WI: Polski Izrael

After WWI, Poland pursued various schemes to acquire colonies—from demanding some ex-German colonies to trying to buy off Liberia and Brazil. Poland also pursued, after 1935, a policy of encouraging Jewish emigration to Palestine. Behind closed doors, Polish diplomats lobbied for Britain to take more immigrants, and for the Mandate to be expanded to the Suez Canal and the Transjordan. By 1939, the Polish Army was even training Jewish militia to set up a Jewish state for that purpose.

Would it be possible at all for Britain to wash its hands of the Mandate of Palestine and leave the headache of Jewish-Arab relations to Poland? To have the League of Nations assign the Mandate to Poland? For Poland, this would achieve the twin goals of acquiring a colony and off-loading its Jewish population.

Obviously, the tenuous nature of Polish independence until the Treaty of Riga is a big obstacle.

And how would Polski Izrael develop? Jewish immigration would be much greater than IOTL. Might there also be Polish immigration? Would this touch off a much earlier Arab-Israeli conflict? And, if WWII still happens, how does Polski Izrael fit in?
 

BigBlueBox

Banned
Running a colony in the Levant while only having ports in the Baltic would be rather difficult for a country with a weak navy. Maybe a different Peace of Riga that resulted in Polish Odessa and Poland getting most of the Tsar’s fleet could make this more plausible.
 
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I think the Marshall would have something to say. The Poland of resisters would help. The sepretists would promote a madigascear sepretist homeland.
 
After WWI, Poland pursued various schemes to acquire colonies—from demanding some ex-German colonies to trying to buy off Liberia and Brazil. Poland also pursued, after 1935, a policy of encouraging Jewish emigration to Palestine. Behind closed doors, Polish diplomats lobbied for Britain to take more immigrants, and for the Mandate to be expanded to the Suez Canal and the Transjordan. By 1939, the Polish Army was even training Jewish militia to set up a Jewish state for that purpose.

This is all very interesting to me - I've never heard anything about it (aside from some unofficial encouragement of emigration). Do you think you could point me in the direction of a place to get going on this? (I'm a big pre-state Israeli history buff)
 
This is all very interesting to me - I've never heard anything about it (aside from some unofficial encouragement of emigration). Do you think you could point me in the direction of a place to get going on this? (I'm a big pre-state Israeli history buff)

It’s in one of Snyder’s books—Black Earth, I think. The relevant excerpt was published as an article and is available:

https://www.thestar.com/news/insigh...madagascar-as-a-future-homeland-for-jews.html

To paraphrase where I found the link, it’s darkly ironic that this was the only Polish Empire-building scheme to ever reach fruition, when Israeli tanks reached the Suez.
 

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
Donor
Monthly Donor
Running a colony in the Levant while only having ports in the Baltic would be rather difficult for a country with a weak navy. Maybe a different Peace of Riga that resulted in Polish Odessa and Poland getting most of the Tsar’s fleet could make this more plausible.

I think the Marshall would have something to say. The Poland of resisters would help. The sepretists would promote a madigascear sepretist homeland.

I think what you meant by that is clearer to you than it is to others. I can tell you are referencing and implying some outcomes, but I cannot tell what side of any issue the you are saying the Marshal (presumably Pilsudski) would be taking.

Running a colony in the Levant while only having ports in the Baltic would be rather difficult for a country with a weak navy. Maybe a different Peace of Riga that resulted in Polish Odessa and Poland getting most of the Tsar’s fleet could make this more plausible.

I think this misses what makes this truly difficult.

The geographic handicap of only having a Baltic port and a weak navy does not so much make the project difficult as it makes it untenable to protect in wartime. Poland is cut off from its colony if it is in a war with any country to the west. Of course of those countries to the west, only Britain, France and Italy have the capacity to grab the colony themselves, the Germans and Scandinavians and Dutch can just halt access if they want to for some reason. But in a peacetime Europe, none of this will be an issue. It is not like the Palestinian Arabs had any navy of their own.

That said, darn right this is rather difficult to very difficult, but for these reasons:
a) Poland is a new country and poor.
b) Power projection is expensive and citizens will dislike tax increases to pay for it. Especially non-Jewish citizens.
c) Poland needs every soldier it has to guard its own frontiers in Europe and control ethnically contested areas.

Having Odessa and a Black Sea Coast is not a quick fix for any of these, it just shortens the water route.
 
I am sorry. I meant the colonels of the late 1930’s. They had sought out a separate solution. The polish people as a whole seemed sympathetic to the Zionist cause but perhaps felt it ought to be elsewhere.
 
The Jewish culture of a "Polski Izrael" would be drastically different from OTL Israel. A slight majority of Israeli jews are Mizrahi Jews from Spain and the Muslim world. In this ATL, a much larger Ashkenazi population would produce a large Polish or Yiddish speaking relative majority in a Polish-influenced Israel. Middle Eastern jews would probably be a culturally alienated minority in this ATL Israel.

If an ASB is feeling particularly Zionist one day, you might even be able to get two Israels: one dominated by Ashkenazim and another that is culturally more Sephardic. If you add an economic spin, its even possible to get a communist Israel AND a capitalist Israel.
 
The Jewish culture of a "Polski Izrael" would be drastically different from OTL Israel. A slight majority of Israeli jews are Mizrahi Jews from Spain and the Muslim world. In this ATL, a much larger Ashkenazi population would produce a large Polish or Yiddish speaking relative majority in a Polish-influenced Israel. Middle Eastern jews would probably be a culturally alienated minority in this ATL Israel.

If an ASB is feeling particularly Zionist one day, you might even be able to get two Israels: one dominated by Ashkenazim and another that is culturally more Sephardic. If you add an economic spin, its even possible to get a communist Israel AND a capitalist Israel.

There’s an idea. Poland sets up a colony for its Jews, and the Polish Jews set up a colony (Yemen, maybe? Or just the other side of the Jordan?) for their own. And then the Mizrahim set up a colony for whoever they displace...

It’s colonies all the way down.

More seriously, I wonder how many would make the trip before a German invasion. There were 3 million Polish Jews IOTL. With no cap on immigration, how many would actually move to the Levant? What sort of economy would they have there? More Kibbutzim?

And, importantly for their Polish patrons, could the Mandate of Palestine be made to turn a profit for Poland, or at least look like it will in a decade or two?
 
There’s an idea. Poland sets up a colony for its Jews, and the Polish Jews set up a colony (Yemen, maybe? Or just the other side of the Jordan?) for their own. And then the Mizrahim set up a colony for whoever they displace...

It’s colonies all the way down.

More seriously, I wonder how many would make the trip before a German invasion. There were 3 million Polish Jews IOTL. With no cap on immigration, how many would actually move to the Levant? What sort of economy would they have there? More Kibbutzim?

And, importantly for their Polish patrons, could the Mandate of Palestine be made to turn a profit for Poland, or at least look like it will in a decade or two?
It depends on how stubborn the Zionist left is. With the right business environment, Israel has the potential to become an economic powerhouse, basically a Polish Hong Kong. The Kibbutzim were only financially viable thanks to subsidies from the Israeli government.
The Kibbutzim were probably the least harmful form of socialism in the sense that the kibbutzim just gradually became normal suburbs once it was clear the socialist experiments failed, there was no need for a Solidarnosc style uprising against a socialist autocracy. A lot of prominent American libertarian thinkers like Milton Friedman and Ayn Rand are the descendants of Ashkenazi emigres who fled from the Pale of Settlement, so it's a plausible pod to have them end up in Israel instead of the US. Maybe the Chicago Boys will be the Tel Aviv boys in this TL.
If it follows a more free market path, Polish Palestine's economy will look a lot like an East Asian Tiger (Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan). Israel has a small land area with few natural resources, but a highly educated and entrepreneurial population in an advantageous location near a major trade route (Suez Canal/Strait of Malacca). They'll probably fill a niche in pharmaceuticals, electronics, and other industries which require lots of intellectual property creation and R&D relative to capital. When you combine a physicist like Einstein (offered presidency of Israel) and a thirsty desert colony, there's a massive potential for a nuclear power industry driven by energy demand for desalination.
 
Having Odessa and a Black Sea Coast is not a quick fix for any of these, it just shortens the water route.

I dunno. Odessa would cut something like 1500-2000 miles off the trip. That ain't peanuts.

After WWI, Poland pursued various schemes to acquire colonies—from demanding some ex-German colonies to trying to buy off Liberia and Brazil. Poland also pursued, after 1935, a policy of encouraging Jewish emigration to Palestine. Behind closed doors, Polish diplomats lobbied for Britain to take more immigrants, and for the Mandate to be expanded to the Suez Canal and the Transjordan. By 1939, the Polish Army was even training Jewish militia to set up a Jewish state for that purpose.

Would it be possible at all for Britain to wash its hands of the Mandate of Palestine and leave the headache of Jewish-Arab relations to Poland? To have the League of Nations assign the Mandate to Poland? For Poland, this would achieve the twin goals of acquiring a colony and off-loading its Jewish population.

Obviously, the tenuous nature of Polish independence until the Treaty of Riga is a big obstacle.

And how would Polski Izrael develop? Jewish immigration would be much greater than IOTL. Might there also be Polish immigration? Would this touch off a much earlier Arab-Israeli conflict? And, if WWII still happens, how does Polski Izrael fit in?

I have entertained similar ideas.

I just can't see Israel (Izrael?) accepting being a Polish colony as such.

What I could see happening is that a stronger Poland, more liberal Poland, might form a close relationship with Israel as sponsoring emigration to Palestine is a way to please both anti-Jewish sentiment among other nationalities that can fit with left of center ideologies as well as something that would please certain segments of Polands Jewery.

So what might emerge is an Israel with strong Polish influence (due to the large numbers of immigrants from Poland), a close alliance with strong economic ties to Poland (like the US and Israel today) and Polish military bases in Israel.

Even a Poland that is strong enough to keep Germany and the Soviets from invading is still going to have to keep such a focus on its landward borders that I don't see Poland exerting more power in Israel than the Israelis allow.

fasquardon
 
I dunno. Odessa would cut something like 1500-2000 miles off the trip. That ain't peanuts.



I have entertained similar ideas.

I just can't see Israel (Izrael?) accepting being a Polish colony as such.

What I could see happening is that a stronger Poland, more liberal Poland, might form a close relationship with Israel as sponsoring emigration to Palestine is a way to please both anti-Jewish sentiment among other nationalities that can fit with left of center ideologies as well as something that would please certain segments of Polands Jewery.

So what might emerge is an Israel with strong Polish influence (due to the large numbers of immigrants from Poland), a close alliance with strong economic ties to Poland (like the US and Israel today) and Polish military bases in Israel.

Even a Poland that is strong enough to keep Germany and the Soviets from invading is still going to have to keep such a focus on its landward borders that I don't see Poland exerting more power in Israel than the Israelis allow.

fasquardon
Pilsudski and the prometheist faction seemed willing to tolerate minorities like Jews and Ukrainians in the territory of the Polish republic and even offer a degree of cultural autonomy as long as they remained loyal to the Polish state. To get some kind of "Polish Israel" you'd probably need a more hardline, National Democrat faction that goes overboard with Polonization or tries to expel any "unassimilable" minorities to a distant colony.
 
Pilsudski and the prometheist faction seemed willing to tolerate minorities like Jews and Ukrainians in the territory of the Polish republic and even offer a degree of cultural autonomy as long as they remained loyal to the Polish state. To get some kind of "Polish Israel" you'd probably need a more hardline, National Democrat faction that goes overboard with Polonization or tries to expel any "unassimilable" minorities to a distant colony.

Not necessarily.

The population in the 2nd Republic was unfortunately fairly anti-semetic.

fasquardon
 
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