Last modified: 2004-12-29 by santiago dotor
Keywords: proposal | star: 6 points (blue outlined) | star: 6 points (white outlined) | triangle: hoist (white) | canton (israel) |
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Zeljko Heimer asked about flag designs he saw in Ha'Degel (The Flag), a 1948 Israeli book (in Hebrew) [Nimtza-bi 1948]. The designs were all in blue and white and incorporated the Israel flag in one way or other. I recently located the book at the National Library and found out that these designs are the author's suggestions for a flag for Israel. He explains that since the Zionist Movement as a political movement would still exist, its flag could not become the flag of Israel as a state. In this situation the Zionists in the Diaspora would be using a flag of a foreign nation which would raise the problem of loyalty. So the flag of Hebrew nationalism and Zionism and the flag of the State of Israel should be distinct, but the latter could incorporate the former, as in the designs illustrated.
I do not know what was done with the suggested designs in the book, but I read elsewhere that the Provisional Government had this consideration in mind too and for that reason the Israeli national flag was officially proclaimed only in October while the merchant flag was adopted in May. Eventually the Zionist flag did became the national flag and indeed in some places and times the Zionists had problems.
Nahum Shereshevsky, 8 September 1997
After receiving the book named Ha'Degel from Nahum, there are some remarks about the Israel proposals' images sent by Zeljko Heimer. Those proposals are from the above mentioned book (written by M. Nimtza-bi in 1948) and are based on his idea that using the Zionist Movement flag (also used as the Jewish nation flag) as the national flag of Isreal could cause troubles to Jews in the diaspora since when they should use the flag as the Jewish nation flag they would be using a foreign country's flag, a thing that might be not be acceptable by local authorities. Therefore, the writer suggested to use the flag as a basis for a new national flag and he brought eight examples.
Dov Gutterman, 20 February 1999
From the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs Flag and Emblem webpage:
In July 1948, Mordechai Nimtza-bi, an expert on heraldry, published a book entitled The Flag, in which he sought to determine the appropriate design for the nat