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  3. From Golda: the Life of Israel’s Prime Minister The Strug

From Golda: the Life of Israel’s Prime Minister The Strug

游客2024-02-27  41
问题                    From Golda: the Life of Israel’s Prime Minister
    The Struggle with Her Parents over Her Education
    When Golda graduated as valedictorian (致告别辞的毕业生代表) of her class, her mother was elated. Now the girl could work full-time in the grocery store. Even in America gifts were not expected to go to high school!
    Golda, however, expected to go. And after some tearful arguments, her parents agreed. Papa had, for once, sided with her-albeit rather faintly. Perhaps he felt guilty that he, the breadwinner, actually earned so little. He was a wise, gentle, and scholarly man, but not cut out for business...
    She had decided to become a teacher because such a profession was "intellectually and socially useful". Mama, however, had found out that married women were not permitted to teach in local schools. "You want to be mi old maid?" she screamed at Golda, "That’s what you’re studying for?"
    Papa now sided strongly with Mama. Either Golda must quit school and go to work like other sensible gifts her age, or she must transfer to a business school to be trained in subjects which would help her get a job and, who knows, a husband too...
After running away from home and living with her married sister in Denver for two years, Golda won this battle too. She returned to Milwaukee to finish high school.
Golda’s Determination for a Jewish Homeland
    Golda was still in high school when the First World War broke out in Europe. And with the war came dire reports of increased programmes. The Jewish Pale of Settlement lay, unfortunately, in the every territory where Russian and German-Austrian armies clashed most often in violent battle. When the White Russian Army fled in retreat, they slaughtered Jews in that section for being German sympathizers. When the Russians swept back and Germans fled from the same section, they murdered Jews for being Russian spies.
    The White Russian armies and their bitter opponents, the Germans, seemed to agree on one tenet only: anti-Semitism. And they had ample opportunities for carrying out their battle cry: death to the Jews. Of the ten million Jews in Europe, eight million lived in the Russian and Austro Hungarian empires.
    Millions of Jews were rendered homeless. Committees were organized to raise funds for the ever-swelling ranks of Jewish refugees who fled from one town to the next, trying to keep out of the way of the armies. Golda worked with the People’s Relief and with an organization called Aid in Need, formed by Jewish workers in Milwaukee to help hungry and homeless European Jews...
    She felt broken apart inside. For nights she could not sleep. What good did it do, running around, making speeches, collecting money for a new generation of suffering, displaced, wandering Jews? There had been a better answer than this. There had to be one place in the world where Jews could at last be free from persecution. There had to be a Jewish homeland. And it must be created as soon as possible. All her beliefs suddenly solidified into one single purpose. As soon as she could, she would go to Palestine and devote her life to this goal. She joined Poale Zion, the Labour Zionist Party.
    Golda’s Talent as a Speaker
    She set about making money for her passage to Palestine. She worked part-time at the Sixteenth Street and North Avenue branch of the Milwaukee Public Library. In the spring of 1916 she graduated.... She entered Milwaukee Normal School for Teachers and took a part-time job at a Yiddish-speaking folk school which advocated Labour Zionism. But even this seemed too far removed from her goal. So she started speaking for the Labour Zionists’ Poale Zion.
    The organization soon discovered that the eighteen-year-old girl had a remarkable talent as a speaker. They sent her on speaking engagements around the country. Her mission: to try to stir the complacent American Jewish youth, awaken them to the philosophies and the necessities of Labour Zionism.
    One Friday night she was scheduled to speak in Milwaukee, not in a meeting room or an auditorium. She would speak on a street comer, standing on a soap box.
    Her father heard about the plan and was horrified. "Women," he thundered at Golda, "did not do such things!" His daughter stood on a soap box exhorting people on the street! "If you dare to go ahead with that speech," he threatened, "I’ll come down there and pull you off home by your braids !"
    "I’m sorry, Papa," Golda said, firmly, "but the speech has already been announced."
     She took the precaution of telling members of Poale Zion that her father might create a scandal that evening, and since she did not cherish the notion of being dragged off the soap box, she asked that they form a protective circle around her as she spoke.
    This was done. But it was almost unnecessary, for the crowd which gathered on the street comer that night was so large that Moshe Mahovitch would have had a hard time shoving his way through. Most of the bystanders had stopped out of curiosity. It was not every day that one saw an attractive young girl standing on a soap box and talking about a faraway land called Palestine. They soon found themselves spellbound, caught up by Golda’s impassionate oratory.
    As she spoke, Golda noticed her father at the edge of the crowd; noticed thankfully that he did not, after all, seem bent on making a scene.
    Afterward, Poale Zion members gathered around her with congratulations. It was a fine speech. One of the best she had ever made...
    When she got home, her mother was singing at the kitchen table sewing.
    "Where is Papa’?"
    "In bed."
    Her mother looked up. She was smiling a little. "He came in. He sat down. tie shrugged. He said, ’Where did she get this talent for speaking?’ Then he stood up. He said, ’God knows what this girl may be able to do!’ And he went to bed."
    From that night onward the Mabovitches offered no more objections to anything Golda wanted to do. They seemed to realize that they had somehow bred a very special child. Their best contribution now would be not to interfere...
    Many years later, when the new country called Israel was about to be born, its leader, David Ben-Gurion, would proclaim, "Some day when our history is written, it will say that there was a Jewish woman who raised the money which made this nation possible."
    The Jewish woman he referred to was Golda. [br] The goal that Golda strived to achieve was to create______.
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答案 a Jewish homeland
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