Page 15 - Issue 18

"The Histadrut has not yet been able to take root
within the Mizrahi communities. They haven’t
found the key to them," David Ben-Gurion,
chairman of the Histadrut and later the first prime
minister of the State of Israel, told the movement
in a 1926 address. "And here is HaNoar HaOved,
the youngest seedling of the labor movement,
who have discovered a talent for it."

"The wonderful and special power, the youth,
which is not only age but spiritual attitude, vitality,
alertness and all those blessed virtues, this power
still exists within the labor movement in its
depths," he went on to say, lauding the youth
movement as a trailblazer in society.

Over the years, the working youth in the
movement often came from
marginalized backgrounds and
worked low-income jobs.
Nevertheless, they constituted
70% of the trainees of the
Palmach, the elite forces of the
pre-State Jewish military, and
settled hundreds of kibbutzim
and moshavim throughout the
country. Naan (1930) was the
movement's first kibbutz, and
Beit Shearim (1936) the first Yiftach Ben David, 12,
moshav. Kibbutzim and Kibbutz Ruhama
moshavim continue to be
important centers of the youth movement.