Dov Ber Borochov (June 21, 1881 – December 17, 1917) was a Marxist Zionist and one of the founders of the Labor Zionist movement as well as a pioneer in the study of Yiddish as a language.
He was born in the town of Zolotonosha, Ukraine, under the Russian Empire. As an adult he joined the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party but was expelled for his Zionist beliefs. Subsequently, he helped form the Poale Zion party and devoted his life to promot...
more
Dov Ber Borochov (June 21, 1881 – December 17, 1917) was a Marxist Zionist and one of the founders of the Labor Zionist movement as well as a pioneer in the study of Yiddish as a language.
He was born in the town of Zolotonosha, Ukraine, under the Russian Empire. As an adult he joined the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party but was expelled for his Zionist beliefs. Subsequently, he helped form the Poale Zion party and devoted his life to promoting the party in Russia, Europe, and America. When the Russian social democrats came to power, Borochov returned to Russia in March 1917 to lead the Poale Zion and organize Jewish brigades for the Red Army. He became ill and died there of pneumonia in December 1917.
Borochov became highly influential in the Zionist movement because he explained nationalism in general, and Jewish Nationalism in particular in terms of Marxist class struggle and dialectical materialism. Borochov predicted, correctly, that nationalist forces would be more...
less
