Tag #123078 - Interview #95883 (Gitli Alhalel)

My family and I followed emotionally the development of Israel, the positive and negative changes. We are worried about the constant war there. I remember well how the UN decided to decree the foundation of the Jewish State in 1948. At that time all Arab states denounced that, saying that such a country could not exist. The following precedent was created: the Palestine state was seized by Egypt and Jordan. Naturally, most of the Arabs were banished from Israel, in fact their lands were no longer theirs (in 1948 when the Israeli state was founded the Jews all over the world were allowed to buy land in Palestine). So, the kibbutzim appeared, which are the most liberal form of communism. They are cooperative form of farming, in which everyone works as hard as the others and owns as much as the others. The Jews in Bulgaria worried a lot about the events in Israel after 1950. I remember that in the 1950s Zionism was declared a form of fascism. Then people in Bulgaria discussed secretly whether citizens of Jewish origin could be appointed to leadership positions in the communist party. Because at the time of the Warsaw Pact, for example, Bulgaria was forced to renounce diplomatic relations with Israel. The other countries from the former Soviet bloc did the same. [35] Yet, despite the weak relations and the distance, we were able to follow the events in Israel and discussed them among each other.