Was the Red Flag Flying There? Marxist Politics and the Arab-Israeli Conflict in Eqypt and Israel 1948-1965 / Edition 1

by Joel Beinin

Overview

Was the Red Flag Flying There? examines the Palestinian/Arab-Israeli conflict through the lens of Marxist politics. Joel Beinin asks how the proposal to partition Palestine into an Arab and a Jewish state—a solution endorsed by international consensus in 1947-49—became an obscure and even unthinkable option by the mid-1960s. As the most consistent adherents of the two-state solution both before and after the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948, the Marxists serve as the focal point of his analysis.

Beinin discusses three Marxist political formations in Egypt and Israel: the communist movement in Egypt; the Communist Party of Israel (MAKI); and the United Workers' Party of Israel (MAPAM), which attempted, but ultimately failed, to sustain a dual commitment to Marxism and Zionism. The failure of these movements and their progressive abandonment of an internationalist orientation toward resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict is explained as a consequence of the ultimate hegemony of nationalist politics in both Egypt and Israel.

Employing both the analytical methods of political economy and a discourse analysis informed by insights drawn from Antonio Gramsci's conception of hegemony, Beinin offers a new interpretation of the significance of Marxist politics in Egypt and Israel. This work builds on and extends the scope of the revisionist history of the Arab-Israeli conflict developed by Israeli scholars during the 1980s, challenging traditional Marxist conceptions of the relationship between anti-imperialist nationalism and the struggle for socialism.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520070363
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	10/22/1990
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	328
Sales rank:	727,775
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Joel Beinin is Assistant Professor of History at Stanford University and the co-editor with Zachary Lockman of Intifada: The Palestinian Uprising Against Israel: Occupation (1989).

Table of Contents

	List of Tables	xi
	List of Abbreviations	xiii
	Acknowledgments	xvii
I.	Introduction	1
	Comparing Egypt and Israel	5
	Revisionist History of the Arab-Israeli Conflict	7
	Was MAPAM a Marxist Party?	15
	Nations, the Construction of Hegemony, and Political Discourse	17
	Structure of the Book	19
	Narration and Politics	21
II.	The Creation of Israel: Zionism as Anti-Imperialism	24
	The Unification of the Marxist-Zionist Left	25
	MAPAM and the 1948-49 War	31
	The Palestine Communist Party's Road to Binationalism	40
	The Communist Educational Association	41
	The Palestinian Arab Intelligentsia and the National Liberation League	42
	Two Paths to Endorsing Partition of Palestine	43
	Toward the Communist Party of Israel	48
	The Palestine Question and the Egyptian Communists	55
	The Marxist Left After Partition	63
III.	The Political Economy of Hegemony	66
	Labor and Capital in the Zionist Movement	67
	The Seamen's Strike and Israel's International Orientation	73
	Confirmation of MAPAI Hegemony	76
	Deradicalization and Depoliticization of the Kibbutzim	79
	The Old Regime and the Egyptian National Movement	84
	The Coup of July 23, 1952	86
	The Revolutionary Command Council and the Working Class	88
	The Workers' Movement and the 1956 War	91
	Guided Capitalism	93
	The Communist Intelligentsia's Accommodation with Nasserism	97
	Arab Socialism	99
IV.	A Window of Opportunity? 1949-1955	102
	The Jewish Question in Egyptian Communism	103
	The Rise of the Indigenous Intelligentsia	110
	"The Question of Yunis"	113
	Was There a "Zionist Deviation" in the DMNL?	114
	A MAPAM-MAKI United Front?	117
	Elections to the Constituent Assembly (First Knesset)	120
	Marxism Engaged in a Jewish Problematic	122
	The Rise and Decline of the Left in MAPAM	125
	The Left Socialist Party	134
	Defense of the Rights of the Arab Minority	137
V.	Internationalism in Practice Relations Between the Egyptian and Israeli Marxists	144
	The International Peace Movement	145
	The Rome Group and DMNL-MAKI Contacts	148
	Yusuf Hilmi's Peace Initiative	153
VI.	The Consolidation of Nationalist Politics: 1955-1958	160
	The Illusion of Success	162
	Bandung and the Czech Arms Deal	164
	The Suez/Sinai War and MAPAM's Capitulation	172
	The Nasserist-Communist Alliance	177
	Unification of the Egyptian Communist Movement	185
	The Twentieth Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and National Communism	190
	MAKI's Arab Period	193
VII.	The Triumph of Nationalism: 1959-1965	204
	Breakup of the Nasserist-Communist Alliance	205
	Dissolution of the Egyptian Communist Parties	208
	Nasserism, MAPAM, MAKI, and the Palestinian Arab Citizens of Israel	212
	Defeat of the Left in the 1959 Knesset Elections	218
	A New Beginning--or the Beginning of the End?	223
	MAKI and Jewish National Communism	231
	Toward the Split in MAKI	235
	Decline of MAKI's Influence in the Jewish Working Class	239
	Mobilization of the Palestinian Arab Citizens of Israel	243
VIII.	Conclusion	246
	Marxism, Zionism, and Arab Nationalism	248
	Political Discourse and Political Action	253
	Epilogue: Toward a Palestinian State and Beyond	255
	Notes	259
	Chronology	293
	Glossary	295
	Bibliography	297
	Index	309