A Well-Read Woman

She wrote to W. Zev Bronner in San Francisco: “It is hard to adequately put into words the hopelessness and [ugliness] and sordidness of the situation to anyone who has not seen it in person. And yet, I do not wish it to anybody to live here under present conditions . . . I am beginning to feel as if living in San Francisco or Seattle was living in a fairy land compared with this nightmare here.”7

On February 22, Ben Yehuda Street was bombed, just a few blocks away from where Ruth lived. She wrote an article describing the wreckage and the tragic story of a five-year-old girl who survived but lost her family. She enclosed it in a letter to Victor Bloom, the owner of the Jewish Tribune newspaper in San Francisco, asking if he was interested in publishing a weekly dispatch from her and requesting that he send press credentials.8 Although she didn’t hear back from him and had no idea if he had published her article, she sent more. Another article of hers did appear in the Jewish Tribune in March under the title “Jerusalem, a Besieged City,” along with her letter to Bloom.9 This one described her visit to a newspaper office and how one hour afterward the man she had spoken with there was shot on a bus. Ruth wrote that the British did not report or count his murder or the murder of other civilians in Jerusalem. She closed her letter to Bloom with a plea to the Tribune’s audience: “I do hope that the article will convey something to your readers, and help to move them to action, or if they are active, to more action.”10 Ruth was also unsure of whether the “Destination Palestine” trip sponsored by the Jewish Tribune would happen.11 As she remembered it later, she sent a telegram to those planning the trip that said, “War broke out, stay home.”12

As in Leipzig, Ruth once again faced a dangerous situation and, instead of avoiding it, wanted to witness it and describe it to others. Reflecting on this much later, she stated, “People sort of sometimes say . . . I seem to be war-prone. And I frequently get this business of, aren’t you scared? And you know, I’m not scared. You know why? I pretend I’m a spectator. I’m not in this war; I’m watching this war. And that gets me off the hook—I don’t have to worry

.”13 Ruth lamented the constant gunshots, bombings, rationing, and the depressed mood of Jews in Palestine. The frequent battles frayed her nerves, but she never felt as though she would be killed or hurt. She told her friends that she hoped the US would get involved in the conflict and that every American Jew should do more to support the new state.

Because she had departed so suddenly from San Francisco, Ruth had left many of her belongings in her apartment, but she had planned on her friends and roommates sending her some things and packing and shipping the rest to Seattle. Ruth ultimately lost many items and grew frustrated with people whom she had trusted to carry out these tasks. Her letters also reveal her demanding personality: asking friends to do laundry lists of favors, including shipping food to her sister Clara, developing her negatives, contacting the IRS about her new situation, and shipping clothing and supplies she could not get in Jerusalem. She always enclosed blank checks or offered to reimburse any expenses and encouraged friends to send items that she could sell for them in Jerusalem at a big markup. At least one friend responded exasperated that Ruth expected too much and had left a mess for others to pick up. Coupled with many letters lost in the mail, Ruth began to doubt if she had any real friends in San Francisco.14

Ruth had accumulated substantial savings along with her inheritance from her uncle Carl. But due to the high cost of living, she was losing money quickly. She was soon desperate for a job and inquired around Tel Aviv and Jerusalem for journalism positions. Before she left the US, many people had given her names of people in Palestine to contact about jobs, but these opportunities did not pan out. She did not know Hebrew, and many employers did not want to hire during the uncertainty of the war. She also blamed Fred for holding her back in her search for a job.15 In the spring of 1948, she was planning on coming back to the US in July unless she got a permanent, decent job. In April, Ruth was offered a trial job to replace an Acme United Press photographer who was killed in Jerusalem. She wrote in her diary about this opportunity: “It pays very little, but promises to be interesting—although I know so little about photography it is not even funny—but then, I did not know anything about the Transcript job and got it and kept it.”16 She was also concerned that she would not be able to keep any of the negatives or prints she shot, which she hoped she would be able to use later for a speaking tour. She made plans to photograph a Haganah training camp for Acme United Press, but worried about her decision: “All seems to be settled, except that something in me is too apathetic for me to pull myself together & to become enthusiastic. I think I’m scared of this job, I don’t feel equipped for it. I am not afraid of the danger but of the flopping.”17 But she managed to confront these fears and took photos of which she was proud. She attended press conferences in Jerusalem where she met other journalists and leaders of the Jewish forces.

These war correspondents were part of an international network of men who had covered the Spanish Civil War and World War II. Many of them were leftists, if not outright Communists. They had traveled the world and risked their lives to capture images and stories of some of the most tragic and poignant moments of the twentieth century. They had seen their acquaintances and friends—and as in photographer Robert Capa’s case, also their lovers—killed in action. Many in this group no doubt suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder. Many others likely felt an emptiness after World War II had ended. Some had tried to cover regular civilian life or Hollywood, but they yearned to get back to documenting another world event. The war in Palestine proved to be what they craved, and in the case of Capa and other Jewish journalists, it would have a deep, personal connection to their lives.18

Capa had taught Ruth how to use a camera.19 They may have connected over their Jewish childhoods in Europe, and she was probably aware of his famous photo of the death of an American soldier on a balcony of an apartment in Leipzig, but she mentioned him only twice, briefly, in her diary.20 Ruth could go toe to toe with these journalists, and her quick wit and willingness to go out drinking and dancing with them helped her gain acceptance in their circle. But she could never shake the feeling that her skills were not quite up to snuff, that she didn’t have their worldly experiences, or that they saw her only as an obnoxious hanger-on, a woman who was not a true equal.

In May 1948 Ruth went on a press trip with forty other journalists and photographers to Katamon, an Arabic section of Jerusalem where there had been recent fighting.21 The group was not allowed into the area, however. Ruth later went back by herself and discovered that “a friendly smile to a commanding officer means much more than dozens of press cards.”22 The officer showed her around and allowed her to take photographs. Ruth realized she saw a dead Iraqi lying in the grass, the first dead body she had ever seen.23 She was disgusted but took a photograph of it. After discussing it with her Acme United Press editor, Dave Boyer, she realized that the photo was evidence that Jews had violated the Red Cross rules against abandoning casualties. For two days she panicked, fearing her press card would be revoked and that she, the officer, or members of the Red Cross would be in trouble. She found out later that the Red Crescent (Arabic Red Cross) insisted on removing their own bodies but that the Jewish forces had not allowed them in—“Typical Jewish bungling,” Ruth wrote. The incident caused her to realize the serious ethical and moral issues that war journalists faced: “Everything is confused, blunders are made, information leaks quickly, & is apt to be given out without being conscious of it. Extreme care must be used, and chances are [that] the source of the crazy military rules and prohibitions that do not seem to make sense are quite necessary.”24 Ruth realized she still had a lot to learn about war journalism, and although she was eager to succeed at this new job, the experience she had gained in Seattle had left her ill prepared to cover such a fraught and dangerous situation.

On May 14, British troops officially left Palestine and Jews declared independence, creating the state of Israel. Ruth wrote of her increasing alienation from these landmark events, “Well, this is supposed to be the historic day—Independence day—The Birth of a Nation—the beginning of the Jewish State, only being right on the spot the glamour is lacking.”25 The same day, Ruth wrote about the continued fighting and how she had taken pictures of the boys manning the Spandau machine gun on the roof of her apartment building. She observed, “It is all so unreal[,] almost like a cheap book or movie thriller.”26

She continued to worry about “flopping” at her job. Despite the momentous events taking place in Israel, Ruth admitted she had done nothing for two days and should have gone to Tel Aviv but either could not or would not leave, because the city was still under siege. She explained in her diary the new political situation: “In Jerusalem we now have martial law—well, rather Jewish martial law, [which I’d rather have] over my head than foreign. America already recognized the Jewish State. Perhaps we shall get some help from there. It will soon be over with victory or no hope! The sun shines, the birds sing, and the bullets whizz while the cannons roar.”27 When the British troops left, Jews took over the official buildings for their new government. The Jewish Agency took on the role of providing information to the press. Due to her proximity to people in power, Ruth was beginning to pull back the curtain and realize that Jewish governance did not guarantee an ethical, fair system that could guarantee basic security for its citizens. She grew increasingly concerned that the residents of Jerusalem were being sacrificed to make a larger point to the world. She was outraged: “Things are not going so well, and . . . there is a terrific censorship in the country! Easy enough for the bigshots to say if necessary they will turn Jerusalem into a second Stalingrad—but who will survive it? And afterwards—who will get Jerusalem? Not the Jews! So why all this sacrifice?”28

Ruth had to battle Israel’s inaugural spokesman, Gershon Hirsch, to obtain a new press pass. He claimed he needed to confirm her status, even though her Acme United Press colleague, Leo Turner, had already done so. Hirsch also joked it might take her five years to get a pass and asked why she needed one anyway if she was a photographer.29 It is unclear why he gave her so much trouble, but it appears likely that it was because she was a woman. When she was locked out of one press conference, she passed the time in another room with another woman, Shoshannah Rothblatt, a correspondent for Hadassah Magazine, who might have also been barred.30

In her diary Ruth admitted that her strongest desires were professional success and recognition. As she worried about her job and whether she should go to Tel Aviv to seek out a new opportunity, she wondered if coming to Palestine was a mistake and if she could have done better by staying in the US:

Palestine and Jerusalem are a smaller pond even than Seattle, but after 5 months I have not even started to swim—I have had a few splashy dives, but that is all—now I’m afraid I’m going to drown. Tel Aviv or Haifa are my last hope—either I do good or I go home defeated. I guess I crave recognition and being known more than anything else—especially since I tasted it in Seattle.31

As Ruth waited to get her press pass, she mostly stayed at home, because it was too dangerous to go out. To pass the time, she read many books, including the German translation of I, Claudius by Robert Graves. She missed going to the press conferences and panicked as mortars hit her apartment building and bullets flew into her room’s open windows. Her isolation and boredom spiraled into depression: “I don’t know, I have the blues and have them badly—I have never felt so sad and alone and lonely, so low—it’s more than just a bad head cold, or no food for 5 months, I feel as if I carried the sadness of a thousand years on my back.”32 She began to question the point of it all. A week after Israel declared its independence, Ruth prophetically explained, “I shudder to think of the aftermath[,] when all the casualties, dead and crippled are going to be known, the poverty & the hatred that will follow, both among the Arabs and the Jews. I wonder if it will really have been worth all this to get a state.”33 Even her belief in Zionism was beginning to crack. She had built her life and her identity around this cause, and she wondered whom she would become if she could not continue her support in good faith:

The way I feel about Palestine and have felt about it ever since I first came here really means a disillusionment of many years’ belief, and even to myself I am not ready to admit it, I keep thinking these are abnormal times, I have not met the right people, etc. … if I go back home now I could not possibly continue being a Zionist, and after all these year[s], it would just be as if part of my life were missing if suddenly I would say nothing any more about Zionism, the great Jewish experiment, the solution of the Jewish problem—oh, it is all such a vicious circle—where does it start and where does it end, and what is going to become of me?34

She admitted that she did not celebrate Jewish holidays. In her diary there is no mention of her attending a synagogue, altho

ugh she did write that she missed American celebrations of both Jewish and Christian holidays, if only because they came with parties and feelings of connection with friends and relatives. Ruth seems to have led a completely secular life in Jerusalem and questioned her identity as a Jew and her allegiance to other Jews: “Sometimes I begin to wonder, maybe the Jews deserve what they are getting here. I know this is wicked, but they are such little mean people, taken up with their own importance, everybody mistrusts everybody else, everybody cheats everybody else out of their last penny, everybody tries to get the better of everybody else, everything is based on ‘Protektia—protection’ that is all.”35 She had always defined herself as a Jew first. She hadn’t always gotten along with other Jews, but the fact that they could treat each other so horribly in this new environment—finally, a Jewish state—was a shock to both her identity and worldview.

Ruth repeatedly wrote that Fred would come into her room and “paw” at her in bed and described other acts that we would now refer to as sexual harassment or abuse. The fact that Fred was a relative made the situation worse, as the boundaries between family, friendship, and sexual relationships began to blur. Jewish tradition held that when a married man died, his brother should marry the widow. Mirjam probably could not have conceived of marrying Fred after Max’s death, but perhaps Fred looked toward Mirjam and Ruth as his only options. Ruth lived with Fred because she seems to have had no other place to live, and she could not escape his constant presence in her own home. Initially Ruth questioned why she was not attracted to Fred and why she felt guilty about it. Was it that she just wasn’t over Jim? She realized that maybe she was acting toward Fred the way Jim had toward her. She mulled over ways to explain to Fred that they just weren’t suited to each other, deciding to tell him that she was an extrovert and he was an introvert. After months of trying to be polite, Ruth decided she had to be firm. She wrote, “I hesitated & then decided that since this utterly foolish relationship and behavior must stop sooner or later it might as well be now. I had intended to do it painlessly, but that won’t work—so—it must be done with ‘Ach & Krach’ [by the skin of my teeth].”36

Fred had grown increasingly jealous of Ruth’s interactions with other people, especially men. As she began to meet other journalists and new and old friends in the city, they recognized her on the street and would often stop to chat. Strangers stared at her nice clothes, and she went out to cafés and bars, as she hated to sit at home. These interactions left Fred fuming, and Ruth complained about his outbursts, crying, and sullen moods. His standoffish attitude toward her new friends and colleagues was downright embarrassing to her. Ruth wrote about what once happened after she came home from a party with other journalists: “[Fred made] a quiet, but nonetheless terrible scene, quietly sobbing away. So I gave way, with the result that he did not let me sleep a wink, kept on pawing and pawing me, until I almost screamed. I was so tired and strained I thought my nerves would burst.”37 Even though she projected an outward image of an independent, confident single woman, Ruth still struggled to say no to Fred.

Jim Pringle, a fellow journalist, asked Ruth on a date to a party at the Sebria, a restaurant and bar.38 When they arrived, she was surprised that Carter Davidson, head of the Associated Press bureau in Jerusalem, knew who she was. She also met journalist Roy C. Carlson, who had written the bestseller Under Cover, in which he described his infiltration of right-wing American groups with pro-Nazi leanings before the war. Carlson was actually the Armenian-born Avedis Derounian. Roy C. Carlson was one of many pseudonyms he used for his investigative work. When Ruth met him in 1948, he was infiltrating the Arabic neighborhoods in Jerusalem for his book Cairo to Damascus, which would be published in 1951 under the name John Roy Carlson. In the book, he admits to sneaking over to the Jewish side of Jerusalem to sleep at the YMCA, since there was no comfortable lodging in the Arabic neighborhoods. At the party, Carlson monopolized Ruth’s attention, to the point where she felt she had committed a faux pas with Pringle. Carlson even invited her to come along with him to take photos. After drinking, dancing, and having a good conversation, Ruth later wrote, “[I] had a swell time—the kind of time I am used to & that one can have every place if one knows the right people.”39 But when she got home, Fred told her, “If you want to be a public whore, at least don’t let the whole house know it by returning at 3 a.m.” He had also read her personal letters to Jim. Ruth was “too crushed and disgusted” to say anything and went to bed but comforted him later that night anyway. It would not be the only time during her two years in Israel that she would be called a slut or prostitute. As a single woman who often traveled without an escort, socialized with men in bars and restaurants, and had her own money, Ruth was vulnerable to these gendered insults.

About two weeks after the party, Ruth again ran into “the great” Roy C. Carlson, as she sarcastically called him. She realized he was spying for both sides and getting paid for it. In their conversation Carlson admitted that if he had known earlier that Fred was her brother-in-law and not her “lover,” he would have given her food and cigarettes. Ruth expressed her outrage at this presumption: “If he thinks he has a chance to sleep with me, then I can get things [from him]—God—what has the world come to. Am I just waking up? Have I been completely naïve and asleep all these years?”40 This was only one of the many, in fact almost daily, humiliating propositions she would be on the receiving end of throughout her time in Israel.

At the end of May, Fred attempted to commit suicide by hanging himself in the kitchen of their apartment. The rope broke, and when Ruth came home she found him lying on the floor.41 She claimed that she was really through with him and that it was clear he was mentally ill. Two days later Fred joined the Israeli air force, and Ruth hoped that the experience would be good for him.42 Over the next few months, Ruth would take steps to cut Fred out of her life, although she would run into him occasionally. In letters to friends, she referred to Fred’s suicide attempt as an example of the awful dating scene in Israel. Disgusted with him, she would remind herself repeatedly to not behave toward any man the way that Fred had toward her: as an obsessive stalker manipulating her with all kinds of efforts to win her over, even with pity.

On the eve of her twenty-fifth birthday, Ruth summed up her general dissatisfaction with her life:

What achievement? Nothing! My own life disorganized—not finished with school—not married—no job—no place to live because I want to or like it! In San Francisco? Half washed up with my sudden departure! In Seattle? Who knows, maybe forgotten or half? In Palestine not a friend outside of Fred—whose friendship is too much of a burden to be enjoyable. My sister? Not giving a damn, but then, I don’t either, really! Jim? All washed up—Fred—soon to be washed up! My money? Soon spent—Next what? Rather a poor inventory, Rappaport, at 25 you might have managed better! Oh, what do I know—no place at home, no place happy, nowhere satisfied? So, what is the difference then where I am or what I do. Why feel so sorry for myself? Papa used to say “Wie man sich bettet so schläft man” [you’ve made your bed, now lie in it]—o.k. so I do, then why must I feel so sorry for myself? Oh hell, I’m so miserable and lonely and lonesome, it’s more, it’s almost frustrated, dissatisfied—but with what? Myself? The war? My inability to make an adjustment here in Palestine below the surface?43

Ruth seemed to blame herself for all her problems, and in her many complaints across her journals she seemed to understand that being a Jew and a woman was at the heart of her troubles, and slowly a consciousness of the discrimination she faced began to emerge. The allusion to her father is just one of two brief mentions of him in her voluminous diaries across two years in Israel. She had learned of her parents’ murders in concentration camps two years before, but she never wrote about it, even in her diary, unless those pages did not survive or Ruth later destroyed them. Her loneliness, while possibly the result of her lack of friends or a boyfriend, may also point to her grief about her parents, which may have seemed unspeakable.

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Ruth grew increasingly concerned that she was still single at age twenty-five. She regularly received letters from friends who updated her on their weddings, new babies, and houses. Surely she must have felt somewhat left behind as they entered these new stages of life. She was not immune to the enormous pressure of the American postwar drive to settle down into a steady life of family and job security. But she questioned if that was what she wanted anyway. When she contemplated a future with someone like Fred, she wrote, “I don’t know why I cannot just be happy living a quiet life without trying to be something or somebody. Why do I keep complicating my life so much?”44

In June 1948 Ruth met Viktor Radnicky in a café in Jerusalem and “something went click.”45 He was a Communist Czech photographer on an assignment in Israel and a friend of Robert Capa’s. Later at the Press Information Office, a division of Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, he told her that he was going to Tel Aviv. She wrote, “Already then, though not deliberately, I wanted to hurry to TA to get to know him better.” Desperate to get away from Fred a few days later, she hitchhiked to Tel Aviv by herself without saying goodbye to him. She made it to a friend’s house, where she showered and ate, then went to see Hadassah in Holon and another friend, where “both acted as if they saw a ghost coming up.”46

Ruth had lost thirty-five pounds while in Jerusalem and often wrote of the intense hunger, food rations, and awful food she subsisted on. At her memorial service in 2010, many friends reminisced and joked about her food-hoarding habits and her repeated requests for friends to drive her to Costco. One woman said that she had once asked Ruth why she did this, and Ruth had replied, “I was hungry once. And I never want to be hungry again.” The woman presumed Ruth was referring to when she had jumped off the train in Switzerland, but Ruth more likely was remembering her experience in Jerusalem.47