Golda Meir Biography

Host: Golda Meir, one of the 20th century’s most formidable politicians was born in Kiev, Eastern Europe in 1898. She spoke no English when her family immigrated to the United States 80th later but graduated as class Valedictorian from her Wisconsin school. As out of—Meyer her husband Morris and sister Zeyna moved to Palestine in 1921 where they joined the Kibbutz. The time she spent there working in the fields, planting fruit trees, and tending animals was amongst the happiest in her life. Host: If you could live your life again, would you make any fundamental changes? Golda Meir: Well for one, I don’t think I would have left the Kibbutz. I would have remained in the Kibbutz. This is something that it’s always been somewhere at the back of my mind a moment that I—I’m sorry but I don’t think I could have acted differently for many reasons but for myself, it’s a point of failure in my life. Host: But Meir did live the Kibbutz and planned her life political campaign centered around the fight for Jewish homeland. Four days before the State of Israel was born, Meir disguised herself as an Arab woman and traveled to Trans Jordan to ask King Abdulla not to join other Arab states when they launched an attack on a fledgy nation. However, she was unsuccessful. On May the 14th in 1948, Meir was one of 24 signatories on the Israeli declaration of independence. The next day, the combined Arab armies attacked Israel. Meir used her American connections to fund raise in the United States and following the Israel’s victory in the War of Independence, she was appointed as Israel’s first ambassador to the Soviet Union, her childhood home. In 1949, Meir was elected to Israel’s parliament as a member of the left leaning Mapai Party serving as minister of labor and foreign minister. But it was his Prime Minister during the intensely difficult period of the early 1970’s that Meir really came into her own. Meir retired from the foreign ministry due to her health in 1966.But soon returned to support Prime Minister, Levi Eshkol following his death in 1969. Meir was elected party leader and became Prime Minister of Israel. It was an uncertain time of the Jewish state. A six-day war of 1967 had successfully carried the Arab aggression and one strategic land. The Palestinian groups began a terrifying pain in the early 70’s but included a massacre of Israeli athletes at the 1972 in the Youth Olympics. In 1973, Israel was taken by surprise when Egypt and Syria launched to surprise attack during Yam Kapur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar. Although Israel prevailed, it suffered heavy losses and the war signaled the end of Meir’s prime ministership. Despite winning elections in December 1973, she was forced to resign the following year sighting the word of the people. Host: And what would your country have done without you if you had stayed on the Kibbutz? Golda Meir: Believe me, it would be exactly the same as it is. I can’t say even better. I don’t think I harmed the country but they could have made any difference and I would have been more at peace with myself throughout my life but that’s gone. Host: Meir died four years after living office, leaving the legacy of a life lived for her country. She never decided power for his own sake and saw Israel through its troubled earth to its mature as he is and living in democracy. Meir is beloved for their contribution to turning the truth into a reality.