A SIGNIFICANTLY DIFFERENT VERSION of the Rhodesian drama, in which the Zionist role is explained at some length, is presented in a book published in Zimbabwe, formerly Rhodesia: Majuta by a Jew, B.A. Kosmin, with the sub-title: A History of the Jewish Community in Zimbabwe.
The author makes no secret of .the fact that in Rhodesia long before the unilateral declaration of independence (UDI) the terms Jew and Zionist were, as he puts it, “almost interchangeable.” He tells us that in 1967, when . the Rhodesians were already feeling the bite of UN-imposed economic sanctions, the, President of the Central African Zionist Organization (CAZO), Mr. A.E. Abramson led a delegation to Prime Minister Ian Smith “to inform him of their planned manpower and financial aid to Israel”, a move which, he adds, “achieved the desired results.”
In the 1930’s, says Dr. Kosmin, the per capita monetary contribution of Rhodesian Jews to the Zionist cause was the highest in the world, “a tradition maintained into the 1970’s in spite of sanctions, which had virtually placed the country in a state of siege.”
Equally disproportionate, it would seem, was the attention lavished on Rhodesia, with its tiny Jewish population, by the world’s Zionist leaders: we read that visitors to the country included Chaim Weizmann, Vladimir Jabotinsky, Nahum Sokolov, Moshe Sharett, Nahum Goldmann, Norman Bentwich, Cecil Roth, Generals Moshe Dayan, Yigal Allon, Chaim Hertzog and Ezer Weizmann.