The Haredi Agudat Yisrael (AY) and the Religious Zionist Mizrahi political movements, both associated with Jewish Orthodoxy, have received considerable scholarly attention over the past few decades. Book-length studies, edited volumes, master's and doctoral theses, and articles are devoted to each of them. This cumulative knowledge relates to a wide range of topics, including specific developments, processes, and episodes; these movements' respective ideological and theological platforms; various organizational, institutional, and economic infrastructures; and biographical sketches of their spiritual and political leaders.
Some of these studies relate to the complex and tenuous relationships between these two rival movements, but in many cases do so in passing; in other studies this topic is overlooked or underestimated. In this volume based on a PhD dissertation, Daniel Mahla is therefore revisiting a scene that is not terra incognita, and does so forcefully, thoroughly, and systematically, with an important grain of sensitivity.
The thrust of Mahla's persuasive argument is that the complex relationship between AY and Mizrahi, characterized primarily by struggles, encounters, rivalries, tensions, and competition, is crucial to understanding the “DNA” of these two religious-oriented political movements. In addition, he argues that these internal relationships are no less important, and at times more so, than those that they held with the nonreligious Jewish and Zionist movements, and are crucial to understanding how they shaped themselves and acted. This aspect must be added to the surrounding environment and contexts, which also clearly influenced the relationship between these two movements.
In addition, Mahla submits that the core difference between these two movements is not solely their respective approaches toward and dealings with the Zionist movement, as certain scholars have suggested, but evolves around two pivotal issues: rabbinic authority and political activism.
Exploring the internal relationships between different and competing Orthodox movements in the first half of the twentieth century demands several skills, and these come to the fore in this study. First and foremost, Mahla's rather unique command of languages enables him to utilize primary sources in English, Hebrew, German, and Yiddish. Second, it requires the ability to analyze rhetoric that is based upon a rich exposure and intuitive knowledge of classical Jewish sources. Third, Mahla demonstrates a command of the existing scholarship.
Based upon a wide array of primary sources, including protocols, letters, and additional archival sources, memoirs, and the press, Mahla documents and contextualizes the relationships between AY and Mizrahi throughout most of the first half of the twentieth century, in chronological order. Following the introduction that sets the stage, each chapter is devoted to a specific period. The chapters begin with a strong focus on the European scene, where these movements were established, and gradually the focus shifts to Palestine.
The first chapter is devoted to Orthodox social and political activism, a phenomenon that is already well documented in several studies that focus on Orthodoxy in other European Jewish scenes. Mahla illustrates this originally by analyzing Haredi and religious Zionist encyclopedias and collective biographies of personalities in these camps, while also accounting for their anachronistic nature.
In the second chapter, which traces the founding of AY and Mizrahi, one can sense the seeds of the complex love-hate relationship between these two movements, as well as the desire to unite forces, that will accompany them for decades to come. In the third chapter, devoted to the struggles and competition between these movements in interwar Poland, as well as the rhetoric that accompanied them, Mahla's main point is that the issue at stake was power, control, and followers in Poland, whereas Zionism and dealings with the Zionist movement primarily served local interests.
The fourth chapter shifts the focus to the Jewish settlement in Mandatory Palestine, and in this context the Zionist movement is a major factor that impacts the relationships between AY and Mizrahi. According to Mahla, talks and potential cooperation between AY and Mizrahi were, at times, motivated by their internal struggle for dominance, no less than their joint feeling of intimidation by the Zionist movement. The fifth chapter presents a twist in the plot, as at its center are the negotiations between AY and Mizrahi, primarily during the second half of the 1930s, with a view to joining forces and collaborating, notwithstanding strong internal opposition and criticism in both movements. These initiatives did not materialize, and Mahla suggests that emphasizing the differences between them ultimately set the grounds for future collaborations based upon mutual interests.
The sixth and final chapter focuses on the 1940s and overall continues the motion of the late 1930s, which saw collaboration in various situations and independence in others, further clarifying distinct characteristics of AY and of Mizrahi. These distinctions set the ground for cooperating in light of the challenges that both movements faced with the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 that centered around their fears of the potential hardships of Orthodox Jews having to live in a secular Jewish state.
The epilogue takes the reader several decades forward to current developments, events, and leaders of AY and current so-called representatives of Religious Zionism that long since replaced the Mizrahi movement; it is followed by a useful appendix, footnotes, and a detailed bibliography. Overall, the argument regarding the importance of the internal relationships between AY and Mizrahi is well taken, and the book sheds new light on these movements, highlights overlooked aspects and episodes, and offers an alternative reading.
Notwithstanding this study's qualities, a few shortcomings are noteworthy. First and foremost, the author does not always include all the relevant parties that took part in the events, and this creates a distortion that leads to overstating his case. Most striking is the role of extreme anti-Zionist Haredim who opposed, delegitimized, and constantly attacked AY. To be sure, they gradually lost their demographic dominance in Palestine after the mid-1920s, but they remained a voice that AY could not overlook.
Another example is the moderate and relatively pro-Zionist Haredi Poalei Agudat Yisrael, founded in Poland in the earlier interwar years. While mentioned in a few contexts, it is for the most part overlooked in the third chapter dealing with the Polish Jewish Orthodox scene. Yet its relationship with AY is important, not least with regard to the talks between Mizrahi and the Zionists in the first half of the 1930s.
Finally, another area that demands further attention is that of gender, which is extremely marginal in this study. To be sure, this is a predominantly male scene. Nevertheless, biographies and social-historical studies in recent years, especially regarding Mizrahi, do point to the involvement and influence of women at the internal political level.
The epilogue is altogether irrelevant to the book and leaves the reader without a concise and persuasive conclusion. It throws the reader into a completely different political environment, and the attempt to connect them without systematically documenting and analyzing the events, developments, and processes between the early 1950s and the beginning of the twenty-first century is unconvincing. This factually inaccurate discussion, at times speculative and impressionistic, may be a result of pressure from the publisher, but it is not to the author's credit.
In conclusion, the strengths of this well-written study outweigh its weaker aspects, and it stresses an overlooked, important layer in the relationships between AY and the Mizrahi movements that unfolds new perspectives. For this, the author deserves a great deal of credit.
