Golda Meir

Golda Meir (earlier Golda Meyerson, born Golda Mabovich, Голда Мабович; May 3, 1898 – December 8, 1978) was an Israeli teacher, kibbutznik and politician who became the fourth Prime Minister of Israel.

Meir was elected Prime Minister of Israel on March 17, 1969, after serving as Minister of Labour and Foreign Minister. Israel's first and the world's third woman to hold such an office, she was described as the "Iron Lady" of Israeli politics years before the epithet became associated with British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Former Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion used to call Meir "the best man in the government"; she was often portrayed as the "strong-willed, straight-talking, grey-bunned grandmother of the Jewish people".

In 1974, after the end of the Yom Kippur War, Meir resigned as prime minister. She died in 1978 of lymphoma.

Early life

Golda Mabovitch (Ukrainian: Ґольда Мабович) was born on May 3, 1898, in Kiev, Russian Empire, present-day Ukraine, to Blume Neiditch (died 1951) and Moshe Mabovitch (died 1944), a carpenter. Meir wrote in her autobiography that her earliest memories were of her father boarding up the front door in response to rumors of an imminent pogrom. She had two sisters, Sheyna and Tzipke, as well as five other siblings who died in childhood. She was especially close to Sheyna.

Moshe Mabovitch left to find work in New York City in 1903. In his absence, the rest of the family moved to Pinsk to join her mother's family. In 1905, Moshe moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in search of higher-paying work and found employment in the workshops of the local railroad yard. The following year, he had saved up enough money to bring his family to the United States.

Golda Meir, 1910 Golda Meir in Milwaukee, 1914

Blume ran a grocery store on Milwaukee's north side, where by age eight Golda had been put in charge of watching the store when her mother went to the market for supplies. Golda attended the Fourth Street Grade School (now Golda Meir School) from 1906 to 1912. A leader early on, she organized a fund raiser to pay for her classmates' textbooks. After forming the American Young Sisters Society, she rented a hall and scheduled a public meeting for the event. She went on to graduate as valedictorian of her class, despite not knowing English at the beginning of her schooling.

At 14, she studied at North Division High School and worked part-time. Her mother wanted her to leave school and marry, but she rebelled. She bought a train ticket to Denver, Colorado, and went to live with her married sister, Sheyna Korngold. The Korngolds held intellectual evenings at their home, where Meir was exposed to debates on Zionism, literature, women's suffrage, trade unionism, and more. In her autobiography, she wrote: "To the extent that my own future convictions were shaped and given form [...] those talk-filled nights in Denver played a considerable role." In Denver, she also met Morris Meyerson (December 17, 1893 – May 25, 1951), a sign painter, whom she later married on December 24, 1917.

Return to Milwaukee, Zionist activism, and teaching

 

In 1913 she returned to North Division High, graduating in 1915. While there, she became an active member of Young Poale Zion, which later became Habonim, the Labor Zionist youth movement. She spoke at public meetings, embraced Socialist Zionism and hosted visitors from Palestine.

She attended the teachers college Milwaukee State Normal School (now University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee), in 1916, and probably part of 1917. After graduating from Milwaukee Normal, she taught in Milwaukee public schools.

In 1917 she took a position at a Yiddish-speaking Folks Schule in Milwaukee. While at the Folks Schule, she came more closely into contact with the ideals of Labor Zionism. In 1913 she had begun dating Morris Meyerson. She was a committed Labor Zionist and he was a dedicated socialist. Together, they left their jobs to join a kibbutz in Palestine in 1921.

When Golda and Morris married in 1917, settling in Palestine was her precondition for the marriage. Golda had intended to make aliyah straight away but her plans were disrupted due to all transatlantic passenger services being canceled due to the outbreak of World War I. Instead she threw her energies into Poale Zion activities. A short time after their wedding, she embarked on a fund raising campaign for Poale Zion that took her across the United States.The couple moved to Palestine in 1921 together with her sister Sheyna.

Aliyah

Golda Meir in the fields at Kibbutz Merhavia (1920s)

In the British Mandate of Palestine, Meir and Meyerson joined a kibbutz. Their initial application to kibbutz Merhavia in the Jezreel Valley was rejected, but in the end they were accepted. Her duties included picking almonds, planting trees, working in the chicken coops and running the kitchen. Recognizing her leadership abilities, the kibbutz chose her as its representative to the Histadrut, the General Federation of Labour.

In 1924 she and her husband left the kibbutz and resided briefly in Tel Aviv before settling in Jerusalem. There they had two children, a son Menachem (born 1924) and a daughter Sarah (born 1926).

In 1928 she was elected secretary of Moetzet HaPoalot (Working Women's Council), which required her to spend two years (1932–34) as an emissary in the United States. The children went with her, but Morris stayed in Jerusalem. Morris and Golda grew apart, but never divorced. Morris died in 1951.

Histadrut activities

In 1934 when Meir returned from the United States, she joined the Executive Committee of the Histadrut and moved up the ranks to become head of its Political Department. This appointment was important training for her future role in Israeli leadership.

In July 1938, Meir was the Jewish observer from Palestine at the Évian Conference, called by U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt to discuss the question of Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi persecution. Delegates from the 32 invited countries repeatedly expressed their sorrow for the plight of the European Jews, but made excuses as to why their countries could not help by admitting the refugees. The only exception was the Dominican Republic, which pledged to accept 100,000 refugees on generous terms. Meir was disappointed at the outcome and remarked to the press, "There is only one thing I hope to see before I die and that is that my people should not need expressions of sympathy anymore."

Pre-state political role

In June 1946, the British cracked down on the Zionist movement in Palestine, arresting many leaders of the Yishuv. Meir took over as acting head of the Political Department of the Jewish Agency during the incarceration of Moshe Sharett. Thus she became the principal negotiator between the Jews in Palestine and the British Mandatory authorities. After his release, Sharett went to the United States to attend talks on the UN Partition Plan, leaving Meir to head the Political Department until the establishment of the state in 1948.

In January 1948, the treasurer of the Jewish Agency was convinced that Israel would not be able to raise more than $7–8 million from the American Jewish community. Meir traveled to the United States and managed to raise $50 million, which was used to purchase arms in Europe for the nascent state. Ben-Gurion wrote that Meir's role as the "Jewish woman who got the money which made the state possible" would go down one day in the history books.

On May 10, 1948, four days before the official establishment of the state, Meir traveled to Amman disguised as an Arab woman for a secret meeting with King Abdullah of Transjordan at which she urged him not to join the other Arab countries in attacking the Jews. Abdullah asked her not to hurry to proclaim a state. Meir replied: "We've been waiting for 2,000 years. Is that hurrying?"

As head of the Jewish Agency Political Department, Meir called the mass exodus of Arabs before the War of Independence in 1948 "dreadful" and likened it to what had befallen the Jews in Nazi-occupied Europe.

Ministerial career

Golda Meir talks with Eva Perón on Meir's visit to Argentina, 1951.

Meir was one of 24 signatories (two of them women) of the Israeli Declaration of Independence on May 14, 1948. She later recalled, "After I signed, I cried. When I studied American history as a schoolgirl and I read about those who signed the Declaration of Independence, I couldn't imagine these were real people doing something real. And there I was sitting down and signing a declaration of establishment." Israel was attacked the next day by the joint armies of Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Transjordan, and Iraq, along with expeditionary forces from other Arab countries and Arab guerilla movements in the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. During the war, Israel stopped the combined Arab assault, then launched a series of military offensives and expanded its territorial holdings.

Minister Plenipotentiary to Moscow

Carrying the first Israeli-issued passport, Meir was appointed Israel's minister plenipotentiary to the Soviet Union, with her term beginning on 2 September 1948 and ending in March 1949. At the time, good relations with the Soviet Union were important for Israel's ability to secure arms from Eastern European countries for the struggle that accompanied its independence, while Joseph Stalin and Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov sought to cultivate a strong relationship with Israel as a means of furthering the Soviet position in the Middle East. Soviet–Israeli relations were complicated by Soviet policies against religious institutions and nationalist movements, made manifest in moves to shut down Jewish religious institutions as well as the ban on Hebrew language study and the prohibition of the promotion of emigration to Israel.

During her brief stint in the USSR, Meir attended Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur services at the Moscow Choral Synagogue, where she was mobbed by thousands of Russian Jews chanting her name. The Israeli 10,000 shekel banknote issued in November 1984 bore a portrait of Meir on one side and the image of the crowd that turned out to cheer her in Moscow on the other.

Labor minister Golda Meir at first session of the third government (1951)

In 1949 Meir was elected to the Knesset as a member of Mapai and served continuously until 1974. From 1949 to 1956, she served as Minister of Labour. While serving in this position, Meir carried out welfare state policies, orchestrated the integration of immigrants into Israel’s workforce, and introduced major housing and road construction projects. In 1955, on Ben-Gurion's instructions, she stood for the position of mayor of Tel Aviv. She lost by the two votes of the religious bloc who withheld their support on the grounds that she was a woman.

Foreign minister

In 1956, she became Foreign Minister under Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion. Her predecessor, Moshe Sharett, had asked all members of the foreign service to Hebraicize their last names. Upon her appointment as foreign minister, she shortened "Meyerson" to "Meir", which means "illuminate". As foreign minister, Meir promoted ties with the newly established states in Africa in an effort to gain allies in the international community. But she also believed that Israel had experience in nation-building that could be a model for the Africans. In her autobiography, she wrote: "Like them, we had shaken off foreign rule; like them, we had to learn for ourselves how to reclaim the land, how to increase the yields of our crops, how to irrigate, how to raise poultry, how to live together, and how to defend ourselves." Israel could be a role model because it "had been forced to find solutions to the kinds of problems that large, wealthy, powerful states had never encountered".

Meir with U.S. President John F. Kennedy, 27 December 1962.

On October 29, 1957, she was slightly injured in the foot when a Mills bomb was thrown into the debating chamber of the Knesset. David Ben-Gurion and Moshe Carmel were more seriously injured. The attack was carried out by 25-year-old Moshe Dwek. Born in Aleppo, his motives were attributed to a dispute with the Jewish Agency, though he was also described as "mentally unbalanced".

In 1958 she was recorded as having praised the work of Pope Pius XII on behalf of the Jewish people shortly after the pontiff's death. Pope Pius's legacy as a wartime pope remains controversial to this day.

The same year, during the wave of Jewish migration from Poland to Israel, Meir sought to prevent disabled and sick Polish Jews from immigrating to Israel. In a letter sent to Israel's ambassador in Warsaw, Katriel Katz, she wrote: "A proposal was raised in the coordination committee to inform the Polish government that we want to institute selection in aliyah, because we cannot continue accepting sick and handicapped people. Please give your opinion as to whether this can be explained to the Poles without hurting immigration."

In the early 1960s, Meir was diagnosed with lymphoma. In January 1966, she retired from the Foreign Ministry, citing exhaustion and ill health, but soon returned to public life as secretary-general of Mapai, supporting Prime Minister Levi Eshkol in party conflicts.

Premiership

Meir (center) with Pat and Richard Nixon in 1973.

After Levi Eshkol's sudden death on February 26, 1969, the party elected Meir as his successor. Meir came out of retirement to take office on March 17, 1969, serving as prime minister until 1974. Meir maintained the coalition government formed in 1967, after the Six-Day War, in which Mapai merged with two other parties (Rafi and Ahdut HaAvoda) to form the Israel Labour party.

In 1969 and the early 1970s, Meir met with many world leaders to promote her vision of peace in the Middle East, including Richard Nixon (1969), Nicolae Ceaușescu (1972) and Pope Paul VI (1973). In 1973, she hosted the chancellor of West Germany, Willy Brandt, in Israel.

In August 1970, Meir accepted a U.S. peace initiative that called for an end to the War of Attrition and an Israeli pledge to withdraw to "secure and recognized boundaries" in the framework of a comprehensive peace settlement. The Gahal party quit the national unity government in protest, but Meir continued to lead the remaining coalition.

Munich Olympics Main article: Operation Wrath of God

In the wake of the Munich massacre at the 1972 Summer Olympics, Meir appealed to the world to "save our citizens and condemn the unspeakable criminal acts committed". Outraged at the perceived lack of global action, she ordered the Mossad to hunt down and assassinate suspected leaders and operatives of Black September and PFLP. The 1986 TV film Sword of Gideon, based on the book Vengeance: The True Story of an Israeli Counter-Terrorist Team by George Jonas, and Steven Spielberg's movie Munich (2005) were based on these events.

Dispute with Austria

During the 1970s about 200,000 Russian-Jewish emigrants were allowed to leave the Soviet Union for Israel by way of Austria. When seven of these emigrants were taken hostage at the Austria-Czechoslovakian border by Palestinian Arab fighters in September 1973, Austrian Chancellor Bruno Kreisky closed the Jewish Agency's transit facility in Schönau, Lower Austria. A few days later in Vienna, Meir tried to convince Kreisky to re-open the facility by appealing to his own Jewish origin, and described his position as "succumbing to terrorist blackmail". Kreisky did not change his position, so Meir returned to Israel infuriated. A few months later Austria opened a new transition camp.

Yom Kippur War

In the days leading up to the Yom Kippur War, Israeli intelligence could not conclusively determine that an attack was imminent. However, on October 5, 1973, Meir received official news that Syrian forces were massing on the Golan Heights. The prime minister was alarmed by the reports, and felt that the situation reminded her of what happened before the Six Day War. Her advisers, however, assured her not to worry, saying that they would have adequate notice before a war broke out. This made sense at the time, since after the Six Day War, most Israelis felt it unlikely that the Arabs would attack. Consequently, although a resolution was passed granting her power to demand a full-scale call-up of the military (instead of the typical cabinet decision), Meir did not mobilize Israel's forces early. Soon, though, war became very clear. Six hours before the outbreak of hostilities, Meir met with Minister of Defense Moshe Dayan and general David Elazar. While Dayan continued to argue that war was unlikely and thus was in favor of calling up the air force and only two divisions, Elazar advocated full scale army mobilization and the launch of a full-scale preemptive strike on Syrian forces.

Meir approved full scale mobilizing but sided with Dayan as for a preemptive strike, citing Israel's need for foreign aid. She believed that Israel could not depend on European countries to supply Israel with military equipment, and the only country that might come to Israel's assistance was the United States. Fearing that the United States would be wary of intervening if Israel were perceived as initiating the hostilities, Meir decided against a preemptive strike. She made it a priority to inform Washington of her decision. Then-U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger later confirmed Meir's assessment by stating that if Israel had launched a preemptive strike, Israel would not have received "so much as a nail".

Resignation

Following the Yom Kippur War, Meir's government was plagued by in-fighting and questions over Israel's lack of preparation for the war. The Agranat Commission appointed to investigate the war cleared her of "direct responsibility", and related to her actions on Yom Kippur morning;

“ She decided wisely, with common sense and speedily, in favour of the full mobilization of the reserves, as recommended by the chief-of-staff, despite weighty political considerations, thereby performing a most important service for the defence of the state. ”

Her party won the elections in December 1973, but she resigned on April 11, 1974, bowing to what she felt was the "will of the people" and what she felt was a sufficient premiership as well as the pending pressures of forming a coalition; "Five years are sufficient...It is beyond my strength to continue carrying this burden." Yitzhak Rabin succeeded her on June 3, 1974.

In 1975 she published her autobiography, My Life.

Death Golda Meir's grave on Mount Herzl

On December 8, 1978, Meir died of lymphatic cancer in Jerusalem at the age of 80. Four days later, on December 12, Meir was buried on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem.

Awards

In 1975, Meir was awarded the Israel Prize for her special contribution to society and the State of Israel. In 1974, Meir was awarded the honor of World Mother by American Mothers. In 1974 Meir was awarded the James Madison Award for Distinguished Public Service by Princeton University's American Whig–Cliosophic Society.

Legacy

Portrayals in film and theater

Meir's story has been the subject of many fictionalized portrayals. In 1977, Anne Bancroft played Meir in William Gibson's Broadway play Golda. The Australian actress Judy Davis played a young Meir in the television film A Woman Called Golda (1982), opposite Leonard Nimoy. Ingrid Bergman played the older Golda in the same film. In 2003 the American Jewish actress Tovah Feldshuh portrayed her on Broadway in Golda's Balcony, Gibson's second play about Meir's life. The one-woman show was controversial in its implication that Meir considered using nuclear weapons during the Yom Kippur War.

Valerie Harper portrayed her in the touring company and in the film version of Golda's Balcony. Supporting actress Colleen Dewhurst portrayed her in the 1986 TV-movie Sword of Gideon. In 2005 actress Lynn Cohen portrayed Meir in Steven Spielberg's film Munich. Later on, Tovah Feldshuh assumed her role once again in the 2006 English-speaking French movie O Jerusalem. She was played by the Polish actress Beata Fudalej in the 2009 film The Hope by Márta Mészáros.

Commemoration

• Golda Meir School, Milwaukee, Wisconsin
• Golda Meir Library, University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, Wisconsin
• Golda Meir Boulevard, Jerusalem, Israel (and various other streets, neighborhoods and schools in Israel)
• Golda Meir Center for the Performing Arts, Tel Aviv
• Golda Meir Square, New York City
• Golda Meir Center for Political Leadership at Metropolitan State University of Denver
• Golda Meir House, Denver, Colorado
• Golda Meir House, Newton, Massachusetts

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  Memorial plaque in Kiev

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  Golda Meir Square is designated in New York City south of Times Square

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  Israeli 10 New Sheqalim Banknote commemorating Golda Meir (1985-1992).

Cultural references

In Israel, the term "Golda's shoes" (na'alei Golda), a reference to the sturdy orthopedic shoes that Golda favored, has become a euphemism for all that is ugly and old-fashioned.

Poll

In 2005 she was voted the 75th-greatest Israeli of all time, in a poll by the Israeli news website Ynet to determine whom the general public considered the 200 Greatest Israelis.

Published works

• This is Our Strength (1962) – Golda Meir's collected papers
• My Father's House (1972)
• My Life (1975). Putnam, ISBN 0-399-11669-9.

See also

• Évian Conference
• List of Israel Prize recipients