The leader as a poet: the political and ideological poetry of Ze'ev Jabotinsky

This article analyses Ze'ev Jabotinsky's Zionist ideology as expressed in his political poetry. It includes inter alia lessons from the pogroms, the need for emergence of 'a new Jew' who would show by his conduct that he is 'a son of kings', who is ready to either die or capture the mountain, believing in the Jewish national right over the Land of Israel on both banks of the Jordan, as well as in the rights of its Arab and Christian inhabitants. These and other ideological principles appear in his poetry alongside a war of words with the Zionist left.