The Ashkenazi Revolution

Land of Israel, during the 16 th century, and Yosef Nasi even received acharter from the sultan of the Tiberius vicinity. But the Sephardi lack ofpersistence revealed itself also here, and it was not they who founded theState of Israel, but the Ashkenazim. In the course of the wide geographicdispersion of Ashkenaz, the Ashkenazim penetrated geographical areas thatwere Sephardi, and turned them into Ashkenazi areas. The Sephardim sawthis as a sort of Ashkenazi conquest of areas that “belonged” to Sepharadfor generations. Moreover: The Sephardim saw, in the Land of Israel, theirlast great outpost in the Jewish world and, when the Ashkenazim “stormed”into it, mixed reactions were awakened within them, including hostility.Against this background, the author of these columns is reminded of anincident that happened to him some 33 years ago in Jerusalem, in theeditorial board of the “Daily Mail”. This newspaper was formerly editedby Itamar Ben Avi, who was close to the Sephardim and faithful to them.Later, the editorial job passed to Jabotinsky and as a result, I worked therefor about half a year. In the courtyard of the editorial office there was aSephardi institution, the Sephardi Committee of Jerusalem. Its secretary,M. D. Gaon, a Balkan Jew who had composed a historic lexicon ofSephardi Jews who had contributed donations for the development of theLand of Israel, would sometimes enter the editorial office. We consideredhim one of us. One day, when a notice, that M. D. Gaon had given us, wasnot printed for some reason, the man burst into the office and, in a voicethat was truly choked with tears, said, or more accurately, yelled: “Ithought we had a newspaper and now we don’t even have this!” M. D.Gaon meant to say that in the days when Itamar Ben Avi was editor, theDaily Mail was owned by the Sephardi Kingdom, but when it editorial jobpassed to Jabotinsky, this newspaper was conquered by Ashkenaz… At thetime, I did not understand the meaning of this little incident, but now it isvery clear to me. Jabotinsky was an exceptional friend to the Sephardimand he uttered, in their presence, compliments that are difficult to forgive.Sephardim participated noticeably in the Revisionist movement in the Landof Israel and around the world, but despite this, M. D. Gaon saw, in thepassing of the editorial position of “The Daily Mail” to Jabotinsky, aconquest by the armies of Ashkenaz that deprived Sepharad of preciousterritory.180