sabra

The plant and the fruits which inspired the term

Sabra (Hebrew: צבר‎, pronounced tsabar; ṣabra) is a term used to describe a Jew born in Israel; the term is also usually inclusive of Jews born during the period of the establishment of the state of Israel.^[1] The word "sabra" is Arabic and Hebrew. Immigrants to the British Mandate for Palestine began using it in the early 1930s, according to the The Dictionary of Slang (Hebrew) written by Israeli Rubik Rozental. The allusion is to a tenacious, thorny desert plant with a thick hide that conceals a sweet, softer interior, suggesting that even though the Israeli Sabra are rough and masculine on the outside, they are delicate and sensitive on the inside. In the United States, this cactus variety is known as the Prickly Pear. In 2010 over 4,000,000 Israeli Jews (70%) were Sabras, with an even greater percentage of Israeli Jewish youths falling into this category.^[2]

History

The term was used a lot politically by the Zionist movement, to celebrate the "New Jew" which the movement created. Unlike the "old Jew" who was born in exile, and was stereotypically bourgeois, the "New Jew" was stereotypically a kibbutz member (or a farmer in a Moshav). "The old Jew" spoke European languages or Hebrew with a heavy accent, while the Sabra spoke the Hebrew language as a mother tongue. Unlike the "Old Jew" who did not fight for his self-defense, the Sabra fought in the Jewish resistance movements, in the Palmach and after the establishment of Israel in the IDF.

The sociological characteristics of the sabra were examined by Oz Almog in his book The Sabra - The Creation of the New Jew.^[3] According to Almog the term "Tzabar" originated from the insult "Sabras" directed towards migrants of the First Aliyah (which consisted of the first generation of native born members of the Zionist movement) by migrants of the Second Aliyah and the Third Aliyah. The changing of the meaning of the term, to emphasize the softer interior rather than the roughness, was done by the journalist Uri Kesari who published an essay, "We Are the Leaves of the Sabra!", on 18 April 1931 in the newspaper Doar HaYom in which he argued against the discrimination which was cast against the native-born by the new immigrants.^[4]

Independence and afterward

The prestige of the Sabra person increased during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War and especially after it ended. The Israeli public, and especially the older generation, tended to attribute the achievements of the war to the country's "sabras", while minimizing the part of the new immigrants and other groups. Even descriptions of the achievements of Operation Kadesh (1956) emphasized the image of the Sabra. The large immigration to Israel of Jews from Islamic countries during the 1950s, the penetration of Western culture and primarily the American culture, as well as the social and political changes which were created following the Six Day War and Yom Kippur War, resulted in a decline of the use of the term after the 1970s and even to pikfok in heroic myths which were attributed to the Sabra term.

In relation, those who were born in the country after independence in 1948 became known as the "Dor haMedina" (Hebrew: דור המדינה‎), or "Statehood Generation", and have been largely described by cultural commentators as being motivated less by the strident nationalism and/or socialism of the pre-independence settler generations and more by a general cultural pragmatism and sensitivity to the mass-cultural output of Western powers.^[5]

In culture

The character "Srulik" created by the Israeli cartoonist Dosh has become one of the symbolic representations of the "Sabra".

The Sabra received an artistic and symbolic representation in the form of the illustrated character "Srulik" (which wears shorts, sandals and a Tembel hat), created by cartoonist Dosh. Another character which become famous was that of the Israeli children's TV program "Kishkashta" which was a speaking cactus.

The English form of the word, Sabra, served Israeli manufacturers who wanted to brand their products as typical Israeli products, which was sold in the foreign markets. As a result, "Sabra liqueur" and "Sabra sport" (the sports model of the "Sussita") were created. The world's largest hummus manufacturer (as of 2009) is a U.S. company called the Sabra Dipping Company.^[6]

In Politics

The first sabra to exercise the powers of the office of the Prime Minister of Israel was Yigal Allon, who served as acting prime minister from February to March 1969; he was born in Kfar Tavor. The first sabra to serve as Prime Minister rather than acting Prime Minister was Yitzhak Rabin, who first held the office 1974-77, and then again 1992-1995. Since Rabin first took office, there have been four other sabra Prime Ministers: the current Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is the first and (so far) only sabra Prime Minister to have been born in the modern state since Israel's declaration of independence in 1948; he first took office in 1996, before leaving office in 1999 and returning in 2009.^{[citation needed]} Furthermore, Ehud Barak, Ariel Sharon, and Ehud Olmert were all born in what is now the territory of the State of Israel during the period of the British Mandate of Palestine.

References

External links

• Youtube video of Kishkashta
• Hebrew site with video of Kishkashta