Beyond a one-man show: the prelude of Revisionist Zionism, 1922–25.

POLITICAL platforms; ZIONISM; JEWISH nationalism; JUDAISM & state; ARAB-Israeli conflict, 1993-

The hallmarks of the Revisionist political platform, such as opposition to the project of the enlarged Jewish Agency or the idea of fundamental land and fiscal reform in Palestine aimed at an intensification of the settlement endeavour, began to appear spontaneously, particularly in Russo-Ukrainian Zionist circles, during the second quarter of 1922. The so-called ‘Our Platform’, a series of articles setting out the Revisionist proposals, published in March 1924, was a joint undertaking and the culmination of numerous, sometimes inconclusive, discussions. The creation of the Union of Zionists-Revisionists sealed this process in 1925. The aim of this article is to investigate the three-year prelude to the organized Revisionist movement, highlighting the role performed by activists, almost all of whom have been forgotten over time (J. Brutzkus, S. Gepstein, J. Schechtman and I. Trivus, among others). It identifies the opposition to the enlarged Jewish Agency project (and not the rejection of the White Paper of 1922) as the main galvanizing point of the process. Last, but not least, it argues that many of the political notions commonly attributed to Jabotinsky actually originated with others among the Revisionist founders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]