Yair Rosenberg@Yair_Rosenberg
As I write and document quite explicitly in the piece, Einstein was a binationalist before Israel's founding (as were many notable Zionists!), but then became a supporter of Israel once it was established in 1948. He hosted Israel's first prime minister David Ben Gurion at his home in 1951. When he turned down the Israeli presidency in 1952, he referred to the country as "our state of Israel." Do you think they would have offered the job to an enemy? In reality, Einstein was an ally of the socialist government in power and a harsh critic of the Israeli right that opposed it -- which was actually a problem, because the presidency is supposed to be nonpartisan. Einstein regularly lambasted the Israeli right, not Israel or the Zionist project, which is quite clear if one actually reads the critical statements and who he refers to.
In 1955, in one of his last interviews, Einstein said "I have great hopes for the future of the Jewish state." haaretz.com/2014-05-22/ty-…
The last speech Einstein composed was intended to mark the 7th anniversary of Israel's founding, and he wrote it in conjunction with Abba Eban, Israel's ambassador to the United States (not the sort of thing an anti-Zionist would do). Explaining his idea in a letter to the embassy, Einstein wrote that "a somewhat critical attitude concerning the behavior of the world powers toward Israel and the Arab states could have a salutary influence. It is easier for me to say those things than for any person connected officially with organized Jewish life. To do this well it has to be carefully prepared in cooperation with responsible Israelis."
Einstein died days before Israel's Independence Day, but we have the text of the undelivered speech. In it, Einstein wrote:
"The establishment of the State of Israel was internationally approved and recognized largely for the purpose of rescuing the remnant of the Jewish people from unspeakable horrors of persecution and oppression. Another purpose was to provide conditions in which the spiritual and cultural life of a Hebrew society could find free expression. Thus the establishment of Israel is an event which actively engages the conscience of this generation.
It is, therefore, a bitter paradox to find that a state which was destined to be a shelter for a martyred people is itself threatened by grave dangers to its own security. The universal conscience cannot be indifferent to such a peril."
He also wrote: "It is anomalous that world opinion should only criticise Israel's response to hostility and should not actively seek to bring an end to the Arab hostility which is the root cause of the tension."
And, as Einstein always did, he closed with an appeal for peace, coupling his defense of Israel with this conclusion: "International policies for the Middle East should be dominated by efforts to secure peace in Israel and its neighbors." He never stopped advocating for Israeli-Arab peace, and raised the same point in that final interview cited above. To him, all these sentiments were not contradictory but complementary.
web.archive.org/web/2014090317…
He bequeathed his intellectual assets and likeness to Hebrew University.
One does not need to align with Einstein's approach to Israel and Zionism to acknowledge the reality of what it actually was. Einstein was a physicist who died in 1955, not some oracle on world politics, and it is perfectly reasonable to disagree today with his views on these and many other subjects. What is not reasonable is to adulterate those views in service of a contemporary ideological agenda.
All of this material is either explicitly discussed or linked in the article. I'm a little confused and surprised that you missed it.
