Haim Arlosoroff (23 February 1899 – 16 June 1933; also known as Chaim Arlozorov; Hebrew: חיים ארלוזורוב) was a Socialist Zionist leader of the Yishuv during the British Mandate for Palestine, prior to the establishment of Israel, and head of the Political Department of the Jewish Agency.

In Germany, he became a key leader of Hapoel Hatzair (also Ha-Po'el ha-Tza'ir, Hebrew for "The Young Worker"),[4] a socialist political party which attracted many of the intellectuals of the time.

In the midst of Arab rioting, Arlosoroff stood in defence of Neve Shalom, a Jewish settlement adjacent to Tel Aviv and Jaffa.

[4] Following the riots, Arlosoroff called upon the Zionist establishment to no longer deny the reality of an Arab national movement existing in Mandatory Palestine.

[12] Arlosoroff would ultimately come to the position that strength-based compromise with neighboring Arabs would not weaken or undermine efforts to establish a Jewish national homeland.

In 1929, the consciously aggressive Betar Youth Movement, organized under Ze'ev Jabotinsky's Union of Revisionist Zionists, took part in a coalition to assertively enforce and enlarge a Jewish presence in the proximity of the Western Wall.

[20] In a private letter to Weizmann dated June 30, 1932, Arlosoroff wrote candidly of his serious concerns for the future success of the Zionist enterprise in Mandatory Palestine.

[21] His correspondence, written in a clearly anguished tone, alerted Weizmann to the possibility that the ability to expand Jewish settlements under the ruling British Administration could, in Arlosoroff’s observation, completely collapse in a short time under certain circumstances.

[36] Immediately following an organized Nazi boycott of Jewish businesses in Germany on April 1, 1933, Arlosoroff contacted High Commissioner Sir Arthur Wauchope requesting Britain's intervention in the crisis.

Arlosoroff asked Wauchope to consider that supplementary immigration visas for Mandatory Palestine be granted to Jewish people seeking refuge from Hitler's Reich.

According to historian Edwin Black, this was because Reich officials were concerned that fleeing Jewish refugees would lend large numbers to a growing international movement for the economic boycott of Nazi Germany.

[35] Hitler's government perceived that organized efforts by Jews to boycott German products on an international basis constituted a potential threat to the newly established Reich.

[39] Seeking to overcome strict government restrictions preventing the removal of German capital from the country,[40] Arlosoroff proposed a plan which would enable Jewish refugees to emigrate legally from Germany to Mandatory Palestine and salvage a portion of their property assets in the process.

Arlosoroff contended, that in the absence of such an agreement, Jewish people attempting to flee Nazi persecution would be compelled to seek out illegal methods to remove their assets from Germany, thus potentially putting all their financial resources at risk.

In the eyes of the Nazi leadership, the remote British-controlled territory appeared to be a "dumping-ground" suitable to isolate thousands of anti-Hitler Jewish refugees from the world's political arena.

[19] In addition, a financial agreement with Zionist leaders for the transfer of the refugees would help bolster a German economy adversely affected by anti-Nazi boycotts.

[46][47] Reich officials hoped to curtail the harmful impact of the anti-Nazi boycotts and invigorate the German financial system[48] by establishing an agreement with Jewish Agency representatives and other parties with shared interests.

In late April 1933, Germany's Consul-General in Mandatory Palestine, Heinrich Wolff, began resolute efforts to work out the details between various parties for what would eventually become the controversial Ha'avara "Transfer" Agreement.

[49] At that time, Arlosoroff contacted Consul-General Wolff's office in Jerusalem on the Jewish Agency's behalf to obtain a "letter of introduction" to initiate discussions with Nazi authorities in Berlin.

Approximately a year after Arlosoroff's successors and German Reich officials formalized the Ha'avara Agreement, a substantial economic reaction began to take place in Mandatory Palestine.

[61] Jewish immigrants from Germany, upon their arrival in Mandatory Palestine, were able to receive back in cash approximately 42% of their original invested funds during the Ha'avara Agreement's early years of implementation.

[64] Shortly after this controversy came to light, in March 1936 a new organization known as INTRIA (International Trade and Investment Agency Ltd.) was formed to operate in conjunction with the Ha'avara Agreement to distribute German exports beyond Mandatory Palestine.

Over a period of time, some of Hitler's elite Nazi entourage, including Adolf Eichmann, began to deeply regret Germany's participation in the Ha'avara endeavors.

[66] Despite vigorous Nazi Party efforts to interfere with the Ha'avara Agreement's progress, transfer operations continued until the beginning of World War II in 1939.

[68][69][70] In addition, the Ha'avara Agreement transferred approximately $100 million to the Yishuv within Mandatory Palestine, which helped establish an industrial infrastructure for what would eventually become the modern Jewish State.

[72] Abba Ahimeir, the head of an activist group with fascist tendencies,[73] the Brit HaBirionim, was charged by the Palestine Police Force with plotting the assassination.

On the same day that the murder took place, Ahimeir's newspaper published an article highly critical of Arlosoroff's negotiations with Nazi Germany, stating that the Jewish people "will know today how to react to this crime".

[71][76] Stavsky's defense accused the police of manipulating the widow's testimony and other evidence for political reasons, and expounded the theory that the murder was connected to an intended sexual attack on Sima Arlosoroff by two young Palestinians.

[78] Some 50 years after the murder, following the publication of a book on the assassination by Shabtai Teveth in 1982,[79] the Israeli government, under the leadership of Menachem Begin as the Prime Minister, established a formal Judicial Commission of Enquiry to reinvestigate Arlosoroff's death.

An 8-foot tall bronze monument dedicated to the legacy of Dr. Haim Arlosoroff stands at the Tel Aviv shoreline promenade where he was fatally wounded.