Absorpcja polityczna polskich Żydów, byłych komunistów, w Izraelu: Od Nowa (1958–1965)
THE POLITICAL ABSORPTION OF POLISH JEWS, FORMER COMMUNISTS, IN ISRAEL. THE OD NOWA JOURNAL (1958 – 1965)

Summary/Abstract: Polish Jews of left-wing orientation who arrived in Israel as part of the Gomułka aliyah set up in 1958 the journal Od Nowa (Eng. Anew). The political patronage over which was held by Mapam (Mifleget Ha-Poalim Ha-Meukhedet). Mapam activists knowing, on the one hand, about the ideology basis of the Gomu³ka aliyah, while on the other about the lack of sufficient backup to provide them with help, set about realising a minimalist programme: they reached out for means that would enable contact with the new arrivals to be maintained. The mission to create the said was entrusted to Ignacy Iserles, who prior to his departure from Poland has been an Appeal Court judge in Warsaw, a Provincial Judge for the Warsaw Voivodeship, and subsequently had been delegated from the Ministry of Justice to act as a substitute replacement for the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court. In these two last court roles he worked in the so-called secret section. It was chiefly those who had rejected communism who contributed to Od Nowa. The communist experiments in Poland, memory of the regime and the deep-rooted conviction as to Poland’s dependence on the USSR decided about its rejection by the journalist circles of Od Nowa as well as on the part of many Jews who had arrived within the Gomu³ka aliyah. Besides Ignacy Iserles, there wrote for Od Nowa: Felicja Mañska, Ran Kislev, Wiktor Cygielman, Borys Eppel (pseudonym Edmund Bora), Roman Frister amongst others. The political thrust of the journal in its editorial manifestation remained, and was not to change, socialist in makeup, with the world still described through these categories and not wandering far from content of a Zionist bent. The existence of the journal, in accordance with the idea of Hebraization, was only short term. The new arrivals in Israel were first and foremost to maintain so-called spiritual contact with the country until the point whereby they learnt Hebrew. The intelligentsia, and it was from amongst them that the readership of Od Nowa was recruited, taught to live a full social, political and cultural life, engaged itself in the learning of the language, not wishing to remain in the margins of events, and with time moved their allegiances to the Hebrew language press. And it was chiefly for this reason that on the 28th of December 1965 Od Nowa appeared for the last time.

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