Home and Parents on the Kibbutz

Abstract

No sooner were the youth groups formed than the first problems became obvious: the youth groups were often made up of young people from different backgrounds and they were different in their ‘veteran Israeliness’: ‘The Poles preceded the Romanians by three months … and the Poles never helped the Romanians integrate, nor even made any approach to them. They did not have the patience or understanding necessary for this.’¹ Even when the youth groups were socially cohesive, after completing their term in the children’s society, together with the kibbutz children, they were still made to join groups of immigrant youths from other kibbutzim, often from a different ethnic or national background. In many cases this was done against the will of the young people themselves, even in face of attempts at persuasion. The main hardship was when a group was waiting for its numbers to be made up by their friends who had not yet arrived in the country and they were unwilling to accept anyone else instead.