaism in Poland, as well as the centers of Polish culture. Traditional Judaism and
Hasidism were strong there, but modern secularism and socialism also had some impact.
Combined with the economic decline of Jews in eastern Poland, a strong if unsophisticated
support of Zionism emerged. They spoke Yiddish and heard about Zion and the socialist
revolution across the border.68 Few had ever experienced hard physical labor. When
graduates of Zionist youth movements joined Klosova in 1928 29, they brought with
them more substantial knowledge about Zionism, Hebrew, and the kibbutz.
The general cultural and educational level of the Polish pioneer movement was
comparatively low. Unlike the Russian or German movements, which had many university
students and gymnasia graduates, in Poland the overwhelming majority of pioneers had an
elementary education (84 91%), sometimes even less, and the educational level
continued to decline during the 1930s, reflecting that of Polish Jewish youth in general.69
Education was somewhat higher in the separate hakhsharah of the youth movements,
where there were more gymnasium graduates.70 In Hehalutz, the occasional gymnasium
graduate or Hebrew speaker would usually take on leadership roles in the kibbutz.

The arrival
Pioneers had vague notions about the kibbutz and Palestine. They knew that the living
conditions in kibbutzim in Palestine were hard and that hunger was not uncommon. In
Klosova nave Zionist dreams were shattered. One girl, for example, imagined Palestine as
a vegetable garden and instead came to find a quarry of dark stones.71 In a memoir based
on his diary, Shlomo Kantor gives a typical account of his first days in the kibbutz. He had
a good income in the city of Kovel, a dying love affair, and had been active for several
years in a branch of Hehalutz, where he met Benny and heard of Klosova. After months of
vacillating, he sold his violin and decided to become a worker who would build his life in
Palestine. He was uncomfortable with the fact that he would have to eat non-kosher food in
the kibbutz, for as tensions between hakhsharah and the Jewish public in Poland grew, its
secular nature had become established. Disregard for tradition was part of the pioneers
reaction to the Jewish publics retreat from support of Zionism. Though it was never
officially closed to observant members, no efforts were made to accommodate their needs
or to appease public sensibilities. Kibbutzim usually worked on the Sabbath and used pork
fat. Those who lit candles or prayed were mocked.72
In April 1928, Shlomo and a friend came to Klosova:
[We] arrived before dawn in this murky valley and were horrified by the sight. We had fallen
into a monstrous hole [the quarry], and were very bewildered and disappointed. Thats it?
22 R. Yona

Woe are the eyes! The sight is terrifying . . . depression, filfth, and poverty, this dark filth,
dear God! We wanted to escape immediately, return home. But that too was impossible, there
was no one to talk to, and we were stuck in this foul place. Slowly we started looking around.
A big wooden house in the middle of a field, alone in the wilderness of Polesia. In the
middle a crude and heavy long wooden table. On it are laid (pardon, lying) 2 3 bundles of
rags, that is, people wrapped in black rags. Their feet are wrapped in crude sacks and ropes,
with parts of black tires of car wheels [as soles]. The cold and emptiness around cry out to the
skies, to despair. Is this it? Is this the kibbutz? I feel sorry for O. [my friend] we both ran out
and cried. . . . 73
Shlomo continues his account later in the evening, after having spent the day in hiding
nearby, not knowing what to do: someone lit a blackened lantern in the large shack, and black
heavy figures started appearing, gathering slowly rags of people, tired creatures, trudging
along after work. They silently filled the large, empty hall and formed a circle. Shlomo stared
at this weird and surreal sight. He had wanted to run away but now was unable to move.
Klosova was at once appalling and fascinating. Shlomo sensed some mystical hidden force
connecting the people together. Someone approached and encouraged him and O. not to be
broken by the disappointment and shock. The account continues with a description of
Shlomos internal transformation. Hard work by day, a close intimacy with complete
strangers by night this was a life without his family for the first time. Gradually, human
faces emerged from the filth and darkness. There was nothing to do after sunset. One night,
someone started humming a tune full of longing. As it intensified, people formed a circle and
started dancing together, gradually entering a trance. The dancing continued deep into the
night, fueled equally by their despair and enthusiasm. Another bizarre sight, wrote Shlomo.
Shlomos friend left, but soon wrote him that she regretted her decision. He stayed,
even though working on the Sabbath and, especially, eating pork vexed him. Within a few
weeks, he grew somewhat accustomed to the place. Before coming to the kibbutz he had
decided that it was only a means for reaching Palestine, and that he would not live in a
kibbutz in Palestine. Now he considered staying. Can one really change so quickly? he
wondered. He witnessed some things that he opposed. Two months later, Shlomo was fully
immersed in the place and had become a bona fide Klosoviak. The kibbutz had become
his entire being. He became a fanatic, severing all ties with the past, interested in the
kibbutz alone. He was now a part of a group, calling themselves khalyastre Yiddish
for a cheerful and wild gang.74
Shlomo lived on a kibbutz all his life. His account provides a glimpse into the
charismatic impact of the intense kibbutz experience on young people. In his case it led to
complete conversion, much like the adoption of a new faith or joining a sect. Shlomo
was one of those who had come with many doubts and a clear decision not to join a kibbutz
in Palestine, but was swept away by the mesmerizing energy of the devoted group.
Another diary recounts the common reaction of shock and horror: Day 2: it is the
second day since I last ate. For some reason no one calls me to the table to eat. No one
serves me [food] . . . I see bread on the table and everyone comes and takes a bite but I am
ashamed . . . yesterday I put down my case and hung up my coat and hat and today
I found nothing. Everyone I ask whether he has seen my hat laughs at me. No one asked
his name or why he was there, but on the third day, he joined the dancing circle, and
afterward approached the table, ate with everyone, and began to feel at home. Scraps of the
diary were later found in a box containing the kibbutz papers, after its owner had thrown it
away, disavowing yet another piece of his private life.75
The confiscation of personal belongings by the collective, most importantly, coats and
shoes, and the offensive manner in which it was conducted, was part of the initiation rite.
 The Journal of Israeli History 23

Runaways usually came with barely any belongings and were spared this unpleasant
welcome. The confiscators remained anonymous, thus avoiding direct confrontation with
new members. The act was called putsn,76 cleaning up newcomers (taken perhaps
from thieves slang), stripping them of their previous life and identity along with their
possessions. Now newcomers had to share the communal clothes storehouse, as they
needed clothes for work. It had chronic shortages of goods, with people often walking
around barefoot.
Other pranks and teasing, somewhat cruel in nature, tested the moral fortitude and
commitment of the newcomer. A favorite one was: Did you cross the river on your way
here? When he or she replied yes, the standard rejoinder followed: You should have
jumped in! Everyone then burst into laughter.77 Newcomers, surrounded by strangers and
anxious about their unknown future, hoped for some friendly attention and comfort, but
were embarrassed if not humiliated. Their resolve and fortitude were tested. And the biggest
test of all still lay ahead enduring the hard work. As they made it through their first days,
they would eventually realize that the members were in fact laughing at themselves, using
humor to cope with the hard and gloomy routine. Still, entering the intimate commune was
not easy. With time, rumors of the difficult life in hakhsharah spread, and people grew more
aware of the hardship ahead of them, though the shock would still be overwhelming.

Opposition and internal criticism

Not everyone overcame the initial shock, and many left. Most available sources are by
those who remained and express acceptance of kibbutz values and practices, or justify
them. Personal accounts of disappointment and rejection are harder to come by.
Opposition inside the kibbutz was often concealed, and those who rejected the kibbutz left
us no account of their departure in Hehalutz publications. Some information can be gleaned
from memoirs in anthologies, written by those who left the kibbutz in Palestine and
politely expressed disagreement and criticism, and from other random sources.78 One
youth, for example, was too young to endure the hard work when he came to Klosova. He
describes crying at night, and his shame at returning home to his mother who had strongly
opposed his departure.79
Another group of three friends who came from Bialystok accepted the hard work and
poor food but not the atrocious sanitary conditions. They criticized the excessive sharing of
belongings which fostered disregard for communal property (clothes, shoes, eating utensils),
and the rude behavior, with everyone grabbing what he could. They demanded changes, like
allowing the sick to return home for treatment. Benny attacked them in the kibbutz assembly,
recruiting the groups support against them. After one of them died in a tragic accident, their
families insisted that they leave. They moved to another less extreme kibbutz.80
One member, who returned to Klosova in 1929 more experienced and mature,
demanded improvements. He and others opposed the habit of asking whether people could
go to work as many took advantage of the custom, claiming to be sick when they were
simply too tired or lazy to get up for another hard day of work. Others also opposed the
overcrowded conditions and wanted to stop admitting members who had not been sent by
Hehalutz headquarters. They tried to initiate a discussion on these sacred principles at
the assembly, but Benny ended the discussion by asking them why should they have the
right to be in the kibbutz and others not. When Benny went away for a few days they
initiated a discussion about the excessive amount of sickness in the kibbutz. When
Benny returned he disapproved of this, even though it resulted in fewer instances of sham
illness. According to one account, people respected Bennys dedication and complete
24 R. Yona

selflessness. He took care of general affairs in addition to attending work regularly,

working to complete exhaustion. They refrained from arguing with him, and yielded even
when he was wrong.81 He was too influential and fanatical to allow change within the
kibbutz, and attempts to challenge his leadership were unsuccessful.
When youth movement graduates joined Hehalutz and hakhsharah in 1928 29, they
brought their traditions to the kibbutz. One member was laughed at for insisting on
speaking Hebrew. Heated debates revolved around singing the socialist anthem The
International. Some were afraid to reveal their movement affiliation, since their youth
movements had competing kibbutz movements in Palestine (Hashomer Hatzair and
Gordonia). Bennys approach reflected the ideology of Hakibbutz Hameuhad, which
aspired to unite the separate kibbutz movements under its leadership. But the other kibbutz
movements opposed this move and soon after instructed their members to leave Klosova
and establish their own separate kibbutzim, where they trained members for their
movements in Palestine.82 Hakhsharah was thus split between the various kibbutz
movements in Palestine, reflecting the latters control over Hehalutz.

Living conditions
According to all accounts, living conditions in Klosova were terrible. The most candid and
detailed descriptions are found in letters and diaries. In early winter 1927, for example, the
kibbutz is described as follows: One house, three rooms with a kitchen . . . inside are 50
people . . . the three rooms, one of which is a dining room, containing up to 18 beds
packed tightly together, and there is nowhere to sleep people have to sleep two to a bed,
besides sleeping on the benches, tables, and inner doors, which are taken off at night and
put back on their hinges during the day.83 People often slept on tables crosswise, with
their legs half hanging in the air. Other accounts describe people sleeping on the floor, in
the attic, the oven, and even in the narrow gap between a big closet and the ceiling.84
In these conditions, there were various sleeping arrangements, and each had its own
terminology. The bare wooden boards called nares (plank cots) had no mattresses.
The Yiddish word kanteven described the cramped conditions. It was impossible to
sleep on ones back. When entering a bed one would say makh a kant (literally make an
edge) to the person already there, who would turn on his side to make room for another
person, sometimes for two or even three more on the edge of the iron bed frame. The term
was probably taken from the sawmills where the pioneers worked. It referred to turning a
wooden board onto its narrow side.85 If anyone wanted to turn over at night, his or her bed
partners had to follow suit. Bunk beds that were built were called internationals after the
socialist organization. If socialism meant sharing, nothing symbolized hakhsharahs
extreme collectivism more than the total lack of privacy, even while asleep. When a triple
bunk bed was built, it was ironically termed, the Third International.86 Sometimes even
this three-tiered arrangement was not sufficient and people had to sleep in shifts. A tiny
room could fit two internationals, accommodating at least two people on each bunk for a
minimum total of eight. A bigger room could accommodate dozens.
Together with the collective clothing storehouse, unsurprisingly called the
commune, the bunk beds constituted a crude and radical socialism. Sharing in Klosova
was more extreme than in other kibbutzim. In the first years, even sleeping places were not
permanent; everyone slept wherever they wanted, and early sleepers enjoyed better spots.
Every morning, you had to find work clothes and shoes, since someone else had taken what
you had worn the day before. People shared even underwear and handkerchiefs. To some
this was real sharing, to others, plain anarchy and a distortion of communal living.87 When
 The Journal of Israeli History 25

living arrangements were regularized, people had regular sleeping partners, called
naparniks (Russian for work mate). Fights would often break out at night: turn over!
stop moving! make room! If the match was no good, couples switched.88
People would not bathe regularly after work, whether for lack of facilities or because
of exhaustion, laziness, or the cold, and hygiene was deplorable. The air in the rooms
would be extremely dense, foul-smelling, and unsanitary. If you threw an axe in the air it
would stay hanging, joked one pioneer.89 In a Polish winter without heating, the thick air
provided some comfort. But lack of hygiene had grave consequences.
The crowded living conditions formed extreme intimacy between inexperienced male
and female members, most of whom had been brought up in a traditional environment
imbued with conservative values of sexual modesty and purity. Free interaction with the
other sex, away from parental supervision, was an exciting new adventure. Many love
affairs blossomed, though heartbreak was just as common. A girlfriend was called a
problem in hakhsharah jargon. A girl who married a pioneer in order to be added to his
certificate was termed fiktsie (fiction), and a true couple, a real fiction. Humor could
only veil common tensions, not solve them. Sexual intimacy remained a serious, unsolved
problem, given the difficult living arrangements.90
The silence of the sources regarding sexual intimacy in hakhsharah poses a serious
obstacle. It is easier to examine stereotypes of gender roles than it is to understand the
actual social reality in Klosova and its like.91 Censorship and self-censorship in the
sources reflect the contemporary attitude to sex as a taboo subject. When speakers and
writers addressed the relations between the sexes in protocols or private letters they used
codes, only hinting at a problem, assuming that the reader or listener would understand.
Even diaries and autobiographies ignored the matter altogether or used a code. The
common terms were the girls problem and the sexual relations problem. These vague
terms could refer both to social relations between the sexes and to actual sexual relations.
We can gather from personal accounts that men and women sometimes shared rooms, but
it is unclear if this was standard practice or the exception. It is even harder to understand
whether men and women shared beds. Members were not used to living and sleeping with the
other sex. In hakhsharah they were exposed to unfamiliar degrees of intimacy, which created
tension. We know that pregnancies did occur in kibbutzim and that abortions took place, but
there is no information on how many there were. The matter was handled with secrecy. We also
know that some pioneers professed free love. The movements leadership opposed this
tendency and tried to limit sexual relations by banning them altogether during the years of
rapid growth in the 1930s. It is hard to tell if this ban was observed. Sexual education was
unavailable, and members were often ignorant about sexual matters. Given the sources silence
on these matters, we can only discern that this was a burning daily issue that preoccupied the
inexperienced youth in kibbutzim. One envoy expressed the opinion that a third of members
in kibbutzim become ill due to the sexual tension: [causing] hysteria and stress.92
To some, the greatest hardship was the sleeping arrangements, others suffered most
from the hard labor, while yet others were repelled by the poor quality of the food,
unvarying, tasteless, hard on the stomach. The industrial-size pot used for cooking in
Klosova was called the social basis, another socialist term.93 Without proper facilities,
supplies, and experience, the cooks could offer little. When money ran out, which was often
the case, nutrition was reduced to black bread, chicory, and rationed sugar, all in minimal
portions. One emissary from a kibbutz in Palestine, who entered incognito, described
lunchtime at Klosova and the spirit of extreme sharing. Though he was a total stranger he
was instantly welcomed, even when there were already some 300 members in the kibbutz,
both in the main house and in rooms rented in the village.
26 R. Yona

Klosova . . . lives in a rhythm and a cycle of shifts, in the day and at night, at work, in the
dining room, in forks and spoons, in beds and shoes. The dining room is too small to fit
everyone . . . my host found a narrow space by the table. What is the table like? Crumbs,
bread crumbs to wipe the spoon or fork that has just been in the mouth of the comrade who has
left the table. And the meal? A slice of white crumbling bread, and dough soup . . . without
any flavor. Watery soup. I was thirsty, but resolved to withstand the trial of this meal with all
its flavors. I cleaned the spoon of my predecessor from leftover food with a piece of bread. My
host asked: Can you eat that?94
Despite the rationing of supplies the income was insufficient and the economic
condition of the kibbutzim was persistently bad. The Polish economy was undeveloped,
and there was an economic crisis throughout most of the 1920s and 1930s, with high
unemployment, increasing competition, and wage cuts. Kibbutz members, unprofessional
and inexperienced, could only obtain low-paying jobs, often on a daily basis without
regular employment. The turnover of members was high, with new members who had to
adjust to the hard work constantly reducing the average income. Only in times of abundant
work could pioneers eat their fill.
The youth had little experience in independent living and did not know how to take
care of themselves or carry out daily practical tasks like cooking, cleaning, and laundry.
Moreover, efficient communal life required experience and guidance, but there was no one
to instruct these young men and women during the daily dilemmas of communal living,
and many organizational, economic, and social mistakes were made. Worse still, as
Shlomo Kantor confessed in his diary, some people had no interest in communal living.
Many came only in order to obtain a certificate; those who were not converted to kibbutz
life like Shlomo had to hide their real intentions.
In these living conditions, the second principle of hakhsharah, cultural training, was
easily forgotten. Even the study of Hebrew was neglected in most places. When Hebrew
speakers joined Klosova and wanted to introduce the language, Benny opposed, saying
people would learn it when they arrived in the Land of Israel.95 The situation in most other
kibbutzim was similar. Envoys and leaders from Palestine repeatedly stressed the
importance of Hebrew to help immigrants feel at home in Palestine and to socially integrate,
but it seems that the need to keep people in the kibbutz and ensure social solidarity was
greater, and Yiddish became the principal language of hakhsharah. Kibbutz life came to
replace Hebrew as the second principle of hakhsharah.
The hard physical labor with poor nutrition, inadequate clothing, insufficient sleep,
cold winters, and very poor hygiene led to frequent illness. The most common ailments
were skin infections contracted from beds and clothes (scabies), called Egypt, with
reference to the biblical plagues. This was yet another trial in the initiation into the kibbutz
the willingness to enter an infected bed in order to emerge several days later as a new
member. There were more serious illnesses too, from fever to rheumatism or appendicitis,
requiring expensive life-saving surgery. It was common for 30 40% of members to be
sick at any given time.96 Given that total commitment to the kibbutz was required, they
were not sent home for treatment. They were exempt from work, but the kibbutz could not
afford effective treatment and medications other than rest and a somewhat better diet. This
practice created a vicious circle, with the poor conditions making many sick, who in turn
added to the burden of an already low income, further diminishing the budget for food,
clothes, and heating. Considering the number of sick people, in addition to the cooks and
cleaners (usually girls) working inside the kibbutz, the secretariat, and the unemployed,
the kibbutz struggled to keep wage-earners at 50% of the membership. This made the
social relations inside the group even more difficult since around half the members were
 The Journal of Israeli History 27

being supported by those who worked outside the kibbutz. It is remarkable that people
were willing to work at all.
How did people bear these harsh conditions for months or years? Hope for aliyah was
the main source of strength. Paradoxically, the suffering brought people closer. They were
all in it together. At night, before sleep on a flat board or on the edge of a bed in a cold,
damp room, dancing would become ecstatic. One visitor marked that even experienced
Hasidim dont have such enthusiasm.97 But there were times of despair too, and many left
hakhsharah disappointed. Memoirs of Klosoviaks tend to diminish the impact of
difficulties in hindsight and resolve them with justifications such as: we didnt care much,
we were young, enthusiastic, and hoping for aliyah; collective life united us like a family;
we somehow got used to it, or managed to get through it. Popular Yiddish songs, sung by
hundreds of pioneers, hundreds of times, provide a better reflection of daily feelings.
The Klosova hymn, which was written by Abraham Goberman, an activist at Hehalutz
headquarters, and was enthusiastically adopted by the pioneers, encapsulated the ideology
of hakhsharah. Goberman wrote it during a visit in 1928, seeking to convey the proletarian
consciousness expressed by members working in the quarry. Set to the melody of a
Russian anarchist hymn, it defined the place as no mans land:98
We have here no one, we need here nothing
We tore ourselves apart from the near and the far,
Ripped out our hearts, spread out our bodies
A lawless gang of sung-out buddies
We laugh at suffering, we smile at troubles
We hear answers resounding from the cliffs of granite
The present belongs to us, we are forging tomorrow
Our veins beat with boiling blood. . . .
The song continues to describe the pounding of the hammers, and concludes: We are
pioneers of the Klosova kibbutz. We build life out of labors song.
Other popular songs expressed different feelings of daily hardship and even despair,
like this one: Late at night, I lie on the nare [wooden board], I lay down my tired bones,
my hope awakes in my heart, to be in [the Land of] Israel soon. The author continues by
describing how his fingers bleed in the quarry, other comrades are broken, and they want to
be sent to another easier kibbutz. The regional committee of Hehalutz and Betty [Batya
Bendersky] write that things will be better, when instead they become worse every day.
Everything is the committees fault, the author accused, many have fallen ill. The
committee doesnt provide good food. Instead they send 10 girls, but for work they are no
good.99 Another song laments, Why did we come here? So that drops of death-sweat will
drip from us? The author sadly describes life without a pillow or a bed, without even a
penny for a cigarette. Another song is written like a bitter-sweet dialogue between mother
and daughter, ironically describing the wonderful experiences of hakhsharah, including
again hard work, poor food, and inadequate sleep with two male pioneers. Yet another
expresses the deep longing for aliyah.100 These grave or humorous expressions of sorrow,
pain, and hope reveal everyday feelings, often contrary to the official ideology of Klosova.

The house
In Klosova, the farm house purchased for the kibbutz served as the main home, where
social and organizational life was centered. Its sparsely decorated living room served as a
dining room, assembly hall, dancing arena, and so forth. As shown on a photo of the living
room (Figure 1), it was adorned with a red banner, a clear socialist symbol, embroidered
28 R. Yona

Figure 1. Kibbutz members in the Klosova dining room. Behind them is the red banner with the
Klosova motto and a portrait of Trumpeldor to the right. Photo probably taken in 1932. Photographer
unknown. Courtesy of the Ghetto Fighters House Archive, Kibbutz Lohamei Hagetaot.

with a golden inscription in Hebrew which became the Klosova motto: The doctrine of
Hebrew pioneering is cruel in its pragmatism and wonderful in its essence.101 The banner
was prepared for the inauguration of the kibbutzs house in early 1927, and although it was
also written by the author of the hymn (Goberman), it was attributed to the Hebrew writer
Yosef Haim Brenner, who became one of the political symbols of the Histadrut, the Ahdut
Haavodah Party, and Hakibbutz Hameuhad after his assassination by Arabs in 1921.102
His figure symbolized the deep emotional rebellion of Jewish youth against the despairing
conditions of east European Jewry, and a quest for their remedy. The Klosova pioneers
who rejected the lifestyle of the surrounding Jewish society identified with this sentiment.
Above the banner hung two portraits. One is not clearly seen on this photo, but the other
is a drawing of Trumpeldor, easily identified by his uniform. The famous national martyr,
one of the founders of Hehalutz, was the main symbol of the movement.103 With the
decision to make Klosova the regional kibbutz of Volhynia, it was named after Trumpeldor,
probably in 1926.104 This identification was contested by Betar, the Revisionist youth
movement established in the mid-1920s, which was also named after Trumpeldor and
championed his military legacy, which was neglected by Hehalutz. Klosova thus used three
simple symbols: a red banner, Hebrew letters, and the national martyr who died in
Palestine. Taken together, they constitute the fundaments of Socialist Zionism, advocating
a Jewish nation-state in Palestine, based on the Hebrew language and social justice.
The verbal culture of the kibbutz was more developed. Several key expressions have
already been mentioned. To these we can add the name of the new house of the kibbutz,
 The Journal of Israeli History 29

which was simply called kibbutz. Once the kibbutz grew and rooms were rented in other
village houses to sleep its members, they were termed moshav (cooperative village),
small kvutzah (group), and workers neighborhood.105 The names were taken from the
terminology of the labor movement in the Yishuv, to which Hehalutz was connected.
Other Hebrew names for rooms were taken from the geography of the Land of Israel, like
the Hula (lake) or Negev (desert), reflecting the pioneers aspiration to go to Palestine.106

The sanctification of suffering

The hardships of kibbutz life in the diaspora can be attributed to three internal factors, in
addition to the objective conditions described here. One was incompetence. Members lacked
required skills like cooking, fiscal management, negotiating with suppliers etc. The second
was negligence. Many members were unwilling to take care of collective responsibilities,
whether because they did not see them as their duty or for social reasons. The third factor can
be called intentional negligence. Because poverty and suffering became so strongly
identified with the image of the pioneer, many young pioneers cultivated them.
Envoys to Hehalutz repeatedly called for serious improvements in Polish kibbutzim.
Some suggested keeping a kibbutz member from Palestine permanently in Klosova to
teach the young members about proper kibbutz life. Such a person would be able to
improve technical elements, such as living arrangements and economic efficiency, and
correct misperceptions of pioneering.107 Some of the envoys who visited the kibbutzim
tried to explain that unnecessary suffering weakened pioneers before their true mission in
Palestine, and efforts were made to improve standards. Other envoys did not address the
practical aspects of daily life and focused on ideology and the organizational aspects of the
movement. One envoy, for example, who stayed in Klosova for a while in 1930,
introduced revolutionary innovations. He explained that it was not necessary to suffer,
that suffering did not prepare one for Palestine. On the contrary, better conditions were
more conducive to creating a good pioneer. One girl was surprised to hear that things did
not need to be so bad in the kibbutz, that they needed to improve. She learned that the
idealization of hardship does not educate to pioneering and kibbutz life in the Land of
Israel . . . the worker deserves all that is good in life. This envoy completely changed
her understanding.108
But envoys could not stay in Klosova on a regular basis. Members of Hehalutz
headquarters and envoys were too few and could only visit kibbutzim sporadically. Their
visits could not instill long-lasting changes. The high turnover of people and the departure
of experienced members to Palestine required constant training of new arrivals. Only in
the smaller organizations, like the separate kibbutzim of the various youth movements,
could this be achieved to a certain extent. In the general movement, hakhsharah remained
a fairly tormenting experience to varying degrees in different places and reflected a rather
juvenile understanding of pioneering.
Hakhsharahs preparation for kibbutz life also raised concerns. It presented distorted
notions about the kibbutz in Palestine. When the first pioneers of Klosova arrived in
kibbutzim in Palestine in 1929, they were almost as shocked as when they had come to
Klosova. Sugar was not rationed, the dining room was in a separate building, and every
pioneer had his/her own bed. It was their first nights sleep alone in years. The shift to
agricultural work was also difficult. It was considered too easy by the Klosoviaks. Many
had to learn Hebrew from scratch.109 Kibbutz life in Palestine was quite different from
what they were accustomed to in Poland. This discrepancy raised the question whether
Klosova was fulfilling its promise.
30 R. Yona

Polish pioneers sanctified the harsh reality that was created in the kibbutzim. They
created a ritual of self-mortification, seeking to toughen the individual. Enduring the hard
work and maintaining the kibbutz consumed all their energy. Perseverance in hakhsharah
was the main goal. While this fact is understandable in light of conditions described here,
it had grave repercussions. The challenges of kibbutz life in Poland were tremendous. The
radical youth did its best to comply. They succeeded in creating kibbutzim, but the results
were seriously wanting, especially when Hehalutz began to grow again.

The diaspora kibbutz as a mass movement

In the spring of 1932, following improved economic conditions in Palestine, large-scale
aliyah began. During two and a half years, the peak years of the Fifth Aliyah, tens of thousands
of Jews, mainly from Poland and Nazi Germany, came to settle in Palestine, including
thousands of pioneers. A new wave of Zionist enthusiasm of unprecedented scale erupted in
Poland. Hundreds of thousands of Jews seeking aliyah joined Zionist organizations, more than
the number of Jews in Palestine at the time.110 The economic crisis of 1929 was not over.
Together with increasing anti-Semitism, it drove many unemployed and impoverished Jews
to leave Poland. The German-Jewish immigration brought considerable capital to Palestine,
and large investments were made in construction, agriculture, and industry. Work was
abundant, and salaries were at least five to ten times higher than in Poland.111
Hehalutz became the hope of many youth in Poland. It quickly grew from about 10,000
to over 40,000 members (between 1931 and 1933). Hakhsharah grew even more rapidly
from 1,000 to around 8,000 members in over 200 kibbutzim in Hehalutz alone, reaching its
largest size ever. Kibbutzim were established in nearly every Jewish small town and city.
The Klosova section alone grew from 300 members in 11 kibbutzim (companies) to about
1,500 members in 43 kibbutzim.112 Numbers remained stable for two years, and began to
shrink with the decline of aliyah at the end of 1935.
Hehalutz became a mass movement, well known among the entire Jewish public, and
the kibbutz gained prominence. The flexible kibbutz network managed to absorb the new
members and expand. The most common work was now chopping wood for domestic
use for Jewish families, especially in winter, as electricity was still rare in many places in
Poland. The axe became the symbol of the pioneer. Girls found work primarily as
housemaids with Jewish families. Work as water carriers, porters, unskilled day laborers,
as well as traditional Jewish trades like tailoring and carpentry were also common, along
with occasional factory work.
The shift from the margins to the center of Jewish life challenged the radical ethos that
had been created in Klosova. How did hakhsharah meet this challenge? Some local groups
managed to establish livable kibbutzim without any guidance.113 Others existed in terrible
conditions, worse than those depicted above, especially in smaller towns and in the
winter.114 The principles of the radical group required training, a deep commitment, and a
strong social base. Resilience was needed to endure hakhsharah and keep its spirit alive,
once initial enthusiasm faded. Without them, the kibbutz became a very grim place.
The kibbutzs social makeup and atmosphere were therefore critical. In Jedrzejow for
example, not far from Kielce, a local company was established. Members found good jobs
and had free firewood, but no one bothered to heat the apartment. Apathy ruled why
should [I] do it and not someone else?115 Many of the new members were driven to
Palestine by distress rather than idealism. They had no interest in kibbutz life and joined
hakhsharah only as a means to obtain a certificate to Palestine. They were called
certificate pioneers or conjuncture pioneers.
 The Journal of Israeli History 31

In September 1933, Berl Katznelson, one of the main leaders of the labor movement in
Palestine, arrived in Poland to examine the huge movement that had sprung up practically
overnight. Socialist Zionism had become the largest Zionist camp in Poland, leading to a
landslide victory in the elections to the 18th Zionist Congress held in Prague the month
before, to a large extent thanks to Hehalutz. The movement that was affiliated with the
Socialist-Zionist camp in Palestine was barely known to the Yishuv and the leaders of the
Histadrut. Only the few envoys sent to Poland were closely acquainted with what was
going on. Katznelson was sent to get a firsthand impression of the largest reservoir of
members for the Histadrut and Mapai. After the congress ended, he toured Poland for a
month, learning about Hehalutz, the kibbutzim, and the state of Jewish life in general.116
Katznelson was shaken by the tragic decline of Jewish life in eastern Europe and the
problems of the pioneer movement. He described the total destruction of the Jewish way
of life. The collapse of Jewish social and educational institutions created a process of
complete assimilation . . . terrible ignorance and spiritual impoverishment. He witnessed
the hopeless poverty that tens of thousands of Jews were reduced to, living in inhuman
conditions of hunger and filth. Orthodox families could not afford any Jewish education
for their many children, who were being deprived of their national Jewish heritage. He
wondered what would become of them in a few years as citizens of nation-states that did
not want them.117 Hehalutz is an inseparable part of Jewry as it is today. This is postwar
Jewish youth, raised in the economic and spiritual decline of Jewish life in the diaspora,
observed Katznelson.118 He toured the movement across Poland, in Warsaw, odz,
Vilnius, Lutsk, and the smaller towns around them. Katznelson visited especially the
kibbutzim, the future members of his movement in Palestine. He came incognito, seeking
direct contact with ordinary members, asking them about the kibbutz and their life in it.119
As early as 1927 Katznelson had warned against the new tendency to identify Hehalutz
with kibbutz life. But in the six years that had passed since then nothing had been done to
prevent this development. Envoys sent by the Histadrut to Poland were primarily activists
of kibbutz movements in Palestine who shaped Hehalutz according to their own
understanding. By 1933, Hehalutz was firmly linked to kibbutz life, and the pioneer
movement outside it followed suit. Katznelson was alarmed by the nature of the mass
movement that had emerged in hakhsharah. The dozens of new kibbutzim, without any
experience of communal living and physical labor or any guidance, had created a crude
way of life: poor sanitary conditions, poverty, ignorance, crowdedness, and sickness.
Without the unique spirit fostered in Klosova by devoted members, the magic was gone
and only the suffering remained. People became seriously weakened and ill after only a
few months in hakhsharah. They were wearing rags, living in degrading conditions, not
learning Hebrew. Was this preparing them for Palestine? Most of all Katznelson disliked
the crude spirit he found in the kibbutzim. The Klosova motto, falsely attributed to
Brenner, one of Katznelsons most admired Hebrew writers, seemed to justify the cruel
reality in hakhsharah and praise it. To Katznelson, the movement that carried the banner
of Socialist Zionism in Poland (and elsewhere) distorted its values. Katznelson and his
colleagues, founders and leaders of the workers camp, aspired to elevate Jewish workers,
materially and spiritually. The kibbutzim he saw in Poland too often did the opposite.
Katznelson opposed the imposition of kibbutz ideology on members. In a long meeting
with leaders of Hehalutz in Poland he warned them not to foster fanaticism. Katznelson did
not deny the need to maintain kibbutzim in the diaspora altogether, but he claimed that in
Palestine people should join a kibbutz out of free will. The distribution of certificates
according to commitment to the kibbutz in Palestine created hypocrisy. Forcing people to
feign such commitment was not going to make good pioneers. I was always worried,
32 R. Yona

he said, that our work would be built on a lie. I mean a lack of honesty and truth in human
relations. Katznelson was referring to the fact that among the new pioneers there were
people who had pledged their allegiance to kibbutz life before their aliyah, but turned out
to have deceived their friends and the movement. Hypocrisy, hiding the face of fear of an
individual or public opinion these are outrageous moral flaws. Do we want to raise
frauds for the Land of Israel?120 But his warnings had no impact. The envoys and local
activists represented the perspectives and interests of the three kibbutz movements in
Palestine, which by now fully controlled Hehalutz and had no intention of giving it
up. They were afraid that Katznelsons intervention on behalf of the Histadrut and Mapai
would diminish their influence. The three kibbutz movements and their representatives
were absorbed in internal power struggles in Hehalutz, disguised in ideological rhetoric.
Hehalutz was completely divided from within. Each movement wanted Katznelson on its
side. Hakibbutz Hameuhad, which was the most dominant movement and controlled
Hehalutz on behalf of the Histadrut, feared Katznelsons intervention the most.
Katznelson had been aware of the negative aspects of Hehalutzs control by kibbutz
members from Palestine before his arrival in Poland. As one envoy of Mapai, Zeev
Scherf, described the situation to him: [Envoys] of the kibbutz here (and probably in
Palestine as well) have a unique talent: either they pull a person until he becomes
completely one of them or they push him in the other direction. They do not know how to
maintain good relations with those who are not entirely theirs. Though Scherf supported
the kibbutz movement, he warned that the party would suffer significant losses if it did not
regain its direct control over Hehalutz and the youth organizations.121
The new immigration wave revealed the problematic aspects of the kibbutzims
control of Hehalutz. The enforcement of kibbutz life in Hehalutz resulted in large
defections in Palestine. Most of the pioneers who came from Poland during the peak years
of the Fifth Aliyah did not remain on kibbutzim. Some left after a few months, some after
days. Others never even went to a kibbutz and stayed in Tel Aviv to work and help their
families in Poland.122 Graduates of youth movements were more inclined to stay in
kibbutzim than those who had no such background, but many of their members also left.123
Back in Palestine, Katznelson criticized Hehalutz headquarters in the harshest terms.
On the day of his arrival he immediately reported his impressions to the party center. He
described a meeting he had attended at Hehalutz headquarters as an incarnation of the
squabbles of competing Jewish grocers in the shtetl, engaged in futile arguments over petty
considerations.124 To him these were not leaders of the Hebrew revolution, not new
men and women leading the nations revival, but embodiments of the nations impotency
and decline. Katznelson ironically remarked that he had been told that the meeting was a
relatively calm one, implying that he knew that they had been cautious in his presence. This
devastating criticism of Hehalutz headquarters in Poland did not come from an opponent
but from one of the two main leaders of the labor movement (alongside Ben-Gurion).
Katznelson set out to change the situation. He wanted to establish a Youth Center in
the Histadrut and another one in the party, which would be responsible for educational and
cultural work both in Palestine and the diaspora. They would initiate large-scale activity,
train activists, and publish materials. They would guide the envoys and supervise them,
thus remedying Mapai and the Histadruts long neglect.125 By taking the lead, the new
centers would restore the control of the central leadership of the Histadrut and the party
over Hehalutz, and diminish the excessive influence of the kibbutzim. The executives of
Mapai and the Histadrut passed resolutions that approved the foundation of the new
centers, but they were too weak to implement them. They could not recruit enough
activists who would be devoted to this kind of educational work and spend long periods
 The Journal of Israeli History 33

abroad. The only organization inside the Histadrut that could supply members was
Hakibbutz Hameuhad.126 It had highly committed members, and the communal
infrastructure provided them with economic and social support that enabled long trips. The
party and the Histadrut could not do the same for their members. Katznelson knew that his
plan depended on Hakibbutz Hameuhad. Four days after his return he set out to meet its
leadership to see if he could gain their cooperation.
Hakibbutz Hameuhad and its envoys were aware of the many flaws in Hehalutz and
hakhsharah, and of their further deterioration caused by their rapid growth. Some
envoys expressed doubts about the contribution of kibbutz life abroad in its present
form.127 The leadership discussed the grave state of affairs, seeking to improve the
organization of kibbutzim in Poland. But they were not willing to give up their control,
even though they could not effectively lead Hehalutz. In Poland alone hakhsharah was
much larger than their kibbutz movement, not to mention the entire Hehalutz. If they left
Hehalutz there would be no one else to lead it. In the 1930s local activists were
increasingly rare, and those who did take up leadership roles emigrated to Palestine
shortly thereafter. Hehalutz confronted Hakibbutz Hameuhad with both a huge
challenge and a huge opportunity.
The leader of Hakibbutz Hameuhad, Yitzhak Tabenkin, had also just returned from
Poland and shared most of Katznelsons criticism on Hehalutz. Everywhere in Poland he
had heard complaints about internal dictatorship. Kibbutz secretaries were called
dictators for their excessive power. Members feared them and their aides, who were
called kanareks (canaries, the name for informers of the Polish secret police). New
members were frowned upon and called Yampam, (meaning beggars), signaling them as
outsiders, dependants and a nuisance begging for alms.128 Tabenkin offered no real
solution other than to demand more pioneering, greater efforts, and more envoys. They
had to help Hehalutz; the kibbutz depended on this.129
The meeting between Katznelson and the leadership of Hakibbutz Hameuhad took
place in the workers commune near Kfar Saba. This was the first serious discussion about
the activity of envoys in the diaspora. All the experienced activists of the kibbutz
participated. The records of this two-day meeting provide a fascinating detailed account of
Hehalutz and the diverse attitudes to the movement in the diaspora.
Katznelson presented his plan for the Youth Center and asked for their sincere
cooperation. Some of the kibbutz activists agreed to Katznelsons criticism of Hehalutz
and shared his doubts regarding the current approach. Others rejected it outright. Gershon
Ostrovsky expressed the views of the more extreme kibbutz activists, attacking the
Histadruts (i.e. Katznelsons) failure to act in many fields and claimed that the only path
to Socialist Zionism was that of Hakibbutz Hameuhad. He warned that eliminating their
monopoly over Hehalutz would turn it into a weak organization like the Histadrut, devoid
of pioneering, a body without a soul. Ostrovsky explained the vision of Hakibbutz
Hameuhad: its essence and raison detre is the belief that everyone can live on a kibbutz,
that everyone should live in a commune, that the commune is possible and necessary for
all workers in the Land of Israel.130
The utopian vision of a general commune of workers had been abandoned by leaders of
the Histadrut nearly ten years earlier, when they realized that the kibbutz did not suit most
workers. Only small and highly motivated groups of workers would live in communes.
If the Histadrut wanted to embrace every worker it had to tolerate various ways of life,
including that of the majority of workers who lived in cities. Hakibbutz Hameuhad clung
to the utopian vision, which lay behind its desire to lead Hehalutz and be involved in
public affairs outside the kibbutz. It was their duty, their calling. They knew that many
34 R. Yona

members of Hehalutz did not want to join a kibbutz in Palestine, but by taking care of the
entire movement they hoped to attract more members to their revolutionary vision.
Otherwise, said Ostrovsky, he and the others would consider organizing only those who
suited them, implying there would be no one left to organize the rest of the movement, as the
Histadrut had thus far been unable to do so. There is no solution to Zionism outside
pioneering [i.e. the kibbutz], he concluded. Everybody must be a pioneer, every Jew has to
be a pioneer. The kibbutz movement should not be closed within itself, but lead the masses
who were joining it. Demand more of ourselves!131 he concluded. Benny Marshak, who
also attended the meeting, expressed similar views.132 Members of Hakibbutz Hameuhad
were proud of opening the kibbutz to anyone who cared to join, and rightly so. The other
kibbutz movements did not do the same. But the members of Hakibbutz Hameuhad also
tended to confuse the interests of their movement with those of the entire people or the
Zionist movement. They were deaf to Katznelsons criticism.
Katznelson argued that the vision should be tested according to actual achievements.
He knew that Hakibbutz Hameuhad was making great efforts, but if only 35% of the last
group of Polish pioneers knew Hebrew, something was fundamentally wrong. He
criticized the approach of trying harder, and called for a change in the nature of work.
The envoys should abandon power struggles with other kibbutz movements in Hehalutz
and cease the constant ideological discussions about the kibbutz. They should instead
concentrate on the praxis of kibbutz life and on improving hakhsharah. Simple but
crucial things determine the outlook of the generation more than any ideological or
theoretical framework, argued Katznelson. The movements aim was to increase the
standard of living, of cleanliness, of order, not to decrease them. The bad conditions of
hakhsharah cultivated pseudo-pioneering and made people hate the kibbutz and leave it
in Palestine. It is not a disaster if some come here knowing they will be [ordinary]
workers. But it is a disaster if the education to kibbutz life raises liars and hypocrites.
He urged clearing the atmosphere of fear and deception. This would be done only by
organizing inside the kibbutzim cells that would be openly affiliated with Hakibbutz
Hameuhad and the moshavim. Only when these groups and the people with no specific
affiliation would be equally treated would people stop pretending.133
The main confrontation in the meeting was between Katznelson and Tabenkin.
Although they were relatives and close friends, they were growing increasingly apart.
They had met beforehand, and Tabenkin agreed to help the new center. Tabenkin tried to
introduce Katznelson to younger activists in the kibbutz who did not know him and were
hostile to his intervention. But in the meeting Tabenkin challenged Katznelsons vision
and leadership. He rejected Katznelsons claim to represent the general interests of the
Histadrut and his attitude to Hakibbutz Hameuhad as just one of its groups. Tabenkin
claimed they had competing visions of the Histadrut, and presented his own, which
reflected the growing tensions between the Histadrut, the party and the kibbutz
movement, and between Hakibbutz Hameuhads increasing desire for independence, on
the one hand, and its desire to lead on the other hand. He emphasized that the problems
of Hehalutz reflected the difficulties faced by every Zionist organization when dealing
with mass membership. He told his associates and followers in the kibbutz that the
difficulties in Hehalutz should be seriously addressed because they affected them
directly. Tabenkin did not overlook the problems Katznelson referred to. He explained
that because the limited number of certificates to Palestine were now in great demand,
selection was inevitable. If the Histadrut demanded the right to determine who would
receive a certificate, preferring young people or those who had learned Hebrew, the
kibbutz also had the right to choose people who wished to join it. Tabenkin knew this
 The Journal of Israeli History 35

would make people hate the kibbutz, but he was willing to pay the price. If young people
and Hebrew speakers served the Zionist project better, so did kibbutz members, who
were more willing than others to fulfill active roles for the sake of the entire nation.
Ordinary workers in the Histadrut were not inclined to do so, they sought their own
comfort. He warned that it was in the Histadruts interest to maintain the status quo since
if Hakibbutz Hameuhad prepared its own people separately, there would be no one to
organize potential immigrants to the Histadrut and the party. How would [the
Histadrut] operate among tens of thousands? asked Tabenkin, insisting that the kibbutz
was the true representative of the Histadrut, There is no contradiction between
Hehalutz, the kibbutz, and the party, nor can there be.134
But the conflict between the leadership of Hakibbutz Hameuhad and Mapai continued on
this and other matters. Tabenkins assertion was an ideological statement, not a description of
reality. He did agree to support the new Youth Center. At the same time, Hakibbutz
Hameuhad continued to foster independent ties with youth organizations in Palestine and
established its own Youth Center.135 It is hard to tell what would have happened if Katznelson
had implemented his proposals. If successful, they could have entirely changed Hehalutz and
hakhsharah by revoking the exclusive status of the kibbutz, but they were never tested.
Hakibbutz Hameuhad did not relinquish its power. Kibbutz leaders rightly argued that the
party and the Histadrut were too weak to create an alternative. Eighteen months after
Katznelsons visit, Hehalutz remained unchanged, with no envoys apart from members of
Hakibbutz Hameuhad. As Zeev Scherf bitterly remarked, In all the countries we are in deep
trouble; if we do not get envoys from Palestine we will not make it. And we will not get envoys
because the kibbutz is not interested in this and Mapai so far contents itself merely with very
serious discussions of the problem.136 By the end of the second year Katznelson concluded
that the Youth Center was a failure and disbanded it. Without the support of Hakibbutz
Hameuhad it did not materialize. Hakibbutz Hameuhad effectively functioned as the
center,137 and the Histadrut had to rely on it. Hakibbutz Hameuhad continued to represent
the Histadrut in Hehalutz until the outbreak of World War II. It was only with the beginning of
the political split between Hakibbutz Hameuhad and Mapai in Palestine that Hakibbutz
Hameuhad was removed from its dominant position in Hehalutz.138
In the meantime, so long as Zionism was popular, Polish Jewrys criticism of the
kibbutzim remained marginal, confined mainly to ideological rivals, especially anti-
Zionists such as the Bund and Jewish communists. Once aliyah dwindled, criticism of the
permanent kibbutz gained momentum. In early 1936 a series of articles written by one of
the most popular and witty Jewish columnists B. Yeushzon (Son of Despair), harshly
criticized the hakhsharah kibbutzim.139 The articles were published in Haynt (Today), one
of the leading Jewish daily papers in Poland. which expressed pro-Zionist and mainstream
agendas. Yeushzon initially questioned the need for permanent kibbutzim, arguing that
thousands of young men and women were wasting their best years in terrible conditions
that damaged them physically and spiritually instead of training them for the Land of
Israel. The writer demanded that they be sent home to wait there for a certificate. After the
leaders of Hehalutz arrogantly dismissed his proposal, the tone of his criticism sharpened.
Mopping floors does not require years of hakhsharah, he claimed, and called the leaders
of Hehalutz demagogues. According to one testimony, these attacks had many secret
supporters inside the kibbutzim.140
With the decline of aliyah and the strengthening of the anti-Semitic right in Poland in
1936, public attention shifted from Zionism to internal affairs. Hehalutz and the kibbutzim
shrank more or less to the size they had been before the movements growth, and other
Jewish parties came to the fore until the outbreak of the war.
36 R. Yona

Summary: A way for many, a way for a few?

This article has addressed only a small part of the kibbutz movements in the diaspora.
Kibbutzim were formed in other countries and periods, and by other Zionist organizations
and youth movements. Each had its unique characteristics and dilemmas. In Hehalutz in
Poland there were other important kibbutzim like the Grochov agricultural farm on the
outskirts of Warsaw, or the large urban kibbutz in odz, which offered different models
and symbols for the movement. There are other interesting aspects of Hehalutz that require
further study such as the tension between agricultural romanticism and proletarian
Marxism, or how Hehalutz tried to develop a proletarian ethos when most pioneers did not
have classic proletarian jobs in factories.
I have focused here on Klosova both because of its importance and because it illustrates
several key aspects of kibbutz life in the diaspora. The diaspora kibbutz was created during
the nadir of Zionism in Poland. It was shaped by a small group of very young women and
men in Klosova, who were guided by members of Hakibbutz Hameuhad. Together they
transformed hakhsharah into an extension of the kibbutz movement in Palestine. Isolated in
rural areas, they developed an extreme cult of communal living and exhausting labor. They
formed a radical group of believers, a nucleus of devoted activists in unfavorable conditions.
Their radical ethos proved its advantages during the 1930s, compared to the organizational
weakness of Polish Zionism. It also proved itself during World War II, when the pioneer
movements were an important part of the Jewish resistance and underground activity under
Nazi occupation, in ghettos and camps, until most of their members perished with the Jewish
population. But this is a subject for another study.141
With the rapid expansion of hakhsharah, the radical ethos was caught in a tragic
paradox. The small group of radical activists in Hehalutz tried to lead a mass movement
and to shape it in their image. But Klosovas model, which was imposed on the entire
movement, proved unfitting. The spontaneous kibbutzim that emerged during the peak
years, without training and guidance, were seriously flawed. The kibbutz was essentially
a small elitist vanguard whose zealotry and extremism were unsuited to large
movements, but the Histadrut and Mapai failed to offer alternatives to the radical model.
When thousands of youth joined hakhsharah, the situation became tragic. Several
thousands of certificates, now desired by hundreds of thousands, were distributed
according to political criteria. Hehalutz was caught in the turmoil and distress of Jewish
youth in Poland, unable to satisfy the desire of increasing numbers of young Jews to
emigrate from Poland.
Kibbutz members in Hehalutz can be roughly divided into two types. Many became
devoted to the ideal of the kibbutz and its values. Thousands joined kibbutzim in Palestine,
contributing to their dramatic increase in the 1930s. They played a key role in settlement and
defense during the critical years of 193649. The average member of Hehalutz, on the other
hand, viewed hakhsharah and kibbutz life as opkumenish (roughly translated as hardship
or torture) or as a gzeyre (a senseless or hostile decree). It needed to be endured in order to
leave Poland. Some made it to Palestine, became Histadrut members, and contributed to the
development of the Yishuv. The rest suffered in vain. When the large movement fell apart,
those who had joined in 193334 and still remained, clinging on to hope, spent five or six
years in the diaspora kibbutz. As one pioneer song humorously expressed their tragedy:
Lost are the years, we cannot steer [to Palestine].
Broken are the bones, no one goes.
Dont be a pessimist
Be a Bundist!142
 The Journal of Israeli History 37

Notes
1. Otiker, Tnuat he-Halutz, 144 45. The largest kibbutz was Yagur in Palestine with 300
members upon its unification with the Haifa workers commune in 1933; it had 448 members in
1935. Tzur, Ha-Kibbutz ha-Meuhad, 146.
2. During the 1930s the kibbutz movements in Palestine grew tenfold, mostly thanks to members
of pioneer movements in the diaspora who joined them. When aliyah stopped between
1939 and 1945 their growth sharply declined to only 5 20% in five years. Sarid, Be-mivhan
ha-enut, 30.
3. The total number of Hehalutz members was much higher, around 90,000, including those not
yet in kibbutzim. Together with affiliated youth movements like Hashomer Hatzair, numbers
peaked well beyond 100,000. The movement was active in Poland, Galicia (separately
organized in Poland), Romania, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Germany, Czechoslovakia, Austria,
Hungary, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Netherland, Belgium, France, England, Egypt, Syria, Iraq,
South Africa, United States, Argentina, Brazil, and Cuba. In 1935, 70% were in eastern Europe,
due to a sharp increase in Germany, but usually it was even higher, with some 85% in 1933, for
example. Basok, ed., Sefer he-Halutz, 415.
4. See ibid., 417. In July 1933, Hehalutz in Poland and Galicia counted around 10,500 members in
kibbutzim (7,000 in central and eastern Poland, and 3,500 in Galicia). In August 1935, numbers
increased to around 12,000. See He-Atid, no. 145, 20 August 1933; Duah merkaz he-Halutz;
Leshchinsky, Ha-hakhsharah be-misparim; Basok, ed., Sefer he-Halutz, 415; Hahlatot ve-
taarikhim, 97 104; Otiker, Tnuat he-Halutz, 137 50.
5. In kibbutzim affiliated with the Histadrut, excluding children and parents. The largest
movement was Hakibbutz Hameuhad, which grew from some 3,000 members to 4,300, a third
of whom lived and worked in communes outside the movements settlements. Near, Ha-kibbutz
veha-hevrah, 418 19.
6. Kibbutz research began in the 1940s 50s, using mainly social science methodologies focusing
on the present, after the destruction of the movement in Europe. This tendency can be seen in
hundreds of articles and books such as Rosner, Social Research; Fogiel-Bijaoui, Baot mi-
shtikah. Kibbutz researchers who address Hehalutz rely on secondary literature, and scholarship
remains divided between movements in the diaspora and in Israel. See for example, Near, The
Kibbutz Movement, 97 112. An interesting exception is Diamond, Kibbutz and Shtetl,
though it relies mainly on a psychological interpretation.
7. For ideological aspects see Oppenheim, Tnuat he-Halutz, 1:553 661, 2:88 106, 233437,
507 14.
8. Ibid., 1:52 81.
9. Joseph Trumpeldor (1880 1920) was a Zionist activist and the most decorated Jewish soldier
in tsarist Russia, who fought during the Russo-Japanese War. After his immigration to
Palestine he worked in agriculture. During World War I he established the Zion Mule Corps, a
Jewish unit in the British army. He was killed while defending Tel-Hai against Arab attackers
and became a national hero.
10. Tomaszewski Between the Social and the National, 55 70.
11. See Marcus, Social and Politcal History, 389 410. According to Gurevich and Gertz, 41.5%
of aliyah between 1919 and 1942 was from Poland, with some 140,000 out of a total of around
350,000 people. Gurevich and Gertz, Jewish Population, 59 (pagination according to the
Hebrew edition). Other estimates are higher (47.9% in 191838), but these numbers include
some Jewish refugees from the Ukraine and USSR, Barlas, Ha-aliyah, 432 34.
12. For example, Halamish, Be-merutz kaful, 9 26, 49 72.
13. According to one estimate, some 50,000 Hehalutz members entered Palestine by 1939, nearly
half of them from Poland. Sarid, Tnuat he-Halutz, 653.
14. Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 16 17. See also Kariv, Kehilat Sarny, 250 51.
15. On the development of kibbutz terminology see Near, Leshonot ha-shituf, 12346.
Hashomer Hatzair also adopted this term during the Third Aliyah, in reference to its forming a
general organization based on economic cooperation, later known as Hakibbutz Haartzi
Hashomer Hatzair, which was established in 1927.
16. There was also a village of Sarny, but in 1900 02, a town was established there, on at the
intersection of two important rail lines. It grew rapidly to some 14,000 inhabitants, about half
of whom were Jewish. The town developed a strong Zionist tradition with a Hebrew school and
Zionist youth organizations. See Kariv, Sefer yizkor le-kehilat Sarny, 27 28.
38 R. Yona

17. Baki, Akhzariyut niflaah, 4 6; Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 19 23. According to some
accounts the initiative came from the Sarny activists.
18. See photo from 23 November 1924, in Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, following p. 144.
19. Ibid., 8, 20.
20. Ibid., 20, 23.
21. Ibid., 21 22, 25.
22. Ibid., 28.
23. State-owned monopolies, for example, which encompassed 20% of the economy, were closed
to Jews. During the 1930s the Jewish proletariat grew due to the impoverishment of the Jewish
lower middle class (though these terms are problematic in the context of east European Jewry).
Still, Jewish workers were employed primarily in the needle and food industries in small
workshops owned by other Jewish workers, and not in large factories, even when they were
owned by Jews. In 1929, for example, only 6% of the workers in large Jewish-owned factories
were Jews. Marcus, Social and Political History, 239.
24. Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 22, 52.
25. Yaakov Rabinovitch, Reshimot (Notes), Ha-Poel ha-Tzair, no. 27, 29 August 1919, 8 10.
26. Mendelsohn, Zionism in Poland, 329 37.
27. See Oppenheim, Tnuat he-Halutz, 1:345.
28. Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 30 31.
29. Ibid., 26, 29 30.
30. Ibid., 38.
31. Klosova was the largest center. Two were small communes, one in the Vilnius region
(Shaharia), and another in the Bialystok region (Tel-Hai). Together with Klosova they were
located in the eastern provinces of Poland where Zionism and the pioneer movement were
traditionally stronger. The fourth was the Grochov farm for training pioneers on the outskirts of
Warsaw, owned by Hehalutz. Ibid., 107.
32. Israel Oppenheim, scholar of Hehalutz in Poland, described this change primarily as an
ideological one, but in my opinion the organizational aspects are the key to understanding the
development of Hehalutz from that moment on. See, for example, Oppenheim, Gilgulei deot
ve-idiologiyah, 234 94. Oppenheims descriptions of Marshak tend to rely on the popular
image of his unique personality by his contemporaries in Hehalutz and Hakibbutz Hameuhad,
which he joined after arriving in Palestine in 1929. His outstanding personality, his
wholehearted dedication and enthusiasm, were certainly important, but his main contribution
was organizational, political, and ideological. He reconstructed hakhsharah on models
borrowed from the large Ein Harod kibbutz in Palestine.
33. See for example Erez, ed., Igrot David Ben-Gurion, 2:107, on the first envoy to Hehalutz in
1922. The affiliation of Hehalutz with the Histadrut was finalized in 1926. Measef, 226.
34. Shva, Beni ratz, 7 15.
35. Hakibbutz Hameuhad was established only in 1927, and was active at the time under the name
Kibbutz Ein Harod, established in 1923 as a national organization of communes in agricultural
settlements and communes of hired workers in cities and orchards. I use the term Hakibbutz
Hameuhad here for the sake of convenience. Among the seminars teachers was Yitzhak
Gruenbaum (1879 1970), Polish Zionist leader, member of the Polish parliament (the Sejm),
and later, the first interior minister of the State of Israel. See Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 30. His
participation was part of his alignment with the Socialist-Zionist camp during those years.
36. Tabenkin was part of the first delegation sent by the Histadrut for prolonged work in Hehalutz
in various countries at the end of 1925. The group was composed of 12 members from various
socialist settlement movements in Palestine. Tabenkin and two other members of Hakibbutz
Hameuhad were sent to Poland for a year. Two other members were sent to Germany, as
Hakibbutz Hameuhad initially concentrated its activity abroad in these countries. Tzur,
Ha-Kibbutz ha-Meuhad, 86 88.
37. Hakibbutz Hameuhads activity in Poland coincided with initiatives to organize hakhsharah and
aliyah in kibbutzim. The formation of kibbutzim for aliyah was initiated by Hehalutz Center in
mid-1925. It was intended to encourage immigrants to join the Histadrut organizations in Palestine.
For example, see memoirs of the centers activist, another refugee from the USSR, who organized
the first aliyah kibbutz, called Hakovesh, in Vilnius: Bankover, Sipurim, 18, 2829. See
protocol of a meeting between the secretary of the World Organization of Hehalutz and Hakibbutz
Hameuhad, 28 July 1925, Yad Tabenkin, Hakibbutz Hameuhad Archives (hereafter YTA),
 The Journal of Israeli History 39

1-2/1/1B. Oppenheim describes this as an internal ideological development in Hehalutz but there is
evidence showing otherwise. Oppenheim, Tnuat he-Halutz, 1:30670, esp. 34758.
38. Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 19 22, 25.
39. Protocols of the Ein Harod Overseas Committee, especially the meeting of the Kibbutz
Secretariat on 23 July 1925. Quote from Tabenkin and Dan (Probably Hillel Dan [1900 69]
who later became one of the heads of the construction cooperative Solel Boneh). See also a
meeting with the secretary of the World Organization of Hehalutz, who recruited the delegation,
held on 28 July 1925. According to his account, the existence of Hehalutz in Poland also relied
on this mission. Rapidly growing, the movement hardly had local activists and needed help:
the salvation [of Hehalutz] can come from the members in Palestine. YTA, 1-2/1/1B.
40. Shva, Beni ratz, 16 22.
41. Oppenheim, Tnuat he-Halutz, 1:460.
42. See, for example, resolutions from the Volhynia kibbutz in Klosova, He-Atid 42, 31 August
1926, taken with the participation of members of Hehalutz headquarters and Hakibbutz
Hameuhad.
43. The envoys from Palestine wanted to establish a permanent kibbutz in Klosova and to link it to
their movement at the time Benny was sent there. At a meeting of the Volhynia kibbutz held
31 August 1 September 1926 and attended by an envoy, a resolution was passed to maintain
a permanent hakhsharah kibbutz in Klosova. The resolution does not reflect a general
agreement since most members did not return to the kibbutz after the holidays. Dan, ed., Sefer
Klosova, 32.
44. Ibid., 41, 73 74, 1034. The house was inaugurated in the beginning of 1927.
45. Benny Marshak at the meeting of kibbutzim in Kajanka village (near Siemiaticze) in Polesia,
August 1927. Quoted in Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 12122.
46. Ibid.
47. N. [Nahum] Benari letter, 15 November 1927, quoted in ibid., 118 19.
48. Benny Marshak to Batya [Bendersky], March 1927, YTA, 15-121/2/4.
49. Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 43, 45.
50. Ibid., 82.
51. Tzur, Pesach in the Land of Israel, 84. The next haggadah available is from Ein Harod (1930)
in Palestine (1930), to which Klosova was related. Interestingly, this haggadah was written
after the arrival of the first Klosova pioneers in Palestine.
52. Tzur and Danieli, eds., Yotzim be-hodesh ha-aviv, 10 29.
53. According to one of the sick girls, Bennys future wife, who came to Klosova before him in the
spring of 1926. Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 55.
54. Ibid., 40, 44.
55. Ibid., 40.
56. The Klosova extensions were initially parts of one commune like the Work Battalion (hence
the term company), but were later remodeled as a union of independent communes like
Hakibbutz Hameuhad.
57. Oppenheim, Tnuat he-Halutz, 1:467. Otiker, Tnuat he-Halutz, 87 91.
58. N. [Nahum] Benari, Me-nesiotai be-Polin (From my travels in Poland), Davar, 13
December 1927, 2 3.
59. See, for example, a visit by a Jewish member of the Sejm, historian Ignaz (Yitzhak) Shipper
(1884 1943), who stayed in the kibbutz for a few days. Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 77.
60. Otiker, Tnuat he-Halutz, 112 25.
61. Elihai, Mifal ha-haksharah; Oppenheim, Ha-hakhsharah ha-kibbutzit shel Betar.
62. See, for instance, a dispute with Gruenbaum regarding the singing of the socialist anthem
The International in Hehalutz, He-Atid, 2 (110), 15 January 1931, 10.
63. In 1929 already 60% of hakhsharah was according to the Klosova model, and this figure would
keep rising. Otiker, Tnuat he-Halutz, 107.
64. Moshe Braslavsky, in Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 227.
65. Hershl Pinsky, in ibid., 225.
66. Ibid., 80.
67. Ibid., 56 78.
68. For an example of the life and background of a potential member from Volhynia, see an
autobiography of an 18-year-old written in 1934, Yivo Archives, New York, RG 4, # 3501.
69. Otiker, Tnuat he-Halutz, 165 71.
40 R. Yona

70. 15% in Hashomer Hatzair in 1935, compared to 6.9% in the general Hehalutz.
71. Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 27.
72. Ibid., 41, 70.
73. Kantor, Hayo hayah, 77 84.
74. Ibid., 85 88.
75. Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 81.
76. Ibid., 50.
77. Halter, Ha-mimrah, 62.
78. See for example autobiographies of Jewish youth, Yivo Archives, RG 4, # 3518, 3726 and
3816.
79. Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 48.
80. Ibid., 68 69.
81. Ibid., 51 52.
82. Ibid., 69 71.
83. Letter from Benari, 15 November 1927, in ibid., 118 20.
84. Ibid., 109, 226.
85. Ibid., 175.
86. Ibid., 139.
87. Ibid., 68.
88. Cohen, Zikhronot, 14, 41.
89. Ibid., 75 76.
90. Oppenheim, Tnuat he-Halutz, 2:141 44.
91. Gender roles in hakhsharah and the position of women in the diaspora kibbutz deserve a
separate study, beyond the scope of this paper.
92. Tabenkins oral report to Hakibbutz Hameuhad Secretariat, 19 October 1933, YTA, 28/1/2-2.
Tabenkin quotes a report on illnesses in kibbutzim by Frumka (Eshed-Asherovsky).
93. Sefer Klosova, 57.
94. Ibid., 171 72. The envoy was Haim Ben-Asher (1904 98), future member of Knesset (MK)
on behalf of Mapai in the State of Israel.
95. Ibid., 43.
96. For example, ibid., 119.
97. Ibid., 119.
98. Ibid., 34, 75 76,
99. Ibid., 83 84.
100. Ibid., 87 98.
101. Ghetto Fighters House Archive, Kibbutz Lohamei Hagetaot (herafter GFHA), photo 56911.
102. Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 76. See his portrait on the stand of the Klosova kibbutz in Lutsk during
a bazaar for the JNF, GFHA, photo 03117.
103. See his image on a poster behind a pioneer group, Keren he-Halutz, no. 1, 14 November 1924,
ILPA, 4-14-1924-24; in the office of a Klosova company, GFHA, photo 11294.
104. Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 32.
105. Ibid., 41.
106. Cohen, Zikhronot, 40.
107. For example, Dan, ed., Sefer Klosova, 225.
108. Ibid., 144.
109. Ibid., 57, 61, 185.
110. There were 210,000 Jews in Palestine in mid-1933. Gurevich, Gertz, and Bachi, The Jewish
Population of Palestine, 26.
111. Miriam Shlomovitz, letter to Lilia [Bassewitz], 6 May 1933, YTA, 2-12/3/5. She estimated
the average daily income of an experienced laborer in Poland (1 2 zlotys) was equivalent to
35 70 mills of a Palestine pound (3.5 7 cents), and sometimes even less. The income of
inexperienced kibbutz members was even lower, and only about a half of them had worked.
In comparison, workers in low-paying jobs in agriculture in Palestine were paid 200 mills a
day (3 6 times higher), and in construction in the cities 350 400 mills and more during the
years of prosperity. See Shalom Zacks survey at Hakibbutz Hameuhad Secretariat, YTA,
8/1/2-2.
112. Hakhsharah numbers include the five regional sections of Hehalutz and some 2,000 members
in separate kibbutzim of youth movements (mainly Hashomer Hatzair and Gordonia). Otiker,
 The Journal of Israeli History 41

Tnuat he-Halutz, 30 35, 105 132 (esp. 125), 146. Numbers fluctuated according to the
number of certificates.
113. For a typical Klosova company in the peak years, see Kagan, Luboml, 126 27, 22225. (The
shtetls name in Yiddish was Libivne). Otiker, Tnuat he-Halutz, 125 32. An average kibbutz
had 25 50 members,
114. See, for example, letters of envoy Miriam Shlomovitz to Hehalutz center, 1933 1934, GFHA,
24213.
115. Miriam Shlomovitz, letter to Hehalutz, 17 January 1934, GFHA, 24213.
116. Shapira, Berl, 428 64.
117. Protocols of Mapai Center, 21 November 1933, Israel Labor Party Archives, Beit Berl
(hereafter ILPA), 2-023-1933-5. See also Katznelsons lecture at the council of Hanoar
Haoved (Federation of Working Youth), 2223 December 1933. Ba-Maaleh, 7 January 1934.
118. Mapai Protocols, 21 November 1933.
119. Berl Katznelsons diary, 25 September 1933 26 October 1933, ILPA, 263-1924-6-4.
120. I could not locate the full protocol of the meeting, only a small part of it which was published in
Sipuro shel Kibbutz Haksharah, 90 91. See also a letter from Yaakov Eisenberg (Eshed) to
Tabenkin, 17 November 1933 (copy), YTA, 15-46/99/7.
121. Letter from Zeev Scherf (1906 84, future Israeli MK), 10 September 1933, ILPA, 86-1920-6-
4. Scherf referred also to relations between Hehalutz and the party (Poale Zion), its youth
movement Freiheit, and its newspaper.
122. See, for example, report on the reception of pioneers, Batya Bendersky, Protocol of the
Extended Kibbutz Secretariat (Hakibbutz Hameuhad), 24 26 November 1933, YTA, 8/1/2-2.
123. Primarily Hehalutz Hatzair, Hashomer Hatzair, Gordonia and Freiheit.
124. Mapai Protocols, 21 November 1933.
125. Mapai Protocols, 21 November and 5 December 1933, IPLA, 2-023-1933-5; protocols of the
Histadrut Executive Committee, 21 November 1933, Labor Archives, Lavon Institute, Tel
Aviv; Ha-veidah ha-reviit, 85 112.
126. This is due to the political and ideological relations between the various elements in the
Histadrut, which are beyond the scope of this paper. Generally speaking Hakibbutz Haartzi
(Hashomer Hatzair) and Hever Hakvutzot (affiliated with Gordonia) had other perceptions of
their relations with the Histadrut and Mapai and were interested in helping only their own
youth movements and not the general section of Hehalutz. See Oppenheim, Tnuat he-Halutz,
2:233 95, 316 437.
127. See for example a very harsh description in a private letter by one envoy. She describes the
pranks played on new members as sadism. The cleaning of their possessions was no longer
done covertly but by the entire kibbutz in front of the miserable member. They collectively
examined their belongings, including toothbrush, soap, razor blades, which thereafter
disappeared, leaving new members completely stripped of their possessions. The following
day members would wear all their clothes. It was their only chance to wear new clothes as
the general property was treated so badly that clothes were quickly torn and destroyed. If the
newcomer objected he was told he should now be a kibbutznik, and his personal needs were
totally dismissed with insults and ridicule. Miriam Shlomovitz to Lilia [Bassewitz], 6 May
1933, YTA, 2-12/3/5.
128. The word seems to be derived from a tune called The Beggars Dance from the famous
Yiddish play The Dybbuk, by S. Ansky.
129. Tabenkin demanded as many as 40 50 envoys. Meeting of the kibbutz secretariat, 19 October
1933, YTA, 8/1/2-2. Leaders of Hakibbutz Hameuhad wanted to impose a unification of the
general kibbutzim of Hehalutz with those of Hashomer Hatzair and Gordonia, hoping the
activists of these movements would thus help organize the rest of the organization.
130. His speech was published in Mibifnim 2, pt. 1, December 1933, 22 28 (reprinted edition).
131. Ibid.
132. Protocols, 24 25 November 1933, YTA, 8/1/2-2, p. 25.
133. Ibid. 12 19.
134. Ibid., 25 30. For Hakibbutz Hameuhads perspective on the matter see Kaneri, Tabenkin,
335 54. Kaneri ignores the issue of imposing kibbutz life in Hehalutz and adopts the
movements position in the conflict with Katznelson.
135. Protocol of the secretariat of Hanoar Haoved, 18 February 1934, on a meeting with Hakibbutz
Hameuhad Secretariat, Labor Archives, Lavon Institute, IV-213-1-17-C. Tabenkin suggested
42 R. Yona

establishing the center upon his return from Poland several months earlier. Meeting of the
kibbutz secretariat, 19 October 1933, YTA, 8/1/2-2. Hakibbutz Hameuhad apparently formed
its center after the second session of the fourth convention of the Histadrut in January 1934,
where Katznelson presented his program for the Youth Center to the public, following power
struggles between the various kibbutz movements over the control of youth movements in
Palestine. Hanoar Haoved, which was affiliated to the Histadrut, was desperate for help and
guidance but could not get it from the Histadrut and strengthened its ties with Hakibbutz
Hameuhad. See also Hanoar Haoved protocols from 21 December 1933, 15 January 1934
with kibbutz members (same file), and the secretariats diary, Labor Archives, Lavon Institute,
IV-213-1-19.
136. Letter to Katznelson, 15 April 1935, IPLA, 4-6-1920-86.
137. Shapira, Berl, 455 64. After the centers failure Katznelson shifted his focus to the political
aspects of the relations between the Histadrut, Mapai and Hakibbutz Hameuhad.
138. Kafkafi, Emet o emunah, 56 57. The split began in 1942.
139. Pseudonym of Moyshe Bunem Yustman (1889 1942), a leading journalist and publicist.
140. Oppenheim, Tnuat he-Halutz, 2:438 76, esp. 468 71.
141. For further reading see Sarid, Be-mivhan ha-enut.
142. Halter, Ha-mimrah, 63.

Notes on contributor
Rona Yona is a Ph.D. student at the Department of Jewish History, Tel Aviv University. She is
currently writing her dissertation, Let Us All Be Pioneers: Popular Pioneering and Nationalism in
Hehalutz in Poland between the Two World Wars.

References
Baki-Kolodni, Rut. Akhzariyut niflaah (Wonderful cruelty.) Et-mol, no. 166 (2002): 4 10.
Bankover, Yosef. Sipurim mi-derekh arukah (Stories from a long road). Tel Aviv: Am Oved, 1975.
Barlas, Haim. Ha-aliyah veha-misrad ha-eretzyisreeli ha-merkazi (Aliyah and the Central
Palestine Bureau). In Entziklopediyah shel galuyot (Encyclopedia of the diaspora). Vol. 1,
Warsaw, 413 34. Jerusalem: Hevrat entziklopediyah shel galuyot, 1953.
Basok, Moshe, ed. Sefer he-halutz (Hehalutz book). Jerusalem: Jewish Agency, 1940.
Cohen, Yoske. Zikhronot mi-yemei hakhsharah (Memoirs of hakhsharah days). Beit Lohamei
ha-Getaot 1984.
Dan, Haim, ed. Sefer Klosova (The Klosova book). Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1978.
Diamond, Stanley. Kibbutz and Shtetl: The History of an Idea. Social Problems 5, no. 2 (1957):
71 99.
Duah merkaz he-Halutz be-Polin likrat ha-veidah ha-shishit be-1935 (Report of Hehalutz center in
Poland in preparation for the sixth convention in 1935). Warsaw, July 1935.
Elihai, Joseph. Mifal ha-hakhsharah shel he-halutz ha-mizrahi be-Polin, 1928 1939 (The
hakhsharah activity of Hehalutz Hamizrahi in Poland, 1928 1939). Be-Shvilei ha-Tehiyah, no. 3
(1988): 123 48.
Erez, Yehuda, ed. Igrot David Ben-Gurion (David Ben-Gurions letters). Tel Aviv: Am Oved,
1971 1974.
Fogiel-Bijaoui, Sylvie, ed. Baot Mi-shtikah: Nashim, kibbutz ve-shinui hevrati (Old dreams, new
horizons: Kibbutz women revisited). Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 2009.
Gurevich, David, Aron Gertz, and Roberto Bachi. The Jewish Population of Palestine: Immigration,
Demographic Structure and National Growth. Jerusalem: Jewish Agency for Palestine, 1944.
Hahlatot ve-taarikhim 5578 5595 (Decisions and numbers, 1918 1935). Warsaw: Hehalutz, 1935.
Halamish, Aviva. Be-merutz kaful neged ha-zman; Mediniyut ha-aliyah ha-tziyonit bi-shnot ha-
shloshim (A dual race against time: Zionist immigration policy in the 1930s). Jerusalem: Yad
Ben-Zvi, 2006.
Halter, Mordekhai. Ha-mimrah ba-kfar (The saying in the village). Tel Aviv: Yeda-Am, 1947.
Ha-veidah ha-reviit shel ha-histadrut moshav sheni (The second session of the fourth convention
of the Histadrut, 9 13 January 1934). Tel Aviv: Ha-Vaad ha-Poel, 1934.
 The Journal of Israeli History 43

Kafkafi, Eyal. Emet o emunah: Tabenkin mehanekh halutzim (Truth or faith: Tabenkin educates
pioneers). Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi, 1992.
Kagan, Berl, ed. Luboml: The Memorial Book of a Vanished Shtetl. Hoboken: Ktav Publishing
House, 1997.
Kaneri, Baruch. Tabenkin be-Eretz Yisrael (Tabenkin in the Land of Israel). Ramat Efal: Yad
Tabenkin, 2003.
Kantor, Shlomo, Hayo hayah: Leket zikhronot al-pi reshimot mi-yamim avaru (Once upon a time:
Collected memories according to notes from times past). (n.p., n.d., [1977?]).
Kariv, Josef, ed. Sefer yizkor le-kehilat Sarny (Memorial book of the Sarny community). Jerusalem:
Yad Vashem, 1961.
Leshchinsky, Yaakov, ed. Ha-hakhsharah be-misparim (Hakhsharah in numbers). Vols. 1 2.
Warsaw: Merkaz Hehalutz, 1936.
Marcus, Josef. Social and Political History of the Jews in Poland 1919 1939. New York: Mouton,
1983.
Measef li-tnuat he-Halutz (Hehalutz anthology). Warsaw, 1930.
Mendelsohn, Ezra. Zionism in Poland: The Formative Years, 1915 1926. New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1981.
Near, Henry. Ha-kibbutz veha-hevrah (The kibbutz and society). Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi, 1984.
. Leshonot ha-shituf: Minuah ve-mahut be-toldot ha-kibbutz (Languages of sharing:
Terminology and essence in the history of the kibbutz). Ha-Tziyonut 13 (1988): 123 46.
. The Kibbutz Movement: A History. Vol. 1. Oxford: Oxford University Press/Littman Library
of Jewish Civilization, 1992.
Oppenheim, Israel. Ha-hakhsharah ha-kibbutzit shel Betar be-Polin bi-shnot ha-shloshim,
1930 1936 (Betars training kibbutzim in Poland in the 1930s, 1930 1936). World
Congress of Jewish Studies 6, no. 2 (1976): 295 305.
. Gilgulei deot ve-idiologiyah shel he-Halutz be-Polin: Hashlatat ha-hakhsharah ha-
kvuah. (Transformations of opinions and ideology of Hehalutz in Poland: Imposing the
permanent hakhsharah). Zion 42, no. 3/4 (1977): 234 94.
. Tnuat he-Halutz be-Polin (Hehalutz movement in Poland). Vols. 1 2. Jerusalem and Sde
Boker, 1982 1993.
Otiker, Israel. Tnuat he-Halutz be-Polin, 1932 1935 (Hehalutz movement in Poland, 1932 1935).
Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1972.
Rosner, Menachem. Social Research, Change, and the Kibbutz. In The Sociology of the Kibbutz,
ed. Menachem Rosner, 7 22. London: Transaction Books, 1983.
Sarid, Levi Arjeh. He-Halutz ve-tnuot ha-noar be-Polin, 19171939 (Hehalutz and the youth
movements in Poland, 1917 1939). Tel Aviv: Am Oved, 1979.
. Be-mivhan ha-enut veha-pdut: Ha-tnuot ha-halutziyot be-Polin ba-shoah u-leahareha
(Under a test of response and redemption: The pioneer movements in Poland during and after the
Holocaust, 1939 1949). Tel Aviv: Moreshet, 1997.
Shapira, Anita. Berl: Biografiyah (Biography of Berl Katznelson). Tel Aviv: Am Oved, 1980.
Shva, Shlomo. Beni ratz: hayav ve-korotav shel Benjamin Marshak (Benny runs: The life of
Benjamin Marshak). Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1981.
Sipuro shel Kibbutz Hakhsharah (The story of a Kibbutz Hakhsharah). Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz
Hameuchad, 1970.
Tomaszewski, Jerzy. Between the Social and the National: The Economic Situation of Polish
Jewry, 1918 1939. Jahrbuch des Simon-Dubnow-Instituts 1 (2002): 55 70.
Tzur, Muki. Pesach in the Land of Israel: Kibbutz Haggadot. Israel Studies 12, no. 2 (2007):
74 103.
, and Yuval Danieli, eds. Yotzim be-hodesh ha-aviv: Pesah Eretz-yisreeli be-hagadot min
ha-kibbutz (Coming out in spring: Passover in the Land of Israel in kibbutz haggadot).
Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi, 2004.
Tzur, Zeev. Ha-Kibbutz ha-Meuhad be-yishuvah shel ha-aretz (Hakibbutz Hameuhad in the
settlement of the Land of Israel). Vol. 1. Tel Aviv: Yad Tabenkin, 1979.