Martin Kramer on Ben-Gurion, Borders, and the Vote That Made Israel

The Tikvah Podcast

Tikvah

Judaism, Politics, Religion & Spirituality, News

4.6 • 620 Ratings

🗓️ 12 April 2018

⏱️ 51 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

On May 12, 1948, just three days before the end of the British Mandate, the People’s Administration, the yishuv’s proto-cabinet, met in Tel Aviv and held a vote that would decide Israel’s future. According to most histories of the period, the Administration’s members voted on whether to move toward independence or accept a truce that would have forestalled an all-out war but delayed Israel’s creation. In the popular account of the meeting, David Ben-Gurion stiffened the spines of his comrades and the decision was made to declare independence.

There’s just one problem: that vote never happened.

That’s the argument historian Martin Kramer of Shalem College makes in his Mosaic essay, “The May 1948 Vote That Made the State of Israel.” Carefully reviewing the minutes of the meeting and other available evidence, Kramer makes the case that the decision to declare independence was never in doubt. There was, however, another vote that would change the course of Israel’s history for the next seven decades. At Ben-Gurion’s urging, the leadership of the state-in-the-making decided that it would not be bound by the borders of the U.N. Partition Plan. Instead, as it fought to defend itself from Arab aggression, Israel would let the fortunes of war decide what territory the Jewish state would hold.

In this podcast, Martin Kramer joins Jonathan Silver to discuss his essay. He explores the historical record of what happened at that fateful meeting and explains why it is important we understand the truth about that day’s vote. As he illuminates the hidden history of the state’s birth, Kramer shows us how May 1948 is but a microcosm of the modern history of Israel.

Musical selections in this podcast are drawn from the Quintet for Clarinet and Strings, op. 31a, composed by Paul Ben-Haim and performed by the ARC Ensemble as well as “Baruch Habah,” performed by the choir of Congregation Shearith Israel.

Transcript

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0:00.0	In 1836, nearly 50 years after all 13 new American states sent delegates to the Constitutional
0:14.5	Convention in Philadelphia, James Madison's careful notes of that convention were published.
0:19.5	At the time of their publication,
0:26.1	neither he nor any other convention delegate still lived. Madison's notes of debates in the Federal Convention of 1787 presented to the nation a firsthand account of ideas tested and probed,
0:33.6	of voting coalitions form, rise, and fall, of petty politicking, as well as statesmanship on a grand scale.
0:41.3	Madison's notes present to the nation a portrait of a democratic founding, as our constitutional
0:46.6	republic took shape. As Israel nears its 70th birthday, historian Martin Kramer invites us into the
0:53.9	Yeshuvves Proto Parliament,
0:56.0	into the petty politicking and grand statesmanship of the founding of the Jewish state.
1:01.1	Welcome to the Tikva podcast and great Jewish essays and ideas. I'm your host, Jonathan Silver.
1:06.5	This week we join Martin Kramer, as he tries to reconstruct in particular the famous vote
1:12.4	taken by the Proto Cabinet to declare Israel's independence in the first place.
1:17.3	This is the vote you can find in virtually every history of the period,
1:21.0	a dramatic moment when David Ben-Gurion almost single-handedly inspired and emboldened.
1:26.1	The other committee members members who, despite
1:28.3	their own serious reservations, were persuaded to join him in declaring Israel's independence.
1:34.8	There's just one problem.
1:37.0	Reviewing the original documents and surveying all the evidence, Kramer comes to discover
1:42.2	that the most famous vote of all actually didn't happen.
1:46.0	Kramer makes his case in his essay, the May-1948 vote that made the State of Israel,
1:51.0	published in April 2018 in Mosaic magazine, and he makes his case here on the Tikva podcast.
1:57.0	He also helps us see what votes of real consequence actually were cast in those decisive meetings of Israel's proto-cabinet just a short time before the British mandate came to an end.
	...

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