selves off from the Jewish people throughout the world, o£ forsaking Western culture, of burying Zionism, of giving aid and comfort to the Arab enemy. But the public debate that we loosed carried these ideas into many quarters. We felt that we were the wave of the future, the authentic new voice of Hebrew youth.
In the fall of 1947, I wrote a booklet called "War and Peace in the Semitic Region," warning against partition and trying to formulate a practical alternative. We translated the summary of the argument into Arabic and sent it to every newspaper and political group throughout the Middle East.
But it was too late. A few days afterward, the war which we call in Hebrew the War of Liberation broke out.
When the radio announced that the plan for the partition of Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state was approved by a majority of the United Nations General Assembly, the masses poured into the streets dancing with joy. The age-old dream, so it seemed, had been realized. Jews had found a national home at long last, free and independent, where they could live at peace.
That fateful night, my few friends and I worked feverishly to publish the last issue of Bama'avak. We warned that partition would not bring peace, that a great war was imminent, that the historical clash between the Hebrew and Arab nations would go on in a different form until Semitic unity is achieved.
On the first page, there appeared a poem which I recall often these past few months:
We swear to you, our motherland,
On this day of your dismemberment:
Great and united you will arise again.
We, your sons, Hebrew and Arab,
Will carry your wound in our hearts,
Until the day comes that sees you again
One country, from the sea to the desert.
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