Exiled to Palestine

"This book tells the largely unknown story of how Zionists imprisoned by the Soviet authorities in the 1920s and 1930s were permitted to opt for a sentence of permanent exile in Palestine. There, they made a significant contribution to building a Jewish polity - forming the backbone of influential left-wing parties and the powerful trade union movement." "Utilizing fresh documents from archives opened after the collapse of the Soviet Union, as well as British and Zionist sources, the authors examine the means by which internal power struggles and personal interventions in the uppermost echelons of the Soviet leadership enabled the Zionists to disseminate their message and recruit thousands of members before the massive arrests of the mid-1920s. They further reveal the extent to which personal contacts between Zionists and Soviet officials were vital in initiating and sustaining the phenomenon of exile to Palestine and assess the crucial role of Anglo-Soviet cooperation in facilitating the immigration of Zionist convicts." "A selection of twenty-two translated and annotated documents from Israeli and Russian archival collections is included. This book will be of great interest to all students of Jewish and Israeli history, Russian and Soviet studies and the history of British rule in Palestine."--BOOK JACKET.