Women, Immigration, and National Identity: Out-Marriage in Israel (1955-1960) as a Test Case

Abstract

The Jewish society of British Mandate Palestine (hereafter, the Yishuv) and the early years of the State of Israel was dominated by immigrants. Living in close proximity with non-Jewish populations in their countries of origin greatly influenced Jewish diaspora communities, shaping their world and economic, social, and cultural contacts – including family ties. Some immigrants were themselves couples with Jewish and non-Jewish partners. 1 This fact compounded their complex integration into the nascent host Jewish society, the non-Jewish spouse in many cases being the wife. This article explores the fascinating intersection between migration and gender and the way it is affected by national identity by looking at a unique test case – the immigration and absorption of mixed couples who moved to Israel from Poland during the second half of the 1950s. While seeking a new life, their encounter with the embryonic Israeli society – whose ethnic and national borders were still being shaped – was accompanied by vicissitudes not experienced by other immigrants. The gender aspect of migration and assimilation played a particularly significant role. Non-Jewish Polish wives being regarded as a threat to the growth of local Jewish society, their identity and gender directly impeded their assimilation. This historical issue sheds light on the confluence between migration and gender (a subject that is now being studied extensively), through everyday immigrant life. In examining the influence of ethnic and national identity upon intersectionality, I hope to add a further chapter to the discussion of the complicated links between migration and gender.