ABSTRACT
I feel duty bound to testify that in this question of the location of the committee whose creation was now under consideration, Yehiel Michael Pines agreed strongly with my opinion and did his utmost to turn the scales in favor of Jerusalem. He, too, argued that apart from the spiritual aspect of the matter, apart from the fact that the practical advantage of Jaffa was a small thing to sacrifice on the altar of Jerusalem's honor, there was another reason, namely, the danger that, in the small city of Jaffa, the unfriendly eye of the Arab population and of the authorities would hold sway over the committee and its affairs. But even the efforts of Pines were of no avail. The practical benefit was too visible and prominent for such abstract things as the honor of the mother city of the days of our glory to tip the scales against it, and the first two pioneers of the national revival returned to Jaffa and crowned it with the prestige of being the headquarters of all their work. Thus the fate of Jerusalem was sealed; for many years to come she was to be, in the eyes of the Lovers of Zion and, later, the Zionists, like a stepdaughter, who gets nothing but the crumbs that fall from the main table.
