The Proletarianization of Palestinians in Israel (ص 183)
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- The Proletarianization of Palestinians in Israel (ص 183)
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183
cifically as influenced by Labor-Zionist practices.
According to Henry Rosenfeld, in 1920, the beginning of the British
Mandate, 12 percent of the Arab villagers were wage earners. °° The size of
the Palestinian working class grew from 5,000 workers in 1925 to 11,000 in
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1929, reaching 33,000 in 1935. In the aftermath of the 1936 revolt of
the Palestinian masses, the size of the Arab proletariat declined to 3,029,
while the size of the Jewish proletariat reached 13,939, °° This decline in
the size of the Arab working class is often interpreted as the effect of re-
pressive measures against this subversive labor action. Although this in-
terpretation has much truth to it, one must see it also in response to the
pace of Jewish immigration, to Aliyah. In 1935 alone, 61,000 Jewish immi-
grants arrived in Palestine, fleeing Nazism. ©” These absolutely disposses-
sed Jewish immigrants who, owing to Nazi persecution, were made "free"
laborers, possessing nothing but their labor power, were thus the most fit
for proletarianization; and with their state of vulnerability, they were
probably as competitive as cheap Arab labor. /° Correlated with the pace of
immigration was also the pace of land acquisition. In that same year, the
Zionist movement acquired 70,000 donams of land; this probably implied fur-
ther displacement of Palestinian peasants and, in effect, intensification
of resistance that led into the 1936-1939 mass revolt in Palestine. The
absorption of the new wave of Jewish immigrants urged better enforcement
of the “conquest of land" and the “boycott of Arab labor". The latter is
reflected also in the unemployment figures.
According to the Simpson Report, in 1930 unemployment in Palestine
totalled 30,000 (Arabs and Jews) and wages declined by 50 percent. While
the number of unemployed Arab workers was only 12,000, by 1935 it almost
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doubled, amounting to 23,000. Notice the contradictory effect of the - تاريخ
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- المنشئ
- Najwa Hanna Makhoul
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