Editing Menachem Begin (section)

==Political career==

===Herut opposition years===
[[File:Menachem Begin při projevu v srpnu 1948.jpg|thumb|Begin; August 1948]]
In August 1948, Begin and members of the Irgun High Command emerged from the underground and formed the right-wing political party [[Herut]] ("Freedom") party.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.knesset.gov.il/lexicon/eng/begin_eng.htm|title=Menachem Begin (1913-1992)|website=www.knesset.gov.il}}</ref> The move countered the weakening attraction for the earlier [[Revisionist Zionism|revisionist party]], [[Hatzohar]], founded by his late mentor [[Ze'ev Jabotinsky]]. Revisionist 'purists' alleged nonetheless that Begin was out to steal Jabotinsky's mantle and ran against him with the old party. The Herut party can be seen as the forerunner of today's [[Likud]].

In November 1948, Begin visited the US on a campaigning trip. During his visit, [[s:New Palestine Party; Visit of Menachen Begin and Aims of Political Movement Discussed|a letter]] signed by [[Albert Einstein]], [[Sidney Hook]], [[Hannah Arendt]], and other prominent Americans and several rabbis was published which described Begin's Herut party as "terrorist, right-wing chauvinist organization in Palestine,"<ref>{{cite news |last=Schuster |first=Ruth |title='This Day in Jewish History / N.Y. Times publishes letter by Einstein, other Jews accusing Menachem Begin of fascism |date=4 December 2014 |work=Haaretz |url=http://www.haaretz.com/news/features/this-day-in-jewish-history/.premium-1.629813 }}</ref> "closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the [[Nazi]] and Fascist parties" and accused his group (along with the smaller, militant, [[Stern Gang]]) of preaching "racial superiority" and having "inaugurated a reign of terror in the Palestine Jewish community".<ref>''"The Gun and the Olive Branch"'' pp. 472–473, David Hirst, quotes ''Lilienthal, Alfred M.'', The Zionist Connection, What Price Peace?, Dodd, Mead and Company, New York, 1978, pp. 350–353 – ''Albert Einstein joined other distinguished citizens in chiding these `Americans of national repute' for honoring a man whose party was `closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties'.'' See text at [http://phys4.harvard.edu/~wilson/NYTimes1948.html Harvard.edu] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071217113044/http://phys4.harvard.edu/~wilson/NYTimes1948.html |date=17 December 2007 }} [http://www.yayacanada.com/einstein_ltr_fascism.html and image] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090704021403/http://www.yayacanada.com/einstein_ltr_fascism.html |date=4 July 2009 }}. Verified 5 December 2007.</ref><ref>[[Albert Einstein]] had already publicly denounced the [[Revisionist Zionism|Revisionists]] in 1939; at the same time Rabbi [[Stephen Samuel Wise|Stephen Wise]] denounced the movement as, "Fascism in [[Yiddish]] or [[Hebrew language|Hebrew]]." See Rosen, Robert N., ''Saving the Jews: Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Holocaust'', Thunder's Mouth Press, New York, 2006, p. 318.</ref>

In the [[1949 Israeli legislative election|first elections in 1949]], Herut, with 11.5 percent of the vote, won 14 seats, while Hatzohar failed to break the threshold and disbanded shortly thereafter. This provided Begin with legitimacy as the leader of the Revisionist stream of Zionism. During the 1950s, Begin was banned from entering the [[United Kingdom]], as the British government regarded him as "leader of the notorious terrorist organisation Irgun."<ref name="haaretz7jul11" /> Begin's disappointment at the result of the [[1951 Israeli legislative election]], in which Herut lost six of its 14 seats, led Begin to resign as Herut leader in August 1951, and naming [[Aryeh Ben-Eliezer]] as his successor. Despite sending the party his resignation letter and going abroad to Europe, the party's national council voted instead to make Ben-Eliezer deputy chairman and grant Begin a six-month [[leave of absence]], while re-electing him as party chairman. Begin did not return to public life until January 1952, prompted to do so by the growing debate around the [[Reparations Agreement between Israel and the Federal Republic of Germany]] as well as by Ben-Eliezer being hospitalized due to a serious heart attack in December 1951.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Weitz |first1=Yechiam |title=Where's Menachem Begin? - His Disappearance in 1951 and Its Significance |journal=Israel Studies Review |date=2005 |volume=20 |issue=2 |pages=115–137 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/41805145|doi=10.3167/106577105780793644 |jstor=41805145 |access-date=1 July 2024|issn=2159-0370 }}</ref>

Between 1948 and 1977, under Begin, Herut and the alliances it formed ([[Gahal]] in 1965 and [[Likud]] in 1973) formed the main opposition to the dominant [[Mapai]] and later the [[Alignment (political party)|Alignment]] (the forerunners of today's [[Labor Party (Israel)|Labor Party]]) in the [[Knesset]]; Herut adopted a radical nationalistic agenda committed to the [[irredentism|irredentist]] idea of [[Greater Israel]] that usually included [[Jordan]].<ref>{{cite book | author = Colin Shindler | title = The Land Beyond Promise: Israel, Likud and the Zionist Dream | publisher = I.B. Tauris | year = 2002| pages = xviii, 45, 57, 87 }}</ref> During those years, Begin was systematically delegitimized by the ruling party, and was often personally derided by [[David Ben-Gurion|Ben-Gurion]] who refused to either speak to or refer to him by name. Ben-Gurion famously coined the phrase 'without Herut and [[Maki (historical political party)|Maki]]' (Maki was the [[communist party]]), referring to his refusal to consider them for coalition, effectively pushing both parties and their voters beyond the margins of political consensus.

The personal animosity between Ben-Gurion and Begin, going back to the hostilities over the [[Altalena Affair|''Altalena'' Affair]], underpinned the political dichotomy between Mapai and Herut. Begin was a keen critic of Mapai, accusing it of [[coercion|coercive]] [[Bolshevism]] and deep-rooted [[institutional corruption]]. Drawing on his training as a lawyer in Poland, he preferred wearing a formal suit and tie and evincing the dry demeanor of a legislator to the socialist informality of Mapai, as a means of accentuating their differences.

One of the fiercest confrontations between Begin and Ben-Gurion revolved around the [[Reparations Agreement between Israel and West Germany]], signed in 1952. Begin vehemently opposed the agreement, claiming that it was tantamount to a pardon of Nazi crimes against the Jewish people.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.jpost.com/Tags/satellite|title=Satellite News and latest stories &#124; The Jerusalem Post|website=www.jpost.com}}</ref> While the agreement was debated in the [[Knesset]] in January 1952, he led a demonstration in [[Jerusalem]] attended by some 15,000 people, and gave a passionate and dramatic speech in which he attacked the government and called for its violent overthrow. Referring to the Altalena Affair, Begin stated that "when you fired at me with a cannon, I gave the order: 'No!' Today I will give the order, 'Yes!'"<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://lib.cet.ac.il/Pages/item.asp?item=7188 |title=See his Speech (Hebrew) |access-date=5 January 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080503135854/http://lib.cet.ac.il/pages/item.asp?item=7188 |archive-date=3 May 2008 |url-status=dead }}</ref> Incited by his speech, the crowd marched towards the Knesset (then at the Frumin Building on King George Street) and threw stones at the windows, and at police as they intervened. After five hours of rioting, police managed to suppress the riots using water cannons and tear gas. Hundreds were arrested, while some 200 rioters, 140 police officers, and several Knesset members were injured. Many held Begin personally responsible for the violence, and he was consequently barred from the Knesset for several months. His behavior was strongly condemned in mainstream public discourse, reinforcing his image as a provocateur. The vehemence of Revisionist opposition was deep; in March 1952, during the ongoing reparations negotiations, a parcel bomb addressed to [[Konrad Adenauer]], the sitting [[West Germany|West German]] [[Chancellor of Germany (Federal Republic of Germany)|Chancellor]], was intercepted at a German post office. While being defused, the bomb exploded, killing one [[sapper]] and injuring two others. Five Israelis, all former members of Irgun, were later arrested in Paris for their involvement in the plot. Chancellor Adenauer decided to keep secret the involvement of Israeli opposition party members in the plot, thus avoiding Israeli embarrassment and a likely backlash. The five Irgun conspirators were later extradited from both France and Germany, without charge, and sent back to Israel. Forty years after the assassination attempt, Begin was implicated as the organizer of the assassination attempt in a memoir written by one of the conspirators, Elieser Sudit.<ref>[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2006/jun/15/germany.lukeharding Menachem Begin plotted assassination attempt to kill German chancellor], Luke Harding, [[The Guardian]], 15 June 2006</ref><ref>Nachman Ben-Yehuda, [https://books.google.com/books?id=19ZMulluIgkC&pg=PA275 ''Political Assassinations by Jews: A Rhetorical Device for Justice''], SUNY Press, New York, 1993</ref><ref>[http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,2054061,00.html Report Says Begin Was Behind Adenauer Letter Bomb], Deutsche Welle, 13 June 2006</ref><ref>[http://www.haaretz.co.il/hasite/pages/ShArtPE.jhtml?itemNo=726635&contrassID=2&subContrassID=21&sbSubContrassID=0 Sudite: I sent the bomb on Begin's order] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110605023943/http://www.haaretz.co.il/hasite/pages/ShArtPE.jhtml?itemNo=726635&contrassID=2&subContrassID=21&sbSubContrassID=0 |date=5 June 2011 }}, in Hebrew</ref>

Begin's impassioned rhetoric, laden with pathos and evocations of the Holocaust, appealed to many, but was deemed inflammatory and [[demagoguery]] by others.

===Gahal and unity government===
In the following years, Begin failed to gain electoral momentum, and Herut remained far behind [[Labor Party (Israel)|Labor]] with a total of 17 seats until 1961. In the [[1965 Israeli legislative election]], Herut and the [[Liberal Party (Israel)|Liberal Party]] united to form the [[Gahal]] bloc under Begin's leadership, but the merger prompted several Liberal MKs to split and form the [[Independent Liberals (Israel)|Independent Liberals]] and Gahal failed to gain seats in the election, or make up the seats it lost from the Independent Liberal defection. In 1966, during Herut's party convention, he was challenged by the young [[Ehud Olmert]]. The opposition group within Herut, however, sensed that Begin's leadership position was too strong to challenge directly and concentrated on winning control over the party organization. They won overwhelming victories in all votes for the composition of party institutions. Begin responded to these challenges by announcing his retirement as party chairman and suggesting he would also resign seat in the Knesset. Begin's move mobilized delegates in support of him, but the party convention ended without a party chairman being elected; the chair would be vacant for eight months. Internal opposition to Begin' leadership came to a head a month after the convention, when Haim Amsterdam, an assistant to one of the opposition leaders, [[Shmuel Tamir]], published a devastating attack on Begin in ''[[Ha'aretz]]'';<ref>[https://jfc.org.il/news_journal/60552-2/101717-2/?lang=eng Herut Members That Criticized Menachem Begin Tried by the Partys Tribunalr], Yoman Geva 378, 1966.</ref> this led to the suspension of Tamir's party membership.<ref>[[Asael Lubotzky]], [[Not My Last Journey]], [[Yedioth Ahronoth]], 2017, pages 196–202.</ref> The leaders of the opposition then established a new party in the Knesset, the [[Free Center]], with the loss of three seats for Herut. After this revolt, Begin reversed his decision to retire and returned as party chairman in February 1967.<ref>{{cite news |title=Herut Convention Ends with Appeal to Begin to Withdraw Resignation |url=https://www.jta.org/archive/herut-convention-ends-with-appeal-to-begin-to-withdraw-resignation |access-date=1 July 2024 |work=Jewish Telegraphic Agency |date=5 July 1966}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Goldstein |first1=Amir |title=Crisis and Development: Menachem Begin's Leadership Throughout the 1960s |journal=Israel Studies |date=Spring 2015 |volume=20 |issue=1 |pages=110–123 |doi=10.2979/israelstudies.20.1.110 |jstor=10.2979/israelstudies.20.1.110 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2979/israelstudies.20.1.110 |access-date=1 July 2024}}</ref><ref name=weitz>Yechiam Weitz: "The Road to the 'Upheaval': A Capsule History of the Herut Movement, 1948–1977", in ''Israel Studies'', Fall 2005, Vol. 10, No. 3.</ref>

The day the [[Six-Day War]] started in June 1967, Gahal joined the [[national unity government]] under Prime Minister [[Levi Eshkol]] of the Alignment, resulting in Begin serving in the [[Cabinet of Israel|cabinet]] for the first time, as a [[Minister without Portfolio]]. [[Rafi (political party)|Rafi]] also joined the unity government at that time, with [[Moshe Dayan]] becoming Defense Minister. Gahal's arrangement lasted until August 1970, when Begin and Gahal quit the government, then led by [[Golda Meir]] due to disagreements over the [[Rogers Plan]] and its "in place" cease-fire with Egypt along the Suez Canal,<ref>[[Newsweek]] 30 May 1977, ''The Zealot'', <blockquote> But he quit in 1970 when Prime Minister Golda Meir, under pressure from Washington, renewed a cease-fire with Egypt along the Suez Canal.</blockquote></ref> Other sources, including [[William B. Quandt]], note that the Labor party, by formally accepting [[UN 242]] in mid-1970, had accepted "peace for withdrawal" on all fronts, and because of this Begin had left the unity government. On 5 August, Begin explained before the Knesset why he was resigning from the cabinet. He said, "As far as we are concerned, what do the words 'withdrawal from territories administered since 1967 by Israel' mean other than Judea and Samaria. Not all the territories; but by all opinion, most of them."<ref>[[William B. Quandt]], ''Peace Process, American Diplomacy and the Arab-Israeli Conflict since 1967'', pp. 194ff</ref>

===Likud chairmanship===
[[File:Flickr - Government Press Office (GPO) - Begin in the Knesset.jpg|thumb|Begin addressing the Knesset in 1974]]
In 1973, Begin agreed to a plan by [[Ariel Sharon]] to form a larger bloc of opposition parties, made up from Gahal, the [[Free Centre]], and other smaller groups. They came through with a tenuous alliance called the [[Likud]] ("Consolidation"). In the elections held later that year, two months after the [[Yom Kippur War]], the Likud won a considerable share of the votes, though with 39 seats still remained in opposition.{{citation needed|date=November 2023}}

Yet the aftermath of the Yom Kippur War saw ensuing public disenchantment with the Alignment. Voices of criticism about the government's misconduct of the war gave rise to growing public resentment. Personifying the antithesis to the Alignment's socialist ethos, Begin appealed to many [[Mizrahi Jews|Mizrahi]] Israelis, mostly first and second generation [[Jewish exodus from Arab lands|Jewish refugees from Arab countries]], who felt they were continuously being treated by the establishment as second-class citizens. His open embrace of Judaism stood in stark contrast to the Alignment's secularism, which alienated Mizrahi voters and drew many of them to support Begin, becoming his burgeoning political base. In the years 1974–77 [[Yitzhak Rabin]]'s government suffered from instability due to infighting within the labor party (Rabin and [[Shimon Peres]]) and the shift to the right by the National Religious Party, as well as numerous corruption scandals. All these weakened the labor camp and finally allowed Begin to capture the center stage of Israeli politics.{{citation needed|date=November 2023}}

In 1977 Begin declared that "between [[From the river to the sea|the [Mediterranean] Sea and the Jordan River]] there shall only be Israeli sovereignty".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Steinberg |first1=Gerald M. |last2=Rubinovitz |first2=Ziv |title=Menachem Begin and the Israel-Egypt Peace Process Between Ideology and Political Realism |date=2019 |publisher=Indiana University Press |page=1976}}</ref>