Reflections on a Lifetime of Engagement with Zionism, the Palestine Question, and American Empire (Noam Chomsky)
►http://www.palestine-studies.org/journals.aspx?id=11394&jid=1&href=fulltext
When and how did you first become involved in the Israel-Palestinian—or, at the time—Zionist, issue? I grew up with it. My parents were part of what amounted to a cultural ghetto, not a physical ghetto, which was the Philadelphia Jewish community. It had many parts, but the part they were deeply involved in was the revival of Hebrew cultural centers, especially Hebrew education. I became conscious of this in the early 1930s. My father was pretty much a disciple of Ahad Ha’am, whose version of Zionism was a cultural center for Jews in Palestine. My mother as well, and their circle of friends and associates was pretty similar. I went to Hebrew school and Hebrew college, and when I was old enough I started teaching at Hebrew school. I was an organizer of what were then called Zionist youth groups, which I suppose would now be called anti-Zionist, because they were mostly opposed to a Jewish state. My own commitments early on, from when I was a teenager, would be socialist binationalism. (...) Source: Noam Chomsky