Golda Meir–A Forty Year Perspective

Almost four decades after Golda Meir’s death, it seems that most Israelis have forgotten her. Her name and fame continued to reverberate overseas, mainly in the United States. But for many years after her death, in Israel her image remained negative. For many years, there was almost unanimity among Israelis that of the first four prime ministers of Israel, she was the worst. Few praised her achievements and many were critical. One such evaluation was that of historian David Shaham:

She was a decisive and unwavering person. She divided the world to the just and the unjust. She had a deep and burning belief that her side, the nation, the party, was always the just side. This belief she succeeded to convey with total inner conviction. It was said that her language was limited and her vocabulary poor. But this never prevented her from being a highly effective speaker. She always exuded an unmitigated assurance around her, in every word she uttered. She had an excellent debating skill and could utilize her opponents’ vulnerable spots. Analysis of her texts shows many logical weaknesses, but the way she spoke and the tone of her speech were also among the components of awe that she spread in her environment. Few dared to dispute her words after she had expressed her decreed opinion. She held the reins of the government and party with a strong and steady hand.¹

This assessment fails to explain why so many millions around the world mourned her death. The Israeli historian Anita Shapira wrote that she had captured the

imagination of those who mourned her with unparalleled power, as a leader, a woman. Her mistakes and mishaps that lowered her image among the Israeli intellectuals and among the public at large, have never hurt her super-status as an admired personality. Even after the Yom Kippur War, she awakened the spontaneous support of many groups. After she retired from the premiership, she became a highly important, well-liked national and international figure. Somehow, her charisma continued to attract hearts with no connection to her position. There was something in her figure, lumpy, heavy, something of the strength of a rock, that succeeds to withstand the erosion of the tempests of the time, inspiring trust and confidence, because of being so stable, so unchanging, so predictable.²

In the first years after her death, her name continued to echo around the world, mainly in the US, where her personality continued to be the source of much interest as seen in thousands of articles, several books, and even a television series starring Ingrid Bergman. The interest waned somewhat until the play “Golda’s Kitchen” reawakened interest in her. Several books were written about her in the early years of the present millennium, two of them in French. In Israel, too, more historians were attracted to study this figure and this led to two full-scale biographies. The publication of the protocols dealing with the Yom Kippur War and her testimonies before the Agranat Commission produced a far more balanced picture. Transcripts of her meetings with Nixon and Kissinger, and the many descriptions praising her leadership during the Yom Kippur War, helped restore her image. A number of highly uncomplimentary books about Moshe Dayan and scores of autobiographies of the participants in that cataclysmic event, also led many to reconsider their previous evaluation of Golda.

Another reason for the renewed interest in her was the many turbulent developments in Israel. The first war in Lebanon that led Begin to resign and sink into depression, the outbreak of the First Intifada, the first Gulf War, the Oslo Process, the signing of the Israel-Jordan peace treaty, the failure of Oslo after the assassination of Rabin, the Second Intifada, the Second War in Lebanon, three operations in Gaza, the lackluster performance of some of her successors, all this led many in Israel to seek a strong and decisive leadership that Golda had provided. Having been followed by prime ministers like Benjamin Netanyahu, Ehud Barak, Ariel Sharon, and Ehud Olmert, no wonder that her image far overshadows...