Zionism and Ethnic Separation in Palestine during the Mandate: the defence of Jewish Labour

Abstract

The Zionist project in Palestine was accompanied by a process whereby the native population was separated and, where possible, expelled. On the one hand, this was the consequence of Zionist ideology that sought the creation of an ethnic state for the Jewish people, and, on the other, of the victory of the Zionist left over private capital. The former defended a “white” colonial project with the substitution of the native population by Europeans, while business interests would have preferred a classic colonial model exploiting Palestinian labour. The ethnic separation contained two interrelated dimensions: the defence of Jewish labour and territorial ethnic cleansing. In this article, I shall analyze the ideological bases of the separation and the dynamic of the imposition of Jewish labour.