Since the establishment of Israel there were many supporters of the Soviet Union in General and Stalin’s regimes in particular. Camp flaming Stalinists was the Israeli Communist party which in the late 1940s — early 1950s was at the Zenith of activity, but mainly the representatives of the United workers ‘ Mapam party. (This party is a clear socialist orientation has arisen on the basis of the movement Hashomer Hatzair and-tsair”, its activists piously followed the precepts of Marx and Lenin and praised Stalin and his ideology of totalitarianism.) The Communists and socialists insisted on the strengthening of relations of Israel with the Soviet Union, which they rightly argued, have saved Europe and the whole world from the brown plague, destroyed the Nazi concentration camps and strongly supported the UN the right of Jews to their own state.
The revelation came (and it would be more accurate to say, began on 20 November 1952 when he was sentenced in the so-called Slansky. This trial in Czechoslovakia, and is named after the General Secretary of the Communist party of Czechoslovakia Rudolf Slansky (real name — Salzman), was a continuation of the Stalinist processes the 1930-ies and link in the same chain of judicial events, a wave swept the countries of postwar Eastern Europe, with “heavy” hands of Stalin have fallen under the banner of communism. Judged Kochi Zojo Albania and Traicho Kostov in Bulgaria, Laszlo rajk in Hungary. Slansky process stands out among these as the gravity of the charges brought against the defendants, and cruelty imposed by judges in sentencing. But the main difference of the process — expressed anti-Semitic, as evidenced by the nationality of the majority of defendants (only 3 of the 14 accused were Jews) and the nature of the charges.
Of course, the Slansky process has caused a huge public outcry in Israel, and not least because among a large group of Jews detained in the framework of the process were two Israelis, were at that time in Czechoslovakia. Single — Mordecai Oren, a renowned functionary of the Mapam party, and the other Shimon Orenstein, a private entrepreneur, who was commercial attache of Israel in Prague and during the War for Independence of the Czechs bought weapons for the IDF. It soon became clear that the participation of Oren and Orenstein in the process was to be charged with proof of “the Zionist footprint in the case of Slansky and his comrades in misfortune. As a result, the majority of the witnesses were also involved in the case and sentenced to lengthy prison terms. Some were in luck: they were released without charges. Looking ahead, we note that all the convicts in the process Slansky was later completely rehabilitated.
The indictment in the case of Slansky and his group of co-defendants, prominent figures of the Communist party of Czechoslovakia and the government officials was an example of a purely Bolshevik, anti-Semitic rhetoric, characteristic of the Stalinist regime. “Traitors,” “Trotskyites,” “Zionists,” “the bourgeois fosterling”, “nationalists”, “enemies of the people seeking to undermine the foundations of democracy, equality and brotherhood in the socialist Czechoslovakia” are just some of the epithets that were filled with pages of trial records. Accused Slansky and his comrades in the plot to overthrow the Communist regime and the restoration of capitalism.
The charges against Rudolf Slansky and the rest of the accused was rendered on 27 November 1952. The last court session, in the best traditions of Communist propaganda was broadcast on radio live.
They all pleaded guilty and gave detailed testimony, what, in fact, it would be hard to doubt the staff “authorities” were able to unleash interrogated languages. The court found all 14 involved in the case of persons guilty of Commission of the alleged crimes: treason, the results of military secrets, Subversion, economic sabotage and sabotage, attempt on the life of the party and state leaders, etc. 11, including Slansky, were sentenced to death by hanging. The sentence was executed on December 4, a week after its announcement. Three — Deputy foreign Minister Artur London, his predecessor on vavro Hyde and Deputy Minister of foreign trade Eugene lebl — escaped life imprisonment.
Later, one of the closest friends of Rudolf Slansky told about how he was furnished with his arrest:
“That evening Rudolph and his wife, Yosef was invited to a gala dinner for the Prime Minister Antonin Septectomy whose Deputy Slansky was already once a few months ago was removed from the post of General Secretary of the Communist party of Czechoslovakia. The dinner was given in honor of the delegation of high-ranking Soviet officials, which concluded the visit to Prague. Septectomy was ordered to hold Rudolph after dinner as long as possible and as soon as he gets to go home to inform where follows. Meanwhile, the staff of the state security service got into the apartment Slansky and wife barely crossed the threshold, twisted Rudolph and took him away. Then went Joseph.”
Familiar picture, isn’t it?.. Slansky process had a very powerful influence of the left political movement in Israel. The arrest of Mordechai Oren, and the charges against him groundless accusations shocked the Israeli socialists and Communists to the core, pretty pokolban their faith in the justice of Stalin’s ideology.
The fact that the Communist regime, figuratively speaking, turned his ardent adept in a despicable spy, sobered many in Mapam party and even caused a split in the left movement: some argued that it was a simple mistake, which sooner or later will be fixed, and ideology has nothing to do with it. Others began to understand that the Slansky process, the burrs which got Mordechai Oren, was fabricated from beginning to end in order to discredit Zionism and to once again whet the hatred of Jews. The dispute between the two camps reached a boiling point when two prominent members of the Mapam party, a Knesset member Dr. Moshe Sneh (the father of the current Deputy defense Minister Ephraim Sneh) and Jacob Riftin, had publicly justified the actions of Communist regimes decided to go to the Communist party. Soon enough Riftin reversed its position and returned under the banner of Mapam. Sne, over time, has gained huge influence in the Communist party of Israel, became the chief editor of the party newspaper “Kol a-am” and in that capacity wrote a controversial article entitled “the national question in the light of Marxism-Leninism” — about his personal transformation from liberal Zionists in the ideological Communist.
In 1965 the Communist party of Israel (MAKI) finally broke up, the part of its activists, Jewish activists and Arabs formed a new party — the New Communist list (“A Reshimo and communistic a-Hadasha”, CANCERS). Moshe Sneh remained in MAKI and until his death on 1 March 1972 and represented it in the Knesset. From time to time for a calm debate in the hall of parliamentary sessions echoed his heated exchanges with the Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, which, however, always claimed that Dr. ROE and his fellow Communists pointless to argue, their ideas just to be ignored. The old Man did.
From Mapam party about the same time, in the mid-1960s were those who realized that the Stalinist regime has a pronounced anti-Jewish, anti-Zionist and inhuman character that Stalinist ideology is insane and inhuman in nature. Frustrated the leader was Yigal Allon and Yisrael Galili, who founded the party “achdut and labor” — “Labor Union”, which was based on a socialist platform and has an active anti-Arab policy. As said by their former colleagues on MAPS, Alon and Galili consider the Arab question through the scope of a rifle.”
And what about Mordechai Oren? In 1955 he was released from prison where he was held in very harsh conditions. It would seem that he was fit to be disappointed in the Communist regime, but no: Oren remained his supporter and never tired of repeating that the painful impressions which he brought from Czechoslovak prison did not shake his faith in the justice of elected Communists of the way.
In 1955, the party MAPS for the first time entered into a coalition, headed by Ben-Gurion, who, as already noted, not only ignored their ideas and opinion, but even considered the Communists a threat to the state of Israel. The reason for the consent to include the MAPS and the coalition, was the fear of the growing popularity of the party “Ahdut a-Avoda” under the leadership of Yigal Alon, who is the old Man always considered one of his most dangerous political rivals. And when the parliamentary elections of 1955 “Ahdut a-Avoda” have received the ten mandates, Ben-Gurion hastened to conclude a coalition agreement with the party to the MAPS, Alona and leaving his party behind. However, the old Man punished the then head of the Shin bet Harel the Icer to keep an eye on the functionaries of the MAPS, and the Executive Harel put them on the wire. Because of this, in 1958, was exposed Soviet spy Aaron Cohen, a member of the Mapam party, transmitting important state information to the employees of the Soviet Embassy in Israel.
However, this did not prevent the representatives of the Mapam party to adopt and develop the ideology of the brotherhood between Jews and Arabs, to get closer to the Arab community of Israel and to include in its electoral list, and then to hold in the Knesset, the first Deputy of the Arab. Only in 1961, Ben Gurion decided not to risk and established a government without the participation of Mapam.
