Page 16 - Kol Bogrei Habonim - September 14

ILAN ISRAEL
Born - London 1950; NW London Ken; Machon – 1968-69; Mazkir
Habonim – 1972-74; Aliyah to Mevo Hama – 1974; Merakez
Chinuch of Ichud Habonim – 1978-1981; Kibbutz Gezer – 1982-
1990; Central Shaliach to HDUK – 1984-85 and Shaliach to HD-
USA – 1985-87; presently resides in Kfar Saba and is Training
Coordinator and Freedom of Information Officer at the Israel
Ministry of Agriculture & Rural Development

E few "all nighters" by the Gestetner printing
ighty five years since the foundation of
Habonim is a good time to reflect on
machine.
what the movement achieved and on how
involvement in the movement influenced me After finishing high school, I was privileged to
personally. participate in Machzor Mem-Gimmel of Machon
Lemadrichei Chutz Le’Aretz in Katamon,
As the movement celebrates its 85th birthday, I Jerusalem. 19 of us, from Glasgow, Casablanca,
calculated that 50 years ago, in September 1964, Vancouver, Montevideo and other locations
I first walked through the doors of 523 Finchley became the Habonim group on Kibbutz Rosh
Road and joined the Bonim of Golani. Before Hanikra, giving us our first taste of kibbutz life.
the summer of 1964, I'd never heard the word
Habonim. I spent that summer at a Jewish I began to realize what an amazing, diverse
summer school run by parents of a chaverat movement I was a part of, and overcoming
Habonim who recruited many of her movement linguistic and cultural differences was a sense of
friends as "counsellors." I was persuaded, along a shared identity and possibly a common future.
with three other campers, to "give Habonim a In that year, as I got acquainted with Israel, I
try" and, for the next 10 years, 523 became my began to evaluate future frameworks. It became
second home as a Chanich , Madrich and clear to me that Israel would be my home but
movement worker until my Aliyah. was kibbutz the best framework for me? I had

little interest in devoting my life to agriculture
I joined Habonim at a time when I was looking
for a reason and a framework to express my (little knowing I would spend most of my
Jewishness outside that of the synagogue and a working life in the Israeli Ministry of
traditional home that was providing me with too Agriculture!) but I was very interested in a
few answers to issues of Jewish identity in my communal group framework. I spent a few days
teenage years. Habonim became my second checking out an urban kibbutz, Garin Sha'al in
home, my "family,” where I discovered practical Karmiel, set up by olim mainly from North
Zionism and humanistic socialism. American Habonim, and I hoped that, on my
return to England, I could interest chaverim in
Purim was a big fancy dress activity, Pesach the movement to join them. However, on my
added a "third seder" on apartheid, Soviet Jewry, return to England, I found that many of my
or the Warsaw ghetto, amazing feats of collective movement peers had become involved with
creativity in the decorated gym of the Moadon Garin Chet which had set itself the challenge of
where we created our own meaningful setting up a new kibbutz. Some had even started
interpretation of freedom, spring, Jewish history studying agriculture so that the idea of a Garin to
and our connection to the world while spending a Karmiel was not feasible. Within a few months,
I had decided to join the Garin in an effort to re-

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