Colonial planners blamed colonized subjects, not the vision, for project failure.

Evidence

According to the historian Gideon Ofrat, the Ben Shemen colony was the first attempt to fulfil Schatz’s vision of a healthy natural life in an artists’ colony combining art and nature. Yet the Yemenites of Ben Shemen, he argues, did not yearn for a “natural” life; they neglected the land given to them and were reluctant to work in agriculture altogether. Moreover, their discipline at work proved lax, they were not accustomed to European standards and rules, their products were of poor quality, and their social life as a community left much to be desired. In short, according to this analysis the fault was not in the vision but in the attempt to force it on the “wrong” people. — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 602

Categorization

• QUESTION: Did later historians (postcolonial readings) challenge Ofrat’s framing? Worth chasing for how Zionist historiography handles this blame-distribution.