| Formation | 1905 (1905) |
|---|
HeHalutz orHeChalutz (Hebrew:הֶחָלוּץ, lit. "The Pioneer") was a Jewish youth movement that trained young people for agricultural settlement in theLand of Israel. It became an umbrella organization of the pioneeringZionist youth movements.
HeHalutz was founded by Eliezer Joffe in America in 1905, and about the same time inRussia.[1]
DuringWorld War I, HeHalutz branches opened across Europe (including Russia), America and Canada. Leaders of the organization includedYitzhak Ben-Zvi (later the second president of theState of Israel), andDavid Ben-Gurion (later the first Prime Minister of Israel) in America, andJoseph Trumpeldor in Russia.
Ben-Gurion was living inJerusalem at the start of the First World War, where he and Ben Zvi recruited forty Jews into a Jewish militia to assist theOttoman army. Despite this, he was deported to Egypt in March 1915. From there he made his way to the United States, where he remained for three years. On his arrival, he and Ben Zvi went on a tour of 35 cities in an attempt to raise a Hechalutz "pioneer army" of 10,000 men to fight on Turkey's side.[2] They succeeded in recruiting 63 volunteers.[3] After theBalfour Declaration of November 1917, the situation changed dramatically and Ben-Gurion, with the interest of Zionism in mind, switched sides and joined the newly formedJewish Legion of theBritish Army, leaving to fight the Turks in Palestine.
At its peak, between 1930 and 1935, HeHalutz operated in 25 countries throughout Europe, North Africa, the Middle East, and Northern South America.
In 1932–1934,Golda Meir, later theprime minister of Israel, was the secretary of the women's chapter of HeHalutz in the United States.[4]
In 1932, the organization established headquarters in New York and twenty branches in cities and towns throughout the United States and Canada. Farms were then established to train members for agricultural work in Palestine. Such farms operated inCream Ridge andHightstown,New Jersey;Poughkeepsie,New York;Smithville, Ontario; andColton, California.[5]
In 1933, after Jews were expelled from the workforce inNazi Germany, HeHalutz farms became the primary framework for vocational training and preparation for emigration.[6]
By the eve ofSecond World War in 1939, HeHalutz numbered 100,000 members worldwide, with approximately 60,000 having already emigrated (aliyah) toMandate Palestine, and with 16,000 members in training centers (hakhsharot) for the pioneering life in the Land of Israel.[7]
During the war and German occupation, Jews in some ghettos in Europe established Hechalutz units, as inLithuania'sŠiauliai Ghetto.[8]
By the 1950s HeHalutz "was absorbed byHashomer Hatzair, which had always maintained a large degree of autonomy. Nominally, however, the He-Ḥalutz Organization of America still exists."[5]
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