ABSTRACT
That Jewish agriculture is the base for the reconstruction of Palestine and a Jewish peasantry the foundation of the new Jewish commonwealth, are integral theses of the Zionist philosophy. Recently, however, many voices have been raised—and their number is not least in prominent Zionist circles—to minimize the importance of agriculture in favor of commerce, industry and the handicrafts. Jewish agriculture, which was so sorely missing in the Diaspora, is indispensable to the national economy in Palestine. It was not for nothing that Jewish colonization in Palestine was purely agricultural from the very first, and aimed by one method or another to root Jews in the soil. Forty years of colonizing experience in Palestine have clearly demonstrated that Jewish agriculture can maintain itself only by Self-Labor. If the principle of Self-Labor be not held to, the course of events is bound to exclude Jewish labor completely.
