The World Jewish Congress and the State of Israel, 1948-1977

The World Jewish Congress (WJC) was established in 1936 in an attempt to create a comprehensive Jewish representative body, due to the rise of Nazism in Europe. The organization worked to motivate the Jewish world and the free democratic forces to act against Nazism, and for the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people in Israel, i.e. goals that combine immediate Jewish interests and Zionist interests. The end of the war and the establishment of the State of Israel posed the WJC with questions of identity and with the need to redefine its objectives particularly in relation to the Zionist ideology and its political execution. The organization was involved in significant issues during the early years of the new country, an involvement that raised questions of the involvement of American Jews in Israel`s internal affairs on the one hand, and the definition of internal affairs of the State of Israel as matters related to the Jewish people as a whole on the other.

The proposed paper deals with the relationship between the WJC and the State of Israel in the early decades of the state (1948 - 1977), in light of the question of the interests that have influenced and directed the dynamics between the WJC and Israel, and the question of American Jews involvement in Israel`s internal affairs