Tony Cliff

Tony Cliff
Tony Cliff in 1986
Born	Yigael Gluckstein 20 May 1917
Died	9 April 2000 (aged 82)

Tony Cliff (born Yigael Gluckstein (Hebrew: יגאל גליקשטיין‎‎); May 20, 1917 – April 9, 2000) was a Trotskyist activist. Born to a Jewish family in Palestine, he moved to Britain in 1947 and by the end of the 1950s had assumed the pen name of Tony Cliff. A founding member of the Socialist Review Group, which eventually became the Socialist Workers Party, in 1977 Cliff became effectively the leader.

Tony Cliff was born Yigael Gluckstein in Zikhron Ya'akov in the Ottoman Empire's Mutasarrifate of Jerusalem, now part of Israel, during World War I, the son of Esther and Akiva Gluckstein, Jewish immigrants from Poland. He had two brothers and a sister. He grew up in British-ruled Mandatory Palestine and in his youth came to identify with Communism, though he never joined the Communist Party of Palestine, as he had not met any of its members before becoming a socialist activist. However, he did join the socialist-Zionist youth movement Hashomer Hatzair, and soon became not only a Trotskyist in 1933, but also a confirmed opponent of Zionism. Along with other Hashomer Hatzair members, he joined the illegal Palestine Revolutionary Communist League, necessitating the use of several pseudonyms in three languages.

During World War II Gluckstein was imprisoned by the British authorities. After his release he moved to Britain in 1947, but was never able to become a citizen and remained a stateless person. To the end of his life he spoke English with a distinct Israeli accent. He was for a while deported to the Republic of Ireland and was only permitted to take up British residency due to the status of Chanie Rosenberg, his wife, as a British citizen. Living in London he again became active with the Revolutionary Communist Party, on to the leadership of which he had been co-opted. For most purposes Gluckstein was a supporter of the leadership of the RCP around Jock Haston, and as such he was involved with the discussions concerning the nature of those states dominated by Russia and the Communist parties initiated by a faction within the RCP. This debate was linked to other discussions on the nationalised industries in Britain and the increasingly critical stance of Haston and the RCP as to the leadership of the Fourth International with regard to Eastern Europe and Yugoslavia in particular.