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hen the Zionist
movement was
founded by Theodor
Herzl in the 1890s, most of
organized Jewry opposed it.
Reform Jews feared that
Zionism's insistence that
Jews should live in Palestine
would call into question
Jewish loyalties to their
native lands. Most Jews on
the left saw Zionism as a
parochial, chauvinistic move-
ment. Orthodox leaders, by
and large, rejected Zionism as
a secular movement, and
argued that God, in His own
good time, would restore the
Jews to Israel; any action to
hasten such a restoration
defied God's will.
After the Nazi rise to power,
however, almost all commit-
ted Jews became Zionists; the
price of not having a Jewish
homeland was just too great.
Nonetheless, one group of
religious Jews, who styled
themselves "The Guardians
of the City of Jerusalem —
Neturei Karta, in the Aramaic
words of the Talmud — con-
tinued to oppose Zionism.
The Neturei Karta
regarded Ben-Gurion and the
Zionist leadership as heretics,
the moral equivalents of the
ancient idolators condemned
by the Torah. In the years
before Israeli statehood was
declared, they repeatedly af-
firmed their preference for be-
ing ruled by either the
British or the Arabs; what
mattered most to them was
that they not be ruled by Jews
less religious than they.
Today, the Neturei Karta —
who consist of several hun-
dred families — are largely
concentrated in the Jerusa-
lem neighborhood of Mea
Shearim. This section of the
city is generally remembered
by tourists for its prominent
signs ordering women to at-
tire themselves in modest
clothing. One routinely sees
missives posted on Mea
Shearim's walls denouncing
the government, equating
Zionism with Nazism, and
condemning local residents
by name for various "sins,"
such as installing televisions
in their homes.
The Neturei Karta regard
themselves as the only Jews
who have not been corrupted
by Zionism. They reserve
great scorn for the Orthodox
Agudat Yisrael party, which
sits in the Israeli Knesset and
solicits government funding
for its schools. The Neturei
Karta, on the other hand, do
not accept any money from
the Israeli government, and
do not vote in Israeli elec-
tions. Representatives of the
movement have met with
Yassir Arafat, head of the
PLO, and have publicly ex-
pressed their preference for
Israel being turned into a
Palestinian state.
Until his death in the mid-
1970s, the movement regard-
ed Rabbi Joel Teitelbaum, the
rebbe of the Satmar Chasidim
in Williamsburg, Brooklyn,
as its spiritual leader. The
Rebbe's views were in line
with the Neturei Karta's. For
example, in discussing Is-
rael's extraordinary victory in
the Six-Day War, Rabbi Teit-
This tiny group
is as
unrepresentative of
Jewish views as
snake-handling
sects are of
Christianity.
elbaum acknowledged that
miracles had taken place, but,
in his opinion, they were per-
formed by Satan, not God.
For many years, the head of
the Neturei Karta in Jerusa-
lem was a man named Am-
ram Blau; in the last years of
his life, he found himself
ostracized by many of his
former followers when he
married a French convert to
Judaism.
Anti-Zionists often point to
the Neturei Karta as proof
that one can oppose Israel's
right to exist without being
anti-Semitic. However, point-
ing to the Neturei Karta to
prove anything about Jewish
life is pointless.
This tiny group is as unrep-
resentative of Jewish views as
the snake-handling sects of
West Virginia — which pass
around poisonous snakes dur-
ing church services — are of
Christianity. Nor indeed do
the Neturei Karta accept the
anti-Zionist contention that
the Jews are only a religion,
and not a people. Further-
more, they do believe in the
right of the Jews to the land
of Israel and trust that some-
day God will send the
Messiah — dressed no doubt
in the distinctive garb of the
Neturei Karta — to restore all
the Jews there.
From the book Jewish Literacy
by Joseph Telushkin. Copyright
© 1991 by Rabbi Joseph
Telushkin.