Brith Shalom (1925)

(Editor's prefatory note:)
In the spring of 1925 a group of intellectuals gathered in Jerusalem to establish an association to promote what Buber called Wirklichkeitszionismus – a Zionism rooted in the complex reality of the Land of Israel. Initiated by Arthur Ruppin (1876-1943), the principal architect of Zionist settlement policy, the association was called Brith Shalom, literally the Covenant of Peace. The founding members of Brith Shalom included veteran Jewish residents of Palestine, academics, members of Ha-Po’el Ha-Tza'ir, Mizrahi (the religious Zionist movement), and liberal Zionists. Gershom Scholem, a founding member who at the time was just establishing his renown as a scholar of Jewish mysticism, has noted that what united this diverse group was a conviction “that the Land of Israel belongs to two peoples, and these peoples need to find a way to live together... and to work for a common future.” The Land of Israel was deemed by them to be empirically a land of two peoples – the indigenous Arab population and the Jews who were returning to their ancestral home. As Ruppin succinctly told the Fourteenth Zionist Congress which met in Vienna in August 1925. “Palestine will be a state of two nations [ein Zweinationalitätenstaat]. Gentlemen, this is a fact, a fact which many of you have not yet sufficiently realized. it may also be that for some of you this is not a pleasant fact, but it nonetheless remains so.” The binational state Ruppin and his colleagues had in mind was a modus vivendi between Zionism and Palestinian Arab nationalism within the existing political framework of the Mandate which they tacitly assumed Britain, because of its imperialistic interests and might, would tenaciously maintain. The Jewish National Home will somehow have to be realized within terms of the bi-national reality of Mandatory Palestine. Accordingly, Brith Shalom envisioned as the most reasonable solution to the problem of Palestine a constitutional arrangement whereby the Jews and Arabs would enjoy political and civil parity within the unitary framework of the Mandate. Brith Shalom, however, did not view itself as a political party, but merely as a study circle sponsoring informed and responsible discussion on the Arab question. Many of its most devoted members claimed to have drawn their inspiration from the teachings of Buber on the Arab question. Buber himself became an active member in the German chapter of Brith Shalom.

Brith Shalom (The Peace Association) Statutes
§1. The name of the Association shall be "The Peace Association" (Brith Shalom).
§2. The seat of the Association shall be in Jerusalem. Branches may be established throughout Palestine and abroad.
§3. The object of the Association is to arrive at an understanding between Jews and Arabs as to the form of their mutual social relations in Palestine on the basis of absolute political equality of two culturally autonomous peoples, and to determine the lines of their co-operation for the development of the country.
§4. Towards this end the Association will promote:
a) The study of the problems arising out of the existence of the two peoples in Palestine, and out of the Mandate under the League of Nations;
b) The spreading of verbal and written information among Jews and Arabs on the history and culture of both peoples, and the encouragement of friendly relations between them;
c) The creation of a public opinion favorable to a mutual understanding;
d) The creation of institutions calculated to advance these ends;
§5. Any person in agreement with the object of the Association and elected by a majority decision of its Committee (§8) is eligible for membership.
§6. The membership fee shall be £1 a year. The Committee (§8) is empowered to reduce this fee for labourers and other persons of limited means.
§7. A General Meeting of the Association shall take place every year. Members shall be advised at least a fortnight in advance by an announcement in three Palestinian papers which appear regularly. The first General Meeting shall be convoked before December 31st, 1927.
§8. The Committee of the Association shall consist of between 7 and 15 members elected by the General Meeting. Branches of the Association in and outside of Palestine shall elect their local Committees on similar lines.
§9. Until the first General Meeting, the founders of the Association shall act as the Committee (§8) and shall have the right of co-optation.

Source: "Hamadpis" Press, Jerusalem