Who was David Ben-Gurion?
Born David Grün in 1886, David Ben-Gurion grew up in Płońsk, a town under Russian rule. At 20 he left for Ottoman Palestine. He was a Labor Zionist, and he helped found the Histadrut labour federation, then rose to lead the Jewish Agency and the Mapai party. In May 1948, on the 14th, he announced the birth of the State of Israel. For most of the years until 1963 he served as both prime minister and defence minister, with a break in 1954-1955. He left politics in 1970 and spent his last years on a Negev kibbutz, hoping others would follow him into the desert. He died in 1973.
Political views
- Believed that Jewish workers had to form the base of any Jewish state, and he helped create the Histadrut to organise them.Source: news.bbc.co.uk
- Put the building of state institutions and the settling of huge waves of newcomers at the heart of his governments.Source: news.bbc.co.uk
- After independence he insisted that separate militias join one national force, the Israel Defence Forces.Source: news.bbc.co.uk
- Backed armed resistance to British rule but denounced groups that used terrorism.Source: news.bbc.co.uk
- Declared a state open to Jewish immigration that promised social and political equality to every inhabitant.Source: avalon.law.yale.edu
- During the Second World War he urged Jews to fight alongside the Allies, while also organising secret passage for Jewish refugees into Palestine.Source: news.bbc.co.uk
- In a 1963 exchange with President Kennedy he resisted regular American inspections of the Dimona reactor.Source: nsarchive.gwu.edu
- After the 1967 war he argued against keeping Arab land beyond Jerusalem.Source: news.bbc.co.uk
Legacy
Most Israelis honour Ben-Gurion as the founding father of their country. They credit him with creating the army and civil service and with absorbing hundreds of thousands of immigrants. Admirers also point to his firm decisions in 1948 and his practical streak. Palestinians, and many historians, link his leadership to the 1948 war, when hundreds of thousands of Palestinian Arabs fled or were driven out, an event Palestinians call the Nakba. They also point to the military rule placed on Arab citizens of Israel until 1966. Inside Israel, critics attacked his domineering manner, the Lavon affair and his fights with party colleagues.
In their own words
“It will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex.”