Golda Meir

Tzionut Hero: Golda Meir

“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.”

Golda Meir (1898–1978) was born Golda Mabovitz in the Ukraine. When she was eight her family moved to the United States, fleeing pogroms. She grew up and was educated in Wisconsin. In 1921 she and her husband made aliyah to Israel, where Golda became one of the founders and great politicians of the emerging Jewish state. When they first moved to Israel, she and her husband Morris joined a kibbutz. On the kibbutz Golda Myerson (she had not yet changed her last name) was quickly elected to represent the kibbutz at the Histadrut, the General Federation of Labor. She was elected secretary of the Women’s Labor Council in 1928. Through the following two decades she gained more and more prominence as a leader of the Zionist movement for the independence of Israel. In 1948 she was one of twenty-four signers of Israel’s Declaration of Independence, and one of two women. Golda said, “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.” She first served as fundraiser in the U.S. for the fledgling Jewish state, having been issued Israel’s first passport. Then she served as Israel’s first ambassador to the Soviet Union. From 1949–1974 she served as member of the Knesset, fulfilling a variety of roles, including foreign minister under Ben-Gurion. After the SixDay War in 1968 she was called out of retirement to serve as prime minister. She was the first woman to be elected as head of Israel and only the third female prime minister ever in the world. Golda Meir resigned from the post of prime minister after the Yom Kippur War. She died in 1978.

Tzionut Activity: Golda’s speech

In January, 1948, Golda Meir flew to the United States to raise funds for the arms that were needed to defend the Jews in Palestine against the Arab attacks that were coming. All of the surrounding Arab nations were going to attack Israel. Here is part of the speech that she made before the Council of Jewish Federations in Chicago on January 2, 1948. The Israeli Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, later described the result of her mission: “Someday when history will be written, it will be said that there was a Jewish woman who got the money which made the state possible.”

We always had faith that in the end we would win, that everything we were doing in the country led to the independence of the Jewish people and to a

Jewish state. Long before we had dared pronounce that word, we knew what was in store for us…I want to say to you, friends, that the Jewish community in Palestine is going to fight to the very end. If we have arms to fight with, we will fight with those, and if not, we will fight with stones in our hands…

During the last few years the Jewish people lost 6,000,000 Jews (in the

Holocaust), and it would be an audacity [ hutzpah] on our part to worry the

Jewish people throughout the world because a few hundred thousand more

Jews were in danger. That is not the issue. The issue is that if these 700,000

Jews in Palestine can remain alive, then the Jewish people is alive and Jewish independence is assured. If these 700,000 people are killed off, then for many centuries, we are through with this dream of a Jewish people and a Jewish homeland…

1. What was Golda Meir’s mission in 1948? 2. What is her reason that the new State of Israel must survive?