Tag #125871 - Interview #98885 (Bitoush Behar)

I have been a member of both Maccabi [21] and Hashomer Hatzair [22]. My brother was a member of Maccabi at the beginning and then he joined Hashomer Hatzair. There was also an organization called Betar [23] – the most right-oriented, the most armed wing of the Zionist movement. They believed that Palestine had to be liberated through revolution, through weapons. The Maccabeans on the other hand were sports people. They used to have a large gym which was their own property. Hashomer Hatzair’s members were with leftist orientation. They were for social equality. The majority of its members left for Israel in 1947 [Mass Alyiah] [24]. During the Holocaust most of its members started co-operating with the UYW [25]. The main occupation of the members of Hashomer Hatzair was tilling the land. There was a big farm, ‘chiflik’, which was owned by the Bulgarian Baltov and, for that reason, known as the Baltov Chiflik. They were giving ‘ahshara’ – a public service which they weren’t paid for, and at the same time were training in agriculture. So there they were working and training in agriculture professionally at one and the same time. Their aim was to be able to till the land after leaving for Israel. There was some competition between the different organizations. Each one of them wanted to attract as many members as possible. At first I was a Maccabean, then I became a Hashomerist but I felt best at Maccabi. In the gym we used to have different exercise facilities – bars, a vaulting horse, a horizontal bar - we were practicing sports and apart from being Zionist, the focus was on the healthy way of living.