One Million Plan

The One Million Plan (;''Tochnit hamillion'') was a strategic plan for the immigration and absorption of one million Jews from Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa into Mandatory Palestine, within a timeframe of 18 months, in order to establish a state in that territory. After being voted on by the Jewish Agency for Israel Executive in 1944, it became the official policy of the Zionist leadership. Implementation of a significant part of the One Million Plan took place following the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948.

When the extent of the decimation of Jews in the Holocaust became known in 1944, the Biltmore Conference ambition of two million immigrants was revised downwards, and the plan was revised to include, for the first time, Jews from the Middle East and North Africa as a single category within the target of an immigration plan.: "The principal significance of this plan lies in the fact, noted by Yehuda Shenhav, that this was the first time in Zionist history that Jews from Middle Eastern and North African countries were all packaged together in one category as the target of an immigration plan. There were earlier plans to bring specific groups, such as the Yemenites, but the "one million plan" was, as Shenhav says, "the zero point," the moment when the category of mizrahi Jews in the current sense of this term, as an ethnic group distinct from European-born Jews, was invented." In 1944–45, Ben-Gurion described the plan to foreign officials as being the "primary goal and top priority of the Zionist movement.": "In meetings with foreign officials at the end of 1944 and during 1945, Ben-Gurion cited the plan to enable one million refugees to enter Palestine immediately as the primary goal and top priority of the Zionist movement."

The ongoing immigration restrictions of the British White Paper of 1939 meant that such a plan was not able to be put into immediate effect. Upon the establishment of Israel, Ben Gurion's government presented the Knesset with a new plan - to double the population of 600,000 within 4 years. Israeli historian Devorah Hacohen describes the opposition against this immigration policy within the new Israeli government, such as those who argued that there was "no justification for organizing large-scale emigration among Jews whose lives were not in danger, particularly when the desire and motivation were not their own" as well as those who argued that the absorption process caused "undue hardship".: "Both the immigrants' dependence and the circumstances of their arrival shaped the attitude of the host society. The great wave of immigration in 1948 did not occur spontaneously: it was the result of a clear-cut foreign policy decision that taxed the country financially and necessitated a major organizational effort. Many absorption activists, Jewish Agency executives, and government officials opposed unlimited, nonselective immigration; they favored a gradual process geared to the country's absorptive capacity. Throughout this period, two charges resurfaced at every public debate: one, that the absorption process caused undue hardship; two, that Israel's immigration policy was misguided." However, the force of Ben-Gurion's influence and insistence ensured that unrestricted immigration continued.: "On several occasions, resolutions were passed to limit immigration from European and Arab countries alike. However, these limits were never put into practice, mainly due to the opposition of Ben-Gurion. As a driving force in the emergency of the state, Ben-Gurion—both prime minister and minister of defense—carried enormous weight with his veto. His insistence on the right of every Jew to immigrate proved victorious. He would not allow himself to be swayed by financial or other considerations. It was he who orchestrated the large-scale action that enabled the Jews to leave Eastern Europe and Islamic countries, and it was he who effectively forged Israel's foreign policy. Through a series of clandestine activities carried out overseas by the Foreign Office, the Jewish Agency, the Mossad le-Aliyah, and the Joint Distribution Committee, the road was paved for mass immigration."
The plan has been described as "a pivotal event in ‘imagining’ the Jewish state" and "the moment when the category of Mizrahi Jews in the current sense of this term, as an ethnic group distinct from European-born Jews, was invented." The large scale immigration in the first few years after Israel's declaration was the product of this policy change in favour of mass immigration focused on Jews from Arab and Muslim countries.

Background

At the 1942 Biltmore Conference, Ben-Gurion promoted the idea of two million Jews emigrating to Palestine in order to build the Jewish majority required to create the Jewish Commonwealth called for at the conference. It was assumed at the time that most of the immigrants would be Ashkenazi Jews. Ben-Gurion described his intentions to a meeting of experts and Jewish leaders:

The Planning Committee

Ben-Gurion had requested an initial analysis on the absorptive potential on the country in early 1941, and in late 1942 commissioned a "master plan" for the proposed immigration. He appointed a committee of experts, a Planning Committee, to explore how the economy of Mandatory Palestine could support a million new Jewish Immigrants.

The Planning Committee ("ועדת התיכון", also known as "The Committee of the Four"), was established in order to develop a blueprint and decide its guiding principles, and to create sub-committees of experts for various sectors, and supervise their work. Ben-Gurion believed that by choosing the members of the committee, he would be able to garner support both for the planning arrangements and their political aspects. Ben-Gurion was chairman of the committee, which also included Eliezer Kaplan, treasurer of the Jewish Agency, Eliezer Hoofien, Chairman of the Anglo-Palestine Bank, Emil Shmorek, head of the department of trade and industry at the Jewish Agency, and a three-person secretariat consisting of economists.

The committee convened for the first time on October 11, 1943, at Kaplan's home, where the decision was taken to convene weekly at the Jewish Agency building in Jerusalem. Ben-Gurion participated regularly and examined the sub-committee reports in detail. The committee established sub-committees consisting of experts to examine the planning issues regarding development of land, water, settlement, industry, transportation, habitation, finance and more. The Planning Committee submitted reports throughout 1944 and the beginning of 1945.

Among the first things discussed by the committee was the definition of its goals. Ben-Gurion declared two goals: 1. The settlement of two million Jews within 18 months, and the elaboration of a plan to facilitate such settlement, and 2. Scientific investigation of the facts related to such settlement, such as the quantity of water required, the nature of the soil, climate, and so on. The other members of the committee found the first goal unrealistic. Eventually Ben-Gurion relented and agreed to two plans. The "big" plan - rapid settlement of a million Jews and the creation of a Jewish majority and Jewish rule, and the "small" plan, the settlement of another million Jews within a few years.

The plan

The plan, envisioning the arrival of a million Jews over 18 months, was completed in summer 1944, providing details of transportation, refugee camps and the financing required.

The plan was first presented to the Jewish Agency Executive on 24 June 1944, not as an operative plan since the British immigration restrictions were still in place at the time, but as a political plan to formulate the requirements of the Zionist Organization at the end of World War II. From 1944 onwards, the plan became the official policy of the Zionist leadership, and the immigration of Jews from Arab and Muslim countries became "explicit or implicit in all the declarations, testimonies, memoranda and demands issued by the Jewish Agency from World War II until the establishment of the state".

Ben-Gurion saw immigration as the top priority of the Zionist project, but was aware of the challenges of such a large-scale project, stating following the 1948 Arab–Israeli War:

The main thing is absorption of immigrants. This embodies all the historical needs of the state. We might have captured the West Bank, the Golan, the entire Galilee, but those conquests would not have reinforced our territory as much as immigration. Doubling and tripling the number of immigrants gives us more and more strength....This is the most important thing above all else. Settlement – that is the real conquest.

The first organizational measure of the Plan was the late 1943 general plan of action entitled 'The Uniform Pioneer to the Eastern Lands', which would offer a course for emissaries from the Jewish Agency Immigration Department to later be sent Islamic countries.: Section "THE ONE MILLION PLAN AND THE OPERATIVE POLICY OF ZIONISM": "Making mass immigration from Islamic countries a political objective required preparations to ensure that the immigrants would actually come. In the course of Zionist activity during World War II, the Yishuv leaders had discovered that the Jews in these countries were not clamouring to emigrate, that there was no comprehensive Zionist activity there and that the Zionist cadre active there was extremely limited in scope and in its ability to have an impact... The first organizational measure was the Jewish Agency's decision to offer a course for emissaries who would then be posted to Islamic countries. In the second half of 1943, a general plan of action was drawn up. Entitled 'The Uniform Pioneer to the Eastern Lands', the plan proclaimed the concept of an ingathering of exiles and the revival of the Jewish people in Palestine as its central theme... To ensure implementation of the plan, it was decided that the emissaries would be sent out by the Jewish Agency Immigration Department and that it, not the Histadrut—as had been the case until then—would be responsible for the enterprise... The Uniform Pioneer Plan set a precedent for the Zionist movement's patronizing attitude toward its adherents in the Islamic countries and later in Israel. These activities in Islamic countries lost their urgency and attraction after WWII, and the boost in resources they received dwindled. The number of activists in these countries was minuscule compared to Europe, and there were not even enough of them to maintain what was already established.

Immigration candidates

Investigating sources of immigrants and their scope figured prominently in the deliberations of the Planning Commission. They were presented with much data - the distribution and number of Jews in each country, including population changes during World War II, and analysis of the economic and occupational opportunities in these communities. Using this data, the composition the million immigrants that would come to the country was arrived at. Three main groups were initially considered as candidates for immediate immigration: Jewish Holocaust survivors in Axis countries—about 535,000 people; WWII refugees in neutral and Allied countries, of which an estimated 30% would want to immigrate—247,000; An estimated 20% of the Jewish population of Islamic countries—150,000. The possibility of a smaller number of people from the first groups was taken into consideration, in which case there would be more immigrants from the third group. In mid-1944, as the extent of the Holocaust became known, focusing of attention on potential immigration from Muslim countries began. The main focus of the plan was Jews from Iraq, Syria, Turkey, Iran, and Yemen.: "The plan also entailed bringing Jews from Europe, but its main focus (roughly three-quarters of the potential immigrants) was on Jews from Iraq, Syria, Turkey, Iran, and Yemen. For the first time, the Jews in Islamic countries were introduced into the political discussion of the Jewish institutions as a single category (called "Sephardim," "Edot Ha'Mizrah," or "Mizrahim", depending on time and context).": "Jews residing in Arab countries were increasingly marked as candidates for mass immigration and thus became the focus of discourse about the absorption of immigrants... Ben-Gurion formulated an ambitious plan to bring one million Jews to Palestine after the war, and he zeroed in on the Jews from Middle Eastern and North African countries as the most promising candidates for immigration."

As the scale of the Holocaust became clearer, the share of Jews from Arab and Muslim countries in the plan was increased. In July 1943, Eliyahu Dobkin, the head of the Jewish Agency's immigration department, presented a map of the estimated 750,000 Jews in Islamic countries, and noted that:

…many of the Jews in Europe will perish in the Holocaust and the Jews of Russia are locked in. Therefore, the quantitative value of these three-quarters of a million Jews has risen to the level of a highly valuable political factor within the framework of world Jewry. The primary task we face is to rescue this Jewry, ndthe time has come to mount an assault on this Jewry for a Zionist conquest.

Similarly, Ben-Gurion stated at a meeting of the Jewish Agency Executive on 28 September 1944 that "My minimum used to be two million: now that we have been annihilated l say one million". On 30 July 1945, Ben-Gurion stated in his diary:

One of the issues that came up during discussions of the One Million Plan was the security of Jewish communities in Islamic countries. In a 1943 Mapai central committee speech, Eliyahu Dobkin stated his view that the creation of Israel in Arab Palestine will create danger for Jews living in other Arab countries. and Ben-Gurion wrote at a similar time of "the catastrophe that the Jews in eastern lands are expected to face as a result of Zionism", although these gloomy forecasts proved false.

Policies were put in place to enhance Zionist activity in the target countries to ensure the immigrants would come. Esther Meir-Glitzenstein notes that "Interestingly, Ben-Gurion cites political and rational reasons for bringing Jewish displaced persons from Europe, whereas in discussing the immigration of the Jews from Islamic countries he mentions not only a political and rational reason, but also a cultural-orientalist explanation, since the 'degeneration' of the East was one of the basic elements of this perception."

Following establishment of Israel

Implementation of a significant part of the One Million Plan's plans and recommendations took place in the newly established State of Israel, following its creation of in 1948. This included mass Aliyah, the setting up of Immigrant camps and Ma'abarot, the Reparations Agreement between Israel and West Germany, the National Water Carrier of Israel and the National Outline Plan.

As a result of the withdrawal of British forces and the declaration of the State of Israel in May 1948, the immigration restrictions to the country were removed, making it possible to implement the policy changes relating to large-scale Aliyah focused on Jews from Arab and Muslim countries. Ben Gurion's government subsequently presented the Knesset with a plan to double the population of 600,000 within four years. This immigration policy had some opposition within the new Israeli government, such as those who argued that there was "no justification for organizing large-scale emigration among Jews whose lives were not in danger, particularly when the desire and motivation were not their own" as well as those who argued that the absorption process caused "undue hardship". However, the force of Ben-Gurion's influence and insistence ensured that unrestricted immigration continued.

According to Dr Irit Katz, the ma'abarot camps were the product of the One Million Plan.: "These camps did not merely appear due to a state of emergency of the increasing stream of immigrants; instead, they were a product of an existing detailed plan, the One Million Plan, consolidated between 1942 and 1945 in order to absorb one million Jewish immigrants a few years before Israel's establishment… Camps were an integral part of the One Million Plan… However, three years after its completion, the One Million Plan approached realisation following the Israeli declaration of independence in May 1948 and the decision to open the state’s gates to Jewish immigration. As planned and anticipated, the camp had gradually become a central instrument in the absorption process. Several small immigrant camps operated before statehood in the centre of the country, and in accordance with the One Million Plan, about 30 additional camps opened in former British military facilities." Dr Roy Kozlovsky notes that the prior existence of the One Million Plan suggests that "the concept of the ma'abara was in fact the precondition for, not the effect of, mass immigration".: "To contain the risks of mass immigration, Ben Gurion commissioned a group of experts to prepare the "Million Plan," which included a complete design for a system of camps to house the influx of refugees until they could be settled and employed. The plan was elaborated with great detail, even calculating the caloric value of the meals that were to be prepared in the camps' kitchens." The existence of the "Million Plan" requires us to reevaluate the way in which the story of the ma'abaras has been told, since it now appears that the concept of the ma'abara was in fact the precondition for, not the effect of, mass immigration." Dr Piera Rossetto described the debate around the conditions of the Ma'abarot, stating her opinion that "the most controversial issue in this respect is not the outcome (e.g. the ma’abarot) of the choice, rather the choice in itself to bring to Israel so many thousands of immigrants, following the idea of the “One Million Plan” unveiled by Ben Gurion in 1944".: "It could be argued that the State of Israel, before and immediately after its declaration, was going through such hardships that there were no many other options to “absorb” so many thousands of immigrants arriving to the Country than by placing them in these precarious hosting facilities. Nonetheless, I am of the opinion that the most controversial issue in this respect is not the outcome (e.g. the ma’abarot) of the choice, rather the choice in itself to bring to Israel so many thousands of immigrants, following the idea of the “One Million Plan” unveiled by Ben Gurion in 1944."

References

Bibliography

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1944 in Mandatory Palestine
June 1944 events
20th-century Judaism
Action plans
Aliyah
History of the Jews in the Middle East
Immigration to Israel
Jewish Agency for Israel
Mandatory Palestine in World War II