Jewish
Socialist state into the fabric of daily life. She began running Histadrut’s complex of mutual aid programs and chaired the board of Kupat Holim, a medical system that covered 40 percent of the Jewish population. When the British began building army camps across Palestine, she ne- gotiated the wages and working conditions of Jewish laborers—and made sure that the British lived up to their agreements.
And, still, she traveled, her Mandate passports filling up with stamps from Switzerland and England, the United States and Czechoslovakia, as the representative of the Histadrut at international meetings and the Ac- tions Committee of the World Zionist Organization.
It was the ideal life for a woman who couldn’t abide voids, who needed constant motion and constant company. Golda could never stand to be alone. If she was in town, her house was always filled with people. If it wasn’t, she called someone to come over to talk or wandered by a friend’s house.
Still, Golda’s schedule was brutal, frequently sending her to bed with a migraine or sheer exhaustion. “What I need is a wife,” she told Men- achem one day. In fact, she had a series of proxy wives, children of friends who needed a place to stay in Tel Aviv, Americans who’d recently arrived in Palestine, all of whom were sucked into the vortex that was Golda.
* * *
Casting off her role as overseas emissary and fund-raiser, Golda took on a new life as an organizer and a serious political player with her trade- mark style, an inimitable fusion of idealism, moralizing, and arm twist- ing that would define her for decades. Golda pursued what she wanted or believed was right—and for Golda there was usually little distinc- tion—with molten single-mindedness. Shrewd and dogged, she always denied that she was motivated by any trace of personal ambition, as did every other Labor Zionist leader. The movement ethic demanded that they pretend to be called to service rather than aspire to power. So after each call, Golda ritually protested that she wasn’t worthy. But she never flinched from saying yes.
The trappings of power held no interest for her. She lived simply in a two-bedroom apartment in a workers’ cooperative building and owned just two dresses, one drying while the other was worn. Nor was she driven by conventional political egomania. Golda was a Zealot, in the original sense of the word, a spirit kindred to the Jewish underground of the first century AD that opposed the Roman occupation. She sought power for its uses, not its perquisites, absolutely confident that she knew precisely how it should be applied.
Curiously, in light of the near adoration she evoked abroad, Golda nei- ther sought nor received similar popularity at home. “She did not court her public,” observed her friend Marie Syrkin, dramatically understating Golda’s indifference to the approval of the masses. Given the yishuv politi- cal system—and the Israeli governmental political system that grew out of it—Golda had little incentive to buff off her hard edges, play the populist, or pretend patience with a recalcitrant public. If Golda wanted to serve on the Zionist executive, on the Histadrut secretariat, or a party ruling body, she didn’t need to woo voters. What counted was the backing of a party hierarchy since they chose candidates for office. In a system carefully de- signed to centralize power in the hands of party bosses, she needed only to make sure that she was one of them.
Her lack of concern for her own popularity served her well since Golda was always willing to risk public anger by delivering bad news and pounding the populace into submission, and Ben-Gurion regularly sent her into that fray.
Her most brutal fight in those years was for a new unemployment tax for all Histadrut members, who were already paying their regular union dues as well as contributing to pension and sick funds. The proposed Mifdeh B, designed to raise money to ease the burden
Socialist state into the fabric of daily life. She began running Histadrut’s complex of mutual aid programs and chaired the board of Kupat Holim, a medical system that covered 40 percent of the Jewish population. When the British began building army camps across Palestine, she ne- gotiated the wages and working conditions of Jewish laborers—and made sure that the British lived up to their agreements.
And, still, she traveled, her Mandate passports filling up with stamps from Switzerland and England, the United States and Czechoslovakia, as the representative of the Histadrut at international meetings and the Ac- tions Committee of the World Zionist Organization.
It was the ideal life for a woman who couldn’t abide voids, who needed constant motion and constant company. Golda could never stand to be alone. If she was in town, her house was always filled with people. If it wasn’t, she called someone to come over to talk or wandered by a friend’s house.
Still, Golda’s schedule was brutal, frequently sending her to bed with a migraine or sheer exhaustion. “What I need is a wife,” she told Men- achem one day. In fact, she had a series of proxy wives, children of friends who needed a place to stay in Tel Aviv, Americans who’d recently arrived in Palestine, all of whom were sucked into the vortex that was Golda.
* * *
Casting off her role as overseas emissary and fund-raiser, Golda took on a new life as an organizer and a serious political player with her trade- mark style, an inimitable fusion of idealism, moralizing, and arm twist- ing that would define her for decades. Golda pursued what she wanted or believed was right—and for Golda there was usually little distinc- tion—with molten single-mindedness. Shrewd and dogged, she always denied that she was motivated by any trace of personal ambition, as did every other Labor Zionist leader. The movement ethic demanded that they pretend to be called to service rather than aspire to power. So after each call, Golda ritually protested that she wasn’t worthy. But she never flinched from saying yes.
The trappings of power held no interest for her. She lived simply in a two-bedroom apartment in a workers’ cooperative building and owned just two dresses, one drying while the other was worn. Nor was she driven by conventional political egomania. Golda was a Zealot, in the original sense of the word, a spirit kindred to the Jewish underground of the first century AD that opposed the Roman occupation. She sought power for its uses, not its perquisites, absolutely confident that she knew precisely how it should be applied.
Curiously, in light of the near adoration she evoked abroad, Golda nei- ther sought nor received similar popularity at home. “She did not court her public,” observed her friend Marie Syrkin, dramatically understating Golda’s indifference to the approval of the masses. Given the yishuv politi- cal system—and the Israeli governmental political system that grew out of it—Golda had little incentive to buff off her hard edges, play the populist, or pretend patience with a recalcitrant public. If Golda wanted to serve on the Zionist executive, on the Histadrut secretariat, or a party ruling body, she didn’t need to woo voters. What counted was the backing of a party hierarchy since they chose candidates for office. In a system carefully de- signed to centralize power in the hands of party bosses, she needed only to make sure that she was one of them.
Her lack of concern for her own popularity served her well since Golda was always willing to risk public anger by delivering bad news and pounding the populace into submission, and Ben-Gurion regularly sent her into that fray.
Her most brutal fight in those years was for a new unemployment tax for all Histadrut members, who were already paying their regular union dues as well as contributing to pension and sick funds. The proposed Mifdeh B, designed to raise money to ease the burden
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