ZIONISM: NATIONALISM OF AND THEODOR

LEE BIH NI

First Edition, 2014 © Lee Bih Ni

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Chapter Contents Page ______

Chapter 1 Theodor Herlz 5  Introduction  Early life  Zionist Leader  Death and burial  and Altneuland (There Jude State And )  Family  He never did return to  Theodor (Binyamin Ze‘ev) Herzl (1860 - 1904)  The  A Movement Is Started  Uganda Isn‘t  Herzl‘s Family  Conclusion

Chapter 2 and 29  Introduction  Capsule  Pre-Zionism  Spinoza and Zionism  Emancipation and Zionism  Proto-Zionism  British Zionism   Zionism of Sephardic Jews  Early Zionism  and Zionism  Proto-Zionism and the "First Aliya"  The and Zionism  Foundational Zionism o and the Foundation of the Zionist Movement  Conclusion

Chapter 3 Streams in Zionism 51  Introduction Political Zionism  Territorial Zionism   Practical Zionism   The Second and Socialist Zionism  Zionism and the conquest of labor  Zionism in WW I  Mandatory Zionism

 Zionism in America  The split in Zionism  Jewish Immigration under the Mandate  The Jewish Agency  Zionism and the  Zionism, the Arab Revolt and the Conflict With Britain  Zionism during the Holocaust  Post-State Zionism  Zionism, the Establishment of Israel and the Palestinian Refugee Question  The UN Partition Resolution and Israeli Legitimacy  The Holocaust and anti-Zionism  Jabotinsky's warnings went largely unheeded.  Zionism After the Establishment of the State of Israel  Zionism after the Six Day War  Zionism after the Yom Kippur War  Post-Zionism  Anti-Zionism  Jewish Anti-Zionism  Communist Anti-Zionism  "Zionism is Racism"  Apartheid Israel  Anti-Zionism and Anti-Semitism  Revival of Zionism  Conclusion

Chapter 4 Zionism Is Seen As A Racist Ideology Like All Nationalism 83

 Introduction o The - 1896 o Theodor Herzl's Program for Zionism  OUR  Nationalism and racism  Origins and definition of Zionism  Zionism in the State of Israel  Why Zionism Is Racism?  Focus on ~Zionism and Racism  Conclusion

Chapter 5 Zionism and the creation of Israel 105

 Introduction  False beliefs about Zionism  Background his  Proto-Zionism  Early Zionists  Zionism and the Arabs

 Zionism and the Conflict With Britain  Anti-Zionism  The  Zionism and the Formation of the State of Israel  Israel Today  Conclusion

Chapter 6 Coclusion: Zionism And Nationalism of Jews 131

 A so-called ‗Jewish State‘  Betrayal, plus ‗divide and rule‘  Growth of the Arab National Movement  Israeli expansionism and land grabs  Zionism — an anti-working class, pro-imperialist movement  Lack of working class leadership the main Arab fault  Arafat and the PLO

Chapter 1

Theodor Herlz

Introduction

Theodor Herzl (May 2, 1860 – July 3, 1904), born Benjamin Ze‘ev Herzl (also known in Hebrew as "Visionary of the State") was an Austro-Hungarian journalist and writer. He is the father of modern political Zionism and in effect the foundation of the State of Israel.

Early life

He was born in Pest, , to a Jewish family originally from Zimony (today , ), which was then part of Austria-Hungary. He was the second child of Jeanette and Jakob Herzl, who were German-speaking, assimilated Jews. He aspired to follow in the footsteps of , builder of the . However, he did not succeed in the sciences, and thus, developed a growing enthusiasm for poetry and the humanities. This passion would later develop into a successful career in and a less-celebrated pursuit of play-writing.1

Herzl had minimal interest in religious as a child, consistent with his parents‘ lax adherence to the Jewish tradition. His mother relied more on German humanist Kultur than Jewish ethics. Instead of a Bar Mitzvah, Herzl's thirteenth birthday was advertised as a "confirmation". He grew up as a "thoroughly emancipated, antitraditional, secular, would-be German boy," who dismissed all religion, and spoke of Judaism with mocking cynicism. He exhibited a secularist disdain toward religion, which he viewed as uncivilized. Even after becoming interested in the "," Herzl's writing retained traces of Jewish self- contempt. According to ,2 Herzl considered himself to be atheist.

In 1878, after the death of his sister, Pauline, Herzl's family moved to , Austria-Hungary. In Vienna, Herzl studied law.

As a young law student, Herzl became a member of the German nationalist Burschenschaft (fraternity) Albia, which had the motto Ehre, Freiheit, Vaterland ("Honor, Freedom, Fatherland"). He later resigned in protest of the organisation's anti-Semitism.

1 Elon, Amos (1975). Herzl, p.21-22, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ISBN 978-0-03-013126-4. 2 Ibid, p.23

After a brief legal career in Vienna and ,3 he devoted himself to journalism and , working as a correspondent for the Neue Freie Presse in Paris, occasionally making special trips to and Constantinople. Later on, he became literary editor of Neue Freie Presse, and wrote several comedies and dramas for the Viennese stage. His early work did not focus on Jewish life. It was of the feuilleton order, descriptive rather than political.4

Zionist Leader

As the Paris correspondent for Neue Freie Presse, Herzl followed the Dreyfus Affair, a notorious anti-Semitic incident in France in which a French Jewish army captain was falsely convicted of spying for . Herzl witnessed mass rallies in Paris following the Dreyfus trial, where many chanted "Death to the Jews!" Herzl came to reject his early ideas regarding and assimilation, and to believe that the Jews must remove themselves from Europe and create their own state.5 There is, however, some debate on the extent to which Herzl was really influenced by the Dreyfus Affair. Indeed, some claim, such as Kornberg, that this is a myth that Herzl did not feel necessary to deflate, and that he also believed that Dreyfus was guilty.6

June, 1895, he wrote in his diary: "In Paris, as I have said, I achieved a freer attitude toward anti-Semitism... Above all, I recognized the emptiness and futility of trying to 'combat' anti-Semitism." However, in recent decades historians have downplayed the influence of the Dreyfus Affair on Herzl, even terming it a myth. They have shown that, while upset by anti-Semitism evident in French society, he, like most contemporary observers, initially believed in Dreyfus's guilt and only claimed to have been inspired by the affair years later when it had become an international cause celebre. Rather, it was the rise to power of the anti-Semitic demagogue Karl Lueger in Vienna in 1895 that seems to have had a greater effect on Herzl, before the pro-Dreyfus campaign had fully emerged. It was at this time that he wrote his play "The New Ghetto", which shows the ambivalence and lack of real security and equality of emancipated, well-to-do Jews in Vienna. Around this time Herzl

3 "Theodor Herzl (1860-1904". . Retrieved 2009-08-08. "He received a doctorate in law in 1884 and worked for a short while in courts in Vienna and Salzburg." 4 M. Reich-Ranicki, Mein Leben, (München 2001, DTV GmbH & C0. - ISBN 3-423-12830-5), 64. 5 Rubenstein, Richard L., and Roth, John K. (2003). Approaches to Auschwitz: The Holocaust and Its Legacy, p. 94. Louisville. Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press. ISBN 0-664-22353-2. 6 Theodor Herzl: A Reevaluation, Jacques Kornberg in The Journal of Modern History, Vol. 52, No. 2 (Jun., 1980), pp. 226-252 Published by the University of Chicago Press jstor.org

grew to believe that anti-Semitism could not be defeated or cured, only avoided, and that the only way to avoid it was the establishment of a Jewish state.7

Beginning in late 1895, Herzl wrote Der Judenstaat, (The Jewish State). It was published February, 1896 to immediate acclaim and controversy. In the book he outlines the reasons for the Jewish people, who so desire, to leave Europe, either for or for their historic homeland, Israel, which he seems to prefer. The book and Herzl's ideas spread very rapidly throughout the Jewish world and attracted international attention. Supporters of existing Zionist movements such as the were immediately drawn to, and allied with, Herzl. Conversely, Herzl and his ideas were vilified by establishment Jewry who perceive his ideas both as threatening to their efforts at acceptance and integration in their resident countries and as rebellion against the will of God.

In Der Judenstaat he writes:

― The Jewish question persists wherever Jews live in appreciable numbers. Wherever it does not exist, it is brought in together with Jewish immigrants. We are naturally drawn into those places where we are not persecuted, and our appearance there gives rise to persecution. This is the case, and will inevitably be so, everywhere, even in highly civilised countries—see, for instance, France—so long as the Jewish question is not solved on the political level. The unfortunate Jews are now carrying the seeds of anti-Semitism into England; they have already introduced it into America.‖ 8

Herzl began to energetically promote his ideas, continually attracting supporters, Jewish and non-Jewish. Norman Rose writes that Herzl "mapped out for himself the role of martyr... as the Parnell of the Jews".9

On March 10, 1896, Herzl was visited by Reverend William Hechler, the Anglican minister for the British Embassy. Hechler had read Herzl's Der Judenstaat. The meeting would be central to the eventual legitimization of Herzl and Zionism.,10 Herzl later wrote in his diary "Next we came to the heart of the business. I said to him: (Theodor Herzl to Rev.

7 Kornberg, Jacques (December 1, 1993). Theodor Herzl: From Assimilation to Zionism. Jewish Literature and Culture. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press. pp. 193–194. ISBN 978-0-253-33203-5. Retrieved 2009-08-08. ""Thus, for the time being, is alien to the , and they are unable to comprehend it... By contrast, several months later...Herzl was to offer a far different assessment of antisemitism in Austria, as a power and mainline movement on an upward course. Moreover, his fury over Austrian antisemitism had no parallel in his reaction to French antisemitism." 8 Herzl, Der Judenstaat, cited by C.D. Smith, Palestine and the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 2001, 4th ed., p. 53 9 Norman Rose, "A Senseless, Squalid War: Voices from Palestine 1945-1948", The Bodley Head, London, 2009. (p. 2) 10 "Jewishmag.com". Jewishmag.com. Retrieved 2011-10-26.

William Hechler) I must put myself into direct and publicly known relations with a responsible or non responsible ruler – that is, with a minister of state or a prince. Then the Jews will believe in me and follow me. The most suitable personage would be the German Kaiser."11 Hechler arranged an extended audience with Frederick I, Grand Duke of Baden, in April, 1896. The Grand Duke was the uncle of Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany. Through the efforts of Hechler and the Grand Duke, Herzl publicly met the Kaiser in 1898. The meeting significantly advanced Herzl's and Zionism's legitimacy in Jewish and world opinion.12

In May, 1896, the English translation of his Der Judenstaat (The Jewish State) appeared in London. Herzl earlier had confessed to his friend Max Bodenheimer, that he "wrote what I had to say without knowing my predecessors, and it can be assumed that I would not have written it, (Der Judenstaat) had I been familiar with the literature".13

Constantinople, , June 15, 1896; Herzl sees an opportunity. With the assistance of Count Philip Michael Newleński, a sympathetic Polish émigré with political contacts in the Ottoman Court, Herzl attempted to meet the Sultan Abdulhamid II. Herzl wanted to present his solution to the Jewish State to the Sultan directly. He failed to obtain an audience with the Sultan. He did succeed in visiting a number of highly placed individuals, including the Grand Vizier who received him as a journalist representing the Neue Freie Presse. Herzl presented his proposal to the Grand Vizier that the Jews would pay the Turkish foreign debt, and attempt to help regulate Turkish finances, if they were given Palestine as a Jewish homeland under Turkish rule. Prior to leaving Constantinople, June 29, 1896, Nevlenski obtained for Herzl a symbolic medal of honor.14 The medal was a public relations affirmation for Herzl, and the Jewish world, of the seriousness of the negotiations, the "Commander's Cross of the Order of the Medjidie".

11 The Diaries of Theodor Herzl, edited by Marvin Lowenthal, Gloucester, Massachusetts, Peter Smith Pub., 1978 pg. 105 12 London Daily Mail Friday November 18, 1898 "An Eastern Surprise: Important Result of the Kaiser's Tour: Sultan and Emperor Agreed in Palestine: Benevolent Sanction Given to the Zionist Movement One of the most important results, if not the most important, of the Kaiser's visit to Palestine is the immense impetus it has given to Zionism, the movement for the return of the Jews to Palestine. The gain to this cause is the greater since it is immediate, but perhaps more important still is the wide political influence which this Imperial action is like to have. It has not been generally reported that when the Kaiser visited Constantinople Dr. Herzl, the head of the Zionist movement, was there; again when the Kaiser entered Jerusalem he found Dr. Herzl there. These were no mere coincidences, but the visible signs of accomplished facts." Herzl had achieved political legitimacy. 13 Reuben R Hecht, When the Shofar sounds, 2006, p. 43 14 Herzl.org. Retrieved 2011-10-26.

Five years later, May 17, 1901, Herzl did meet with Sultan Abdulhamid II. The Sultan refused Theodor Herzl's offers to consolidate the Ottoman debt in exchange for a charter allowing the Zionists access to Palestine.15

Returning from Constantinople, Herzl traveled to London, to report back to the Maccabeans, a proto-Zionist group of established English Jewry led by Colonel Albert Goldsmid. November,1895, they had received him with curiosity, indifference and coldness. bitterly opposed Herzl. After Constantinople, Goldsmid agreed to support Herzl. In London's East End, a community of primarily Yiddish speaking recent Eastern European Jewish immigrants, Herzl addressed a mass rally of thousands, July 12, 1896. He was received with acclaim. They granted Herzl the mandate of leadership for Zionism. Within six months this mandate had been expanded throughout Zionist Jewry. The Zionist movement continued growing very rapidly.

In 1897, at considerable personal expense, he founded of Vienna, Austria- Hungary and planned the in , Switzerland. He was elected president (a position he held until his death in 1904), and in 1898 he began a series of diplomatic initiatives intended to build support for a Jewish country. He was received by the German emperor, Wilhelm II, on several occasions, one of them in Jerusalem, and attended The Hague Peace Conference, enjoying a warm reception by many other statesmen.

Herzl visited Jerusalem for the first time in October 1898. 16 Herzl deliberately coordinated his visit with that of Kaiser Wilhelm II to secure, what he thought had been prearranged with the aid of Rev. William Hechler, a public world power recognition of himself and Zionism.17 Herzl and Kaiser Wilhelm first met publicly, October 29, at , near present day , Israel. It was a brief but historic meeting. He had a second formal, public audience with the emperor at the latter's tent camp on Street of the in Jerusalem, November 2, 1898.18 19

In 1902–03 Herzl was invited to give evidence before the British Royal Commission on Alien Immigration. The appearance brought him into close contact with members of the

15 "Time Line". Herzl.org. 1949-08-16. Retrieved 2011-10-26. 16 "Theodor Herzl in Jerusalem, Just Prior to Meeting With German Emperor Wilhelm II...". Shapell Manuscript Foundation. Retrieved 26 October 2011. 17 Herzl had written in his diary of the necessity for world power recognition. March 11, 1896" 18 Ginsberg, Michael Peled; Ron, Moshe (June 2004). Shattered Vessels: Memory, Identity, and Creation in the Work of David Shahar. State University of New York Press. ISBN 978-0-7914-5919-5. 19 Kaiser Wilhelm II had assured Herzl of his support for the Jewish protectorate under Germany when they had met privately in Constantinople a week earlier. By the time of their public meetings at Mikveh Israel and Jerusalem, the Kaiser had changed his mind. Herzl had thought he had failed. In the eyes of public opinion he had not.

British government, particularly with , then secretary of state for the colonies, through whom he negotiated with the Egyptian government for a charter for the settlement of the Jews in Al ', in the , adjoining southern Palestine.

In 1903, Herzl attempted to obtain support for the Jewish homeland from . Cardinal explained to him the Church's policy of non possumus on such matters, saying that as long as the Jews deny the divinity of Christ, the Church certainly could not make a declaration in their favor.20

On the failure of that scheme, which took him to Cairo, he received, through L. J. Greenberg, an offer (August 1903) on the part of the British government to facilitate a large Jewish settlement, with autonomous government and under British suzerainty, in British East Africa. At the same time, the Zionist movement being threatened by the Russian government, he visited St. Petersburg and was received by , then finance minister, and Viacheslav Plehve, minister of the interior, the latter of whom placed on record the attitude of his government toward the Zionist movement. On that occasion Herzl submitted proposals for the amelioration of the Jewish position in Russia. He published the Russian statement, and brought the British offer, commonly known as the "Uganda Project", before the Sixth Zionist Congress (Basel, August 1903), carrying the majority (295:178, 98 abstentions) with him on the question of investigating this offer, after the Russian delegation stormed out.

In 1905, after investigation, the Congress decided to decline the British offer and firmly committed itself to a Jewish homeland in Palestine.

Death and burial

Herzl did not live to see the rejection of the Uganda plan. At 5 p.m. July 3, 1904 in Edlach, Lower Austria, Theodor Herzl died of cardiac sclerosis. A day before his death, he told the Reverend William H. Hechler: "Greet Palestine for me. I gave my heart's blood for my people."21

His will stipulated that he should have the poorest-class funeral without speeches or flowers and he added, "I wish to be buried in the vault beside my father, and to lie there till the Jewish people shall take my remains to Palestine".22 Nevertheless, some six thousand

20 Catholicism, France and Zionism: 1895-1904. 21 Elon, Amos (1975). Herzl, p.400-1, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ISBN 978-0-03-013126-4. 22 'Obituary', The Times, Thursday, July 7, 1904; pg. 10; Issue 37440; col B.

followed Herzl's hearse, and the funeral was long and chaotic. Despite Herzl's request that no speeches be made, a brief eulogy was delivered by . Hans Herzl, then thirteen, read the .23

In 1949 his remains were moved from Vienna to be reburied on in Jerusalem.

Der Judenstaat and Altneuland (There Jude State And The Old New Land)

Beginning in late 1895, Herzl wrote Der Judenstaat, the Jewish State. The small book was initially published, February 14, 1896, in Leipzig, Germany and Vienna, Austria by M. Breitenstein's Verlags-Buchhandlung. It is subtitled "Versuch einer modernen Lösung der Judenfrage", "Proposal of a modern solution for the Jewish question"

Herzl's solution is the creation of a Jewish State. In the book he outlines his reasoning for the need to reestablish the historic Jewish State.

"The idea I have developed in this pamphlet is an ancient one: It is the restoration of the Jewish State. . ."

"The decisive factor is our propelling force. And what is that force? The plight of the Jews. . . I am profoundly convinced that I am right, though I doubt whether I shall live to see myself proved so. Those who today inaugurate this movement are unlikely to live to see its glorious culmination. But the very inauguration is enough to inspire in them a high pride and the joy of an inner liberation of their existence. . ."

"The plan would seem mad enough if a single individual were to undertake it; but if many Jews simultaneously agree on it, it is entirely reasonable, and its achievement presents no difficulties worth mentioning. The idea depends only on the number of its adherents. Perhaps our ambitious young men, to whom every road of advancement is now closed, and for whom the Jewish state throws open a bright prospect of freedom, happiness, and honor, perhaps they will see to it that this idea is spread. . ."

"It depends on the Jews themselves whether this political document remains for the present a political romance. If this generation is too dull to understand it rightly, a future, finer, more advanced generation will arise to comprehend it. The Jews who will try it shall achieve their State; and they will deserve it. . ."

23 Elon, Amos (1975). Herzl, p.402, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ISBN 978-0-03-013126-4.

"I consider the Jewish question neither a social nor a religious one, even though it sometimes takes these and other forms. It is a national question, and to solve it we must first of all establish it as an international political problem to be discussed and settled by the civilized nations of the world in council.

We are a people — one people.

We have sincerely tried everywhere to merge with the national communities in which we live, seeking only to preserve the faith of our fathers. It is not permitted us. In vain are we loyal patriots, sometimes superloyal; in vain do we make the same sacrifices of life and property as our fellow citizens; in vain do we strive to enhance the fame of our native lands in the arts and sciences, or her wealth by trade and commerce. In our native lands where we have lived for centuries we are still decried as aliens, often by men whose ancestors had not yet come at a time when Jewish sighs had long been heard in the country..."

"Oppression and persecution cannot exterminate us. No nation on earth has endured such struggles and sufferings as we have. Jew-baiting has merely winnowed out our weaklings; the strong among us defiantly return to their own whenever persecution breaks out..."

"Wherever we remain politically secure for any length of time, we assimilate. I think this is not praiseworthy..."

"Palestine is our unforgettable historic homeland..."

"Let me repeat once more my opening words: The Jews who will it shall achieve their State. We shall live at last as free men on our own soil, and in our own homes peacefully die. The world will be liberated by our freedom, enriched by our wealth, magnified by our greatness. And whatever we attempt there for our own benefit will redound mightily and beneficially to the good of all mankind."24

His last literary work, Altneuland (in English: The Old New Land, 1902), is a novel devoted to Zionism. Herzl occupied his free time for three years in writing what he believed might be accomplished by 1923. It is less a novel, though the form is that of romance, than a serious forecasting of what could be done within one generation. The keynotes of the story are the love for Zion, the insistence upon the fact that the changes in life suggested are not utopian, but are to be brought about simply by grouping all the best efforts and ideals of every race and nation; and each such effort is quoted and referred to in such a

24 "Jewishvirtuallibrary.org". Jewishvirtuallibrary.org. Retrieved 2011-10-26.

manner as to show that Altneuland, though blossoming through the skill of the Jew, will in reality be the product of the benevolent efforts of all the members of the human family.

Herzl envisioned a Jewish state which combined both a modern Jewish culture with the best of the European heritage. Thus a Palace of Peace would be built in Jerusalem, arbitrating international disputes, and at the same time the Temple would be rebuilt on modern principles. Herzl did not envision the Jewish inhabitants of the state being religious, but there would be much respect for religion in the public sphere. He also assumed that many languages would be spoken, but Hebrew would not be the main tongue. Proponents of a Jewish cultural rebirth, such as Ahad Ha'am were critical of Altneuland.

In Altneuland, Herzl did not foresee any conflict between Jews and Arabs. One of the main characters in Altneuland is a engineer, Reshid Bey, who is one of the leaders of the "New Society", is very grateful to his Jewish neighbors for improving the economic condition of Palestine and sees no cause for conflict. All non-Jews have equal rights, and an attempt by a fanatical to disenfranchise the non-Jewish citizens of their rights fails in the election which is the center of the main political plot of the novel.25 Herzl also envisioned the future Jewish state to be a "third way" between capitalism and socialism, with a developed welfare program and public ownership of the main natural resources and industry, agriculture and even trade organized on a cooperative basis. He called this mixed economic model "Mutualism", a term derived from French utopian socialist thinking. Women would have equal voting rights—as they did have in the Zionist movement from the Second Zionist Congress onwards.

In Altneuland, Herzl outlined his vision for a new Jewish state in the . Herzl summed up his vision for an open society:

"It is founded on the ideas which are a common product of all civilized nations... It would be immoral if we would exclude anyone, whatever his origin, his descent, or his religion, from participating in our achievements. For we stand on the shoulders of other civilized peoples. ... What we own we owe to the preparatory work of other peoples. Therefore, we have to repay our debt. There is only one way to do it, the highest tolerance. Our motto must therefore be, now and ever: ‗Man, you are my brother.‘" (Quoted in "Zion & the Jewish National Idea", in Zionism Reconsidered, Macmillan, 1970 PB, p.185)

In his novel, Herzl wrote about an electoral campaign in the new state. He directed his wrath against the nationalist party which wished to make the Jews a privileged class in

25 Avineri, Shlomo (September 2, 2009). "Herzl's vision of racism". . Retrieved 2009-08-08.

Palestine. Herzl regarded that as a betrayal of Zion, for Zion was identical to him with humanitarianism and tolerance—that this was true in politics as well as in religion. Herzl wrote:

"Matters of faith were once and for all excluded from public influence. ... Whether anyone sought religious devotion in the synagogue, in the church, in the mosque, in the art museum, or in a philharmonic concert, did not concern society. That was his [own] private affair." (Quoted in "Zion & the Jewish National Idea", in Zionism Reconsidered, Macmillan, 1970 PB, p.185)

Altneuland was written both for Jews and non-Jews: Herzl wanted to win over non- Jewish opinion for Zionism.26 When he was still thinking of Argentina as a possible venue for massive Jewish immigration, he mentioned in his diary he

"When we occupy the land, we shall bring immediate benefits to the state that receives us. We must expropriate gently the private property on the estates assigned to us. We shall try to spirit the penniless population across the border by procuring employment for it in the transit countries, while denying it any employment in our country. The property owners will come over to our side. Both the process of expropriation and the removal of the poor must be carried out discretely and circumspectly ... It goes without saying that we shall respectfully tolerate persons of other faiths and protect their property, their honor, and their freedom with the harshest means of coercion. This is another area in which we shall set the entire world a wonderful example ... Should there be many such immovable owners in individual areas [who would not sell their property to us], we shall simply leave them there and develop our commerce in the direction of other areas which belong to us", "The Complete Diaries of Theodor Herzl", vol. 1 (New York: Herzl Press and Thomas Yoseloff, 1960), pp. 88, 90 hereafter Herzl diaries.

Herzl's draft of a charter for a Jewish-Ottoman Land Company (JOLC) gave the JOLC the right to obtain land in Palestine by giving its owners comparable land elsewhere in the Ottoman empire.

The name of is the title given to the Hebrew translation of Altneuland by the translator, . This name, which comes from Ezekiel 3:15, means tell— an ancient mound formed when a town is built on its own debris for thousands of years— of spring. The name was later applied to the new town built outside of , which went on to

26 L.C.M. van der Hoeven Leonhard, "Shlomo and David, Palestine, 1907", in From Haven to Conquest, 1971, W. Khalidi (ed.), pp. 118-19.

become Tel Aviv-Yafo the second-largest city in Israel. The nearby city to the north, , was named in honor of Herzl.

Family

Herzl's grandfathers, both of whom he knew, were more closely related to traditional Judaism than his parents. In Zemun (Zemlin), his grandfather Simon Loeb Herzl "had his hands on" one of the first copies of 's 1857 work prescribing the "return of the Jews to the Holy Land and renewed glory of Jerusalem." Contemporary scholars conclude that Herzl's own implementation of modern Zionism was undoubtedly influenced by that relationship. Herzl's grandparents' graves in Semlin can still be visited.27 Alkalai himself, was witness to the rebirth of Serbia from Ottoman rule in the early and mid 19th century, and was inspired by the Serbian uprising and subsequent re-creation of Serbia.

Jakob Herzl (1836–1902), Herzl's father, was a highly successful businessman. Herzl had one sister, Pauline, a year older than he was, who died suddenly on February 7, 1878 of .28 Theodor lived with his family in a house next to the Dohány Street Synagogue (formerly known as Tabakgasse Synagogue) located in Belváros, the inner city of the historical old town of Pest, in the eastern section of .29 The remains of Herzl's parents and sister were re-buried on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem.30

In June 25, 1889 he married Julie Naschauer, daughter of a wealthy Jewish businessman in Vienna. The marriage was unhappy, although three children were born to it, Paulina, Hans and Margaritha (Trude). Herzl and Julie declined to have their son Hans circumcised.31 Herzl had a strong attachment to his mother, who was unable to get along with his wife.32 These difficulties were increased by the political activities of his later years, in which his wife took little interest.33 Herzl and his children on a trip in 1900. All three children died tragically.

27 "European Jewish Congress – Serbia". Eurojewcong.org. 2007-03-16. Retrieved 2011-10-26. 28 "Theodor Herzl – Background". Aboutisrael.co.il. Retrieved 2011-10-26. 29 Herzl, Theodor (January 1898). "An Autobiography". London Jewish Chronicle: 20. Retrieved 2008-03-18. "I was born in 1860 in Budapest in a house next to the synagogue where lately the rabbi denounced me from the pulpit in very sharp terms (...)" 30 Herzl, Theodor (1960). "Herzl Speaks: His Mind on Issues, Events and Men". Herzl Institute Pamphlet (New York: The Herzl Press) 16. "I went...to the synagogue [in Paris] and found the services once again solemn and moving. Much reminded me of my youth and the Tabakgasse synagogue in Pest." 31 Stewart, D., Theodor Herzl (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1974), p. 202 32 Hans Herzl voluntarily had himself circumcised May 29, 1905; Princes Without a Home, Modern Zionism and the Strange Fate of Theodor Herzl's children, Ilse Sternberger, pg.125 33 Theodor Herzl on WowEssays.com

Herzl Statue in Dimona.

His daughter Paulina suffered from mental illness and drug addiction. She died in 1930 at the age of 40, of a heroin overdose.34

His only son Hans was given a secular upbringing, and Herzl notably refused to allow him to be circumcised.35 After Herzl's early death, Hans successively converted and became a Baptist, then a Catholic and flirted with other Protestant denominations.36 He sought a personal salvation for his own religious needs and a universal solution, as had his father, to Jewish suffering caused by anti-Semitism. Hans committed suicide (gunshot) the day of sister Paulina's funeral.37

Hans left a death note explaining his reasons.

"A Jew remains a Jew, no matter how eagerly he may submit himself to the disciplines of his new religion, how humbly he may place the redeeming cross upon his shoulders for the sake of his former coreligionists, to save them from eternal damnation: a Jew remains a Jew... I can't go on living. I have lost all trust in God, All my life I've tried to strive for the truth, and must admit today at the end of the road that there is nothing but disappointment. Tonight I have said Kaddish for my parents--and for myself, the last descendant of the family. There is nobody who will say Kaddish for me, who went out to find peace--and who may find peace soon... My instinct has latterly gone all wrong, and I have made one of those irreparable mistakes, which stamp a whole life with failure. Then it is best to scrap it."38 39

Hans was 39.

In 2006 the remains of Paulina and Hans were moved from , France, and reburied not far from their father on Mt. Herzl.40

Paulina and Hans had little contact with the youngest daughter, "Trude",(Margarethe, 1893–1943). She married Richard Neumann, a man 17 years her elder. Neumann lost his

34 Elon, Amos (1975). Herzl, p.403, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ISBN 978-0-03-013126-4. 35 Female Circumcision: Multicultural Perspectives, By Rogaia Mustafa Abusharaf, (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007), page 51 36 The Gender Of Desire: Essays On Male Sexuality, By Michael S. Kimmel, SUNY Press, 2005, page 181 37 "Crash Course in Part 63 - Modern Zionism". Aish.com. Retrieved 2011-10-26. 38 Princes Without a Home, by Isle Sternberger 39 "Goliath.exnext.com". Goliath.ecnext.com. Retrieved 2011-10-26. 40 Herzl's children to be disinterred on Tuesday in Bordeaux, France haaretz.com

fortune in the Great Depression. Burdened by the steep costs of hospitalizing Trude, who suffered from severe bouts of depressive illness that required repeated hospitalizations, the Neumanns' financial life was precarious. The Nazis sent Trude and Richard to the Theresienstadt concentration camp where they died. Her body was burned. 41 (Likewise her mother who died in 1907 was cremated. Her ashes were lost by accident).

Trude's son (Herzl's only grandchild), Stephan Theodor Neumann (1918–1946) was sent to England, 1935, for his safety, at the request of his father Richard Neumann to the Viennese Zionists and the Zionist Executive in Palestine.42 The Neumanns deeply feared for the safety of their only child as rabid Austrian anti-Semitism expanded. In England, he read extensively about his grandfather. Zionism had not been a significant part of his background in Austria. Stephan became an ardent Zionist. He was the only descendant of Theodor Herzl to be a Zionist. Anglicizing his name to Stephen Norman, during World War II, Norman enlisted in the rising to the rank of Captain in the Royal Artillery. In late 1945 and early 1946, he took the opportunity to visit the British Mandate of Palestine "to see what my grandfather had started." He wrote in his diary extensively about his trip. What impressed him the most was that there was a "look of freedom" in the faces of the children, not like the sallow look of those from the concentration camps of Europe. He wrote upon leaving Palestine, "My visit to Palestine is over... It is said that to go away is to die a little. And I know that when I went away from Erez Israel, I died a little. But sure, then, to return is somehow to be reborn. And I will return."43

Norman planned to return to Palestine following his military discharge. The Zionist Executive, through Dr. L. Lauterbach had worked for years to get Norman to come to Palestine.44 He would be the symbol of Herzl returning.

Operation Agatha of June 29, 1946, precluded that possibility: British military and police fanned out throughout Palestine and arrested Jewish activists. About 2,700 individuals were arrested. On July 2, 1946, Norman wrote to Mrs. Stybovitz-Kahn in Haifa. Her father, Jacob Kahn, had been a good friend of Herzl and a well known Dutch banker before the war. Norman wrote "I intend to go to Palestine on a long visit in the future, in fact as soon as passport & permit regulations permit. But the dreadful news of the last two days have done nothing to make this easier." 45

41 Fulfilling Historical Justice: Herzl's Children Come Home, jewishagency.org 42 Zionist Archives letters of Richard Neumann 43 Airstop in Palestine, by Stephen Norman, azure.org.il 44 -extensive documentary exchange between Lauterbach and Norman 1936−1946 45 Central Zionist Archives, Jerusalem, Papers of Stephen Norman, July 2, 1946, letter to Mrs. Stybovitz-Kahn

He never did return to Palestine.

Demobilized from the British army in late spring 1946, without any money, or job and despondent about his future, Norman followed the advice of Dr. . Dr. H. Rosenblum, the editor of "Haboker", a Tel Aviv daily that later became Yediot Aharonot, noted in late 1945 that Dr. Weizmann deeply resented the sudden intrusion and reception of Norman when he arrived in Britain. Norman spoke to the Zionist conference in London. Haboker reported, "Something similar happened at the Zionist conference in London. The Chairman suddenly announced to the meeting that in the hall there was Herzl's grandson who wanted to say a few words. The introduction was made in an absolutely dry and official way. It was felt that the chairman looked for – and found – some stylistic formula which would satisfy the visitor without appearing too cordial to anybody among the audience. In spite of that there was a great thrill in the hall when Norman mounted on the platform of the praesidium. At that moment, Dr. Weizmann turned his back on the speaker and remained in this bodily and mental attitude until the guest had finished his speech." (From Haboker 10-26-1945. Document amongst the papers of Stephen Norman at the Central Zionist Archives in Jerusalem.) The 1945 article went on to note that Norman was snubbed by Weizmann and by some in Palestine during his visit because of ego, jealousy, vanity and their own personal ambitions. Brodetsky was Chaim Weizman's principle ally and supporter in Britain. Norman secured, through influence, a very desirable, but minor position with the British Economic and Scientific mission in Washington, D.C. In late August 1946, shortly after arriving in Washington, he learned that his family had been exterminated. Norman had re-established contact with his old nanny in Vienna, Wuth who informed him of what happened.46 Norman became deeply depressed over the fate of his family and his inability to help the Jewish people "languishing" in the European camps. Unable to endure the suffering any further, he jumped to his death from the Massachusetts Avenue Bridge in Washington, D.C., November 26, 1946. Norman was buried by the Jewish Agency in Washington, D.C. His tombstone read simply, 'Stephen Theodore Norman, Captain Royal Artillery British Army, Grandson of Theodor Herzl, April 21, 1918 − November 26, 1946'.47 Norman was the only member of Herzl's family to have been a Zionist, been to Palestine, and openly stated his desire to return.

46 Central Zionist Archives, Jerusalem, August, 1946, 47 "These Children Bore the Mark of Freedom, by Jerry Klinger, Theodor Herzl Foundation, in Midtstream, A Bi- Monthly Jewish Review, May/June 2007, pages 21-24, ISSN 0026-332X

After 61 years, he was reburied with his family on Mt. Herzl, in the Plot for Zionist Leaders, December 5, 2007.48 49 50 51

In Jerusalem, on Mt. Herzl, the Stephen Norman garden was completed in Norman's honor and memory. It is the only memorial in the world to a Herzl, other than to Theodor Herzl. The garden was dedicated May 2, 2012 by the Jerusalem Foundation, the World Zionist Organization and the Jewish American Society for Historic Preservation.52 On one of the walls of the garden, located between the and the Herzl Educational Center, is a quote from Norman from when he visited Palestine in 1946, it summarized the meaning of Zionism and Israel.

"You will be amazed at the Jewish Youth in Palestine...they have the look of freedom." 53

Writings

A. Books The Jews' State (Der Judenstaat) (ISBN 1-59986-998-5) B. The Old New Land (Altneuland) (ISBN 1-55876-160-8)

"If you will it, it is no dream." a phrase from Herzl's book Old New Land, became a popular slogan of the Zionist movement—the striving for a Jewish National Home in Israel.54

Plays55 56

1. Kompagniearbeit, comedy in one act, Vienna 1880 2. Die Causa Hirschkorn, comedy in one act, Vienna 1882 3. Tabarin, comedy in one act, Vienna 1884

48 Theodor Herzl's only grandson reinterred in J'lem cemetery, Haaretz Dec.6, 2007 49 Washington Jewish Week, June 27, 2007, "Zionist set to come 'home' Herzl's grandson slated to be reburied in Israel", by Richard Greenberg 50 "A Zionist who deserves to come home", by Jerry Klinger, Jerusalem Post, Feb. 12, 2003. Crash Course in Jewish History Part 63 - Modern Zionism at www.aish.com 51 Guttman, Nathan (August 29, 2007). "Jerusalem Plans a Hero's Burial to Long Deceased Grandson of Herzl". Jewish Daily Forward. 52 "Jewish-american-society-for-historic-preservation.org". Jewish-american-society-for-historic- preservation.org. 2007-12-05. Retrieved 2011-10-26. 53 Jerry Klinger, President of the Jewish American Society for Historic Preservation, was the principle organizer behind the five year reburial effort. 54 "Brandeis.edu". Brandeis.edu. 2010-05-24. Retrieved 2011-10-26. 55 "Theodor Herzl 2004". The Department for Jewish Zionist Education. Retrieved 2009-08-08. 56 Balsam, Mashav. "Theodor Herzl: From the Theatre Stage to The Stage of Life". All About Jewish Theatre. Retrieved 2009-08-08.

4. Muttersöhnchen, in four acts, Vienna 1885 (Later: "Austoben" by H. Jungmann) 5. Seine Hoheit, comedy in three acts, Vienna 1885 6. Der Flüchtling, comedy in one act, Vienna 1887 7. Wilddiebe, comedy in four acts, in co-authorship with H. Wittmann, Vienna 1888 8. Was wird man sagen?, comedy in four acts, Vienna 1890 9. Die Dame in Schwarz, comedy in four acts, in co-authorship with H. Wittmann, Vienna 1890 10. Prinzen aus Genieland, comedy in four acts, Vienna 1891 11. Die Glosse, comedy in one act, Vienna 1895 12. Das Neue Ghetto, drama in four acts, Vienna 1898. Herzl's only play with Jewish characters.[56] 13. The New Ghetto, translated by Heinz Norden, New York 1955 14. Unser Kätchen, comedy in four acts, Vienna 1899 15. Gretel, comedy in four acts, Vienna 1899 16. I love you, comedy in one act, Vienna 1900 17. Solon in Lydien, drama in three acts, Vienna 1904

Theodor (Binyamin Ze’ev) Herzl

(1860 - 1904)

“In Basle I founded the Jewish state . . . Maybe in five years, certainly in fifty, everyone will realize it.”

Theodor (Binyamin Ze‘ev) Herzl, the visionary of Zionism, was born in Budapest in 1860. He was educated in the spirit of the German•Jewish Enlightenment of the period, learning to appreciate secular culture. In 1878 the family moved to Vienna, and in 1884 Herzl was

awarded a doctorate of law from the . He became a writer, a playwright and a journalist. The Paris correspondent of the influential liberal Vienna newspaper Neue Freie Presse was none other than Theodor Herzl.

Herzl first encountered the anti-Semitism that would shape his life and the fate of the Jews in the twentieth century while studying at the University of Vienna (1882). Later, during his stay in Paris as a journalist, he was brought face-to-face with the problem. At the time, he regarded the Jewish problem as a social issue and wrote a drama, The Ghetto (1894), in which assimilation and conversion are rejected as solutions. He hoped that The Ghetto would lead to debate and ultimately to a solution, based on mutual tolerance and respect between Christians and Jews.57

The Dreyfus Affair

In 1894, Captain , a Jewish officer in the French army, was unjustly accused of treason, mainly because of the prevailing anti-Semitic atmosphere. Herzl witnessed mobs shouting ―Death to the Jews‖ in France, the home of the French Revolution, and resolved that there was only one solution: the mass immigration of Jews to a land that they could call their own. Thus, the Dreyfus Case became one of the determinants in the genesis of Political Zionism.

Herzl concluded that anti-Semitism was a stable and immutable factor in human society, which assimilation did not solve. He mulled over the idea of Jewish sovereignty, and, despite ridicule from Jewish leaders, published Der Judenstaat (The Jewish State, 1896). Herzl argued that the essence of the Jewish problem was not individual but national. He declared that the Jews could gain acceptance in the world only if they ceased being a national anomaly. The Jews are one people, he said, and their plight could be transformed into a positive force by the establishment of a Jewish state with the consent of the great powers. He saw the Jewish question as an international political question to be dealt with in the arena of international politics.

Herzl proposed a practical program for collecting funds from Jews around the world by a company to be owned by stockholders, which would work toward the practical realization of this goal. (This organization, when it was eventually formed, was called the Zionist Organization.) He saw the future state as a model social state, basing his ideas on

57 Jews Virtual Library. 2013. Theodor (Binyamin Ze’ev) Herzl. Retrived May 25, 2013 from http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Herzl.html

the European model of the time, of a modern enlightened society. It would be neutral and peace-seeking, and of a secular nature.

In his Zionist novel, Altneuland (Old New Land, 1902), Herzl pictured the future Jewish state as a socialist utopia. He envisioned a new society that was to rise in the Land of Israel on a cooperative basis utilizing science and technology in the development of the Land.

He included detailed ideas about how he saw the future state‘s political structure, immigration, fund•raising, diplomatic relations, social laws and relations between religion and the state. In Altneuland, the Jewish state was foreseen as a pluralist, advanced society, a ―light unto the nations.‖ This book had a great impact on the Jews of the time and became a symbol of the Zionist vision in the Land of Israel.58

A Movement Is Started

Herzl's ideas were met with enthusiasm by the Jewish masses in Eastern Europe, although Jewish leaders were less ardent. Herzl appealed to wealthy Jews such as Baron Hirsch and Baron Rothschild, to join the national Zionist movement, but in vain. He then appealed to the people, and the result was the convening of the First Zionist Congress in Basle, Switzerland, on August 29•31, 1897.

The Congress was the first interterritorial gathering of Jews on a national and secular basis. Here the delegates adopted the Basle Program, the program of the Zionist movement, and declared, ―Zionism seeks to establish a home for the Jewish people in Palestine secured under public law.‖ At the Congress the World Zionist Organization was established as the political arm of the Jewish people, and Herzl was elected its first president.

Herzl convened six Zionist Congresses between 1897 and 1902. It was here that the tools for Zionist activism were forged: Otzar Hityashvut Hayehudim, the and the movement‘s newspaper Die Welt.

After the First Zionist Congress, the movement met yearly at an international Zionist Congress. In 1936, the center of the Zionist movement was transferred to Jerusalem.

58 Ibid.

Uganda Isn’t Zion

Herzl saw the need for encouragement by the great powers of the aims of the Jewish people in the Land. Thus, he traveled to the Land of Israel and in 1898 to meet with Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany and the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire. The meeting with Wilhelm was a failure - the monarch dismissed Herzl‘s political entreaties with snide anti-Semitic remarks. When these efforts proved fruitless, he turned to Great Britain, and met with Joseph Chamberlain, the British colonial secretary and others. The only concrete offer he received from the British was the proposal of a Jewish autonomous region in east Africa, in Uganda.

In 1899, in an essay entitled ―The Family Affliction‖ written for The American Hebrew, Herzl wrote, ―Anyone who wants to work in behalf of the Jews needs - to use a popular phrase - a strong stomach.‖

The 1903 and the difficult state of Russian Jewry, witnessed firsthand by Herzl during a visit to Russia, had a profound effect on him. He requested that the Russian government assist the Zionist Movement to transfer Jews from Russia to Eretz Yisrael.

At the Sixth Zionist Congress (1903), Herzl proposed the British Uganda Program as a temporary refuge for Jews in Russia in immediate danger. While Herzl made it clear that this program would not affect the ultimate aim of Zionism, a Jewish entity in the Land of Israel, the proposal aroused a storm at the Congress and nearly led to a split in the Zionist movement. The Uganda Program was finally rejected by the Zionist movement at the Seventh Zionist Congress in 1905.

Herzl died in Vienna in 1904, of pneumonia and a weak heart overworked by his incessant efforts on behalf of Zionism. By then the movement had found its place on the world political map. In 1949, Herzl‘s remains were brought to Israel and reinterred on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem.

Herzl‘s books Der Judenstaat (―The Jewish State‖) and Altneuland (―Old New Land‖), his plays and articles have been published frequently and translated into many languages. His name has been commemorated in the Herzl Forests at Ben Shemen and Hulda, the world's first Hebrew gymnasium — ―Herzliya‖ — which was established in Tel Aviv, the town of Herzliya in the Sharon and neighborhoods and streets in many Israeli towns and cities.

Herzl coined the phrase ―If you will, it is no fairytale,‖ which became the motto of the Zionist movement. Although at the time no one could have imagined it, Zionism led, only fifty years later, to the establishment of the independent State of Israel.59

Herzl’s Family

Herzl and his wife Julia, who was prone to mental instability, had three children, each of whom met a terrible end. His eldest daughter Pauline was a drug addict who died in a French hospital. His son Hans, who shot himself upon learning of his sister‘s death, had left Judaism for a series of Christian churches. Herzl had failed to have his son circumcised, and the Zionist leadership, following Herzl‘s death, saw to it that the oversight be remedied when the boy was 15 years old. His youngest daughter Trude perished in the Nazi concentration camp of Theresienstadt. Her son, Stephen Theodore Norman (born Stephen Neumann), had been sent to safety in England. On November 20, 1946, after learning of the death of his parents, he jumped to his death from the Massachusetts Avenue bridge in Washington, D.C. at the age of 27.

Herzl himself was 44-years-old when he died in the summer of 1904, on the 20th of Tammuz in the Jewish calendar.60

Conclusion

Herzl's ideas were met with enthusiasm by the Jewish masses in Eastern Europe, although Jewish leaders were less ardent. Herzl appealed to wealthy Jews such as Baron Hirsch and Baron Rothschild, to join the national Zionist movement, but in vain. He then appealed to the people, and the result was the convening of the First Zionist Congress in Basle, Switzerland, on August 29•31, 1897. Herzl convened six Zionist Congresses between 1897 and 1902. It was here that the tools for Zionist activism were forged: Otzar Hityashvut Hayehudim, the Jewish National Fund and the movement‘s newspaper Die Welt. After the First Zionist Congress, the movement met yearly at an international Zionist Congress. In 1936, the center of the Zionist movement was transferred to Jerusalem.

59 Ibid 60 Ibid

References

"A Zionist who deserves to come home", by Jerry Klinger, Jerusalem Post, Feb. 12, 2003. Crash Course in Jewish History Part 63 - Modern Zionism at www.aish.com

"Brandeis.edu". Brandeis.edu. 2010-05-24. Retrieved 2011-10-26.

"European Jewish Congress – Serbia". Eurojewcong.org. 2007-03-16. Retrieved 2011-10-26.

"Goliath.exnext.com". Goliath.ecnext.com. Retrieved 2011-10-26.

"Herzl.org". Herzl.org. Retrieved 2011-10-26.

"Jewish-american-society-for-historic-preservation.org". Jewish-american-society-for-historic-preservation.org. 2007-12-05. Retrieved 2011-10-26.

"Jewishvirtuallibrary.org". Jewishvirtuallibrary.org. Retrieved 2011-10-26.

"Theodor Herzl (1860-1904". Jewish Agency for Israel. Retrieved 2009-08-08. "He received a doctorate in law in 1884 and worked for a short while in courts in Vienna and Salzburg."

"Theodor Herzl 2004". The Department for Jewish Zionist Education. Retrieved 2009-08-08.

"Theodor Herzl in Jerusalem, Just Prior to Meeting With German Emperor Wilhelm II...". Shapell Manuscript Foundation. Retrieved 26 October 2011.

"Theodor Herzl – Background". Aboutisrael.co.il. Retrieved 2011-10-26.

"These Children Bore the Mark of Freedom, by Jerry Klinger, Theodor Herzl Foundation, in Midtstream, A Bi- Monthly Jewish Review, May/June 2007, pages 21-24, ISSN 0026-332X

"Time Line". Herzl.org. 1949-08-16. Retrieved 2011-10-26.

"Jewishmag.com". Jewishmag.com. Retrieved 2011-10-26.

Balsam, Mashav. "Theodor Herzl: From the Theatre Stage to The Stage of Life". All About Jewish Theatre. Retrieved 2009-08-08.

"Crash Course in Jewish History Part 63 - Modern Zionism". Aish.com. Retrieved 2011-10-26.

London Daily Mail Friday November 18, 1898 "An Eastern Surprise: Important Result of the Kaiser's Tour: Sultan and Emperor Agreed in Palestine: Benevolent Sanction Given to the Zionist Movement One of the most important results, if not the most important, of the Kaiser's visit to Palestine is the immense impetus it has given to Zionism, the movement for the return of the Jews to Palestine. The gain to this cause is the greater since it is immediate, but perhaps more important still is the wide political influence which this Imperial action is like to have. It has not been generally reported that when the Kaiser visited Constantinople Dr. Herzl, the head of the Zionist movement, was there; again when the Kaiser entered Jerusalem he found Dr. Herzl there. These were no mere coincidences, but the visible signs of accomplished facts." Herzl had achieved political legitimacy.

Airstop in Palestine, by Stephen Norman, azure.org.il

Avineri, Shlomo (September 2, 2009). "Herzl's vision of racism". Haaretz. Retrieved 2009-08-08.

Catholicism, France and Zionism: 1895-1904

Central Zionist Archives -extensive documentary exchange between Lauterbach and Norman 1936−1946

Central Zionist Archives, Jerusalem, August, 1946,

Central Zionist Archives, Jerusalem, Papers of Stephen Norman, July 2, 1946, letter to Mrs. Stybovitz-Kahn

Elon, Amos (1975). Herzl, p.23, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ISBN 978-0-03-013126-4.

Elon, Amos (1975). Herzl, p.400-1, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ISBN 978-0-03-013126-4.

Elon, Amos (1975). Herzl, p.402, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ISBN 978-0-03-013126-4.

Elon, Amos (1975). Herzl, p.403, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ISBN 978-0-03-013126-4.

Female Circumcision: Multicultural Perspectives, By Rogaia Mustafa Abusharaf, (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007), page 51

Fulfilling Historical Justice: Herzl's Children Come Home, jewishagency.org

Ginsberg, Michael Peled; Ron, Moshe (June 2004). Shattered Vessels: Memory, Identity, and Creation in the Work of David Shahar. State University of New York Press. ISBN 978-0-7914-5919-5.

Guttman, Nathan (August 29, 2007). "Jerusalem Plans a Hero's Burial to Long Deceased Grandson of Herzl". Jewish Daily Forward.

Hans Herzl voluntarily had himself circumcised May 29, 1905; Princes Without a Home, Modern Zionism and the Strange Fate of Theodor Herzl's children, Ilse Sternberger, pg.125

Herzl had written in his diary of the necessity for world power recognition. March 11, 1896"

Herzl, Der Judenstaat, cited by C.D. Smith, Palestine and the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 2001, 4th ed., p. 53

Herzl, Theodor (1960). "Herzl Speaks: His Mind on Issues, Events and Men". Herzl Institute Pamphlet (New York: The Herzl Press) 16. "I went...to the synagogue [in Paris] and found the services once again solemn and moving. Much reminded me of my youth and the Tabakgasse synagogue in Pest."

Herzl, Theodor (January 1898). "An Autobiography". London Jewish Chronicle: 20. Retrieved 2008-03-18. "I was born in 1860 in Budapest in a house next to the synagogue where lately the rabbi denounced me from the pulpit in very sharp terms (...)"

Herzl's children to be disinterred on Tuesday in Bordeaux, France haaretz.com

Jerry Klinger, President of the Jewish American Society for Historic Preservation, was the principle organizer behind the five year reburial effort.

Kaiser Wilhelm II had assured Herzl of his support for the Jewish protectorate under Germany when they had met privately in Constantinople a week earlier. By the time of their public meetings at Mikveh Israel and Jerusalem, the Kaiser had changed his mind. Herzl had thought he had failed. In the eyes of public opinion he had not.

Kornberg, Jacques (December 1, 1993). Theodor Herzl: From Assimilation to Zionism. Jewish Literature and Culture. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press. pp. 193–194. ISBN 978-0-253-33203-5. Retrieved 2009-08-08. ""Thus, for the time being, antisemitism is alien to the French people, and they are unable to comprehend it... By contrast, several months later...Herzl was to offer a far different assessment of antisemitism in

Austria, as a power and mainline movement on an upward course. Moreover, his fury over Austrian antisemitism had no parallel in his reaction to French antisemitism."

L.C.M. van der Hoeven Leonhard, "Shlomo and David, Palestine, 1907", in From Haven to Conquest, 1971, W. Khalidi (ed.), pp. 118-19.

M. Reich-Ranicki, Mein Leben, (München 2001, DTV GmbH & C0. - ISBN 3-423-12830-5), 64.

Norman Rose, "A Senseless, Squalid War: Voices from Palestine 1945-1948", The Bodley Head, London, 2009. (p. 2)

'Obituary', The Times, Thursday, July 7, 1904; pg. 10; Issue 37440; col B.

Princes Without a Home, by Isle Sternberger

Reuben R Hecht, When the Shofar sounds, 2006, p. 43

Rubenstein, Richard L., and Roth, John K. (2003). Approaches to Auschwitz: The Holocaust and Its Legacy, p. 94. Louisville. Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press. ISBN 0-664-22353-2.

Stewart, D., Theodor Herzl (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1974), p. 202

The Diaries of Theodor Herzl, edited by Marvin Lowenthal, Gloucester, Massachusetts, Peter Smith Pub., 1978 pg. 105

The Gender Of Desire: Essays On Male Sexuality, By Michael S. Kimmel, SUNY Press, 2005, page 181

Theodor Herzl on WowEssays.com

Theodor Herzl: A Reevaluation, Jacques Kornberg in The Journal of Modern History, Vol. 52, No. 2 (Jun., 1980), pp. 226-252 Published by the University of Chicago Press jstor.org

Theodor Herzl's only grandson reinterred in J'lem cemetery, Haaretz Dec.6, 2007

Washington Jewish Week, June 27, 2007, "Zionist set to come 'home' Herzl's grandson slated to be reburied in Israel", by Richard Greenberg

Zionist Archives letters of Richard Neumann

Elon, Amos (1975). Herzl, p.21-22, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ISBN 978-0-03-013126-4.

Jews Virtual Library. 2013. Theodor (Binyamin Ze’ev) Herzl. Retrived May 25, 2013 from http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Herzl.html

Chapter 2

Zionism and Israel

Introduction Theodor (Binyamin Ze‘ev) Herzl (May 2,1860 - July 3, 1904), founded the Zionist political movement. He was born in Budapest in 1860, and educated in the spirit of the German • Jewish Enlightenment, as a secular Jew, though his grandfather had been a friend of Rabbi Yehudah Alkalai, a proto-Zionist of an earlier era. In 1878 the Herzls moved to Vienna, where Theodor Herzl studied law in the university of Vienna, graduating in 1884. However, rather than studying law, Herzl became a writer, a playwright and a journalist, acting as Paris correspondent for influential liberal Vienna newspaper Neue Freie Presse.

Theodore Herzl - Founder of the Zionist movement Herzl probably first experienced anti-Semitism while studying at the University of Vienna (1882). He thought of the Jewish problem as a social issue and wrote a play, The Ghetto (1894), about the dilemma of Vienna Jewry, in which assimilation and conversion were rejected as solutions. He hoped that The Ghetto would lead to debate and ultimately to a solution, based on mutual tolerance and respect between Christians and Jews.

In 1894, Captain Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish officer in the French army, was falsely accused and convicted of treason (See Dreyfus Affair ) . Mobs shouted ―Death to the Jews‖ in France, the home of the French Revolution and the emancipation of the Jews. Herzl became convinced that the Jews needed a country of their own.

Herzl witnessed the Dreyfus affair as a newspaper correspondent. According to conventional accounts, his Zionism resulted from contemplating the persecution of Dreyfus. According to some others, he may have been more influenced by the election of the anti-Semitic Karl Luger as mayor of Vienna.

Herzl concluded that anti-Semitism was a stable and immutable factor, which assimilation would not solve, and which it was futile to combat. Despite ridicule from Jewish leaders, he published The Jewish State (Der Judenstaat) in 1896. Herzl claimed that the Jews could gain acceptance in the world only if they stopped being an anomaly among nations. He asserted that the scattered Jews are one people. Their plight could be transformed into a positive force by the establishment of a Jewish state guaranteed in international (public) law - "volkerrechtig" -- with the consent of the great powers. Echoing Rabbi Yehudah Alkalai and a few other Zionist forerunners, Herzl saw the Jewish problem as an international political issue. His ideas were quite similar to those of , but he evidently was unacquainted with Pinsker's Auto-Emancipation.

Herzl proposed to collect funds from Jews around the world by a company which would work toward settling Jews in Palestine. and securing a state. Eventually this idea was transformed into the Zionist Organization, the Jewish National Fund and other organizations. The Jewish State and Herzl's novel, Altneuland (Old New Land) published in 1902, pictured a Jewish social utopia in Palestine. It would be a pluralist, technologically advanced, secular society with equality for Arabs. Altneuland became a symbol of the Zionist vision in the Land of Israel. It was translated into Hebrew almost simultaneously with the name "Tel- Aviv," which soon became the title of the first Zionist city in Palestine.

Herzl's ideas were rejected in Western Europe. Herzl was turned down by Jewish magnates such as Baron Hirsch and Baron Rothschild. Herzl then appealed to the people, organizing the First Zionist Congress in Basle, Switzerland, on August 29•31, 1897. (see Theodor Herzl: Address to the first Zionist Congress ) The congress was historic not just for founding the Zionist movement, but because it was the first time an organized body , representing at least the Jews of the Western world, had been convened since the exile nearly 2000 years ago.

Herzl's ideas found mass support from the poor Jews of Eastern Europe and Russia. At Basle, the Zionist movement resolved to " establish a home for the Jewish people in Palestine secured under public law.‖ The Basle congress also resolved to set up a political organization and financial institutions to carry forward the Zionist idea. The World Zionist Organization was established, and Herzl was elected president. Herzl wrote in his diary, "At Basle, I founded the Jewish state.. If not in five years, then certainly in fifty, everyone will realize it.―‖‖

Herzl presided over six Zionist Congresses between 1897 and 1903, setting up the Jewish Colonial Trust, the Jewish National Fund and the movement's newspaper Die Welt. After Herzl's death, the movement continued to meet every year except during war. In 1936 the center of the Zionist movement moved to Jerusalem.

In his quest for great power backing, Herzl traveled to Palestine and Istanbul in 1898 to meet with Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany and the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire. Herzl met Kaiser Wilhelm in Palestine, where he showed him a Jewish settlement. However, the meeting turned out to be a ceremonial one only, and the Kaiser refused to commit himself to backing a Jewish national home.

Herzl's plan was to obtain money from Jewish financiers to pay off the onerous debt of the Ottoman Empire, and in return, get a charter from the Sultan to develop Palestine as a national home for the Jewish people. But the Jewish financiers were unenthusiastic. Rothschild ridiculed the idea that Palestine could be a home for the Jews. Herzl negotiated with the Sultan nonetheless. He assumed that the financial backing would be forthcoming if he could obtain a charter from the Sultan. But the Sultan, after lengthy negotiations was unwilling to give up Palestine and unwilling to have a concentration of Jews there. He offered immigration to other parts of the Ottoman empire instead. In 1902, the negotiations came to a final end. Herzl recorded in his diary:

‖February 15. ‗All right, let us establish on both sides what is involved here‘, said the Sultan‘s representative, Izzet. ‗His Imperial Majesty is prepared to open his Empire to Jewish refugees from all countries, on condition that they agree to become Ottoman subjects with all the duties that this imposes, under our laws and our military service.‘ ‗Exactly!‘, I replied. He continued: ‗Before entering our country they must formally resign their previous nationality and become Ottoman subjects. On this condition they may establish themselves in any of our provinces except - at first - Palestine.‘ I did not bat an eyelash, also understood at once that this was only the first offer and that they would be open for bargaining. ‗In return‘, Izzet went on, ‗His Imperial Majesty asks you to form a syndicate for the consolidation of the public debt...‘

February 17. Thereupon Izzet took my letter to the Sultan. While we were waiting, Ibrahim and Ghalib raved about the happy conditions to come: how it would be when the Jews came.

They dreamed aloud of the improvement of agriculture and industry, of banks which would not serve foreign interests, etc. But then Izzet returned with the Sultan's decision, and it was unfavorable. The Sultan is willing to open his Empire to all Jews who become Turkish subjects, but the regions to be settled are to be decided each time by the government, and Palestine is to be excluded...A charter without Palestine! I refused at once.‖ And so the meeting ended.

Herzl wrote to the Greater Action Committee of the failure of the Turkish negotiations, but wished to keep the setback a secret to prevent discouragement.

Herzl then met with Joseph Chamberlain, the British colonial secretary and others, who offered, not Palestine, which Britain did not have, but possibilities of settlement in Cyprus or in east Africa, in what was called Uganda (actually part of Kenya today). Likewise, the possibility of settlement in the Sinai, near El Arish which would be "close" to Palestine, was explored. The British government in Egypt vetoed the El Arish project on the grounds that it would require an impractical scheme of bringing large quantities of water from Egypt.

The Kishinev Pogrom in 1903 caused Herzl to realize the urgency of finding some shelter for the Jews of Russia. He travelled to Russia in 1903 in order to meet with the notorious anti-Semite von Plehve, who was thought to be responsible for the wave of Pogroms instigated against the Jews. Russian Zionists were upset by this visit, which they felt was playing into the hands of the enemy. Herzl to proposed that the Russian government assist the Zionist Movement to transfer Jews from Russia. Von Plehve gave a partially favorable reply, which he later withdrew. But Herzl did get Von Plehve to rescind some of the very restrictive laws against Zionist political activity. Nonetheless, the Russian Zionists were not happy with his visit.

With the British offer in hand, Herzl proposed the British "Uganda" offer as a temporary refuge - a "night shelter" for the Jews of Russia, at the Sixth Zionist Congress in 1903. Herzl made it clear that this program would not affect the ultimate aim of Zionism, which was settlement in "Eretz Yisrael" - Palestine. However, the proposal aroused great anger, particularly, and surprisingly, among the Russian delegates, the very people whom Herzl had sought to help. Menahem Ussishkin in particular, organized a protest congress of the Russian Zionists, the Kharkov Conference, that presented Herzl with an ultimatum requiring him to withdraw the Uganda proposal. Herzl wrote in his diary that the Russian Zionists

were in open rebellion. A bitter exchange ensued. Herzl upbraided Ussishkin the pages of Die Welt. He asked rhetorically, if Ussishkin knew of a better and shorter way to bring about the open public settlement of Palestine by the Jewish people. If he knows such a way, then it is wrong for a such a good Zionist not to reveal it, Herzl noted sarcastically. But if he knows no such way, then it is better that he should keep silent and not destroy with empty rhetoric the unity of the Zionist movement, which is worth more than a couple of bits of land in Palestine.

The proposal was finally rejected in part because the British themselves had withdrawn it. Though alternative homes such as Uganda were never considered by Zionists as more than a temporary measure, anti-Zionists have falsely seized on these initiatives for national homes outside Palestine as "proof" that Jews have no special tie to Palestine. The contrary is true. Prior to the Zionist movement, various Jewish thinkers and philanthropists had proposed "national homes" in the United States or South America. However, though Baron Hirsch set up colonies in Argentina, the idea never captured the imagination of the people. The hearts and minds of the Jews were always set on "the Holy Land."

On April 11, 1904, at a reconciliation meeting of the Greater Action Committee of the Zionist movement, Herzl redeclared his support for Palestine as the ultimate goal of the Zionists. His speech was characteristic of personality - tinged with hurt dignity and bitterness, it also defined with fair precision what Herzl had accomplished for the formerly disunited and ineffectual Zionists:

I have undertaken to bring you a word of peace. I know what distress and anxiety reigns among the masses of our fine, good, faithful Zionists throughout the whole world, and particularly in Russia; I know with what concern they follow these negotiations, how profoundly they fear that these beginnings of a national organization, brought about with so much labor for the benefit of the national cause, may suffer injury. As far I am concerned, I am without obstinacy; I pass the sponge across whatever has been said against me personally, and will say not another word about it. But I am aroused when it is a question of safeguarding our organization, completing our work, guarding our unity and fulfilling the obligations to which we pledged ourselves in accepting our mandates to the Congress. ... My personal point of view was and is that we have not the right simply to reject such a proposal, fling it back without even asking the people whether they want it or not. I do not

want to use the much debated word "Night Refuge" in describing the English offer, but say rather: "Here is a piece of bread." I, who perhaps have cake to eat, and in any case can always have a piece of bread, have not the right to reject the piece of bread which is being offered to the poor because I don't need or want it. Perhaps I personally can be moved to great enthusiasm by the fact that there are some people who, in the midst of their need and hunger, are strong enough in their idealism to say: "No, we don't want the bread." But I am obligated at least to transmit the offer to the people. That is my conviction. ... For, gentlemen, here in Vienna I tore myself loose one day from that which had been my life till then, from my friends and acquaintances, and devoted myself to that which I considered right. I do not feel the need of a majority. What I do need is that I shall be at one with my convictions. Then I am content, though not even a dog will take a piece of bread from my hand. ... We want the continuous growth of Zionism, we want Zionism as the representative of the people. Why do we want this? Because we believe that we cannot achieve our goal without great forces, and these great forces are not to be found in a federation of little societies. Such a federation you had twenty years ago, and you are always telling me that you were already Zionists twenty and twenty-five years ago. You are always throwing that up to me. But what do you prove thereby? What could you achieve as long as you did not have political Zionism? You lived in little groups and collected money. Undoubtedly your intentions were magnificent, your idealism unchallengeable. Nevertheless you could not achieve anything because you did not know the path to the objective. This path is the organization of the people, and its organ is the Congress. That is why you must submit to the Congress, even though you may be utterly dissatisfied with its decisions. ... It was as a Jewish statesman that I presented myself to you. I gave you my card, and there the words were printed: "Herzl, Jewish statesman". And in the course of time I learned a great deal. First and foremost, I learned to know Jews, and that was sometimes even a pleasure. But above all, I learned to understand that we shall find the solution of our problem only in Palestine. ... If today I say to you: "I became a Zionist and have remained one, and all my efforts are directed toward Palestine", you have every reason in the world to believe me. ...

Gentlemen, I have certain things to forgive you, for in certain matters pertaining to me you are to blame. But let me pass over that. I ask nothing more than that you do your duty as organized Zionists, without doing violence to your convictions. Fight as much you like, think of every device which may obtain for you a majority at the Congress, but do not do it with the help of the instruments of the movement; do it in your personal capacities. If you should create a majority of votes, a party, against me, I would certainly be grateful, but only on condition that you really do get a majority. I counsel you: submit to the Congress decisions, as the rest of us have to do. Until now I have not conducted a fight against you. If you should leave this session of the Actions Committee and agitate against the Congress, than I shall carry out an agitation against you, and I promise you that you will be defeated. Please believe me that this effort at reconciliation, the trouble I have taken, the words I have uttered not altogether consonant with my dignity, do not indicate that I am in any way afraid of the struggle. We have a tremendous majority on our side. But what I want is that you shall be able to come home and say to your people: We have received reassuring declarations, we know that the Executive in Vienna is working, and we know what the leader wants. Do not fix your eyes on an uncompleted house, just begun; wait till it is ready, and put your confidence in those men whom you have trusted till now and who have done nothing to lose your confidence!

Herzl took ill in May. He died in Vienna a few months later, in July of 1904, of pneumonia contracted as a complication of heart disease, but the essential part of his work was done. In 1949, Herzl's remains were brought to Israel and buried on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem.

All of Herzl's political activity for Zionism was condensed into the brief period of eight years. He did not achieve a charter for a Jewish national home in his life time. However, he had done something almost as impossible: he created, by the force of his unique personality, a movement that unified not only the splintered Zionist groups, but much of the Jewish people, overcoming the opposition of assimilationists and reactionary religious leaders, as well as the indifference and aloofness of magnates. He got the secular, socialist, capitalist and religious Zionists to sit together in one hall and to bind themselves together into a single organization for a common purpose. This unity, which he recognized and hailed in his Address to the first Zionist Congress is what made the Zionist project into a practical reality. Herzl's constant struggles to unite the quarreling factions behind a single Zionist program came at a price. Significantly, he had written In 1899, in an essay entitled ―The Family

Affliction‖ written for The American Hebrew, ―Anyone who wants to work in behalf of the Jews needs - to use a popular phrase - a strong stomach.‖

Herzl became the symbol of Zionism. His picture dominates offices of the Israeli government and Zionist organizations. His name is commemorated in the names of towns, schools and streets. Every fair sized town in Israel has a Herzl street. On the other hand, foes of Zionism caricature the picture of Herzl, as well as his image. For Arabs and other anti-Zionists, Herzl is the symbol of "Zionist Colonialism." For ultra-orthodox Jews, he is the symbol of secularist evil. An ultra-orthodox anti-Zionist MK once declared in the Knesset, "May Herzl turn over in his grave.

The Israel government has declared that his birthday is to be marked each year on the twelfth day of the Hebrew month of , exactly one week following Israel independence day.

Herzl met Kaiser Wilhelm in Palestine

Herzl's work made possible what others had only dreamed about. He said "If you will, it is no legend." He was the midwife of a movement that was to fulfill the age-old impossible dream of the Jews, to be a free people once again in their own country.61

What is Zionism?

61 Zionism and Israel – Biographies Theodor Herzl. Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://zionism- israel.com/bio/biography_herzl.htm

Zionism is the Jewish national liberation movement. "Zionism" derives its name from "Zion," (pronounced "Tzyion" in Hebrew) a hill in Jerusalem. The word means "marker" or commemoration. "Shivath Tzion" is one of the traditional terms for the return of Jewish exiles. "Zionism" is not a monolithic ideological movement. It includes, for example, socialist Zionists such as Ber Borochov, religious Zionists such as rabbis Kook and Reines, nationalists such as Zeev Jabotinsky and cultural Zionists exemplified by Asher Ginsberg (Ahad Ha'am). Zionist ideas evolved over time and were influenced by circumstances as well as by social and cultural movements popular in Europe at different times, including socialism, nationalism and colonialism, and assumed different "flavors" depending on the country of origin of the thinkers and prevalent contemporary intellectual currents. Accordingly, no single person, publication, quote or pronouncement should be taken as embodying "official" Zionist ideology.

Zionism is the ideological success story of the twentieth century. It has overcome seemingly insuperable obstacles to realize an impossible dream. Zionism is not a pernicious conspiracy, but it has aroused opposition owing to its success. This brief survey will discuss the history of the Zionist movement, and show how it created modern Israel and was in turn re-shaped by the revolutionary new reality that it had created.62

Capsule History of Zionism In retrospect, it is useful to divide the development of Zionism into several more or less distinct stages, influenced by the course of external events as well as changes that Zionism itself brought about.

Pre-Zionism - The cultural basis of Zionism, the tie of the Jewish people to the land of Israel, existed since the time of the exile, throughout the history of the Galut (Golah, Diaspora). In this period, Zionism was often expressed in Messianic movements. We may, with some truth as well as humor, call this the period of "impractical Zionism."

Proto-Zionism - Early 19th century writings and movements that advocated the restoration of the Jews to the land of Israel, without waiting for the . This included the

62 Introduction - What is Zionism?. . Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://www.zionism- israel.com/zionism_history.htm

rabbinical Zionism of rabbi Yehudah Alkalai and Rabbi Tzvi Hirsh Kalischer as well as the somewhat later practical and secular Zionism of , Leon Pinsker and others.

Foundational Zionism - In this period, Zionism became an organized political movement inspired and initially led by Theodor Herzl and then by Chaim Weizmann. It includes the development of Zionism from the first Zionist congress to the British Mandate, including Political Zionism, Cultural Zionism, Practical Zionism,Religious Zionism and Territorial Zionism. The latter movements were stimulated as a reaction to Political Zionism. This period also saw the emergence of or Socialist Zionism. The principle concern of Zionism in this period was obtaining a charter for a Jewish national home. The Zionist movement was led by middle and upper class Jews.

Mandatory Zionism - Under the British mandate, the leadership of the Zionist movement came to be centered in the land of Israel ("Palestine") rather than in Europe, and became identified with the Labor Zionist leadership of the Jewish Yishuv (community in Palestine). In this period Zionism focused on settling the land, on defense against Arabs, and later on rescuing Jews from the Holocaust and the struggle against the British government. David Ben-Gurion led the Zionist movement during most of this period.

Zionism after the birth of Israel - The Israel War of Independence and the birth of the state of Israel marked a watershed in the ideological and practical development of Zionism. David Ben-Gurion again is identified with the initial period of Israeli independence. Inside Israel, "Zionism" became associated with "official" ideology and political cant, derisively known as "tsiyonut."

Zionism after the Six Day War - The Six day war wrought significant changes in Zionism. It made Zionism more respectable in the United States among American Jews and it kindled a Zionist reawakening in Jews around the world, especially in the Soviet Union. At the same time it encouraged militarism, the birth of the Greater Israel movement and ultimately helped to bring to power revisionist Zionism under and the Likud party. It also encouraged the dangerously complacent belief that the existence of Israel is an irreversible fact.

Zionism under the Revisionists - The Yom Kippur War set in motion a train of events that led to disillusionment with Labor Zionist leadership. In 1977, the Likud party came to power.

Israel and a portion of the Zionist movement became focused on developing settlements in the occupied West Bank and Gaza strip. Socialist ideals were discarded in favor of a free economy. The historical culture of Israel changed. The education system downgraded the contribution of the Labor Zionist movement and its leaders. The change expressed itself in all aspects of Israeli culture. Formal dress, once anathema to Israeli politicians and Israeli society, became acceptable and desirable. Revisionist and religious Zionist movements, once the fringe of the Zionist movement, insisted that they are the "real" Zionists, and Zionism abroad came to be identified with the settlement movement.

The "Post-Zionist" Reaction and dovish Zionism - Those who opposed the settlement movement initiated a reaction against the Zionist swing to the right. This reaction expressed itself in the form of Zionist opposition to government policies, and of anti-Zionist opposition, which called itself "post-Zionist." The Zionist opposition seeks to end the occupation and settlement of territories conquered in 1967. The latter group strives to discredit Zionism as a colonialist imperialist movement and wants to end the Jewish State of Israel. As a byproduct of the Oslo peace process and the subsequent violence, the post-Zionist movement achieved considerable prominence for a time. Professor Zeev Sternhell is considered a member of the Zionist opposition, while Ilan Pappe is a "post-Zionist," actually anti-Zionist, advocate of the abolition of the Jewish national home.

Zionist Revival - The Arab Palestinian violence that began in September 2000 was accompanied by increasingly strident anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism, including calls for academic boycotts of Israel and calls for dismantling the "apartheid state." This induced a revival of Zionism and Zionist sentiment, especially abroad.

Pre-Zionism Zionism was a natural product of the culture of the Jewish people in exile. It did not spring full blown from a void with the creation of the Zionist movement in 1897. The central idea of Zionism, disputed by anti-Zionists, is that the Jews are a people, a nation tied to a specific land, and not just just a religion. It is a misconception to think that this idea was born in the 19th century. Since the Romans exiled the Jews from the land that the Jews called Judea and the Romans called Palestine, the Jews had referred to the lands outside the land of Judea or Israel as Gola meaning "exile" rather than "Diaspora (meaning dispersion) and to their condition as "Galut." Both were always terms with negative and bitter connotations.

Implicitly then, there was a land from which Jews were exiled and to which they understood that they belonged.

Jews had lived in "Eretz Yisrael (the land of Israel, called "Palestine" by the Romans and Greeks) since about 1200 B.C.E. The land of Israel was at a crossroads of the Middle East and the Mediterranean and was therefore conquered many times: by Egyptians, Hittites, Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Seleucid Greeks and Romans, as well as invading Philistines. Of these, only the Jews made the land into their national home. Jewish national culture, fused with religion, centered around the geography, seasons and history of the land and of the Jews in the land. The Jews created the Old Testament Bible- The Tanach, which described their history and the history of the land, and their connection to it. The Bible formed the backbone of Jewish culture and later was to form the backbone of Western Christian culture, so that the entire world recognized the connection between the Jews and their land. When the Romans conquered Palestine, and Jews were exiled to the Diaspora, the connection to the land was preserved in the Bible, and in prayers that daily called for the rebuilding of Jerusalem, and it was expressed in the writings of medieval poets.

In the Diaspora, religion became the medium for preserving Jewish culture and Jewish ties to the ancient land land of the Jews. Jews prayed several times a day for the rebuilding of the temple, celebrated agricultural feasts and called for rain according to the seasons of ancient, sunny Eastern Mediterranean land of Israel Israel, even in the farthest frozen reaches of Russia. The ritual plants of Sukkoth were imported from the Holy Land at great expense. A Holy-Land centered tradition persisted in Diaspora thought and writing. This tradition may be called "proto-nationalist" because there was no nationalism in the modern sense in those times. It was not only religious or confined to hoping for messianic redemption, but consisted of longing for the land of Israel. It is preserved in the poetry of Yehuda Halevi, a Spanish Jewish physician, poet and philosopher, who himself immigrated to "the Holy Land" and died there in 1141.

Jews had maintained a connection with Palestine, both actual and spiritual. This continued even after the Bar Kochba revolt in 135, when large numbers of Jews were exiled from Roman Palestine. The Jewish community in Palestine revived in subsequent years. Under Muslim rule, it is estimated to have numbered as many as 300,000 prior to the Crusades, about 1000 AD. The Crusaders killed most of the Jewish population of Palestine or forced them into exile, so that only about 1,000 families remained after the reconquest of Palestine

by Saladin. The Jewish community in Palestine waxed and waned with the vicissitudes of conquest and economic hardship. A trickle of Jews came because of love of Israel, and were sometimes encouraged by invitations by different Turkish rulers to displaced European Jews to settle in and . At different times there were sizeable Jewish communities in Tiberias, , Hebron and Jerusalem, and numbers of Jews living in Nablus and Gaza. A few original Jews remained in the town of Peki'in, families that had lived there continuously since ancient times.

From time to time, small numbers of Jews came to settle in the land of Israel in answer to rabbinical or Messianic calls, or fleeing persecution in Europe. Beginning about 1700, groups of followers led by rabbis reached Palestine from Europe and the Ottoman empire with various programs. For example, Rabbi Yehuda Hehasid and his followers settled in Jerusalem about 1700, but the rabbi died suddenly, and eventually, an Arab mob, angered over unpaid debts, destroyed the synagogue the group had built and banned all European (Ashkenazy) Jews from Jerusalem. Rabbis Luzatto and Ben-Attar led a relatively large immigration about 1740. Other groups and individuals came from Lithuania and Turkey and different countries in Eastern Europe.

At no time between the Roman exile and the rise of modern Zionism was there a movement to settle the holy land that engaged the main body of European or Eastern Jews, though many were attracted to various false such as Shabetai Tzvi, who promised to restore Jews to their land. For most Jews, the connection with the ancient homeland and with Jerusalem remained largely cultural and spiritual. Return to the homeland was a hypothetical event that would occur with the coming of the Messiah at an unknown date in the far future. European Jews lived, for the most part in ghettos. They did not get a general education, and did not, for the most part, engage in practical trades that might prepare them for living in Palestine. Most of the communities founded by these early settlers met with economic disaster, or were disbanded following earthquakes, riots or outbreaks of disease. The Jewish communities of Safed, Tiberias, Jerusalem and Hebron were typically destroyed by natural and man-made disasters and repopulated several times, never supporting more than a few thousand persons each at their height. The Jews of Palestine, numbering about 17,000 by the mid-19th century, lived primarily on charity - Halukka donations, with only a very few engaging in crafts trade or productive work.

Spinoza and Zionism

The religion of the nation of Israel, Judaism, had been so completely identified with its people, that almost nothing remained of an ethnic or national consciousness. Indeed, in Europe of the Middle Ages, "nations" did not really exist, and there were few if any people who would admit to being non-religious. One of the first Jews who may be studied as a "test case" regarding the nature of Judaism was Baruch Spinoza (Baruch d'Espinoza 1632-1677). Spinoza was a refugee from the Spanish Inquisition who lived in Holland. He began to deliver himself of beliefs that the elders of the congregation felt were incompatible with the Jewish religion. Spinoza did not believe in conventional religion and prayer, and he asserted that god was in everything and everywhere. He was excommunicated from the Jewish congregation. Therefore, he was no longer a member of the Jewish religion. Yet it was clear that everyone considered him to be a Jew in some sense. Therefore, it is clear that even before the 19th century, the Jews, and the world, understood that "Jewish" is something more than a religion. Spinoza cannot be considered a Zionist, but his ethics and his approach to Jewish history and the Jewish religion served as an inspiration for many later secular Zionists. (see Yovel, Yirmiyahu, Spinoza and other Heretics, The Marrano of Reason, Princeton University Press, 1989).

Emancipation and Zionism The French revolution and the rise of Napoleon hastened the emancipation of European Jewry, who were no longer confined to the ghettos of European cities, and became citizens like everyone else. Eventually, the liberalization reached Eastern Europe and Russia as well. The enlightenment of the 18th century and the emancipation of the 19th were a great shock for Jewish culture and identity. Jews split into several groups during the nineteenth century. Ultraorthodox Jews remained faithful to the culture of the ghetto, which excluded the possibility of intermingling in modern society or gaining a modern education. A second group attempted to assimilate completely into European society, converting to and losing their Jewish identity. A third group believed that they could integrate as modern citizens, with equal rights and still maintain their Jewish faith, while renouncing any cultural or group allegiance to Judaism. In effect, their Judaism became somewhat like a section of the Protestant religion. They found various euphemisms for their identity, such as Hebrews or Germans of the faith. This group founded the movement. The assimilationist viewpoints took it on faith that once the Jews "became like everyone else"

they would be accepted in society as equals, and would become Germans, Italians, Englishmen or Frenchmen. However, it became increasingly evident to many during the nineteenth century that assimilation was not necessarily desirable. Perhaps it was impossible as well, since anti-Jewish feeling did not abate. The newly coined Christians and "Germans of the Mosaic Faith" found themselves the objects of increasing anti-Jewish sentiment, which took on the title of "anti-Semitism" in 19th century Germany.

The ferment and cultural chaos unleashed by the emancipation produced a confusing variety of religious, intellectual and cultural reform movements among the Jews, which also evolved in many directions. The "" or Jewish enlightenment was a movement for modernization of Judaism. In part it was assimilationist, but some of the leaders of the Haskalah believed in Hebrew culture and some turned ultimately to nationalism and Zionism, causing a split within the movement.

The first challenge of emancipation to Judaism was that while it seemed that Jews could live as equal citizens in modern society, it became obvious that if they truly integrated into modern secular democracies, Jews would stop being Jews, and therefore the idea of "equal rights for Jews" would be meaningless.

Proto-Zionism

During this period, after the French Revolution and the emancipation of European Jewry, the vague spiritual bonds of the Jewish people to Israel began to express themselves in more concrete, though not always practical ways. About 1808, groups of Lithuanian Jews, followers of the (a famous rabbi and opponent of Hassidism) arrived in Palestine and purchased land to begin an agricultural settlement. In 1836, Rabbi Tzvi Hirsh Kalischer. petitioned Anschel Rothschild to buy Palestine or

at least the Temple Mount for the Jews. In 1839-

1840, Sir visited Palestine and Rabbi Tzvi Hirsh negotiated with the Khedive of Egypt to allow Rabbi Judah ben Jewish settlement and land purchase in Kalischer (Kalisher) Shlomo Alkalai Palestine. However, the negotiations led to (Alkali) (1798- (1795-1874) nothing, possibly frustrated by the outbreak of

an anti-Semitic blood-libel in . 1878) Thereafter, Montefiore continued with less ambitious philanthropic schemes in Palestine and in Argentina. In the 1840s, Rabbi Kalischer in Poland, and rabbi Yehudah Alkalai a Sephardic Jew, wrote articles urging practical steps for hastening redemption by settling in the Holy Land, to be sponsored by the efforts of philanthropists.

British Zionism The idea of a Jewish restoration also took the fancy of British intellectuals for religious and practical reasons. British religious support for restoration of the Jews can be traced back to the Puritans and beyond. It was renewed in the theology of the Plymouth Brethren founded by J.N. Darby in the early 19th century. The restoration was championed in the 1840s by Lords Shaftesbury and Palmerston, who in addition to religious motivations thought that a Jewish colony in Palestine would help to stabilize and revive the country, Jewish national stirrings were also voiced by novelists and writers such as Lord Byron, Benjamin Disraeli, George Eliot and Walter Scott.

Christian Zionism US Christian Support for Restoration of the Jews Puritan support for restoration of the Jews was transferred to the United States with the arrival of the Puritans. Increase Mather and many others were early champions of restoration of the Jews in 17th century United States. This idea became assimilated into the mainstream of U.S. ideas and culture and was supported by Presidents beginning with John Adams. In more recent times, it has also become the project of fundamentalist sects, including those derived from dispensationalist doctrines.

Zionism of Sephardic Jews Through an accident of history, European (Ashkenazy) Jews took the lead in organized Zionism for many years. However, Sephardic (Spanish) Jews and Jews in Arab lands maintained a closer practical tie with the holy land and with the than did Ashkenazy Jews and also influenced and participated in the the Zionist movement from its

inception. -born Judah ben Solomon Hai Alkalai (1798-1878,) is considered one of the major precursors of modern Zionism. Alkalai believed that return to the land of lsrael was a precondition for the redemption of the Jewish people. Alkalai's ideas greatly influenced his Ashkenazy contemporary, Rabbi Tsvi Hirsch Kalischer. Alkalai was also a friend of the grandfather of Theodor Herzl, the founder of modern Zionism. Another Sephardi Jew, David Alkalai, a grand-nephew of Judah Alkalai, founded and led the Zionist movement in Serbia and Yugoslavia., and attended the first Zionist Congress in Basel (1897).

Early Zionism The modern formulation of Zionism was partly divorced from religious aspirations. The 19th century enlightenment allowed the Jews to leave the ghettos of Europe for the first time. Some converted to Christianity and assimilated to surrounding society. Others, exposed to a general education, dropped their religious beliefs, but understood that both they and others still considered them to be Jews. This suggested a conundrum. If one could be a non- believer and still be a Jew, then "Jew" must be more than just the name of a religion, a problem already raised by the case of Spinoza. German racists solved this conundrum by inventing a racial theory, which lacked any real scientific basis. Socialists cited the aberrant class structure of Jewish society and labeled Jews a "caste.". Zionists solved the conundrum by declaring that Jews are a people, a fact implicit in the Jewish biblical and cultural concept of "am Yisrael." The Jews were a people without a country however, and would remain politically powerless as long as they did not have a national home. They would be guests everywhere and at home nowhere, according to Zionist ideology. This homelessness was the cause of the "Jewish Problem," and it could not fail to be exacerbated by the rise of nationalism and nations in the 19th century. This explained why, paradoxically, anti-Jewish sentiment might become more pronounced in "enlightened" Europe than it had been in previous centuries.

Moses Hess, a more or less secular Jew and a socialist, was probably the first to enunciate these ideas in so many words in his book Rome and Jerusalem, published in 1862, calling for a Jewish national movement similar to the Italian risorgimento nationalist movement. These and similar sentiments were adopted by numerous small groups that formed primarily in Eastern Europe, but also in Britain and in the United States.

Religion and Zionism Jewish religious authorities took a variety of attitudes to the evolving Zionist movement. One group was unalterably opposed to Zionism, both because they understood that Zionism provided a secular alternative to their monopoly on leadership of the Jewish community, and for theological reasons. Rabbi Moses Schreiber, the Hatam Sofer (1762-1839) was the rabbi of Pressburg. He opposed any type of reform. His opposition to Zionism was based on the assertion that nobody had ever thought of it before, so it must be wrong:

Why should we look for new ideas never dreamed of by our ancestors? If the idea of settlement was good and pleasing in the eyes of the Lord, why did our ancestors never devote themselves to it? As men say -- whatever is new is forbidden by the Torah. (Slucki, A,J. ed Shivat Tziyon, Warsaw, 1892, V 1, p 70.)

Rabbi Israel Meir Ha-Cohen of Radun, the Hafez Chaim ("desirer of life") who founded the anti-Zionist Agudath Yisrael, expressed similar opinion:

It is not in our power to repair the condition of our people, because we are under the sway of our enemies; we must attend to the spiritual situation of our people, which degenerates from day to day, and return them to the Lord. When we have corrected our actions, our material state will also improve, as promised in the Torah. (Poupko, H.L Hakohen, Kitsur Toldot heHafetz Haim, Mikhtevei HeHafetz Haim, Warsaw, 1937, page 68.)

A much smaller group of orthodox leaders took up the cause of settlement in the land of Israel in the late 19th century. They included Rabbi Isaac Jacob Reines, the founder of the Mizrachi movement, Rabbi Naphthali Zeev Berlin, and Rabbi Samuel Mohilever (or Mohilewer) who led the religious faction of Hovevei Tzion. They variously saw their task as one of preserving the unity of the Jewish people, of blending the Haskalah with , or of ensuring that religious Jews did not lose control of the settlement enterprise and allow unbelievers to run the Jewish community in the land of Israel, which was, after all, holy to them.

Proto-Zionism and the "First Aliya"

The first groups of immigrants who came to the land with the idea of turning the land into a national home for the Jews are known as the "first Aliya." "Aliya" literally means "going up"

and it is term Jews have used for a long time for coming to the holy land. Beginning in the 1870s, religious and nonreligious Jews established several study groups and societies for purchasing land in Palestine and settling there. In 1870 the Alliance Israelite, an ostensibly non-Zionist organization, founded the Miqve Yisrael agricultural school near Beit Dagan.

In 1882, the BILU (an acronym for "Beyt Ya'akov Lechu Venelcha" - House of Jacob let us go) and Hibbat Tziyon (love of Zion) and Hovevi Tziyon groups were established. They were inspired by the impetus of the wave of anti-Jewish violence that had swept Russia in 1881.

Hibbat Tziyion began as a network of independent underground study groups, eventually forming larger groups called Hovevei Tziyon. They attracted followers of the Haskalah who could no longer believe in assimilation or the possibility of normal life as Jews in the Diaspora. These and similar groups established a number of early Jewish settlements including Yesod Hamaalah, Rosh Pinna, Gedera, Rishon Le Tziyon, Nes Tziyona and Rehovot on land purchased from Arab owners with the aid of Jewish Petah Tiqva philanthropists, chiefly Lord Rothschild. Joel Solomon led a group of orthodox Jews out of Jerusalem to found Petah Tiqva in 1878.

The settlements were characteristically vineyards and orange orchards. The settlers were mostly religious Jews, though the religious Jewish establishment frowned on Zionism. In 1882, 150 Yemenite Jews also found their way to Palestine. The first Aliya numbered about 25,000 persons, primarily from Eastern Europe. Many of them returned home defeated by disease, poverty and unemployment.

Revival of Hebrew - Among the first arrivals of the first Aliya was Eliezer ben Yehuda (Perelman). Inspired by European, particularly Bulgarian nationalism, Ben Yehuda was moved to settle in Palestine. He arrived in 1881 and undertook to revive the Hebrew language. With the help of Nissim Bechar, principal of a school operated by the Alliance Israelite Universelle, Ben Yehuda began teaching Hebrew. Later he founded and published the Hatzvi newspaper and set up a linguistic council. Ben Yehuda's work was the major force in the revival of Hebrew as a modern language.

Leon Pinsker and Hovevei Tziyon - Inspired by the anti-Semitic violence in Russia, Leon Pinsker formulated the modern idea of Zionism in a small pamphlet called Auto-

Emancipation, published in 1882. Pinsker believed that anti-Semitism was inevitable as long as Jews were guests in every country and at home nowhere, and wrote that the Jews' only salvation lay in liberating themselves and settling in their own country. Pinsker favored Argentina or other countries as sites for the Jewish homeland. However, Western Jews who might have favored this idea rebuffed him. In his native Russia, however, his ideas were well received, but they were channeled to settlement in Palestine. In 1884, Pinsker was made head of the Hovevei Tziyon organization, which united many small and scattered groups, primarily in Russia, into a single organization. Pinsker favored "political Zionism," that is, organization of Jews in Europe and petitioning the great powers for land on which to establish a national home. However, his efforts in this direction were rebuffed by the Russian government. Instead, he directed his energies to the gradual purchase of land and settlement of small groups in Palestine.63

Early settlers faced innumerable cultural and economic difficulties. In 1800, the ravages of misadministration and war had reduced the population to about 200,000. By the 1880s, the land had recovered somewhat, but it was still poor and disease ridden. The total population was about 450,000. Jerusalem was a small town of 25,000 inhabitants, slightly more than half Jewish. The first settlement of Petah Tiqva in 1878 failed and was later refounded. Early Jewish Settlers

The Ottoman government barely tolerated the settlers, especially those who retained their foreign nationality, and the government officially restricted Jewish immigration, while making somewhat frantic attempts to import Muslim settlers from other parts of the Ottoman empire, including Bosnia, Kossovo and Circassia. Settlers who adopted Ottoman nationality were liable for the Turkish draft. Disease, poverty and unemployment caused many to leave.

The Bible and Zionism The Old Testament Bible inspired not only Christian Zionists, but Jewish Zionism as well. Secular Zionists, especially David Ben Gurion, viewed the Bible as the "deed" of the Jewish people to the land of Israel and a part of both Cultural Zionism and to a lesser extent

63 Ibid.

Religious Zionism was study of the bible and de-emphasis of writings, philosophy and religious thought. Students in the Jewish Yishuv educational system memorized long passages of the Bible, and went on field trips to explore and familiarize themselves with places mentioned in the bible. For both Christians and Jews, biblical archeology became an ideological activity as well as an academic pursuit.

Foundational Zionism Theodor Herzl and the Foundation of the Zionist Movement In the latter part of the nineteenth century, Zionism was transformed from a cultural feature of Judaism to a charitable concern to a social movement. The writings of the proto-Zionists gave it an ideology. The contribution of Theodor Herzl was to transform Zionism into a political organization. The Dreyfus Affair, in which a Jewish officer in the French Army was falsely convicted of treason, developed in France beginning in 1894. It excited a wave of anti-Semitism that made Western European Jews conscious of their national identity, and made many lose their faith in assimilation through the progress and equality offered by modern liberal democracy. In particular, it affected a young Vienna journalist, Theodor Herzl and his friend . Herzl's pamphlet Der Judenstaat, The Jewish State, was published in 1896. Herzl's plan for creating a Jewish State, arrived at after contemplating other solutions as well, provided the practical program of Zionism, and led to the first Zionist Congress in Basle, Switzerland, in August, 1897

After the first Basle Congress, Herzl wrote in his diary, ―Were I to sum up the Basle Congress in a word- which I shall guard against pronouncing publicly- it would be this: ‗At Basle, I founded the Jewish State. If I said this out loud today, I would be answered by universal laughter. If not in 5 years, certainly in 50, everyone will know it.‘‖

In 1902, Herzl published a utopian novel to popularize the Jewish state, Altneuland, (old- new land). Set in Eretz Yisrael (Palestine), Altneuland is a pluralistic multicultural vision complete with monorails, modern industry and equality for Arabs. The novel concludes, "If you will, it is no legend."64

Conclusion As the Zionist movement developed, several different factions or streams emerged in the early years. The protocols of early Zionist congresses were filled with the squabbles of these

64 Ibid

groups, and in some cases the squabbles led to splits. However, it should be understood that these groups often worked together, and that the Zionist movement tended to support all efforts that bore fruit. In retrospect, it could be seen that each group had made an essential and valuable contribution.

References Hertzberg, Arthur. 1959. The Zionist Idea, A conceptual Analysis and Reader. NYC, Atheneum. This classic book of readings is essential for understanding Zionism.

Introduction - What is Zionism?. . Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://www.zionism- israel.com/zionism_history.htm

Laqueur, Walter. 1997. A History of Zionism, Fine Communications. This authoritative and readable history explains the beginnings of Zionism, from the French Revolution to the creation of Israel. Unlike Sachar's even larger book, it does not go into details of modern Israeli history.

Proto-Zionism and the "First Aliya". Retrieved May 26, 2014 from http://www.zionism- israel.com/zionism_history.htm

Sachar, Howard M. 1998. A from the Rise of Zionism to Our Time. Alfred A. Knopf,. A comprehensive overview of the subject, told from the Zionist point of view. A good reference, but too detailed and compendious for casual reading by most.

Zionism and Israel – Biographies Theodor Herzl. Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://zionism-israel.com/bio/biography_herzl.htm

Chapter 3 Streams in Zionism

Introduction Political Zionism

Those who believed, like Herzl, that the key to success lay in a political solution, were classed as advocates of Political Zionism.

Herzl thought that diplomatic activity would be the main method for getting the Jewish homeland. He called for the organized transfer of Jewish communities to the new state. Of the location of the state, Herzl said, "We shall take what is given us, and what is selected by public opinion."

Herzl attempted to gain a charter from the Sultan of Turkey for the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine, then ruled by the Ottoman Empire. To this end he met in 1898 with the German Kaiser, Wilhelm II, in Istanbul and Palestine, as well as the Sultan, but these meetings did not bear fruit.

Herzl negotiated with the British regarding the possibility of settling the Jews on the island of Cyprus, the Sinai Peninsula, the El Arish region and Uganda. After the Kishinev pogroms, Herzl visited Russia in July 1903. He tried to persuade the Russian government to help the Zionists transfer Jews from Russia to Palestine. At the Sixth Zionist Congress Herzl proposed settlement in Uganda, on offer from the British, as a temporary "night refuge" (nachtasyl). The idea met with sharp opposition, especially from the same Russian Jews that Herzl had thought to help. Though the congress passed the plan as a gesture of esteem for Herzl, it was not pursued seriously, and the initiative died after the plan was withdrawn. In his quest for a political solution, Herzl met with the king of Italy, who was encouraging, and with the Pope, who expressed opposition.

Territorial Zionism A small group, the Jewish Territorial Organization ("Territorial Zionism") led by Israel Zangwill, split with the Zionist movement in 1905, and attempted to establish a Jewish homeland wherever possible. The organization was dissolved in 1925.

The insistence of Eastern European Jews on Palestine as the Jewish homeland, coupled with the failure of alternatives, maintained the focus of the Zionist movement on Palestine.

Attempts to find a "night asylum" in places such as Cyprus and Uganda have been distorted and exploited by anti-Zionists as "proof" that Zionism was not particularly focused on Palestine as the territory of the Jewish state. However, they were never intended as a permanent state and never gained much support. They were an expression of the misery of Eastern European Jewry and of the frantic urgency with which some Zionists viewed the situation of the Jews.

Cultural Zionism Herzl's political approach was attacked by Achad Haam, father of Cultural Zionism. He pointed out that the Jews were not a political force, had no chance at all of getting a declaration guaranteeing a Jewish national home from any country, and had no massive presence in Palestine that could provide a basis for their claims. Therefore, he felt that both political Zionism and Zionism based on settlement were premature and impractical. Ahad Haam wrote a penetrating criticism of Herzl and the "Volkerrechtig" national home: Jewish

State, Jewish Problem, which seemed to prove that the idea was impossible to implement. As we shall discuss below, he also foresaw objections of the Arab inhabitants of the land to Zionist settlement, and believed that the tiny Jewish community would never be able to hold its own against the Arabs.

Achad Ha'am believed that the new Jewish homeland should at first be primarily a cultural center for Jews of the Diaspora. He explained that revitalization of Jewish culture was needed before large numbers of Jews would come to Palestine. It was never precisely clear whether he intended that the Jewish state should house only a minority of the Jews at all times, or whether he thought that eventually it would become a physical and actual center, as well as a cultural center.

Achad Haam had earlier attacked the settlement movement, claiming that it was premature and would not be able to stand up against Arab resentment, in This is not the way ("The wrong way") written in 1889. But in his eulogy for Pinsker, An Open Letter to my Brethren: Pinsker and his Pamphlet, Auto-Emancipation, Ahad Ha'am made it clear that there was no real contradiction between his approach and that of the settlers, and that he was not opposed to settlement in the land of Israel.

Cultural Zionism fought a battle on two fronts. One front, as discussed, was opposition to political Zionism. The real battle of cultural Zionism however, was against the traditional Diaspora Jewish education system and religious rabbinical Judaism. Cultural Zionists attacked the traditional and backward "Cheder" education system which taught religious subjects by rote, and did not prepare its students for life in the modern world. Cultural Zionists understood that a revitalized Jewish nation and cultural life could not be viable without a modern education, and that Cheder education was driving many Jews into assimilation. They advocated and instituted reforms in the education system, as well as the revival of Hebrew as a spoken language. The Orthodox Jewish establishment was horrified by these ideas, and by the proposal that would essentially remove Jewish education from their exclusive oversight. This opposition was expressed at Zionist congresses through the religious Zionists, who gradually coalesced into a separate stream. It was their opposition, and not the opposition of a "political Zionist" faction, that prevented adoption of the cultural Zionist program they proposed. Herzl was afraid to back their demands because he believed that adoption of the program would split the Zionist movement, and we has, above all, concerned for unity of the movement. The revival of the Hebrew language, and the spread of Hebrew education in the Diaspora were the two major and lasting contributions of Cultural Zionism.

In modern times, some have taken Achad Ha'am's ideas out of context, to imply that Israel should remain only a cultural center for a Jews around the world, and also to claim that Ahad Ha'am believed that settlement in Israel was impossible and undesirable due to Arab oppostion. However, that is a gross distortion of Achad Ha'am's ideas and of cultural Zionism. Alongside his advocacy of cultural Zionism, Achad Haam was an enthusiastic supporter of Zionism in the conventional sense of ingathering of the exiles. Ahad Ha'am came on Aliya and died in Tel Aviv.

Practical Zionism The new Zionist movement, despite its preference for high politics, could not and did not want to ignore the fact of settlement of the land, however tiny it was. The early settlers of the BILU and others of the first Aliya had established "facts on the ground." Those who represented them insisted that settlement of the land, rather than Quixotic political efforts,

would turn the Zionist dream into reality. Their approach came to be known as Practical Zionism.

In 1907, a young economist named Arthur Ruppin was sent to Palestine to study the conditions of the Yishuv. Arthur Ruppin's report and ideas formed the basis for the Zionist action program in the coming years, and shaped the second Aliya as well as the future of Zionist settlement and the character of the state. Ruppin understood that it was impossible to continue with the plantation model introduced by the first Aliya settlement program. He backed a small group of socialist settlers who wanted to found a commune at Sejera. This became Kibbutz Degania in 1909, later followed by Kinnereth, Merchavia and other kibbutzim. The arrangement, originally thought to be temporary, proved to be practical, as well as suited to the socialist ideals of the new settlers. It soon inspired several other kibbutzim (collective farms). The Kibbutz movement was to become the backbone of Labor Zionism in Palestine, and eventually provided political and military leadership. Kibbutzim provided ideal places for hiding arms from the British and recruiting and training troops, as well as for organizing local defense and guarding borders.

Religious Zionism Religious Zionism is the most natural-seeming stream in Zionism for outsiders, but it is also the stream that actually came to Zionism with the greatest difficulty, it is most misunderstood stream and it changed and evolved since its inception.

Contrary to the beliefs of heavy handed anti-Zionist propagandists, the religious Zionism of Rabbis Mohilever, Reines and Kook was not "Messianic." On the contrary, adoption of Zionism was a break with tradition for religious Jews. It meant that they were taking matters into their own hands and were not waiting for divine redemption. The goal was not to bring the Messiah, but to be satisfied with a less ambitious material improvement in the condition of the Jews. In 1876, Mohilever wrote:

... we see that we have not succeeded through our deeds to bring about speedy redemption. The earlier generations with their righteousness were not granted the boon of bringing the miraculous redemption immediately, so a fortiori we shall not merit it.... We have to expect the redemption "in its season" and it will be by natural means and of a lower degree. (Fishman, Rabbi J.L., ed. Sefer Shmuel, Jerusalem, 1923, p 153)

Redemption would come about through self-help. This made it possible for religious thinkers to break free of the paralyzing formulations of rabbinical Zionism that had prevented religious participation in Zionism. Mohilever led the religious faction of the Hibbat Tziyon for many years. The key to his approach was unity of the Jewish people. It was difficult for some orthodox Jews to accept that this "material redemption" would come about through the agency of unbelieving Jews.

Rabbi Isaac Jacob Reines carried on the battle of religious Zionism in the Zionist congresses. When the fifth Zionist Congress, in 1902, decided to implement the cultural Zionism program of Ahad Ha'am, it was perceived as a clear threat to religious education. There was no religious alternative to modernization of Jewish cultural life and education. Reines founded the Mizrachi (an acronym for "Mercaz Ruhani" - spiritual center) movement as a faction of the Zionist movement in that year. Mizrachi had in fact existed in Russia before this time, as a faction of the Hovevei Tziyon let by Rabbi Mohilever. The ideas of Mizrachi soon received the support of Rabbi Isaac Kook, Cook was to become the first Ashkenazy Chief Rabbi of . Like Mohilever and Reines, Kook believed in the legitimacy of secular Zionism, which was, according to him, performing a sacred mission, and he strove

for reconciliation of all parts of the Zionist movement. The National Religious Party (NRP) which is the political part of Mizrachi followed a similar line until 1967 was a dovish liberal, progressive party in the traditions of German Jewish liberalism.

The Second Aliyah and Socialist Zionism Herzl's political Zionism had been a movement designed for, and led by, the middle and upper classes. The Zionist congresses with their frock coated delegates could hardly be taken for workers' assemblies. This was not entirely an accident. Herzl was convinced he needed the support of rich Jewish financiers to pay the Sultan's debts and to finance immigration and land purchase in Palestine, and the support of rabbis who would bring the Jewish communities they represented with them. Many of the delegates to the congress were chosen because they were relatively relatively affluent. Russian communities often "sent" delegates who were actually already in Western Europe - students and business people. In Russia, Zionism was represented primarily by the orthodox Zionists of the Mizrachi movement. This made it easy for the anti-Zionist Bund and the communists to portray Zionism as a reactionary religious movement. Chaim Weizmann wrote to Herzl in 1903:

In Western Europe it is generally believed that the large majority of Jewish youth in Russia in in the Zionist camp. Unfortunately, the opposite is true. The larger part of the contemporary younger generation is anti-Zionist, not from a desire to assimilate as in Western Europe, but through revolutionary conviction... (Luz, Ehud, Parallels Meet, N.Y, 1988 p 177)

Weizmann may have exaggerated. The potential for progressive Zionism existed. There were Russian Socialist Zionists. Nahman Syrkin had formulated his ideas for non-Marxist Zionist socialism in 1888. In 1898, Syrkin published the article The Jewish Problem and the Socialist Jewish State, but by this time he was in exile in Austria. There were also Marxist Zionists, but they were part of the the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (SDLP) as it was called then, the party that later split into the Bolshevik and Menshevik parties. There was no effective socialist Zionist political organization. The only possible political organization in Czarist Russia that was in any way revolutionary had to be an underground organization, and the leaders of those organizations, like Syrkin, were frequently exiled.

However, it soon became apparent that the "Political Zionism" approach was, at least in the immediate future, a failure. The Sultan would not give up Palestine, the British had nothing to offer but empty promises and the Kaiser was not really interested. Moreover, the rich financiers would not back Zionism as a mass movement. Herzl died, and at the same time a change took place in Russian society and in Russian Zionism. It became increasingly evident that the Russian communists (Russian Social Democratic Labor Party -SDLP as it was called then ) had no place or patience for the Bund or and of the other nationalist organizations. Plekhanov derided the Bund as "Zionists who get sea-sick." A Jewish member of the SDLP, Ber Borochov, split with the party and founded the Poalei Tziyon party which soon had a substantial membership. Borochov explained the Jewish problem in economic terms and produced a synthesis of Marxist socialism and Zionism that was appealing to secular Jewish socialists who had already felt the sting of anti-Semitism within the nascent communist movement.

According to Borochov. the Diaspora produced aberrant social conditions that made Jews economically inferior and politically helpless. The normal organization of society was a

pyramid, according to Borochov, with a large body of workers and smaller groups of intelligentsia, land owners and capitalists. The Diaspora had created an 'inverted pyramid' in Jewish society, with almost no Jewish peasant or worker class as Borochov showed in his analysis of Jewish occupations - The Economic Development of the Jewish People. Jews performed peripheral occupations which were not desirable to non-Jews for various reasons, and in which Jews had a competitive advantage. In the successive economic crises of capitalism however, the lower middle class, which included many Jews were "proletarianized" - forced into the working class, and competition for places of employment intensified. Jews would be forced out of their niche.

The Jews were therefore the most vulnerable part of any society during social change, and would be pushed out of the countries of world one after the other as they industrialized (a "stychic process"). Self-liberation of the Jews would come about by proletarianization of the Jews in their homeland, and the nascent Jewish proletariat would join the socialist international. (See The National Question and the Class Struggle, Our Platform and Eretz Yisrael in our program and tactics ) The idea that the Jewish proletariat, rather than the rabbis or the rich Jews of Western Europe would lead the Zionist revolution seemed totally quixotic, since the Jews of Russia were poor and weak, and the Jewish people lacked a true working class as Borochov's analysis had shown. Nonetheless, it was precisely the Jewish proletariat and Labor Zionism in Palestine which was to form the nucleus of the Zionist movement, providing for Zionist self defense and a Zionist government and virtual state organization under the British Mandate.

The Russian revolution of 1905 failed, and many young radicals fled the Tsarist police. Some came directly to Palestine, others fled to Poland and then to western Europe.

Many of these young men and women made their way to Palestine and formed theSecond Aliya. The socialists formed several movements in Palestine. Hapoel Hatzair, ("The young worker") was founded by A.D. Gordon. Marxist followers of Borochov founded Poalei Tziyon ("workers of Zion"), and later Hashomer Hatzair("the young guard) was also inspired by Ber Borochov.

Labor Zionism - Detail of photo showing delegates to the fourth meeting of the Hapoel Hatzair, about 1909. more about labor Zionism and socialist Zionism.

A.D. Gordon, inspired by 19th century romanticism, called for a Jewish return to the soil and virtually made a religion of work. These ideas fused into the ideals of "productivization" (returning the Jews, who engaged mostly in professional and mercantile trades, to productive labor) and "conquest of labor" (Kibbush Haavoda ). "Conquest of labor" later took on additional meanings. (See also Labor Zionism and Socialist Zionism

The Second Aliya arrived and established itself under the most prohibitively difficult conditions. Disease, poverty and Turkish persecution reduced its numbers and tried its will. Zionists of foreign nationality, mostly Russian, were viewed by the Turks as enemy aliens and were forced to flee the land during the first world war. A wave of epidemics swept the country, killing and impoverishing many. Those who survived were extremely tough, able, pragmatic individuals, who would go on to become the backbone of the leadership of the Jewish State, including David Ben-Gurion, Golda Meir Ze'ev (Valdimir) Jabotinsky and many others. The viable nucleus of a Zionist Yishuv (community) was planted in the land of Israel in this period and had taken root by 1914. A tradition of Zionsit self-defense was inaugurated with the creation of the Hashomer group. The ultraorthodox beggars of the "" had now become a minority. Practical Zionism had become a reality, if as yet only a tenuous one. The vanguard of Zionist efforts had shifted from the philanthropic efforts of rich Jews toward the socialist revolutionaries of the Poalei Tziyon and Hapoel Hatzair. Practical settlement efforts gradually increased the Jewish population of Palestine from about 25,000 in 1882 to approximately 85,000 to 100,000 just prior to World War I, including a new Jewish city, Tel Aviv, and the first kibbutzim.

Zionism and the conquest of labor The new immigrants arrived with the ideals of socialist Zionism, but reality was not favorable to implementing those ideas. The Zionist movement attempted to find them work. but the new immigrants, who had no training in agriculture and poor physical stamina, were unable to compete with Arab peasants. Arabs certainly would not hire Jewish workers, who could not work well and could not speak Arabic. Arab labor was also preferred by the plantation and vineyard owners of the First Aliya. Arabs were experienced and hard workers, and were able to work for much lower wages because they were often members of an extended family that made its main income from sharecropping. The plantation owners had also developed a superior colonialist mentality which suited the hiring of "natives," and clashed with the egalitarian ideas and social demands of the newly arrived socialists.

The socialist Zionist movements tried to force plantation owners to grant higher wages, and also began to insist that plantation owners hire only Jewish workers. This aspect of "conquest of labor" was controversial within the socialist-Zionist movements because it engendered lack of solidarity with the Arab working class and was discriminatory. One labor Zionist leader wrote:

"How can Jews, who demand emancipation in Russia, rob rights and act selfishly toward other workers upon coming to Eretz Israel? If it is possible for many a people to hide fairness and justice behind cannon smoke, how and behind what shall we hide fairness and justice? We should absolutely not deceive ourselves with terrible visions. We shall never possess cannons, even if the goyim shall bear arms against one another for ever. Therefore, we cannot but settle in our land fairly and justly, to live and let live. " (Meir Dizengoff (writing as "Dromi") "The Workers Question," Hatzvi, September 21, 1909)

At the same time, Conquest of Labor was a central part of Labor Zionist ideology, as a means of rebuilding the Jewish people, not a discriminatory ideology. A.D. Gordon wrote:

But labour is the only force which binds man to the soil… it is the basic energy for the creation of national culture. This is what we do not have, but we are not aware of missing it. We are a people without a country, without a national living language, without a national culture. We seem to think that if we have no labour it does not matter - let Ivan, John or Mustafa do the work, while we busy ourselves with producing a culture, with creating

national values and with enthroning absolute justice in the world. (A.D. Gordon, "Our Tasks Ahead" 1920)

The boycott of Arab labor, only partly successful, was carried out reluctantly as a matter of necessity, and because the establishment of Jews as a class of colonial plantation owners seemed worse than the alternative. In 1934, David Ben-Gurion told Palestinian leader Musa Alami,

―We do not want to create a situation like that which exists in South Africa, where the whites are the owners and rulers, and the blacks are the workers. If we do not do all kinds of work, easy and hard, skilled and unskilled, if we become merely landlords, then this will not be our homeland‖ (Shabtai Teveth, Ben-Gurion and the Palestinian Arabs: From Peace to War, London: Oxford University Press, 1985, p. 140).

While it was the only way to foster Jewish labor, the "conquest of labor" program was discriminatory. It provoked bitterness among some Arabs, particularly watchmen who lost their jobs to Jews. Realistically, as the Jews were about 15% of the population of Ottoman Palestine, the program could not have had a real effect on the Arab labor market. In the main the "conquest of labor" movement was not successful before World War I. Only a few thousand Jewish workers were involved. Gershon Shafir (Land, Labor and the Origins of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, 1882–1914, University of California Press, 1996) estimates that about 10,000 such workers passed through Palestine in the second Aliya, many leaving in discouragement. Other sources claim there were about 3,000 workers out of approximately 33,000 who came to Palestine in the second Aliya. Because of the wage differential and because of the expertise of Arab workers, Arab labor continued to find employment in Jewish settlements. Conquest of Labor was to become important in the late 1930s, when the Arab revolt and strikes, as well as swelling Jewish immigration cause a much more significant displacement of Arabs from Jewish industry and agriculture, especially when Arabs simply didn't show up for work. At the same time, it must be remembered that Arabs almost never hired any Jews, especially not for agricultural or industrial labor, and this discrimination was taken for granted.

Zionism in WW I The outbreak of World War I in August 1914 isolated Zionists in their respective communities in the Diaspora. The Zionist organization decided to remain officially neutral, though Zionists in each country aided their side in the war. Conditions in Ottoman Palestine, never good, deteriorated. The authorities expelled those Jews who were enemy Russian nationals. Many of the leaders fled to Egypt and to the United States. In the United States, they played an important role in strengthening the beginnings of the Zionist organization. Joseph Trumpeldor, Ze'ev Jabotinsky and others helped to form first the Zion Mule Corps and then the Jewish Legion, which fought on the side of the British at Gallipoli. The official leadership in Palestine however, cooperated with the Turks, and Jews having Turkish citizenship served in the army or aided the war effort. The Zionist Yishuv was anxious not to provoke further Turkish oppression of the Jews, but a clandestine group, the NILI, organized by Aaron Aaronsohn, communicated with British ships and aided the British assault. Most of the NILI group were arrested and executed, but Aaronsohn escaped to Egypt and gave General Allenby's forces vital information about water sources in the Negev desert that aided in the capture of . During the war, the Jewish population was greatly depleted by emigration and by successive epidemics of typhus and influenza.

Mandatory Zionism

The British Mandate - The first achievement of Political Zionism The Zionist movement did not give up efforts to find a political solution. The political Zionism and practical settlement approaches were merged into "Synthetic Zionism" advocated by Chaim Weizmann. Weizmann and others understood that a British victory would spell the end of the Ottoman empire, and present a unique opportunity to implement a Jewish national home in Palestine.

The efforts ultimately bore fruit in the , a promise by Britain to support a Jewish national home in Palestine, and in the League of Nations Mandate, which gave international sanction to the Jewish national home. Weizmann became head of the Zionist organization and later was the first President of Israel.

Zionism in America Zionist sentiment in the United States was primarily kindled among early Christian groups, and motivated initial missionary work in the land of Israel. The same time, the project of Mordecai Manuel Noah to form a Jewish "state" as a temporary on Grand Island in New York, remained for many years the lone symbol of American proto-Zionism. The cause however, was taken up by American Jewish poet and others toward the end of the 19th century. Another very important American Zionist was , who in 1912 initiated the foundation of the Hadassah organization. Initially a medical relief effort, Hadassah went on to become the largest women's Jewish organization in the United States, underpinning much of the educational and charitable work of the Zionist organization in the US and around the world, and marrying Zionism to progressive causes and women's rights in the United States.

During World War I, both chief Justice Brandeis and Justice Frankfurter became supporters of the Zionist cause, using political influence to help garner support for the Balfour declaration and the British mandate for Palestine. Jewish refugees from Palestine who found temporary refuge in the United States also built support for Zionism and recruited for the Jewish Legion. However, American Zionism in the United states remained a low key organization for many years. American Jews were satisfied with their new home. If they supported Zionism, it was only mostly as a movement to build a refuge for unfortunate European Jews. American Jewish interest in Zionism was cooled by the anti-Zionist stance of the large Reform Judaism movement. This opposition began to change as the tragic events in Germany disproved assimilationist ideologies and demonstrated the unity of the Jewish people. It was not until 1937, however, that Reform Judaism officially reversed its historic antipathy to Zionism in the Columbus Platform. Thereafter, American Jews increasingly came to play a critical role in support for Zionism and the Jewish state, replacing European Jewry that was destroyed in the Holocaust, and becoming the largest Diaspora community of Jews. American Zionists are responsible for most of the charitable donations to the Palestinian Jewish community and to Israel, for financing the creation of Jewish military capabilities, for organizing the campaign to bring about creation of a Jewish State, and for ongoing political efforts to secure support for Israel in the United States.

The split in Zionism During the 1920s, a split occurred in the Zionist movement, owing to disagreements over cooperation with the British and Jewish self defense. British policy in London at first favored Zionism in Palestine, but Palestine was still under military rule in 1920. The British military had little use for either Jews or Zionism. In 1920, and again in 1921 Arab riots broke out in Palestine, apparently with the encouragement of the British, and led by Hajj Amin Al

Husseini and Aref el Aref. In 1920, the Arabs had rioted in Jerusalem during the Nebi Musa holiday at Easter time. They screamed "Palestine is our land and the Jews are our dogs ("Filasteen Arduna wa'al yahud kilabuna"). Ze'ev Jabotinsky and other veterans of the Jewish Legion had formed a tiny clandestine defense force armed with pistols, the beginnings of the Haganah. They were arrested following the riots. The riots and the British reaction demonstrated the urgent need for a Jewish self-defense force, since the British would not protect the Jews from the Arabs. The Haganah was established as a clandestine force, and Jewish and Arab gunrunning was a matter of concern for the British administration, who exaggerated its extent. Some veterans of the Jewish Legion insisted that there must be a legal and open defense force and some British officials were sympathetic ( see John Evelyn Shuckburgh, Colonial Office Memo on Jewish Gun-Running in Palestine) but the British administration was opposed. If they granted a Jewish force, they reasoned that they would need to grant an Arab force as well. The Zionists did not press the point. In 1923, Jabotinsky published the Iron Wall, Though clothed in apocalyptic bombast, the Iron Wall was not a call for a modern national army, but only for legalization of a small force of Jewish police who would carry rifles.

Meanwhile, the British were having second thoughts about the Jewish national home, which provoked opposition from the Arabs. The British split the large area of Transjordan from the Palestine Mandate (see map at right). This was part of the basis for an eventual split in the Zionist movement. The revisionists refused to accept the loss of Transjordan and eventually left the Zionist movement over that and other issues. In 1923 the British also split off the Golan heights, a small portion of northern Palestine, northeast of the sea of Galilee, and gave it to French mandated . The Zionist movement, led by Weizmann, accepted the loss of these lands and counseled cooperation with the British. Jabotinsky and a few followers resigned from the Zionist movement in protest.

A nucleus of radicalized crystallized around Jabotinsky. They were bitter over the loss of the greater part of Palestine, and Jewish defenselessness in the face of Arab attacks. Most of them were out of step with the leaders of the Jewish yishuv, who were predominantly socialist. In 1925, Jabotinsky founded the revisionist Zionist movement as an alternative to official Zionism. The main tenet of Revisionism was the claim to both sides of the Jordan river.

Jewish Immigration under the Mandate The creation of the Mandate seemingly opened up a huge new opportunity for the Zionist organization, but the promise was only partially fulfilled. Only tiny sums of money could be raised in Europe and the United States to purchase lands and settle immigrants in Palestine. Russian Jews, once the hope of the Zionist movement, were now confined to the USSR following the Russian revolution, and Zionist activity there was soon forbidden. In Britain, attitudes to Zionism hardened owing to opposition of Arabs and of foreign office personnel to the Zionist program. Some Zionists foresaw an urgent need for resettling the Jews of Europe and predicted a looming catastrophe, though none envisioned the Holocaust that was to take place. However, it was impossible to get even small sums to finance Zionist

work from European Jewry, who would eventually be forced by the Nazis to pay many times the 4 million pounds sterling that the Zionists required.

All these factors, plus sporadic Arab violence and initially poor conditions in Palestine, forced the Zionist movement to proceed cautiously and slowly, cooperating with British authorities in setting modest limits to the yearly immigration quotas as well as restrictive financial requirements for immigrants.

Jewish immigration after the British entered Palestine is somewhat arbitrarily divided into three further Aliyoth (plural of Aliya):

The third Aliya - The third aliya consisted mostly of Eastern European and Russian Jews, including some who had left or been expelled by the Turks during the war. This immigration began about 1919 when Palestine was still under British military rule and is considered to have ended about 1923. Perhaps 35,000- 40,000 Jews came to Palestine in this period (see Third Aliya).

The fourth Aliya - After the institution of the mandate, immigration quotas were established, and applicants had to prove that they had some capital with which to begin life in Palestine. The fourth Aliya lasted from 1924 to 1929 or 1932 and consisted in large part of Polish Jews who were motivated to come to Palestine by the anti-Semitic regime and the new immigration quotas imposed in the United States. The fourth Aliya is generally considered to have ended in 1929, after Arab riots in Jerusalem seemed to show that settlement in Palestine was not a safe solution for Jews, or in 1932, after which immigrants began coming from Nazi Germany in large numbers. About 60,000-70,000 Jewish immigrants came to Palestine in this period (see Fourth Aliya).

The fifth Aliya - The fifth Aliya lasted from 1929 or 1933 to 1939, when the British White Paper closed the gates of Palestine to Jewish immigration due to the Arab revolt and international Arab pressure on Great Britain. About 200,000- 250,000 Jews arrived in this period; 174,000 of them came between 1933 and 1936, when severe quotas were first introduced. Many of them were German Jews fleeing . The Germans allowed the Jews to leave in part because of the "hesder" or "ha'avara" agreement under which the property Jews took with them was treated as "export goods" in return for a ransom paid to the Reich (see Fifth Aliya ).

The Jewish Agency The Jewish Agency was set up formally in 1929 through the efforts of Chaim Weizmann and others, in accordance with the stipulation of the League of Nations Mandate that an "agency" comprised of representatives of world Jewry assist in the establishment of the Jewish National Home. The agency was the official interlocutor for the Jews of Palestine and the Zionist endeavor with the British Mandate and the League of Nations. The Jewish Agency was not a Zionist organization, however, since it was set up by the World Zionist Organization and non-Zionist groups and leaders, including Leon Blum, Felix Warburg and Louis Marshall.

Zionism and the Arabs When Jews began thinking about return to Israel in the early 19th century, there were about 200,000 Arabs living in all of the land, mostly concentrated in the countryside of the West Bank and Galilee, and mostly lacking in national sentiment. Palestine was, in Western eyes, a country without a nation, as Lord Shaftesbury wrote. Early proto-Zionists did not trouble themselves at all about the existing inhabitants. Many were heavy influenced by

utopianism. In the best 19th century tradition, they were creating a Jewish utopia, where an ancient people would be revived. They envisioned a land without strife, where all national and economic problems would be solved by good will, enlightened and progressive policies and technological know-how. Herzl's Altneuland was in in fact just such a utopia. Jewish population grew, but Arab population grew more rapidly. By 1914, there were over 500,000 Arabs in Palestine.

At the same time, Zionist pronouncements and outlook were often frankly colonialist, especially when addressing leaders of foreign powers. The plantations sponsored by Baron Rothschild were modeled on plantation settlement in and other colonies. Colonialism was fashionable and "progressive" in Europe, and early Zionist leaders saw nothing wrong in assimilating this idea to Zionism along with other "modern" ideas such as socialism, utopianism and nationalism.

This changed as socialist Zionists came to dominate the Zionist movement. Later Zionists were heavily influenced by socialism and embarrassed at the colonialist aspects of the Zionist project. They were also aware, of course, that Palestine was already occupied by Arabs. Many however, including the young David Ben--Gurion, who headed the Executive Committee of the Zionist Yishuv (Jewish community) in Palestine and was later the first Prime Minister of Israel, initially thought that the Arabs could only benefit from Jewish immigration and would welcome it. Others, such as Eliezer ben Yehuda, frankly envisioned removal of the Arabs from Palestine.

One of the earliest warnings about the Arab problem came from the cultural Zionist writer Achad Haam (Asher Ginsberg), who wrote in his 1891 essay "Truth from Eretz Israel" that in Palestine "it is hard to find tillable land that is not already tilled", and moreover

From abroad we are accustomed to believing that the Arabs are all desert savages, like donkeys, who neither see nor understand what goes on around them. But this is a big mistake... The Arabs, and especially those in the cities, understand our deeds and our desires in Eretz Israel, but they keep quiet and pretend not to understand, since they do not see our present activities as a threat to their future... However, if the time comes when the life of our people in Eretz Israel develops to the point of encroaching upon the native population, they will not easily yield their place. Arab opposition to Zionism grew after 1900. The birth of Arab nationalism and Arab political aspirations in the Ottoman empire coincided with the arrival of a fairly sizeable number of Zionists with the announced program of settling the land and turning it into a Jewish national home. In his book, Reveil de la Nation Arab in 1905, Najib Azouri stated that the Jews wanted to establish a state stretching from Mt. Hermon to the Arabian Desert and the Suez Canal. Azoury wrote:

Two important phenomena of the same nature but opposed, are emerging... They are the awakening of the Arab nation and the latent effort of the Jews to reconstitute on a very large scale the ancient kingdom of Israel. These movements are destined to fight each other continually until one of them wins.

*Mandel, Neville, The Arabs and Palestine, UCLA, 1976

Arabs recognized that the Jews had a historic claim to the land, and that is precisely what frightened them. The mayor of Jerusalem, Zia al Khalidi, wrote to Tsadok Khan, chief rabbi of France:

Who can contest the rights of the Jews to Palestine? God knows, historically it is indeed your country.

But he asserted that the brutal force of reality prevented resettlement of Palestine by Jews. Khalidi concluded:

In the name of God, leave Palestine in peace. (Nusseibeh, Sari, Once Upon a Country, Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 2007, p 23)

Arab nationalism was not recognized by the early Zionists because it did not exist. The Arabs, along with the West, recognized that Palestine had belonged to the Jews, and that the Ottoman Empire and the Arabs were colonialist occupiers, asserting their claim based on might rather than justice. This perception would soon change.

Local Arab opposition to Zionism and Zionist settlement was not initially based on national sentiment, but on specific conflicts arising from land purchases and on racism and prejudice and against Jews. Rashid Khalidi (Palestinian Identity, Columbia, 1997) notes that beginning about 1908 Palestinian newspapers offer extensive evidence of anti-Zionist agitation. Actual conflicts flared up because the Zionists purchased large tracts from landowners and subsequently evicted the tenant farmers. The former tenants, though they had received compensation, continued to insist that the land was theirs under time honored traditions, and tried to take it back by force. A notable case was Al-Fula, where Zionists had purchased a large tract of land from the Sursuq family of . Local officials took the side of the Arab peasants against the Zionists and against the Ottoman government, which upheld the legality of the sale. One hundred and fifty Palestinian notables cabled the Ottoman government to protest land sales to Jews in March 1911. Azmi Bey, Turkish governor of Jerusalem responded:

We are not xenophobes; we welcome all strangers. We are not anti-Semites; we value the economic superiority of the Jews. But no nation, no government, could open its arms to groups... aiming to take Palestine from us.

(Benny Morris, Righteous Victims, Knopf 1999 Page 62)

This was an Ottoman Turkish national claim, not an Arab one. However, national claims were soon mixed with economic grievances. It was not clear which was the actual motivation, and which was the issue used as an excuse to advance the issue.

Likewise, the Kibbush Haavoda "conquest of labor" movement displaced some Arab watchmen and led to violence. While the actual number of persons displaced or dispossessed may have been small, and may have been offset by real economic benefits and increased employment provided by Zionist investment, the feeling grew among the Arabs that the Zionists had arrived to dispossess them. A Nazareth group complained that the Zionists were "a cause of great political and economic injury... The Zionists nourish the intention of expropriating our properties. For us these intentions are a question of life and death." (Morris, loc cit.) As the conflict intensified, the Zionists formed a guard association, Hashomer, to guard the settlements in place of Arab guards. The attempts to retake land and disputes with Jewish guards led to increased violence beginning in the second half of 1911.

Many Zionists however, believed at least initially that conflict was not inevitable, and certainly most Zionist thinkers did not contemplate expulsion of the Arabs. Ber Borochov, the founder of socialist Zionism, said in his last speech:

Many point out the obstacles which we encounter in our colonization work. Some say that the Turkish law hinders our work, others contend that Palestine is insignificantly small, and still others charge us with the odious crime of wishing to oppress and expel the Arabs from Palestine...

When the waste lands are prepared for colonization, when modern technique is introduced, and when the other obstacles are removed, there will be sufficient land to accommodate both the Jews and the Arabs. Normal relations between the Jews and Arabs will and must prevail. (Ber Borochov - Eretz Yisrael in our program and tactics - Kiev, September 1917)

The Zionists were well aware of Arab nationalism by the start of World War I, and Chaim Weizmann took care to meet with the Emir Feisal. Weizmann wanted the Zionist and Arab national struggles to be seen as causes with a common interest. Feisal did not go quite so far perhaps, but he was willing to acquiesce in Zionist control of Palestine, provided that the British fulfilled their promises to the Arabs. (see Feisal-Weizmann Agreement and Feisal- Frankfurter Correspondence ) That support evaporated when France was given a mandate for Syria, and the Arabs believed the British had betrayed their promises.

The Arabs of Palestine were appalled at the prospect of living in a country dominated by a Jewish majority and feared that they would be dispossessed. By 1919, representatives of the Jaffa Muslim-Christian council were saying Arab opposition to Zionism was not based only on economic and social issues. It was colored by the traditional Muslim vision of the Jews as second class citizens. They announced:

"We will push the Zionists into the sea or they will push us into the desert"

(Benny Morris, Righteous Victims, Knopf 1999 Page 91)

Anti-Jewish rioting and violence broke out in 1920 and 1921. By the 1920s, it was also motivated by a strong admixture of Western anti-Semitism. In March of 1921, Musa Kazim El Husseini, deposed as Mayor of Jerusalem because of his part in riots earlier that year, told Winston Churchill:

The Jews have been amongst the most active advocates of destruction in many lands... It is well known that the disintegration of Russia was wholly or in great part brought about by the Jews, and a large proportion of the defeat of Germany and Austria must also be put at their door.

(Benny Morris, Righteous Victims, Knopf 1999 Page 99)

It is not clear how Churchill received this unwitting testimonial to the aid supposedly proffered to his country's war effort by the Jews, or what Husseini thought to accomplish by it. Aref Dajani had earlier voiced similar sentiments to the King- Crane Commission:

It is impossible for us to make an understanding with them or or even to live with them... Their history and all their past proves that it is impossible to live with them. In all the countries where they are at present they are not wanted... because they always arrive to suck the blood of everybody...

Benny Morris, Righteous Victims, Knopf 1999 Page 91)

By this time, Zionist leaders could no longer ignore the conflict with the Arabs. David Ben Gurion told members of the Va'ad Yishuv (the temporary governing body of the Jewish community in Palestine) in June 1919:

But not everybody sees that there is no solution to this question. No solution! There is a gulf; and nothing can bridge it.... I do not know what Arab will agree that Palestine should belong to the Jews...We, as a nation, want this country to be ours; the Arabs, as a nation, want this country to be theirs.

(Benny Morris, Righteous Victims, Knopf 1999 Page 91)

While Palestinian Arabs now viewed themselves as a small group of helpless victims of powerful British and Jewish "interests," the Zionists saw the opposite side of the coin. The militant Zionist leader, Ze'ev Vladimir Jabotinsky, asked in 1918:

The matter is not ... an issue between the Jewish people and the Arab inhabitants of Palestine, but between the Jewish people and the Arab people. The latter, numbering 25 million, has [territory equivalent to] half of Europe, while the Jewish people, numbering ten million and wandering the earth, hasn't got a stone...Will the Arab people stand opposed? Will it resist? [Will it insist] that...they...shall have it [all] for ever and ever, while he who has nothing shall forever have nothing?

(Caplan, Neil, Palestine Jewry and the Palestine Question, 1917-1925, Frank Cass, 1978)

In his Iron Wall article of 1923, Jabotinsky answered his own question. He argued that agreement with the Arabs was not possible, because they

...look upon Palestine with the same instinctive love and true fervor that any Aztec looked upon his Mexico or any Sioux looked upon his prairie. To think that the Arabs will voluntarily consent to the realization of Zionism in return for the cultural and economic benefits we can bestow on them is infantile. Jabotinsky was at least initially against expulsion of the Arabs, which he was "prepared to swear, for us and our descendants, that we will never [do]". Rather in The Iron Wall, he argued that the Jewish presence should be imposed by forming a strong defense that would demonstrate to the Arabs that the Jews could not be forced out of Palestine. However, while The Iron Wall expressed a comprehensive philosophy, its practical background and intent were much more limited. Jabotinsky wanted the British authorities to allow the Jews to form a separate defensive force under British supervision, to combat attacks such as the riots that had occurred in 1920 and 1921. The British refused. The Zionist organization resigned themselves to the British decision, but Jabotinsky wanted to continue with the formation of such a force. Though the Haganah defensive underground was founded in 1920 by Jabotinsky, it didn't become a major project of the Zionist movement until after the riots of 1930.

Meanwhile the Arab and Jewish communities grew progressively apart. Arabs refused to participate in a Palestinian local government which gave equal representation to the Jewish minority. The British, nearly bankrupt after WW I, insisted that the mandate should be self- sufficient. Mandate services were paid for from taxes paid by the Jewish and Arab inhabitants of Palestine. Additional services were funded by philanthropists from abroad and

from membership dues in various organizations. Zionist philanthropy and organization far- outstripped what Palestinian Arabs could provide. By 1936, each Jewish worker in Palestine was earning on average four times as much as each Arab, and paying four times as much taxes. The Jews had set up an approximation of a modern industrial economy, while most of the Arabs languished in feudalism, and their leaders did nothing to help them. Neither Arabs nor Jews wanted integrated schools. Zionist groups funded religious, secular and labor-Zionist educational networks for Jewish children in Hebrew, but few comparable schools were set up for Arabs. The Zionists founded the Histadrut Labor federation to encompass Jewish workers, providing Hebrew education, medical care, worker-owned enterprises and cultural facilities as well as representation of labor rights. No comparable association was created by the more numerous Arabs of Palestine, though the Histadruth made some efforts to organize Arab labor beginning in 1927, and the Palestine Communist party attempted to represent both Jewish and Arab labor.

Zionism, the Arab Revolt and the Conflict With Britain

From the beginning of the British Mandate, Arab opposition to Zionism coalesced into organized resistance, taking the form of riots and later a revolt. The chief architects of this mischief were the Husseini clan led by Hajj Amin Al Husseini, the Grand Mufti.The Mufti and others convinced Palestinian Arabs that the Zionists were going to dispossess them of their lands by force, and spread false rumors that the Jews were going to desecrate the Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. Riots and pogroms were instigated in 1920, 1921 and 1929 (see Arab Riots and Massacres of 1929 andHebron Massacre)resulting in deaths and injuries in Jaffa, Hebron, Jerusalem, and elsewhere. The British government increasingly understood that its promises to the Zionists and Mandate obligations were

very unpopular in the Arab world. They split off the major part of the Palestine Mandate territory to form Transjordan even as Grand Mufti Hajj Amin Al the mandate came into effect, and in 1930 issued the Passfield Husseini featured on the White Paper that proposed limiting Jewish immigration to cover of Vienna Illustrated Palestine. (Wiener Illustrierte) magazine. Husseini is apparently reviewing troops he had recruited.

The Passfield White Paper was quietly withdrawn under pressure from Zionists, from British public opinion and from the League of Nations. However, Palestine did not remain quiet. The Mufti allied himself with Fascist Italy and Germany, and probably was funded by the Italian government beginning about 1936.

These policies turned the once-friendly British into antagonists of the Zionist movement. Labor Zionists and the Zionist Executive were in favor of moderate policies that would try to work around the British opposition to Zionism. A faction led by Ze'ev Jabotinsky believed in

confronting the British and the Arabs, and if necessary, using force. In 1925, Jabotinsky split from the main Zionist movement and formed the Revisionist movement.

In 1936, in response to the large Jewish immigration from Europe, open Arab Revolt broke out. Three years of bloody riots instigated by the Grand Mufti Hajj Amin Al Husseini and his allies resulted in hundreds of Jewish casualties and an estimated 4,500 Arabs were killed, the majority by the Mufti's gangs. The rioting forced the British to take draconian measures. The Mufti fled to Iraq in 1937 and then to Nazi Germany in 1941 after instigating a pro-Axis Coup in Iraq. In 1937, the British proposed tentatively to partition Palestine in the Peel report. This caused additional divisions in the Zionist movement. Some believed in a bi- national Jewish Arab state and objected to the idea, contained in the Peel recommendations, of transferring Arabs "voluntarily" out of the territory to be allotted to the Jewish state. The revisionists and religious Zionists, on the other hand, objected to giving up any part of the territory of Palestine. Subsequently the British issued the White Paper of 1939, severely limiting Jewish immigration. The Revisionists formed the underground army, which attacked British soldiers and administrators and perpetrated terror attacks against Arabs in retaliation for Arab attacks on Jews. Zionism during the Holocaust The murder of six million Jews by the Nazi regime in the Holocaust has become inevitably and inextricably bound up to the history of Zionism. The relation of the Holocaust to Zionism has provoked controversy and resentment, particularly among anti-Zionists. Zionists have been accused of indifference to the plight of European Jews. To an an extent it was true at first. Initially, the reports of Nazi persecution did not seem to be any worse than persecution of Jews that had occurred in Europe for hundreds of years - confiscation of businesses, discriminatory legislation and expulsion. The Yishuv was struggling with an Arab revolt and trying to build a Jewish society. The tiny, more or less powerless and poor Israeli Yishuv and the Zionist movement that supported it, could do very little to aid the Jews of Europe in any case. Nonetheless, the Zionist organization and the Yishuv ransomed Jews from Nazi Germany in return for economic concessions. The Zionists managed to save over 200,000 European Jews before World War II. When the British responded to Arab pressure and ended Jewish immigration to Palestine, the Zionists, attempting to rescue Jews from the Nazis, organized illegal immigration through the "Institution for Illegal Immigration" (Hamossad L'aliya Beth).

Illegal immigration (Aliya Bet) was organized by the Jewish Agency between 1939 and 1942, when a tightened British blockade and stricter controls in occupied Europe made it impractical, and again between 1945 and 1948. Rickety boats full of refugees tried to reach Palestine. Additionally, there were private initiatives, an initiative by the Nazis to deport Jews and an initiative by the US to save European Jews. Many of the ships sank or were caught by the British or the Nazis and turned back, or shipped to Mauritius or other destinations for internment. The Patria (also called "Patra") contained immigrants offloaded from three other ships, for transshipment to the island of Mauritius. To prevent transshipment, the Haganah placed a small explosive charge on the ship on November 25, 1940. They thought the charge would damage the engines. Instead, the ship sank, and over 250 lives were lost. A few weeks later, the SS Bulgaria docked in Haifa with 350 Jewish refugees and was ordered to return to Bulgaria. The Bulgaria capsized in the Turkish straits, killing 280. The Struma, a vessel that had left Constanta in Rumania with about 769 refugees, got to Istanbul on December 16, 1941. There, it was forced to undergo repairs of its engine and leaking hull. The Turks would not grant the refugees sanctuary. The British would not approve transshipment to Mauritius or entry to Palestine. On February 24, 1942, the Turks ordered the Struma out of the harbor. It sank with the loss of 428 men, 269 women and 70 children. It had been torpedoed by a Soviet submarine, either because it was mistaken for a Nazi ship,

or more likely, because the Soviets had agreed to collaborate with the British in barring Jewish immigration. Illegal immigration continued until late in the war, apparently without the participation of the Mossad l'aliya Bet. Despite the many setbacks, tens of thousands of Jews were saved by the illegal immigration.

To circumvent British regulations against creating new settlements, the Zionists initiated the "stockade and tower" ("homa umigdal") program, that allowed overnight creation of a new "settlement," consisting of a wall and watch tower. Under the law, the British could not destroy such an 'established' settlement.

The Zionists wanted to fight Fascism and rescue European Jews, but they could not do so except as permitted by the British government. The British recruited soldiers in Palestine. About 26,000 Jews out of a population of perhaps 500,000 and 6,000 Arabs out of a population of over a million, volunteered to fight in the British army. The Zionists pleaded for combat duty in Europe in a special Jewish Brigade. For the most part, however, they were employed in the Middle East. Eventually a Jewish Brigade was formed. The Jewish Agency proposed a scheme to send hundreds of Jewish commandos into occupied Europe to liaison with partisan groups and rescue Jews. Over a year passed before the British finally approved of a limited version of this plan. About 110 Zionist Parachutists were trained of the 250 who volunteered, but less than 40 reached Europe.

Reports of Nazi atrocities became increasingly frequent and vivid. Despite the desperate need to find a haven for refugees, the doors of Palestine remained shut to Jewish immigration. The Zionist leadership met in the Biltmore Hotel in New York City in 1942 and declared that it supported the establishment of Palestine as a "Jewish Commonwealth." This was not simply a return to the Balfour declaration repudiated by the British White Paper, but rather a restatement of Zionist aims that went beyond the Balfour declaration, and a determination that the British were in principle, an enemy to be fought, rather than an ally. This was a defeat for the left-wing party of the Labor Zionists, Mapam, who wanted a bi- national Zionist state. David Ben-Gurion also portrayed it as a victory for himself over Chaim Weizmann, who had opposed confrontation. Weizmann supported the Biltmore declaration, but he was too irrevocably identified with the failed moderate line, and he lost support. The Revisionists rejoined the Zionist movement, but were still called "dissidents" and did not merge their underground armies, the Irgun (Etzel ) and the (also called the "Stern Gang") into the Hagannah defense organization of the mainstream Zionists.

On November 6, 1944, members of the Lehi underground Eliyahu Hakim Eliyahu Bet Zuri assassinated Lord Moyne in Cairo. Moyne, known to be an anti-Zionist, was in charge of carrying out the terms of the 1939 White Paper. Lord Moyne and his wife were personal friends of the Churchills. The assassination turned Winston Churchill against the Zionists. The Jewish Agency and Zionist Executive believed that British and world reaction to the assassination of Lord Moyne could jeopardize cooperation after the war, that had been hinted at by the British, and might endanger the Jewish Yishuv if they came to be perceived as enemies of Britain and the allies. Therefore they embarked on a campaign against the Lehi and Irgun, known in Hebrew as the "Sezon" ("Season"). Members of the underground were to be ostracized. Leaders were caught by the Hagannah, interrogated and sometimes tortured, and about a thousand persons were turned over to the British.

Following World War II, Britain continued to limit Jewish immigration to Palestine. The Zionist factions united and conducted an underground war against the British, as well as applying pressure on the British government through the United States. In June of 1947, the British rammed the Jewish illegal immigrant ship Exodus (formerly "President Warfield") on the high seas. They towed it to Haifa where it was the subject of extensive publicity, generating public sympathy for the Zionist cause. The passengers were eventually disembarked in Hamburg. The incident set world opinion, and particularly US opinion against the British, and caused the British to intern illegal The Exodus - 1947 immigrants thereafter in Cyprus, rather than attempting to return them to Europe.

Post-State Zionism

Israel - Zionism creates the Jewish National Home The British found it necessary to maintain a large military establishment in Palestine to enforce the draconian immigration policy and respond to Jewish underground attacks on British personnel. This policy was increasingly unpopular at home owing to loss of British lives. This forced the British to announce in February 1947 that they were returning their mandate to the UN. A special commission, UNSCOP, was set up to recommend a solution to the UN. The commission recommended partition. The Arabs were opposed to either partition or a binational state. The U.S. and the USSR supported partition of Palestine, and carried a large bloc of votes with them. On November 29, 1947, the United Nations voted to partition Palestine into Jewish and Arab states in General Assembly Resolution 181.

Map of the UN Partition Plan for Palestine, 1947

A war broke out in fact, while the British were still in Palestine. The Arab League initiated a war against the Jewish community and the Jewish state, with the declared aim of "driving the Jews into the sea." There was little doubt about their intentions. The Grand Mufti Hajj Amin Al Husseini, a Nazi collaborator who escaped the clutches of the Nuremberg war crimes tribunal, had told the

British that in his view the preferred solution for the Jews of Palestine was the one adopted in Europe, in other words, annihilation. Apparently he had planned to build a death camp near Nablus.

Almost as soon as the UN decided on partition of Palestine, Arabs began attacking Jews, beginning with lethal riots in Jerusalem and attacks on Jewish transportation. The British allowed a volunteer army under Fawzi El Kaukji, to enter Palestine in January of 1948. During the fighting, with Jerusalem virtually blockaded, the state of Israel was established on May 15, 1948. Arab countries, chiefly Egypt, Syria, Jordan and Iraq, invaded almost immediately.

Zionism, the Establishment of Israel and the Palestinian Refugee Question

The Arabs of Palestine were not well organized and could not attain their goal of cleansing Palestine of Jews. Instead, it was they who suffered expulsion. The Jews were also able to hold their own against the invading armies of Arab states. As a result of the war, between 600,000 and 800,000 Palestinian Arabs fled or were expelled from their homes. Population displacements are deplorable, but they often happen as a result of war. The Czechs expelled the Sudetens Germans after World War II, because like the Arabs of Palestine, the Germans of Czechoslovakia sought to destroy the state in which they lived. It is absurd to claim that the Czechs had planned to expel the Germans since the beginnings of Czech nationalism, but this claim is often made about Zionism.

Map of Israel showing the 1949 armistice lines.

Map of the Israel "Green Line" Borders

In a civil war such as occurred in 1948, armed militias use villages and neighborhoods as bases. Civilian casualties were therefore inevitable, and it was very likely that once the war was initiated, one side or the other would suffer massive displacement and tragedy. For the Arabs of Palestine, their Nakba, or catastrophe, vindicated their fears that the Zionists were bent on dispossessing them. (see Palestine Nakba, 1948 )

Both anti-Zionists and right-wing Zionists have claimed that the expulsion of Arabs in 1948 was a more or less deliberate result of Zionist policy and ideology. Anti-Zionists make this claim to discredit Zionism, while right-wing Zionists make this claim in order to justify possible transfer or expulsion of Arabs in the future. This is, in part, a major support for the often repeated "Zionism is Racism" slogan. The evidence does not seem to support those claims. It is true that some Zionists were (and are) in favor of "voluntary transfer," which is not the same thing as forcible expulsion and genocide. A great many quotes of Zionist leaders about "voluntary transfer" are cited in this connection. For the most part, these

statements were made in a very specific historical context, at a time when such transfers were common practice. In 1937, the British were considering creation of a tiny Jewish state, and it was the British Peel and Woodhead commissions that proposed transfer as part of this plan, which was discussed with varying reluctance by different Zionist leaders. However, there is no decisive evidence that transfer or expulsion became part of Zionist or Israeli government planning. Several Zionist political parties strongly protested incidents of massacre and expulsion in 1948. Ben Gurion was apparently genuinely surprised by the early flight of Palestinian Arabs in 1948, and in Haifa and a few other places, Zionist leaders tried to convince Palestinian Arabs to stay. The Haganah plan "D," (plan Daleth) is frequently cited by anti-Zionists as the Zionist blueprint for expelling the Arabs of Palestine. However, the plan did not call for mass expulsion, but only for temporary occupation of villages as part of a defensive strategy.

From the first, the Zionist plan was to buy land and not to expel Arabs by force. Arthur Ruppin, the Palestine land agent, described in detail some of the difficulties involved in Palestine purchases. Purchase of land was hampered by lack of money, by the unwillingness of Palestinian landowners to sell land to Jews, and by the arduous conditions obtaining in the Middle East in those days. Additionally, and perhaps more important, there was not much land to buy. Under Turkish law, most of the Arab inhabitants of Palestine leased their land from the government or cultivated village land that was held in common. The Turks had introduced private land ownership in the Tanzimat reform of 1858. However, as few wished to pay taxes, they did not register their lands. Large tracts were bought by notables close to the ruling circles, but much of this land was in the the West Bank. Land was also purchased in the Galilee, and part of this land was purchased by the Jewish Agency. Some land was and is owned either by the Waqf (Muslim religious endowment), The Greek Catholic Church or other religious institutions. The Greek Orthodox church was and remains one of the largest landholders in Palestine, and some of this land was leased by the Zionist leadership, including the land where the Israeli Knesset (parliament) is located. The Greek Orthodox Church however, could not sell its land. The British regularized the registry of land to the extent that land that was not village land or government or Waqf land was considered taxable, regardless of who owned it. The person or persons who worked the land paid taxes and it was theirs to use, but not to sell as long as the land did not lie fallow for three years. The lands of the Negev, which were not arable before the national water carrier was built, were owned by the government and were not for sale. The government owned about 48% of the land in all. The Jewish Agency managed to purchase only about 6% of the land area of Palestine that became Israel by 1948. This was a small percentage of the total area, but it was a large percentage of the land that was privately owned and could be bought.

The UN Partition Resolution and Israeli Legitimacy

Some argue that it was "understandable" that the Palestinians would defy the U.N. partition resolution, because the resolution "took Palestine away from them and threatened to dispossess them of their homes. However, there is no evidence that Jewish leaders planned to dispossess Arabs or threatened to do so. Just before the establishment of the State of Israel, Chaim Weizmann, head of the World Zionist Organization and first President of Israel, wrote in his autobiography, Trial and Error, "... the world will judge the Jewish state by what it will do with the Arabs." (Chaim Weizmann, Trial and Error, Hamish Hamilton, London, 1949, p. 566).

That was Zionist policy and intent, but the war forced upon Israel by the Palestinians and the Arab states produced an impossible reality. The right of the Jews to self-determination in Palestine was recognized not only by the United States, South American and Western

European countries, but by the USSR as well. There is hardly a more eloquent defense of Zionism then the one given by the Soviet representative, Andrei Gromyko in the United Nations:

The delegation of the USSR maintains that the decision to partition Palestine is in keeping with the high principles and aims of the United Nations. It is in keeping with the principle of the national self-determination of peoples...

The solution of the Palestine problem based on a partition of Palestine into two separate states will be of profound historical significance, because this decision will meet the legitimate demands of the Jewish people... UN Debate on Palestine Partition- November, 26, 1947

Besides, the disposition of Palestine as a Jewish national home had already been recognized as part of the post World War I peace settlement, and in the League of Nations British Mandate for Palestine. Those who claim that this settlement was illegitimate because it was inspired by imperialism and colonialist greed, must remember that the same arrangements created all the Arab states of the Middle East as well as Czechoslovakia, Poland and other countries. The Arab defiance of the UN in 1947 was not very different than the German defiance of the League of Nations when Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia in 1938. Indeed, the Nazis used parallel arguments: the Versailles treaty was unjust, Czechoslovakia was an "artificial state" and the Sudetens Germans had, according to Hitler a "general right to self- determination."

The Holocaust and anti-Zionism

The Holocaust and the historical view of the Holocaust have been made into a major item of contention by anti-Zionists. The Holocaust was the tragic and dramatic fulfillment of Zionist claims that Jews would never be safe without a sovereign Jewish homeland. This prophecy was not just an abstract ideological principle. In particular, the revisionist Zionist leader Ze'ev Jabotinsky repeatedly warned Polish Jews of the coming catastrophe. For example, in August of 1938, he wrote, in an article published in Warsaw:

"...it is already three years that I am calling upon you, Polish Jewry, who are the crown of world Jewry. I continue to warn you incessantly that a catastrophe is coming closer. I became gray and old in these years, my heart bleeds, that you, dear brothers and sisters, do not see the volcano which will soon begin to spit its all consuming lava. I know that you are not seeing this because you are immersed in your daily worries. Today, however, I demand your trust. You were convinced already that my prognoses have already proven to be right. If you think differently then drive me out from your midst.

"However, if you do believe me, then listen to me in this 11th hour: In the name of G-d, Let any one of you save himself as long as there is still time. And time there is very little.

Jabotinsky's warnings went largely unheeded.

The Holocaust seemed to be a solemn warning that Jews could not ever integrate securely into European society. That question itself became moot after World War II, because there were so few Jews left in Europe, and there was so much revulsion at the crimes of the Nazis, that for a long period anti-Semitism seemed to have disappeared entirely. Nonetheless, the Holocaust remains a major embarrassment for anti-Zionist ideologues, and they in turn, have attempted to counter this impression in different ways. Some have resorted to

Holocaust denial, others insist that the Zionists were somehow at fault for the Holocaust, because they didn't do enough to save European Jewry. Others insist that "the Zionists" have made too much of the Holocaust and have created a "Holocaust industry," and that in fact, the Holocaust was not aimed particularly at Jews, since some gypsies and homosexuals and mental defectives were also killed by Nazis. Of course, nobody could have really foreseen the extermination of European Jews, despite Jabotinsky's warning, and even if they had, there was little more that the Zionists could have done than what they did. The tiny Yishuv (community) and the struggling Zionist movement managed to save only a few tens or hundreds of thousands of Jews out of all the millions of European Jewry, but the fact is that nobody else saved more. The US Jewish community did little to protest the Nazi policies even after there was hard evidence of the murders in the 1940s, and even if they had, it is unlikely that the US government, fearing anti-Semitic backlash, would have done very much about it.

To an outsider it may seem that the state of Israel would not have come into existence without the Holocaust. Anti-Zionists have used this impression to claim that the state was "given" to the Jews by the world as a "special favor" and that therefore the legitimacy of the existence of Israel depends on the morality of Israeli acts, as judged by them. The same people often give the idea that there were no Jews in Palestine before World War II, and that immediately after the war, Zionists brought hundreds of thousands of Jews, creating the state at the expense of the Palestinians, to atone for European misdeeds. That idea is certainly false, since most of the 1948 Jewish population of Palestine had arrived before the war, and since Zionism, born in 1897, could not have been motivated by the Holocaust that happened nearly half a century later.

While it is certain that the Holocaust helped to mobilize international opinion in favor of a Jewish state, it is by no means certain that it was a critical factor or necessary cause. Sever Plocker and Tom Segev have both argued that without the Holocaust, a Jewish state would have been born in any case, and it would have been much stronger because of the support and presence of European Jews. Certainly, the Zionists envisioned that the Jewish state would be built by European Jews. The Holocaust, and the imprisonment of Soviet Jewry made this impossible and changed the nature of the state, exacerbating the problems it faced. Segev wrote:

... After three decades of Zionism in Palestine, there was still no clear timetable for the Jewish state, but no doubts remained that Jewish independence was on the horizon. The social, political, economic and military foundations of the state to-be were firm, and a profound sense of national unity prevailed. The Zionist dream was about to become a reality.

There is therefore no basis for the frequent assertion that the state was established as a result of the Holocaust...." (Tom Segev in "One Palestine Complete" pp 490-491)

It is probably philosophically unsound to insist on the inevitability of the creation of the state either with or without the Holocaust. However it is certainly unprovable that the state would not have been created without the Holocaust. Israel came about through a series of improbable events. Only a tiny group of people believed in 1897 that it could be possible to establish a Jewish national home anywhere, that any power would grant a charter for such a home, or that Jews would come to live in this country. However the Zionist movement was opportunistic. Zionist leaders leveraged on anti-Semitic notions of mysterious "Jewish power" as well as on Christian sentiment for restoration of Israel to obtain the Balfour declaration during World War I.

Faced with the tragedy of the Holocaust, Zionist leaders used it to lobby for a Jewish state. The Holocaust was a unique event in many ways, but there is little doubt, given the nature of European history, that an anti-Semitic upheaval of some kind would have occurred in Europe, as indeed it occurred in the USSR despite Soviet anti-Fascist propaganda. There is also little doubt that any such anti-Semitic manifestation would have helped to mobilize Jewish and world sentiment in favor of a Jewish state. The relatively small numbers of the Jews in Palestine masked their potential, which was due to organization and economic power. The organization was due to the ability of the Zionist leaders, despite differences, to unite around a common program and to provide essential services that bound the community to them. The economic power was due in part to the organizational ability and social cohesion, which produced the kibbutzim, the Histadrut labor union, school systems, agricultural training schools and an agricultural advisory service among other institutions. In part, the economic power was due to the relatively large investment in Palestine made by the Zionist organization. As a result, each Jew in Palestine produced about times the amount that each Palestinian Arab produced, and Zionist investment accounted in large part for the prosperity of the Palestinian Arabs. (see Zionism and its Impact Wars are decided by economic power.. If conflict between Jews and Arabs in Palestine was unavoidable, the outcome of such a conflict was predictable in advance. The Jews, being the more organized and economically stronger power, would have won in any case, and certainly would have had a better chance of success with the backing of a large population of European Jews. See also discussion here and here ).

Labor Zionism vs Revisionism - After independence, the Labor Zionist movement became, for many years, the leading political force in Israel. Mapai (Miflegeth Poalei Eretz Yisrael - the party of the workers of the land of Israel) party led by David Ben-Gurion and his successors held power continuously until 1977. The Zionist movement had split when Jabotinsky led the revisionists out of the Zionist organization in the 1930s. The Zionist executive was led by Labor Zionism under David Ben-Gurion. Revisionists and Labor Zionists had separate underground armies. Revisionists and Labor Zionists cooperated against British after World War II. However, the "Sezon" in 1944-45, the massacre perpetrated at Deir Yassin by the Revisionists in April 1948, and the subsequent sinking of the "Altalena" Irgun arms ship by the Israeli government, as well as numerous smaller incidents, helped to deepen the split between mainstream Labor Zionism and Revisionist Zionism. Begin, the leader of the Revisionist Zionists, was distrusted by Ben-Gurion and viewed a dangerous extremist. It was not until the Six day war in 1967 that revisionists were allowed to participate in a government coalition.

Zionism After the Establishment of the State of Israel

The Zionist organization has continued to function after the establishment of the Jewish state. It has helped to bring millions of new immigrants to Israel; it encourages the teaching of Hebrew and Jewish culture abroad; it lobbies for Israel with the US and other governments, and rallies support to Israel in times of crisis. However, in Israel, "Zionism" became somewhat of a pejorative, associated with government propaganda, super- patriotism and regimentation. Zionism, and the Israeli self-image, has reinvented itself many times and will need to continue to reinvent itself to adapt to changing realities.

Israel was a surprise success story that confounded anti-Zionists and skeptics. Defying the experts, Israel beat its enemies handily in the War of Independence, absorbed huge numbers of immigrants in the first years of its existence and created a viable economy. Detractors pointed out that Israel was accumulating a huge national debt. They insisted that the new nation of Jews from all over the world would disintegrate because of differences

between Ashkenazic Jews, and Sephardic Jews or because Arabs would outnumber Jews, or Israel would be conquered by Arab nationalists. In fact, in every period of Israel's existence detractors and experts "proved" that Israel could not exist another ten years, or another twenty years. The dogs barked, but the caravan moved on. The differences between Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews, so important in the first years of the state, diminished with time. Lacking natural resources, Israel invented an economy driven by technological excellence and scientific research. This required a revision of the agricultural and settlement Zionism of the earlier pioneers and a reorientation of societal values that is not yet complete. Beloved institutions such as the kibbutz, central to the early years of Zionism, were modified or fell by the way-side if they failed to adapt.

The most important change brought about by Zionism was psychological rather than material. It is very difficult for people living today to imagine the self-image of Jews or the image of Jews in the eyes of others, before the existence of the Jewish state. Not all the change has been positive. Anti-Semites who pictured Jews as cowards now picture Jews as evil technological super-soldiers. Where once Jews idealized intellectualism and compromise, over-zealous enthusiasts now imagine that force can solve all problems. However, the cowering ghetto Jew, once a universally recognized icon, is now just a bad memory of European culture. Zionism did not banish anti-Semitism yet, as early Zionists supposed it would, but Zionism and the establishment of Israel changed the rules of the game.

Zionism and Modern Israel

Despite the initial successes of Israel in overcoming its enemies in the War of Independence, absorbing and integrating over a million refugees, and the military victory of the Sinai Campaign, Diaspora Jews in the affluent West remained largely indifferent to Zionism. If they thought of Israel at all, it was as a charitable cause, a place where unfortunate refugees might be settled. The Jews of Soviet Russia were unable to leave or to voice their support for Israel. Substantial numbers of Jews who had survived the Holocaust did arrive from Romania, Poland and other parts of Eastern Europe. However the bulk of the new immigrants to Israel in the first two decades of statehood were Jews who were forcibly expelled from Arab countries or those who chose to leave Arab states.

The fortunes of Zionism and of Israel rose and fell with Israel's material success. Until the mid-1960s, owing to this steady stream of immigrants and to investment and construction, the Israeli economy enjoyed a steady expansion. A slow down in immigration, economic downturn and political disaffection within the ruling Labor party brought on a movement of great pessimism.

In the background, the Arab states had been repeatedly vowing to defeat Israel since the Arab Summit of 1964. Palestinian terrorist groups were established by the Arab countries with the aim of destroying Israel. Egyptian President Nasser and his Syrian rival embarked on a dangerous rhetorical contest, each trying to demonstrate that they were the leaders in the effort to destroy Israel. This was encouraged by the USSR, which hoped to gain by maintaining a constant confrontation and using the issue of Israel to push the United States out of the Middle East.

In its pessimistic national mood, Israel seemed hardly ready to deal with a military and diplomatic crisis of any kind. in 1966, emigration exceeded immigration. A famous cartoon showed a sign at Lod airport, "The last one to leave should please remember to shut off the electricity."

Zionism after the Six Day War

The Arab political machinations escalated into a crisis in 1967. Increasingly violent border incidents related to the Israel water carrier plan led to Syrian complaints, fed by deliberately false Soviet information, that Israel was massing troops in preparation for an invasion. President Nasser of Egypt, goaded for his inaction, closed the straits of Tiran to Israeli ships, dismissed the UN Emergency Force that had been put in place in 1956 and moved about six divisions of the Egyptian army into the Sinai desert. After a long waiting period, Israel launched a lightning attack on Egypt on June 5, 1967, beginning the Six day war, Dealing with each enemy in turn, Israel first conquered the Sinai desert from Egypt, then turned to the West Bank and wrapped up the war with Jordan, and then proceeded to capture the Golan heights from Syria.

The dramatic victory changed the image of Israel and of Zionism among , Jews in the Diaspora, friends and allies. Most Diaspora Jews came to look upon Israel as a source of pride and an asset. The United States, had more or less ignored Israel or treated it as a "poor relative" or "unviable client state," as one US diplomat expressed it. US foreign aid and military sales to Israel had been minimal. The Israeli air force was French, because the US refused to sell Israel aircraft. Israeli armor consisted mostly of third hand remodeled Sherman tanks and tiny French AMX anti-tank vehicles. Though the US had supplied Israel with some Patton tanks, these were being refitted at the time of the war. Requests for temporary replacements were refused. Prior to the war, the US reneged on promises to reopen the straits of Tiran closed by Gamal Nasser, owing to the unpopularity of the Vietnam war and pressure by oil lobbies. However, the US understood that it could now regain a foothold in the Middle East only by trading land won in the war for influence with Arab countries. It also understood that Israel was an independent military power that had won the war primarily with French military equipment. This was an uncomfortable state of affairs. For the Arabs, the war was a humiliating defeat. It destroyed the Pan-Arab nationalist dreams of Gamal Nasser.

A wave of euphoria and a false sense of invincibility engulfed Israel following the Six day war. The unification of Jerusalem and the conquest of ancient Samaria and Judea (known as the West Bank after the name given it by the Jordanians after World War II) with their Jewish holy places inspired a wave of messianic Zionism. Religious Zionism, which had been a relatively mild and dovish movement, veered to the right and took upon itself the "mission" of settling the newly conquered territories.

Zionism after the Yom Kippur War

The sense of invincibility was shattered by the Yom Kippur War. Though Israel recovered from the surprise attack and objectively had dealt the Arab countries another defeat, the Arabs had proven that Israel was vulnerable after all. Zionism and the Israeli image had to reinvent themselves again. The Labor Zionist movement, that had founded the state, eventually found itself in a minority, replaced in large part by more militant religious Zionists and the Likud party, which inherited the mantle of revisionism, carried on by Menachem Begin after the death of Ze'ev Jabotinsky. This change both reflected a change in the evolving self-image of Israel and the Zionist movement, and it catalyzed a further change. Initially, the changeover from a state that had been ruled by one party for thirty years was beneficial for democracy in the state and for the Zionist movement. However, the Likud itself soon developed all the negative symptoms of an incumbent party that has held power too long, and Israeli society moved away from pioneering values toward materialism. The Likud actively promoted settlement of the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) and Gaza. For

many people in Israel and abroad, "Zionism" came to imply support for the settlement of Jews in these territories, and assumed a very negative connotation for those who oppose the occupation.

Post-Zionism

Beginning in the 1980s, some Israeli historians and sociologists began to question facts about the official history of Israel and Zionism, as well as the Zionist ideology. They reasoned that Zionism had accomplished its purpose in creating the Jewish state, and that now it was time to move on. They posited that Israel and the Zionists had a large share of the blame for the animosity between Jews and Arabs, and had in fact, ignored the existence of the Arabs in Palestine and then dispossessed the Palestinians by force. This reasoning was supported by new histories, that talked frankly about less savory aspects of Israeli history that had been previously ignored. The new historians made a case that at least part of Zionism had always envisioned expulsion or transfer of the Arabs, and described massacres and expulsions which took place in 1948, often claiming that these were part of a deliberate policy. The historians claimed that these new facts were revealed by declassified archives. Actually, the main facts supposedly "revealed" by the new historians were known to all Israelis who wanted to know them, though perhaps not in detail, and not presented in the particular way that new historians presented them, and not written up in English. These ideas, called by some "Post Zionism," do not form a coherent ideology and their practitioners do not generally see themselves as members of a movement or followers of a distinct philosophy. Some "post-Zionists" like Ilan Pappe are avowedly anti-Zionist, while others, like Benny Morris, use the same facts to arrive at very different conclusions that might support a militant Zionist ideology. Post-Zionism attained a wide popularity for a while, fueled by resentment against the occupation. In an Israeli cultural atmosphere where "Zionism" ("tsiyonut") was ridiculed as hypocritical political hot air, "post-Zionist" and anti- Zionist views and those who preached them enjoyed an easy tolerance. Post-Zionism fell into eclipse after peace negotiations between Palestinians and Israel failed, and violence flared in September of 2000. The flag of "post-Zionism" was raised aloft by anti-Zionists, and revived and extended the different anti-Zionist currents discussed below.

Anti-Zionism

Anti-Zionism has been inspired by several sources. The mainsprings of anti-Zionism were independent of the Arab-Jewish conflict in Palestine. The first was opposition of orthodox and reform and assimilationist Jews to Zionism. The second was anti-Semitism. A third source was the insistence of communists that the coming of world communist would do away with the nation state and nationalism. Palestinian and Arab propagandists were quick to take advantage of all three of these potential sources of opposition to the Jewish state. In particular, they make public efforts to mobilize the support of "progressive" (anti-Zionist) Jews and of ultra-orthodox anti-Zionists. The conflicting opinions of these tiny minorities are used to "prove" that Zionism is not a legitimate movement and does not represent the Jewish people.

Under cover of combating the "occupation," anti-Zionists began to wage a militant campaign of delegitimization, boycotts and divestment, aimed at proving that Israel is an illegitimate state and Zionism is an illegitimate ideology. This campaign was apparently orchestrated by pro-Palestinian groups and timed to coincide with the outbreak of the Intifadeh in 2000. The existence of Israel, which many had thought to be secure after the Six day war was now understood to be threatened once again. This time the threat is through a propaganda war. Some reactions included "circling the wagons." Right wing Zionist extremists conducted

an extremely defensive campaign that tried to equate any opposition to any Israeli policy as "anti-Semitism." Bona-fire anti-Semites capitalized on this to cloak anti-Semitic propaganda and ideology as "justified criticism of Israel." A more sophisticated approach is evolving, that attempts to separate legitimate criticism of Israel and internal debate from anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism.

Jewish Anti-Zionism

Zionism was popular among Jewish people as a movement they might support with money or at political meetings. However, few, especially in Western countries, thought of coming to Palestine or Israel until the latter decades of the twentieth century, except when in danger of persecution. Palestine was too far, economically backward and dangerous to draw many immigrants. Nonetheless, non-Zionist groups like Alliance Israelite Universelle and many others helped Zionist efforts in Palestine and joined the Jewish Agency for Palestine.

Almost every national movement is of necessary also a social revolutionary movement. Zionism had much more of the characteristics of a social revolutionary movement than other national movements.

In the Diaspora, the Jewish communities had adopted a social life and organization that was suited to their anomalous social situation. A cohesive part of the community that remained orthodox was united under the rule of various rabbis. Other Jews, depending on their countries, tried to free themselves from the physical or social ghetto and assimilate. Rabbis and rich Jews controlled the social and charitable institutions and often represented "the Jews" as a group to the government. Zionism introduced new priorities and social values, and necessarily challenged the establish social order, though this was not necessarily understood by the early Zionists like Herzl, who tried to work through rich Jews and "great men." The Western European delegates to the first Zionist congress were largely looking for a solution for their "unfortunate brethren" in the East. They were willing to accept Uganda or Cyprus as an alternative to Palestine because they were not going there. Surprisingly, to Herzl, the Russian Jews who were the intended recipients of this "benefit" rejected it, and insisted that only the land of Israel could be the destination of Zionists. It is quite alright to contemplate Uganda as a Jewish national home after all, if you don't intend to live there yourself. The effect of the urgent situation of Russian and Eastern European Jews was to overturn the established social order. The Western European Jews who saw themselves as the "advanced" and natural leaders favored by fortune, were pushed aside by the more dynamic and committed socialist Zionists of Russia. For that reason, Zionism represented an additional threat to the established Jewish social order.

Several organized Jewish groups were actively anti-Zionist . Jews who sought to assimilate in their own countries claimed that they were loyal citizens of a different faith, sometimes styling themselves "of the Mosaic persuasion." They felt that the Zionist movement and the concept of a "Jewish People" would raise questions about their own loyalty, and they resented the fact that Zionists often spoke as though they represented all Jews. This movement was particularly prevalent in Germany, where Jews were staunch supporters of German nationalism. At one point, the reform Jewish movement went so far as to systematically remove all references to the Holy Land and Jerusalem from their liturgy. A large segment of ultraorthodox Jews were displeased by the secular ideas that dominated Zionism, and insisted that the rebuilding of Israel must await the coming of the messiah. In Europe, the agitation of assimilationist and ultraorthodox Jews helped to actively block Zionist rescue efforts in the 1930s, when it began to be apparent that Nazism would soon make Europe very dangerous for Jews.

Most religious Jews and the reform movement, initially anti-Zionist, reconciled themselves with the Jewish state, after the Holocaust seemed to bear out the basic thesis that Jews required a homeland of their own and would not necessarily be safe even in the best circumstances, and after the creation of Israel proved that Zionist aspirations could become a reality. Nonetheless, anti-Zionist ideologies and their representatives persist among religious groups such as the ultraorthodox Neturei Karta and leftist writers such as Noam Chomsky. In recent years they have leveraged on the issues raised by the occupation to try to legitimize their ideas as "criticism of Israel." Jewish anti-Zionists include figures like Rabbi David Weiss and others who support Holocaust Denial and other anti-Semitic claims.

Communist Anti-Zionism

Communists, including Jewish communists and the Jewish Bund were and are opposed to Zionism because Marxism posited the disappearance of the Jews as a historic anomaly, once international atheistic communism triumphed over nationalist particularism, and religion, the opium of the people, died out. In the USSR, as part of his "nationalities" policy, which assimilated or murdered numerous national groups, Stalin tried to handle the Jewish problem by creating an autonomous Jewish republic in the wastelands of Birobidjan. This project was never supported very seriously and was later abandoned. Though the USSR supported the creation of the state of Israel, Stalin was opposed to Zionism inside Russia and the USSR suppressed Zionist activities and at times persecuted Jews as well as Zionists.

"Zionism is Racism"

This ideological opposition to Zionism later dovetailed with the anti-Israel cold-war politics of the Soviet Union and the Arab antagonism to Israel, as well as with anti-Semitism. Retrospectively, communist ideologues pegged Zionism as a racist and colonialist ideology bent on exploiting and dispossessing the native inhabitants of Palestine, and creating an apartheid colonialist fascist Jewish state. Zionist theorists assumed that the Jews are socially inferior and "abnormal" because they did not have a national home. The "abnormal" Diaspora character of Jews would be corrected when the people returned to their own land, realized their right to self-determination and renewed their nation existence. Zionists believe that the Jewish right to the land is based on ancient historical links, not racial superiority. Some Zionists see the Arabs as usurpers, just as the Arabs see the Zionists as usurpers.

Anti-Zionists saw matters differently, and branded Zionism as "racism." The ideological basis for this was perhaps provided by Jean Paul Sartre's 1960 essay, "Racism and Colonialism as Praxis and Process," in his "Critique of Dialectical Reason." Analyzing French colonialism in Algeria, Sartre argued that racism grew out of the need of colonialists to rationalize exploitation of natives by French "capitalists." This explanation of racism became popular, regardless of the fact that racism existed since the days of ancient Greece and Rome, and even though it could not explain anti-Semitism and other racist ideologies. When the Palestinian movements adopted the "national liberation movement" ideology of the Algerian FLN, it was natural that these same ideas would be transferred to Israel and Zionism. However, the original Marxist rationale is largely forgotten by many and different explanations are offered by various anti-Zionists to justify the slogan, "Zionism is Racism." This slogan has prospered, whatever its merits as an explanation of social and historical reality.

In 1975, in the wake of the Yom Kippur War, a pro-Soviet and pro-Arab majority in the UN passed General Assembly Resolution 3397, branding Zionism as racism. The resolution was

repealed in 1991, but similar sentiments were repeated at a conference of non-government organizations in Durban, South Africa in 2001.

It is undeniable that early Zionist leaders used the language and rhetoric of colonialism and established organizations with names like "The Jewish Colonial Trust." In part, this reflects the influence of the 19th century European cultural milieu, when colonialism was a perfectly acceptable concept. In part, it reflects efforts of Zionist leaders to sell leaders of the great powers on the idea of supporting a Jewish colonization scheme that would support German or British or French interests in the Middle East. The Socialist-Zionist movement certainly did not see themselves as colonialists and were opposed to colonialism and imperialism, nor did the USSR originally oppose Zionism on the basis that it is a colonialist movement.

Apartheid Israel

The slogan "Apartheid Israel," named after the South African practice of racial segregation, was coined by anti-Zionists as a means of discrediting Zionism and the depriving the Jewish people of the right of self determination. The implication is that the "politically correct" democratic "peace" solution is to do away with Israel as a Jewish homeland. This slogan, once the emblem of extremists and bigots, was rendered respectable when Jimmy Carter used in the title of his book about the Israeli Palestinian peace process. The essential logic behind the phrase is flawed. Israeli Jews and Palestinian people, unlike South Africans, are not a single nationality that was separated by race laws. Palestinian Arabs do not want to become integrated into Israeli society, but rather to erect their own state or to destroy Israel. The facts behind the assertions are also wrong. See Israel is a democracy in which Arabs vote - Not an apartheid State.

Anti-Zionism and Anti-Semitism

The equation of anti-Zionism with Anti-Semitism is controversial. Anti-Zionism that is based on the proposition that Jews do not have a right to self-determination, whereas Palestinians and other peoples do have such a right is discriminatory. It is difficult to see how this idea could not be considered racist and hence anti-Semitic. The pro-Palestinian academic, John L. Strawson, has written:

These arguments all lead to an uncomfortable position that whereas all other self-declared nationalisms have validity, the Jews have no such claims... While there are honorable Anti- Zionist positions they are few. On the whole Anti-Zionism is close to, or a mask for, Anti- Semitism.

"Anti-Zionist" writings are redolent of the language of anti-Semitism, and the arguments, with a few changes in wording, can often be easily shown to be a mask for anti-Semitic sentiments. These have become "politically incorrect," but hide themselves easily behind a facade of anti-Zionist terminology. "The Jews have too much power" becomes "The Zionists have too much power" or "the Israel lobby has too much power." The "Internationalen finanzjudentum" (international finance Jewry) of Adolf Hitler is recognizable in the phrase "International Zionism," Conspiracy theories formerly based around the Jews or the mythical "Elders of Zion: are now transferred to "Zionists." The doctrines of "progressive" anti-Zionism are so indistinguishable from racism that a UK "Boycott Israel" activist saw no problem in recommending an article that supposedly explains the truth about Israel, even though the article was posted at the website of racist David Duke.

These phrases are taken from different Web sites:

Jewish Persecution - A Primary Tool Of International Zionism (Rense)

What Zionism is -- and its pernicious influence upon the USA (Serendipity)

Jew Watch - Jewish World Conspiracies - zionism (JewWatch)

They are certainly anti-Semitic, and there are hundreds more scattered throughout "anti- Zionist" rhetoric.

The imagery of anti-Zionist cartoons and graphics in the Arab world and even in European countries like Great Britain is indistinguishable from Nazi stereotypes used in anti-Semitic cartoons and propaganda themes.

That is not to say, of course, that all criticism of Israeli policies or of the Zionist movement is in itself anti-Semitic. One may be opposed to the occupation, or to a particular injustice in Israel or in any other country, without being a bigot.

Revival of Zionism The failure of the peace process and Palestinian initiated violence in September of 2000 entrained a world wide anti-Zionist and anti-Semitic revival. Supposedly respectable British journals featured covers that portrayed the Jews taking over Europe, and caricatures of baby-devouring Jews. The libels directed at Jews by anti-Semites were transformed and thinly veiled as "anti-Zionist" accusations: The "Zionists" or "Israel Lobby," rather than the Jews, were alleged to control the government and the media. This in turn caused many Jews and others to rally to the cause of Israel and Zionism, and to re-examine some of the beliefs that underlay the post-Zionist reaction. The so-called al-Aqsa Intifadah was accompanied by violence, suicide bombings, beheading of Jews and calls to "Kill them wherever you find them." The existence and indestructibility of Israel, formerly taken for granted, were again understood to be directly threatened. A new generation came to understand that anti-Semitism is a reality, and that violent, racist Arab and Muslim opposition to the existence of the Jewish state and even to the existence of the Jewish people was not a Zionist myth. A new generation of Israeli historians, including Yoav Gelber and Anita Shapira, attempted to achieve some balance between the heroic exaggerations and myths of early Israeli Zionist histories and the latter demonification and distortion of Zionist and Israeli history by new historians. In this period, the "new historian" Benny Morris "explained" that his earlier exposition of supposed Zionist evil-doing was misunderstood by the public, and that Zionist actions in settling the land and during the Israel war of Independence were, in his view, justified.

Conclusion The Future: Challenges to Zionism; Political, organized Zionism is scarcely more than a hundred years old. However, the work of Zionism, to oversee the collective well-being of the Jewish people as a nation, began, in a sense, over 3,000 years ago. It can never be done. As long as there is a Jewish people, there can never be a "post-Zionist" period. Some of the challenges and tasks facing Zionism:

To establish the undisputed legitimacy of Israel - Zionism must answer the challenge of anti- Zionism, whether it is motivated by anti-Semitism or other ideological or political factors. The existence of Israel must come to be truly taken for granted, in the same way as the existence of German, France, the United States or Egypt.

To achieve peace with Israel's Arab neighbors - The Arab-Israeli conflict has warped the development of the Jewish national movement and is a constant threat to Zionist achievements in Israel. Israelis are always conscious, and Zionists living abroad must never forget, that the threat of extinction hangs over Israel as long as the enmity of surrounding Arab states is maintained. As well as being a moral imperative, peace is a practical imperative. Given that Arab and Muslim states are far larger and more numerous than Israel can ever be, it is obvious that Israel must make peace in order to survive.

To see to the physical defense and survival of the state of Israel - As long as there is no peace, military preparedness is a regrettable and burdensome necessity.

To complete the ingathering of the exiles - Zionism set out to bring the Jewish people to Israel. While the Jewish Diaspora will no doubt continue to exist, there are still, among the numerous Jewish population scattered throughout the world, a large number of people who would live in Israel if they could, but who are prevented from doing so for economic or cultural reasons or family ties unrelated to Zionist ideology. The Zionist movement must strive to remove the accidental impediments that prevent people from living in Israel.

To constantly improve Israeli society - No society is perfect; that certainly includes Israel. Zionism must strive to improve and perfect Israeli society. A healthy democracy and a strong society are also the best guarantees for Israeli survival.

To reunite and revitalize the Jewish people - Zionism must attempt to heal the numerous divisions among the Jewish people by providing a broad framework for Jewish cultural and national identity, and by providing cultural leadership for the Jewish community abroad.

References

Hertzberg, Arthur. 1959. The Zionist Idea, A conceptual Analysis and Reader. NYC, Atheneum. This classic book of readings is essential for understanding Zionism.

Introduction - What is Zionism?. . Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://www.zionism- israel.com/zionism_history.htm

Laqueur, Walter. 1997. A History of Zionism, Fine Communications. This authoritative and readable history explains the beginnings of Zionism, from the French Revolution to the creation of Israel. Unlike Sachar's even larger book, it does not go into details of modern Israeli history.

Proto-Zionism and the "First Aliya". Retrieved May 26, 2014 from http://www.zionism- israel.com/zionism_history.htm

Sachar, Howard M. 1998. A History of Israel from the Rise of Zionism to Our Time. Alfred A. Knopf,. A comprehensive overview of the subject, told from the Zionist point of view. A good reference, but too detailed and compendious for casual reading by most.

Zionism and Israel – Biographies Theodor Herzl. Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://zionism-israel.com/bio/biography_herzl.htm

Chapter 4 Zionism Is Seen As A Racist Ideology Like All Nationalism

Introduction The Jewish State - 1896 Theodor Herzl's Program for Zionism

Theodore Herzl's pamphlet Der Judenstaat, The Jewish State, was published in 1896. It heralded the coming of age of Zionism. Several articles and books advocating the Zionist idea had appeared beginning in the 1840s, and small Zionist groups such as Hovevei Tzion (Lovers of Zion) had begun recruiting immigrants to Palestine, but no group had a coherent plan or modern ideology. Herzl's plan for creating a Jewish State, arrived at after contemplating other solutions as well, provided the practical program of Zionism, and led to the first Zionist congress in Basle, Switzerland, in August, 1897.

Born in Budapest, Hungary, on May 2, 1860, Herzl was educated in the spirit of the German- Jewish "Enlightenment." His family moved to Vienna in 1878 after the death of his sister. He became a doctor of law in 1884 and worked for a short while in courts in Vienna and Salzburg. However, he soon left law and devoted himself to writing.

In 1891 Herzl became Paris correspondent for the liberal Vienna newspaper New Free Press. Herzl was in Paris when a wave of anti-Semitism broke out over the court martial of Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish army officer. Dreyfus, falsely accused of espionage and banished to an island prison, was divested of his rank in a humiliating public ceremony in January 1895, as a mob shouted "Death to the Jews.

The Dreyfus case motivated Herzl to devote thought and effort to the Jewish problem. He contacted Baron Hirsch for the first time with his ideas in the spring of 1895, but Hirsch and others turned him down. Herzl began to keep a diary, in which his father made the entries for some reason. The diary, as it progressed, shows the evolution of his ideas and political understanding.

Herzl formalized the concept of emergence from the Diaspora (the dispersion of the Jews) and in The Jewish State. In The Jewish State, he proposed, for the first time, a program for immediate political action. From the preface he wrote for the Jewish State, it appears that he was inspired in part by a socialist Utopia written by Theodor Hertzka, another Vienna visionary. Though Herzl claimed Hertzka's scheme was utopian, Hertzka did try to carry it out in Africa.

Remarkably, Herzl had not read any early Zionist writings when he conceived of his idea for a Jewish State. He heard about Leon Pinsker's Auto-Emancipation , about Elliots' Daniel Deronda and Moses Hess's Rome and Jerusalem< only after he began traveling about and consulting with others about his ideas.. He did not even hear of the Hovevei Tziyon before embarking on his Zionist project.

The title "Der Judenstaat" was probably meant as an ironic play on words, since it literally means "The Jews'-State," a derogatory construction like the "Judenstrasse" (Jews' Street) of the medieval ghetto. In The Jewish State, Herzl proposed a modern solution to the Jewish question. He believed that attempts at assimilation of Jews into European society were in vain, as the majority in each country decided who was a native and who an alien. The

persistence of anti-Semitism determined that the Jew would always be an outsider and only the creation of a Jewish state, a matter of interest to both Jews and non-Jews, would put an end to the Jewish problem.

The Jewish State proposed that diplomacy would be the primary way of attaining the Jewish State. Herzl called for the organized transfer of Jewish communities to the new state. Of the location of the state, Herzl said, "We shall take what is given us, and what is selected by public opinion."

Herzl's The Jewish State included social innovations such as the seven-hour working day. He was interested in an economy where free enterprise and state involvement went hand-in- hand. It was to be a modern, sophisticated and technologically advanced and Europeanized society.

The Jewish State established Herzl as the leader of Zionism, and the "father of the Zionist Idea." Zionism also provoked considerable opposition, in particular from the assimilationist Jews of Central and Western Europe. The book became required reading for all Zionists and was taken as the basic platform of political Zionism.

In the Jewish State, Herzl anticipated some of the antagonism that the Zionist idea would provoke, especially among those who believed in the abolition of nationalism:

" To the first class of objections belongs the remark that the Jews are not the only people in the world who are in a condition of distress. Here I would reply that we may as well begin by removing a little of this misery, even if it should at first be no more than our own.

It might further be said that we ought not to create new distinctions between people; we ought not to raise fresh barriers, we should rather make the old disappear. But men who think in this way are amiable visionaries; and the idea of a native land will still flourish when the dust of their bones will have vanished tracelessly in the winds. Universal brotherhood is not even a beautiful dream."

Quite accurately, Herzl foresaw the sort of objections that some in the Jewish community would raise to the idea of Zionism:

It might more reasonably be objected that I am giving a handle to anti-Semitism when I say we are a people--one people; that I am hindering the assimilation of Jews where it is about to be consummated, and endangering it where it is an accomplished fact, insofar as it is possible for a solitary writer to hinder, or endanger anything. This objection will be especially brought forward in France. It will probably also be made in other countries, but I shall answer only the French Jews beforehand, because these afford the most striking example of my point.

Precisely these objections were raised to the Balfour declaration in Britain, by some British Jews. Along with objections to nationalism, they echo in the arguments of Jewish anti- Zionists today.

If however, Herzl foresaw the tremendous antagonism of ultra-orthodox rabbis to the "heretical" doctrine of Zionism, which would supplant religious governance of the Jews by a political and ideological framework, he was careful not to mention this issue, perhaps because he understood the need to cultivate the allegiance of the rabbis and the religious camp.

Without apparently having read modern Zionist writings, Herzl nonetheless understood the paradoxical basis of modern anti-Semitism:

Modern anti-Semitism is not to be confused with the religious persecution of the Jews of former times. It does occasionally take a religious bias in some countries, but the main current of the aggressive movement has now changed. In the principal countries where anti- Semitism prevails, it does so as a result of the emancipation of the Jews

In conclusion, Herzl wrote:

" And what glory awaits those who fight unselfishly for the cause!

Therefore I believe that a wondrous generation of Jews will spring into existence. The Maccabeans will rise again.

Let me repeat once more my opening words: The Jews who wish for a State will have it. We shall live at last as free men on our own soil, and die peacefully in our own homes.

The world will be freed by our liberty, enriched by our wealth, magnified by our greatness.

And whatever we attempt there to accomplish for our own welfare, will react powerfully and beneficially for the good of humanity. "

(The Jewish State, Chapter 6).

In the Jewish State, at least, Herzl largely ignored the presence of Arabs or other minorities in the prospective Jewish State. The book was not necessarily about colonization of any particular country. Though he mentions Argentina or Palestine as choices, he generally refers to the location of the state as "over there." By 1902 Herzl, who had visited Jerusalem by then, had a different perspective and included Arab citizens in his vision of the Jewish State which was now more firmly anchored around the ancient Jewish land.

Herzl was not a racist, and did not base his conception of the Jewish people on racist ideas of nationalism current at the time, but rather on cultural and historical development. He described himself as a "Spinozist" - a follower of Baruch de Espinoza, the Portuguese Jew who rejected literal interpretations of the Bible and formal religion. Spinoza, who had been excommunicated by the Jewish community, inspired many 19th century Jewish and non- Jewish thinkers, including Zionists, from Heine and Marx and Hegel to Hess and Herzl. Nonetheless, Herzl had a great respect for the formal manifestations of religion, perhaps in part because he understood that he could only mobilize support for Zionism through the rabbis, who were the leaders of Jewish society, especially in Eastern Europe. He wrote:

... We shall first of all ask for the cooperation of our Rabbis.

OUR RABBIS

...Our rabbis, on whom we especially call, will devote their energies to the service of our idea, and will inspire their congregations by preaching it from the pulpit. They will not need to address special meetings for the purpose; an appeal such as this may be uttered in the synagogue. Thus it must be done. For we feel our historic affinity only through the faith of

our fathers as we have long ago absorbed the languages of different nations to an ineradicable degree.

Herzl completely rejected the race theories of Israel Zangwill. He became increasingly aware of the existence of Sephardic Jewry, but he envisioned the Jewish State as a state of Europeans, who might speak German. In his diaries he wrote:

"I believe German will be our principal language...I draw this conclusion from our most widespread jargon, 'Judeo-German.' But over there we shall wean ourselves from this ghetto language, too, which used to be the stealthy tongue of prisoners. Our teachers will see to that." (June 15, 1895, Diaries, 1: 171)

In The Jewish State, Herzl envisioned the government of the new state to be an "Aristocratic Republic," apparently modeled on contemporary Austria or Germany. In 1902, Herzl published a utopian novel about the Jewish state, Altneuland (old-new land) a vision complete with monorails and modern industry. Altneuland envisioned a multipluralistic democracy in which Arabs and Jews had equal rights. The novel concludes, "If you will, it is no legend."

Der Judenstaat and Altneuland were visions of a Jewish state to be populated by European Jewry, who in 1900 were far more numerous than the tiny remnant of oriental and Sephardic Jews in Muslim lands and the Balkans. Herzl himself was no doubt aware of Zionist yearnings among Sephardic Jews. His grandfather was a friend of Rabbi Yehudah Alkalai, a Zionist precursor. But Herzl addressed his vision to the Jews of Europe.

The Jewish State would not have been important if Herzl had not taken active steps to implement its program. Because of his contacts and organizational genius, Herzl was able to organize the first Zionist Congress in Basle, Switzerland, which was probably the key event in the coming of age of the Zionist movement. Herzl did not invent either practical or 'political' Zionism. > Practical Zionism , the settling of the land for purposes of rebuilding a Jewish community in Palestine, had been practiced by the BILU and other groups before Herzl. Political Zionism, the attempt to secure a "charter" for a Jewish state from Turkey, Egypt or another country, had been around for hundreds of years. It was the program of the false Messiah Shabetai Tzvi in the seventeenth century. In 1839, Sir Moses Montefiore had petitioned the Khedive of Egypt for a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Herzl's contribution was to establish a unified Zionist movement that made a public statement of its political ambitions and settlement program.

The Jewish State of Israel was only established after the Holocaust had resulted in the murder of about 40% of European Jewry, For most of the first fifty years of its existence, Israel had an oriental, Sephardic majority. Nonetheless, Herzl's vision dominated many aspects of the Zionist program for better or worse. Like Herzl, Zionists ignored the presence of Arabs in Palestine. Like Herzl, they became committed to the premise that Jews must return to performing productive work, and like Herzl, they were committed to a democratic society. As in Herzl's utopian vision, Israel evolved, through conscious effort, to an advanced technological society. Herzl's vision of a secular, liberal democracy inspired the Israeli Declaration of Independence.

Herzl appealed in vain to wealthy Jews such as Baron Hirsch and Baron Rothschild, to join the national Zionist movement. He found allies however, in impoverished Eastern European socialists and Zionists who had already formed Zionist groups. The result was the First Zionist Congress in Basle, which established the World Zionist Organization and adopted the

program of attaining a Jewish State to be provided by "public law." Herzl convened six Zionist Congresses between 1897 and 1902. The Congresses created the instruments of Zionist action for implementing the settlement plan, including The Jewish Colonial Trust, the Jewish National Fund and the movement's newspaper Die Welt.

After the first Basle Congress, Herzl wrote in his diary, "Were I to sum up the Basle Congress in a word- which I shall guard against pronouncing publicly- it would be this: 'At Basle, I founded the Jewish State. If I said this out loud today, I would be answered by universal laughter. If not in 5 years, certainly in 50, everyone will know it.'"

Herzl attempted to gain a charter from the Sultan of Turkey for the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine, then ruled by the Ottoman Empire. To this end he met in 1898 with the German Kaiser, Wilhelm II, in Istanbul and Palestine, as well as the Sultan, but these meetings did not bear fruit.

Herzl then negotiated with the British regarding the possibility of settling the Jews on the island of Cyprus, the Sinai Peninsula, the El Arish region and Uganda. After the Kishinev pogroms, Herzl visited Russia in July 1903. He tried unsuccessfully to persuade the Russian government to help the Zionist Movement transfer Jews from Russia to Palestine. At the Sixth Zionist Congress Herzl proposed settlement in Uganda, on offer from the British, as a temporary "night refuge." The idea met with sharp opposition, especially from the same Russian Jews that Herzl had thought to help. Though the Congress passed the plan as a gesture of esteem for Herzl, it was not pursued seriously, and the initiative died after the plan was withdrawn. Herzl met with the king of Italy, who was encouraging, and with the Pope, who expressed opposition.

Herzl quarreled with the Zionist movement over the Uganda project, which had proposed only as a "night refuge" and at one point he resigned from the chairmanship briefly. However, he never thought of Uganda as a preferred solution. In September 1903, he wrote in his diary of a visit to the Duke of Baden:

At one point the good old Duke seemed moved: when I told him that we would gladly renounce the good land in East Africa for the poor land in Palestine. I would particularly regard it as a vindication for us avaricious Jews, if we gave up a rich country for the sake of a poor one.(Sept. 1, 1903, 4: 1549)

Frustrated by quarrels in the Zionist movement, Herzl wrote in his diary what may be a fitting epitaph:

One day, when the Jewish state will be in existence, everything will appear petty and self- evident. Perhaps a fair-minded historian will find that it was something, after all, that an impecunious Jewish journalist, in the midst of the deepest degradation of the Jewish people and at a time of the most disgusting anti-Semitism, made a flag out of a rag and a people out of a decadent rabble, and was able to rally this people around such a flag. (June 1, 1901, Diaries, 3: 1151).

Herzl died in 1904 and was buried in Vienna. After the establishment of the State of Israel his remains were reburied on Mt. Herzl, Jerusalem in the summer of 1949.65

65 The Jewish State Theodor Herzl's Program for Zionism. Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://www.zionism-israel.com/js/Jewish_State.html

Zionism = Racism Zionism is a racist ideology, like all nationalisms. The specific racist characteristics are summarised here: labelling them racist should be uncontroversial in itself. However Israel and its supporters are allergic for the label, and that hinders rational assessment of nationalist ideology.

Nationalism and racism

Nation states are components of a nationalist world order, and nationalism is the ideology or movement that promotes that world order. The present world order is composed of permanent states. With one exception, the Vatican, they are formed by trans-generational communities - nations. Together these states hold all inhabitable territory, as contiguous national territories: a planet of nations. All nationalists hold certain core beliefs about this world order, about the nation itself and about the nation state. Some of these core beliefs are clearly racist. Others - such as the belief that nation states should be transgenerational - are not racist in themselves, but lead almost inevitably to racist policies by the states. All modern nation states are founded on certain racist principles, which derive directly from nationalist ideology. The multi-ethnic empires, the traditional target of European nationalist resentment, did not always apply such principles.

The catechism of nationalism

 The nations are collectively equivalent to humanity: they are its natural units.  Each person inherently belongs to a specific nation, and no-one can validly claim not to belong to any nation.  Nations are sacred: they have a status which no other group or collectivity can have. Nations deserve supreme respect, beyond that for other groups.  The nations have a monopoly of state formation. No entity which is not

a nation may acquire or hold territory, to form a state.  Nations have a great historical continuity and should be continued. National cultures have intrinsic value, therefore nations must exist to produce and preserve them.  Nations may not be abolished, singly or collectively. No process which terminates the existence of any nation is legitimate. The world order of nation states shall never be terminated. If a nation ceases to exist, by decline or erosion, then its place in the world order shall be taken by a successor nation.

from: Nation Planet

All nation states are founded on the nationalist belief that each nation has a specific claim to a specific territory. Nationalists can and do recognise other nations claims to other territories, but almost all make an exclusive claim to at least some territory. This claim is, by definition, an expression of group superiority. The members of the nation, according the nationalist movement in question, possess an inherently superior claim to the territory, purely by membership of the group. They do not have to do anything for it. The claim covers not only their claimed right to live there, but their claimed right to exclude others.

There is one exception to this pattern: the diaspora nationalism of the Roma. The Roma do not know exactly where their ancestral homeland is located. Therefore, in sharp contrast to other nationalist movements, Roma nationalism does not claim territory. And until they know where it is, Roma nationalists can not attempt to expel the existing inhabitants of that territory.

All existing nation states do make a claim of superior right to national territory. In all cases, this claim is made on behalf of a single ethnic group, or a cluster of ethnic groups (titular nation plus national minorities). That the groups are ethnic is the source of most of the racism in ideology and policy. If states were exclusively founded on gender, their ideology might be sexist, but not racist.

Conversely, all nation states claim that other groups do not possess that specific right to the territory in question. Irish nationalists believe that the 'Irish people' have a superior right to the island of Ireland, and that the Paraguayan people do not possess this right. They believe that individual Irishmen and Irish women are the bearers of this collective right, and that these individuals can not be denied the right to reside in Ireland. They they do not believe this about randomly selected individual Paraguayans. Ireland has no indigenous ethnic minorities so the definition of the nation is relatively simple. However these beliefs can be held on behalf of more than one national group, but never on behalf of all nations of the world - at least not in any existing nation state. The formal expression of these underlying beliefs is the citizenship and immigration policy of the nation states. Note that nothing stops Irish and Paraguayan nationalists from respecting each others claims, especially since they have no common disputed territory. However, that does not make their claims any less racist.

It is often said, that the nation states have widely differing conceptions of citizenship. In fact they all operate in conformity with these two principles of superior claim, and legitimate exclusion. All existing nation states share two other characteristics. No nation state has an absolute open-border policy (totally free immigration), and all nation states allow the acquisition of citizenship by descent.

These four characteristics allow Zionism to be considered racist - in the company of other nationalisms, including the quasi-official ideologies of each nation state.

The superior claim to national territory is the attribution of a superior quality to members of the national group. The denial of this claim to certain other ethnic groups is the attribution of an inferior status to their members. The lack of an open-door immigration policy means, that these claims are translated into real exclusion. Finally, the acquisition of citizenship by descent is a purely biological mechanism: it is racist in the general sense, but it is also

closest to the biological ideologies first described by the term 'racism'.

French and German attitudes are said to represent the extremes of citizenship policy, but in fact both states share a biological concept of citizenship. Both illustrate this core policy, despite their differences in emphasis. Germany has a generally restrictive immigration policy, which it relaxed in the 1960's and 1970's to allow labour migration for (West) German industry. The children of the many Turkish immigrants grew up in Germany as foreign citizens, with a Turkish passport and a German residence permit. Even the third generation, often born in Germany of German-born parents, usually speaking only German, were still Turkish citizens. If they committed a crime they were liable to be deported to Turkey, even if they did not speak a word of Turkish and had never been there before. Only in the last few years has naturalisation become almost automatic for the third generation. In contrast, descendants of Germans who settled in eastern Europe, sometimes two or three centuries ago, can arrive in Germany and claim full citizenship. It is not necessary that their parents are German citizens, and they are not required to speak a word of German. The German state will pay for their full integration in German society, because they are considered part of the German 'Volk'.

French policies are based on different assumptions, about the effectiveness of French society in transferring its own core values. Living in France for a long period, or growing up in France, is considered to effectively assimilate the migrant or the child. (There is an underlying belief in the self-evident superiority of French values). Naturalisation is therefore easier, and in principle birth in France confers citizenship - but the parents must get there first, for the child to be born there.

However in both cases a basic rule applies, which undermines the French pretensions to have a 'non-racist' citizenship and nationality policy. The child born of citizens is a citizen. All existing nation states apply this principle, usually without regard to place of birth. The child born to a French-citizen mother and a French-citizen father, in Zambia, is a French citizen. The child born to a German-citizen mother and a German-citizen father, in Zambia, is a German citizen. No special procedure is required of either the parents or the baby, and no supplementary qualifications.

The child of Zambian parents, who have no German or French ancestors and no connection with Germany or France, can make no claim on the citizenship of these countries. Both doors are equally closed. That essential inequality is by definition racist. As an adult, the Zambian child can later try to enter either country, and acquire citizenship. That means going through a special procedure, and meeting certain norms, for instance on educational level. Ultimately, acquiring citizenship might be easier in France, but there is no guarantee there either.

This is the reality of nation states: most people got their citizenship from their parents, and they did nothing for it. They certainly did not have to cross the Strait of Gibraltar in a small boat, and spend 10 years picking tomatoes or cleaning toilets - which is what a Zambian might do to acquire legal residence in an EU country. In other words the average citizen, certainly in the richer countries, is complicit in a grand racist scheme. They benefit greatly from their privilege at birth, while others lose horribly. That is presumably why they don't like to talk about the issue, but in terms of human suffering this is the worst aspect of the inherent racism of the nation states. If adults in a western city were arrested, and condemned on the basis of their ethnicity to the typical conditions of life in rural Africa, it

would be considered a crime against humanity.

Origins and definition of Zionism

The racist characteristics of nationalism can be found in the Zionist ideology and in the State of Israel, a nation state. The word Zionism is used today for the foundational ideology of the Israeli nation state - the claims by which it justifies its existence. However Zionism as a nationalist movement is older than that state: past and present Zionism do not always coincide.

Zionism is a diaspora nationalism of the Jewish people. In a diaspora nationalism, most members of the national group are not resident on the claimed national territory, and the nation state can only be achieved by 'return' migration. Zionism is an unusual nationalism: it is largely the creation of a single individual, Theodor Herzl. He was the first to make a public claim to a Jewish State, and promoted that idea in Europe. His work reflected the general climate of nationalist revival movements in eastern Europe at the time, especially in the Austro-Hungarian empire. It was almost inevitable, that a Jewish movement would identify Jews as 'a people' when all around them Germans, , Czechs, Slovaks, Ruthenians, Slovenes, Croats, Serbs, and Hungarians were doing the same. The other historically possible options - a purely religious revival movement, and an emancipation movement - were side-tracked.

Zionism is also unusual because, in the early years, there was no clear idea of the national homeland. There was a clear territorial concentration of Jews in Europe, in what is now Poland, Belarus, the Ukraine and southern Russia. However, except for local concentrations, they were in a minority even in this territory. The idea of a Jewish nation state in eastern Europe was never influential in Zionism. Some of the early plans for Jewish resettlement were not even formally nationalist: they made no claim to a state. Resettlement in a British colony, such as Uganda, was for a time the most serious option. The negotiations came to nothing - but the idea influenced British policy, when Palestine became a British mandate territory, after the First World War.

By the time of the Balfour Declaration, Zionism was a standard nationalist movement. Zionists claimed to speak on behalf of a people, the Jewish people. They claimed a nation state for that people in Palestine, on the grounds that it was the historic homeland of the Jewish people. The 'Jewish people' for almost all Zionists was (and is) an ethno-national group - and not a religious community. A minority of religious Jews still opposes Zionism for religious reasons.

Zionism in the State of Israel

When the State of Israel came into existence, it included a mainly Arab minority, now about one million people. Historically Zionism has never recognised any 'national minority' within the nation, the status of (for instance) the Frisians within the modern Dutch nation. For Zionists, the Jewish people is the Jewish nation: Zionism is a mono-ethnic nationalism comparable to Irish nationalism. The present State of Israel generally has the constitutional structure of a secular nation state. It has conceded citizenship to the 'Israeli Arabs', although many will identify themselves as 'Palestinians'. However there is no tradition in

Zionism which sees this group ('Arabs' or 'Palestinians') as a constituent minority of the Jewish people. Although many Zionists claimed the territory where Yasir Arafat lived, no Zionist ever saw him as a Jew.

There is also no nationalist movement to establish a bi-national state on the former mandate territory of Palestine. Zionism is not such a movement, and the State of Israel does not claim to be a bi-national state. In this respect, Zionism is comparable to Czech nationalism or Slovak nationalism - not to Czechoslovak nationalism.. No Zionists call themselves Palestino-Jews or Judaeo-Palestinians. The State is called Israel, not Filastino- Israel or Israelo-Filastina

Within this framework, which includes contradictory ideas about Israeli citizenship, the four racist characteristics can be identified.

Firstly, the Zionist movement historically made a claim to territory on behalf of 'the Jewish people', an exclusive geopolitical claim. It claimed that individual Jews had a right to residence in that territory, which did not apply to randomly selected non-Jews outside that territory. None of the early Zionists advocated the ethnic cleansing, which in fact preceded the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 - but none of them believed that non-Jews had a right to the Jewish homeland either. Zionists attribute a superior quality to Jews, namely the exclusive right to the Jewish national territory. The State of Israel, by definition, claims Israeli territory for Israeli's. It attributes a superior quality to Israeli's, although paradoxically that includes the Arab minority with Israeli citizenship. However, the State of Israel is not 'Israelist' - in the sense of consistently presenting these claims for both its Jewish and Arab citizens. In official pronouncements, such as its defensive speech to the Durban anti-racism conference, Israel continues to claim state legitimacy as the national homeland for the 'Jewish people'. It is therefore not correct to say, that in Israel Jewish diaspora nationalism has been succeeded by Israeli nationalism. The legitimising ideology of Israel is still largely Zionism, and not 'Israelism'.

Secondly, Zionism attributes an inferior status to members of non-Jewish ethno-national groups: that they lack the absolute right to residence in the Jewish homeland, and to citizenship of a Jewish nation state. The State of Israel confers no right of residence or citizenship on persons born outside Israel, unless they have specific links to Israel, to the Jewish people, or to Judaism. That excludes about 99% of the world population. The only exception to the general pattern of nationalist exclusion is, that the State of Israel extends citizenship to the historically resident Arab minority. However, some groups in Israel dispute even their right to residence, and propose their expulsion as part of a 'peace settlement' - together with the expulsion of Palestinians from all or part of the occupied territories. According to a 2003 opinion poll in Israel (Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies), 31% now support the expulsion of the Arab minority, and 46% support clearance of the territories.

The most obvious exclusion, which was not foreseen by the early Zionists, is the status of the Palestinians in the occupied territories. Theodor Herzl never imagined that a Jewish state would be an occupying power, and therefore the de facto government, for a large non- Jewish population. In addition, about three million people belong to the clearly identifiable 'Palestinian-refugee' minorities, in other Arab countries, although most were born in their present country of residence. The State of Israel clearly attributes an inferior status to this population: namely that they do not possess the right to Israeli citizenship. This population is generally equivalent to the 'Palestinian people' in the occupied territories, although it

includes small non-Jewish, non-Arab minorities. The members of this population, (primarily Palestinian), can not vote, for instance, and if they did all vote in Israeli elections, it would mean the end of the State of Israel. Again it is true that all nation states operate this exclusion, and none of them extend citizenship to everyone, certainly not to hostile populations. That does not make such policies any less racist, since the exclusions are by definition on ethnic or national grounds.

That would not matter so much, if Israeli borders were open to all immigrants: but they are not, and this is the third racist characteristic of Zionism. Israel has one of the highest immigration rates in history, but immigration policy has always been restrictive. Although Israel grants citizenship to the resident Arab minority, it does not permit Arab immigration, even by former residents of its territory. Only those who stayed in their villages in 1948 got Israeli citizenship: those who crossed the front line to the Arab side can not get back - not as a citizen, and probably not as a visitor. Other Arabs, who have no connection with Palestine, can not simply migrate to Israel, nor can most of the world's population. Israeli immigration is essentially for Jews only, and this is the most obviously racist policy of present Zionism. In this case, the State of Israel has a formal and explicit policy of Jewish immigration, which is clearly Zionist. It is the logical consequence of the original Zionist demand for a Jewish state formed by migration, meaning migration of Jews.

In one respect Israeli policy differs from most national immigration policies: citizenship can be indirectly acquired on religious grounds. A person who converts to Judaism can be a Jew in the sense of the Israeli , if the conversion is accepted as valid by religious authorities in Israel. The convert can then go to Israel (entry can not be legally refused), and can claim Israeli nationality and citizenship. Sometimes this is quoted by Israel's supporters, to show Israel is not racist. In theory, all the inhabitants of the Palestinian territories can sincerely convert to Judaism tomorrow, and on acceptance of their conversion move to Israel. - where they will all presumably live as good and prosperous Israeli citizens. In practice this is absurdly unlikely. And the question is: why should they have to convert to Judaism, when native-born atheist or Buddhist Israelis can still be part of the Jewish people?

This is the fourth racist characteristic, equally present in the state policies of Israel and present Zionist belief. It was not very relevant for the early Zionists, who were too far from a Jewish state to think about its future citizenship policy. Nevertheless, it was predictable even at the time Herzl wrote, on the basis of the general characteristics of European nation states (and of the Austro-Hungarian empire where he lived). The child of an Israeli citizen mother and and Israeli citizen father is an Israeli citizen. (I am not sure if this applies to the children of Israeli Arabs, born in the occupied territories). The child acquires this privilege without effort: no application under the Law of Return, no conversion to Judaism, no other qualification for citizenship. The child simply acquires the rights (and duties) of an Israeli citizen through unconscious biological process. The child without this biological advantage (birth, or parentage, or genetic material) does not automatically acquire citizenship. Life in Israel is not always pleasant, and many western Jews hesitate to emigrate there, but within the region an Israeli-born child has the advantage. The child born to Israeli settlers in central Hebron will statistically live longer, be better educated, and have a higher standard of living, then the Palestinian child born in an adjoining house. This advantage is part of the general advantage of being born in a rich country, which about one-fifth of the world's population share.

In citizenship and immigration issues, biology determines fate. Not inevitably, but

because nation states are structured that way. There is no inherent moral reason why states should limit immigration, or residence, or citizenship, simply on grounds of birth. In fact, it is hard to think of any moral justification for it. It is clearly racist in the general sense of the word, and its derivation from the ideology of nationalism indicates the racist origins of that ideology. The nationalism underlying the nation state Israel, which is accurately called Zionism, is no different in this respect. Here too, Zionism is racist.66

Why Zionism Is Racism?

Zionism is a racist and irredeemable movement, like Bolshevism, Nazism, and Apartheid.

(Note: This article is a direct response, using the same format, on a line by line basis, to an editorial that appeared in the Montreal Gazette on April 26, 2001, written by Gil Troy, a Professor of History at McGill University.)67

On this, the 53rd anniversary of the Nakbe' (the Catastrophe of the Palestinian people), it is all too tempting for friend and foe alike to define Israel, and zionism, solely by the Americans' proclamations of its enlightened democracy. To do so is to miss the normal atrocities that occur in Israel daily, the millions who are under curfew and blockade, starving and brutalized, in the Middle East's only colonized state. To do so is to feign the reality of zionism, a racist and irredeemable movement, that survived the twentieth centuries' other genocidal and seemingly passing revolutions such as Bolshevism, Nazism, and Apartheid.

The sad truth is that over a century after its founding, zionism seems to be grander and more honorable than its reality. Arabs have suffered from Zionism's belligerence and exclusivity, and many have blamed the United States, and the West, for this because of their unshakeable support of zionism. Israeli aggression over the past seven months has finally renewed international recognition that zionism is racism.

On this anniversary of the Nabke', it is now up to all Jews to follow in the footsteps of the brave few, and denounce the racist and separatist nature of zionism, while the world should encourage them to do so. The world should not allow the torchbearers of zionism to silence and quell the idealism of these few. No nationalism is pure, no movement is perfect, no state is ideal, but today, Zionism persists as a menace, a militaristic and dictatory movement to me and to most Palestinians. A century ago, zionism extended Western colonialism to Palestine; today, as in the rest of the world, colonialism must be ideologically purged from Palestine.

I believe that zionism is racism, because 53 years after being exiled from their homeland, in defiance of the four Geneva Conventions, UN Resolutions 181, 194, 242, 338, and others, and other multilateral and international human rights conventions, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the disinherited refugees of Palestine, continue to endure

66Zionism = Racism. Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://web.inter.nl.net/users/Paul.Treanor/zionism.html

67 Rabee' Sahyoun. 2001. Why Zionism Is Racism. Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://www.albalagh.net/current_affairs/zionism_racism.shtml

merciless punishment from the Zionist entity, most recently in the bulldozing of makeshift homes in the Khan Younis refugee camp in Gaza.

I believe that zionism is racism, because I am a Palestinian, and without recognizing the colonialist component in zionism, I cannot explain its racist character, a western movement uprooting the native peoples of Palestine, Muslim, Christian, Jew, Samaritan alike, a people bound to their land, through centuries of raising orange groves, and herding sheep, lending grace to the Hills of God, historically, religiously and culturally.

I believe that zionism is racism, because it fails to appreciate or acknowledge the Palestinians' ties to their homeland, their love for their historical capital, Jerusalem, and the 53-yar plight they have endured as refugees worldwide, in Europe, in North America, in camps Dheishe, Shatila, Wehdaat and others, never giving up hope or struggle in yearning to return home.

I believe that zionism is racism, because it fails to admit the reality that the minority indigenous Jewish community in Palestine, that lived there for the last two thousand years, was an undistinguishable people from its Christian and Muslim Palestinian brethren, and that the leader of the Jewish community of the Jewish quarter of Old Jerusalem, Rabbi Lamram Blau, stood on the side of his Palestinian brothers and sisters being exiled in 1948.

I believe that zionism is racism because in modern times, the promise of liberal democracy and justice is a double-edged sword, preached by the Western powers, yet only paid lip- service to in the case of Israel, where Palestinian are continuously expelled, ethnically cleansed, and subjugated, and in the cases where they are assimilated, they are granted, limited, if any, civil rights.

I believe that zionism is racism, because in establishing the racially exclusive state of Israel, in 1948, and expelling the indigenous Palestinians from the land, the zionists severed a relationship that people had to the land for over 4,000 years, uninterrupted, since before Abraham.

I believe that zionism is racism, because in building Israel, the zionists were revising history, embracing the notion of racial superiority, an ideology that has empowered them to discriminate, with all of its associated social ills, injustices, and moral bankruptcy.

I believe that zionism is racism because it fails to distinguish between the nationalism of the American, based on multi-cultural harmony, and the racial exclusivity, separatism, ethnic cleansing, and brutality of zionism, that stands in clear violation of the most basic elements of international law and human rights practices, as most recently highlighted by reports issued by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.

I believe that zionism is racism because in our world of post-modern identities, I know that we do not have to be "either-ors", we can be "ands and buts" – a zionist and a settler, an American citizen of Polish heritage but a soldier in the Israeli army.

I believe that zionism is racism because it self-propagates itself as a democratic movement. However, a democracy, cannot, by definition, only be representative of one community in a bi-national and tri-religious contiguous geographic area. A democracy cannot exist for one people and not for another. This as called Apartheid in South Africa, and is now called zionism in Palestine.

I believe that zionism is racism, because it espouses an independent and sovereign Jewish state, in a land where there is no Jewish majority. It espouses that such a sovereign state be at peace and harmony with its neighbors without allowing the Palestinian refugees dwelling within their borders, who were expelled from their homes in Palestine by zionist militias, as is clearly documented by numerous sources including the memoirs of David-Ben Gurion himself, to return to their homes, which is a basic human right guaranteed by Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

I believe that zionism is racism because it is presented by its champions, from Gil Troy to Elie Wiesel, as a romantic movement, which allowed zionists to reclaim the desert and build a model nation-state. This is racism at its most acute, since there was no desert in Palestine, other than the Negev in the South. This is simply a myth that has been propagated by racists who have supported Israel for the last 53 years, and economic data on agricultural exports to Europe from Palestine dating to medieval times easily rejects and exposes this as a blasphemous claim.

Yes, it sounds far-fetched today. But as Vladamir Jabotinsky, father of revisionist zionism said in a racist boast in 1923, "There can be no discussion of a voluntary reconciliation between us and the Arabs… Any native people…view their country as their national home… They will not voluntarily allow, not only a new master, but even a new partner… Colonization can have only one goal. For the Palestinian Arabs this goal is inadmissible. This is in the nature of things. To change that nature is impossible… colonization can, therefore, continue and develop only under the protection of a force independent of the local population - an iron wall which the native population cannot break through. This is, in toto, our policy towards the Arabs. To formulate it any other way would only be hypocrisy."

And thus, Gil Troy and zionists abound are exposed as nothing more than unabashed racists.

[Mr. Rabee' Sahyoun is a economic development policy researcher, human rights activist, and columnist residing in Beirut, Lebanon. He is affiliated with the global grassroots Palestine Right To Return Coalition.]68

Definition of Racism, Definition of Zionism, are Zionism and Racism the same?69

Racism On January 4th 1969, the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination adopted General Assembly Resolution 2106 of 21st December 1965, in accordance with Article 19.

In included the following:

The term ―racial discrimination‖ shall mean any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, colour, descent, or national or ethnic origin which has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life.

68 Ibid. 69 Definitions of Zionism and Racism. Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://www.zionismontheweb.org/antizionism/Zionism_and_Racism_definition.htm

These were always the principles of the Zionists, and twenty years before the UN Resolution, Israel‘s Declaration of Independence of 14/5/1948, stated:

In the midst of wanton aggression, we yet call upon the Arab inhabitants of the State of Israel to return to the ways of peace and to play their part in the development of the State, with full and equal citizenship and due representation in all its bodies and institutions, provisional or permanent.

Israel has adhered to this Declaration in the face of continual attacks by its neighbours and, (see is Zionism ―Apartheid‖), non-Jews are active in every walk of Israeli life, in its public institutions such as hospitals, politics and education.

Zionism Put simply, Zionism is the belief in a Jewish homeland for the Jewish people, in Israel. Zionism is the Jewish people's instantiation of the human right of self determination. No more, no less.70

Zionism is Racism - True or False?71

It is shameful to condemn the national liberation movement of one people only as "racism," but the "Zionism is Racism" slogan does just that, because Zionism is the national liberation movement of the Jewish people. If Zionism is racism, then the Italian, Irish American, French, Algerian, Palestinian and Indian national movements are all "racism."

The Zionism is Racism campaign apparently grew out of an anti-Zionist conference held in Mexico city in 1975. Riding the crest of pro-Arab appeasement following the Arab oil boycott of 1973, the PLO managed to win an observer seat in the UN, a UN resolution legalizing "resistance" (terror) as legitimate, a U.N. permanent committee on the "inalienable rights" of Palestinians at the UN and in 1975, UN General Assembly Resolution 3379 - the "Zionism is Racism" resolution. The idea behind this campaign was to take advantage of world indignation at South African apartheid and racism and try to show that somehow Israel is like South Africa. The resolution stated inter alia:

RECALLING ALSO that, in its resolution 3151 G (XXVIII) of 14 December 1953, the General Assembly condemned, inter alia, the unholy alliance between South African racism and Zionism,

TAKING NOTE of the Declaration of Mexico on the Equality of Women and Their Contribution to Development and Peace 1975, proclaimed by the World Conference of the International Women's Year, held at Mexico City from 19 June to 2 July 1975, which promulgated the principle that "international co-operation and peace require the achievement of national liberation and independence, the elimination of colonialism and neo-colonialism, foreign occupation, Zionism, apartheid and racial discrimination in all its forms, as well as the recognition of the dignity of peoples and their right to self- determination",

70 Ibid. 71 Zionism is Racism - True or False? . Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://www.zionism- israel.com/issues/racism.htm

In view of the situation of women in Arab countries, the fact that this resolution came out of an International Women's Year conference is sadly ironic. Israel is one of the few countries in the Middle East where women enjoy equal protection under the law.

Kofi Annan, Secretary General of the United Nations, described this as the "low point" in the history of the organization. This odious resolution was ultimately repealed in 1991.

Unfortunately, the same theme was adopted at the Durban conference of NGOs in 2001, which became a festival of racism and Jew hate. Respectable organizations that had agreed to participate in this conference condemned the anti-Israel resolutions and some withdrew from the conference.

On the other hand, most anti-Zionist propaganda is racist and anti-Semitic. The racist David Duke is a leading proponent of anti-Zionism. Palestinian leader Grand Mufti Hajj Amin El Husseini was a Nazi who organized SS units in Yugoslavia and told the British that his solution for the Jews of Palestine was the same as the one adapted in Europe by the Germans - extermination. John Strawson, a vigorous advocate of the Palestinian cause, has written, On the whole Anti-Zionism is close to, or a mask for, Anti-Semitism

Is Zionism racism? Israel patriots and Zionists include non-Jews such as Azzam Azzam, LaVon Mercer and Ayub Kara. Zionists and Israeli Jews also include Africans like Mehereta Baruch. Figure it out for yourself.72

Focus on Jerusalem~Zionism and Racism73

In the many centuries of their Roman enforced separation from the Promised Land, the Jews never ceased to mourn the loss of their national homeland, and never gave up hope of a return to the land of their ancestry. The prayer book of Jewish Synagogue is replete with petitions to God for the restoration of the people to the land of Israel, and thereafter for the rebuilding of the fallen temple.

In 1897 Theodore Herzl wrote ―Der Judenstat‖ (the Jewish State) which gave birth to the modern movement of Political Zionism. The revival of Zionism was induced by the plague of persecution heaped upon Jewry through anti-Semitism in Europe and Russia.

The onslaught of Satanic evil unleashed upon the world in 1914-1918 during World War I actually was utilized by God almighty to avail the land of Palestine to the nation of Great Britain. Great Britain under the auspices of the League of Nations was authorized to effect the Palestine Mandate. This mandate sought to resolve the Jewish problem in Europe by according the Zionist Congress with a national homeland in Palestine. So, in essence God used WWI to prepare the land to receive the people of Zion. Although the land was ready for the Jewish people, the people themselves were not quite ready to return. Judaism expected the Messiah to prepare the agency of that return. Then came the dark days of WWII, an era of unprecedented evil that saw the forces of Satan attempt to wipe out the people of Zion. But again, God utilized that terrible evil to place the people back into the land and to re-fashion the nation of Zion amongst the community of nations of the world on May 14, 1948.

72 Ibid. 73 Darrell G. Young. 2001. Focus on Jerusalem~Zionism and Racism. Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://www.focusonjerusalem.com/zionismandracism.html

Then in 1975, at the behest of the Arab world, the United Nations equated Zionism with racism. This resolution stated unequivocally, that the zeal of Zionists to rebuild Israel in the Promised Land is tantamount to racism against the Arabic-Muslim peoples, and an obstruction to peace in the world. In 1990 the UN repealed that resolution prior to the 1991 Persian Gulf War against Iraq.

At the United Nations World Conference against Racism, held recently in Durban, South Africa, tiny Israel again was specifically singled out as today's number one villain of world racism. Thousands took to the streets with banners calling Israel an apartheid state, comparing Zionism to racism and calling for the indictment of Israeli Prime Minister Sharon.

UN Secretary General Kofi Anan, in his opening speech, used Israel as the poster country to single out for racism, condemning it for occupying, displacing, blockading and utilizing genocide and ethnic cleansing upon the Palestinians.

He further upbraided Israel for using the Holocaust as a means to overwork the world- sympathy issue, while it used similar tactics against the Palestinians. The draft resolutions of the conference mention no other country but Israel, blaming it for "ethnic cleansing" and executing its own holocaust upon the Palestinian people.

In reality it is the Arab countries themselves that brought about the atrocities on the Palestinian people. Israel never wanted conflict and never initiated any wars. The Arab countries, refusing to accept the Partition Plan approved by the UN, started the 1948 war, hell-bent on destroying Israel. The Arab countries have continuously provoked Israel and brought about each war and conflict since then, never for a moment giving up their dream of cleansing the Middle East of its purported cancer, the Jewish people. All the atrocities, those experienced by Israelis and Palestinians, were brought about by the leaders of the Arab people. Israel fought in self-defense. It is still, unfortunately, fighting on the defensive.

Today, Israel does not want to occupy the Palestinians, nor does it want to blockade their cities. Yet the constant threat of an attack on a passenger bus, or an explosion on a street, or a suicide blast in some inconspicuous shopping center leaves Israel with only one choice, simply to act to defend itself. So who is to blame? Leaders of Palestinian terrorist groups who send their suicide bombers to blow up women and children, or the leaders of Israel who are merely doing their best to ensure that their people can live without the constant threat of violence?

What is the problem with Zionism? Why does it stir up so much hatred and passion in the world? Why is the nation of Israel such a controversial dynamic in our world today? It is quite well known that this dilemma is rooted in thousands of years of religious history. But what exactly is the root of all of these complex problems concerning Zion? As I alluded to in a previous article, ―Sought Out, A City Not Forsaken‖, it is a dilemma rooted in Divine Providence! God has chosen Jerusalem and Mt. Zion to be the manifest parallel of the Divine in the eternal realm. The controversy over Zion and Jerusalem exemplifies the reality that there is an ever intensifying supernatural conflict concerning the one whose right it is to rule in Zion!

Isaiah 28:16 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste.

That precious cornerstone, which was foreordained before the foundation of the world, is Jesus Christ! Therein lies the whole problem! This world, its nations, its , and its peoples are not sympathetic to the right of Jesus Christ to reign in Jerusalem on Mount Zion. This plain fact was pointed out by the apostle Paul in his writings to the Romans.

Romans 9:33 As it is written, Behold, I ( God ) lay in Zion a stumbling-stone and rock of offence: (Jesus Christ) and whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed.

Thus Zion is a stone of offence to this whole world. While the world can find an accommodation and tolerance with, or for any of man-kinds humanistic philosophies or religiosity, it simply cannot condone the fact that God has manifest his own son in human flesh, allowed him to be sacrificed for sin, bore him away to Heaven via the resurrection awaiting the great Day of the Lord, when he shall return unto his people Israel, whereupon he shall become the reigning King in Zion!

And the obstacle for people toward that accommodation is their complicity with the conspiratorial rebellious scheme of the God of this world, Satan himself, to usurp the throne of God. The Luciferic Conspiracy began in the Heavenly Zion and is now increasingly focused on the earthly Zion.

Obviously included within that conspiracy are those who equate Zionism with racism. The UN sponsored conference on Racism was commandeered by radical elements of real racists. The assembly branded Zionism as being based solely upon a religious teaching that elevates Jewry to a position of racial superiority. The very same nations that have sought to rewrite history by indicating that the Holocaust never really happened, were the same nations represented at the racism conference demanding that Israel be liquidated, and the Jews be exterminated. It reminds me of another conference that was held in Germany in 1938. At the Wansee Conference of Nazi Germany, Palestinian Chief Mufti Haj al-Husseini met with Adolph Hitler to discuss the means of annihilating the Jews of Palestine as well as those in Europe. Once the plan was drawn up, it was called the "Final Solution." But even the Nazis couched their plans in less-open terms than do the anti-Zionists of today. Terms like "killing," "extermination" and so forth were never again used in public or committed to paper by the Nazi's. They sought to keep secret their evil scheme until it was too late for anyone to obstruct their mission. The Arab states today are far more explicit in their language describing their ultimate plans for Israel. Listen to himself: ―Our struggle against Zionism is not a struggle about borders, nor about peaceful co-existence, it is a struggle about the existence of Israel‖! ―Peace to us only means the total extermination of Israel‖! Furthermore, many of the fanatical Muslim clerics declare that Holy Jihad must be waged by the Islamic faithful to eradicate the Middle East of the Zionist state altogether. This agenda has historically been the dream of Satan ever since the ―enmity between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman‖ first raised its head of conspiracy. ( Genesis 3:15 ) And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.

Yahweh God, by his mere choosing the Woman (Israel) is the real target of this targeted hatred.

In a conference that was intended to denounce racism and prejudice, we witnessed instead the open and blatant hatred which yet prevails in our world against God's chosen people. This is racism that reeks of the discrimination that Jews have experienced throughout their history. When I hear and see so many of our world leaders and thousands of their followers point to Israel as the villain in the Middle East conflict, while at the same time tolerating the

terrorists threats, and the persistent rumors of war that is associated with terror organizations, I cannot help but realize that Satan is already gathering steam for his final war on the remnant of Israel. But let there be heard a word of caution to all anti-Zionists:

Psalms 129:5 Let them all be confounded and turned back that hate Zion.

Psalms 110:1 The LORD said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool.

Anti-Zionists will find themselves squarely positioned in the storm of the wrath of almighty God. Acts 2:34-35; Mark 12:36; Psalms 110: 1-2; Matthew 5:25 all allude to the idea that God will put down all enemies of Zion, and make them the footstool of Jesus Christ when he comes to reign in Zion. The world will become the footstool of Israel and heavenly Zionism!

Still, the conspiracy of Satan permeates much of the human race, and compels mankind to engulf himself in the program of evil against God's anointed! But God is not mocked! The Psalmist states: The heathen rage and the people imagine a vain thing, the kings and rulers take counsel together against Israel, conspiring to cut Israel asunder; but God sitteth in the heavens and laughs in derision, because his son hath already perfected salvation, and will soon return unto Zion!

Psalms 2:6 Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion

This is the reason that Christians should pray for the peace of Jerusalem! (Psalms 122:6) For hundreds of years, Jews have prayed the prayers of David, asking; how long Oh Lord wilt thou not remember Zion? The day of the Lords return to Zion is set in stone, and it draws nearer as the world gathers itself together in total opposition to Israel's mere existence.

Joel 2:1 Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the Day of the LORD cometh, for it is nigh at hand;

Joel 3:16-17 The LORD also shall roar out of Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth shall shake: but the LORD will be the hope of his people, and the strength of the children of Israel. So shall ye know that I am the LORD your God dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain: then shall Jerusalem be holy, and there shall no strangers pass through her any more.

That there seems to be a great many evidences to show that we have reached the period in the great roll of the centuries, when the ever-living God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, is up lifting his strong right hand to bring his people from afar, to plant them in their own land, and to return his Divine attention once again to Zion, is indisputable. None other people under Heaven can boast of such high authority to their earthly inheritance, for it is rooted in the Holy Word of God, and that very same God has planted them back in the land of Zion, because it is time for their King to return!

The Jewish people and the land are inseparable! Providentially the aim of God is the establishment of the Zionist Kingdom on this earth, a kingdom which shall have no end.

Luke 1:32-33 He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David: And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end.

Isaiah 2:3 And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.

Psalms 132:13-14 For the LORD hath chosen Zion; he hath desired it for his habitation. This is my rest for ever: here will I dwell; for I have desired it.

Psalms 69:35-36 For God will save Zion, and will build the cities of Judah: that they may dwell there, and have it in possession. The seed also of his servants shall inherit it: and they that love his name shall dwell therein.

No wonder that there is such a controversy over Zion! Surely the most frustrated creature in the entire cosmos would have to be Satan. He has conspired to utilize every evil means his wicked cadre of associates can hatch to thwart the Divine plan of God to fulfill his covenant with Abraham, and through that reality to bless all nations through the King of Zion. Satan will soon give up on his anti-Zionist stance, and seek to perpetrate a deceptive evil plot to establish his own king in Zion. Having seduced Israel into an illicit covenant, Satan will once again think that he has conquered Jesus Christ. But then just like he did back on Calvary, Jesus Christ will crush the head of the ole serpent with a mighty vengeance! The Lord is jealous over Zion, and he will deal harshly with the enemies of Zion.

Zechariah 1:14 So the angel that communed with me said unto me, Cry thou, saying, Thus saith the LORD of hosts; I am jealous for Jerusalem and for Zion with a great jealousy.

Zechariah 8:2-3 Thus saith the LORD of hosts; I was jealous for Zion with great jealousy, and I was jealous for her with great fury. Thus saith the LORD; I am returned unto Zion, and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem: and Jerusalem shall be called a city of truth; and the mountain of the LORD of hosts the holy mountain.

Almighty Yahweh God, who chose Israel to proclaim to the world his existence, his revelation of prophecy, his priesthood, his blessings, his Holy Word, and finally his own precious son shall soon choose to return his Son to Israel, whereupon he will upbuild the fallen tabernacle of David and establish his throne upon Mount Zion. Finally at long last the promises that Yawweh made to the Old Testament prophets of Israel concerning Zion will be realized. Daniel prophesied that Israel would cut off their Messiah in mid-stream, leaving half of his mission to this old world still as yet unaccomplished. But soon it will become fulfilled!

Daniel 9:24 Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to ―anoint the most Holy‖.

These six things remain to be accomplished in our world. Sin, iniquity, transgressions, unrighteousness, completion of prophecy, and un-holiness abound in our world today. That is because the whole world is confederated together against the rightful King of Zion!

The Most Holy is soon to be Anointed! He was rejected two thousand years ago when Israel conspired with Satan, and joined him in crucifying the only begotten son of God, but the day

is fast approaching when Israel will mourn for him as one that mourneth for his only son. ( Zechariah 12:10-11 )

Psalms 102:13-16 Thou shalt arise, and have mercy upon Zion: for the time to favour her, yea, the set time, is come. For thy servants take pleasure in her stones, and favour the dust thereof. So the heathen shall fear the name of the LORD, and all the kings of the earth thy glory. When the LORD shall build up Zion, he shall appear in his glory.

Psalms 14:7 Oh that the salvation of Israel were come out of Zion! when the LORD bringeth back the captivity of his people, Jacob shall rejoice, and Israel shall be glad.

Zechariah 1:17 Cry yet, saying, Thus saith the LORD of hosts; My cities through prosperity shall yet be spread abroad; and the LORD shall yet comfort Zion, and shall yet choose Jerusalem.

Yes, there is a ―Set‖ time for God to favor Zion. The setting for that re-choosing of Zion commenced with the return of the Jewish nation in 1948, and using Jesus own analogy, that set time comes like a woman in travail with child. The child that is depicted as causing Israel's labor pains today is Mt. Zion!

Oh but there cometh out of Zion a great Deliverer! Zionism stirs deep within my heart and soul, for I know that the Lord awaits me on the beautiful hill of Zion. I take heart in the ages old songs about Zion.

THERE WAITS FOR ME A GLAD TOMORROW, WHERE GATES OF PEARL SWING OPEN WIDE, AND WHEN I'VE PASSED THIS VALE OF SORROW, I'LL GO TO DWELL UPON THE OTHER SIDE.

SOME DAY I'LL HEAR THE ANGELS SINGING, BEYOND THE SHADOWS OF THE TOMB, AND ALL THE BELLS OF HEAVEN RINGING, WHILE SAINTS ARE SINGING, ―HOME SWEET HOME‖.

SOMEDAY MY LABORS WILL BE ENDED, AND ALL MY WANDERINGS WILL BE O'ER, AND ALL EARTH'S BROKEN TIES BE MENDED, AND I SHALL SIGH AND WEEP NO MORE.

SOMEDAY THE DARK CLOUDS WILL BE LIFTED, AND ALL THE NIGHT OF GLOOM BE PAST, AND ALL LIFE'S BURDENS WILL BE LIFTED, THE DAY OF REST SHALL DAWN AT LAST.

SOMEDAY BEYOND THE REACH OF MORTAL KEN, SOMEDAY GOD ONLY KNOWS WHERE AND WHEN, THE WHEELS OF MORTAL LIFE SHALL ALL STAND STILL, AND I SHALL GO TO DWELL ON ZION'S HILL.

I want to be with my precious redeemer, and I want to hear him say ―well done my child‖, and I long for the day when he will bring peace to this ole world, and he will live and reign upon Mount Zion, but I also know that the enemy is targeting all lovers of Zion, and is trying to steal Zion's hope.

But until then, we can all carry a song in all of our hearts, a song about our wondrous new home that awaits just over the hill: ―Were marching to Zion, beautiful, beautiful Zion, were marching upward to Zion, the beautiful city of God‖! Psalms 50:22 Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined!74

74 Ibid

Conclusion

Claims regarding racism and Zionism are made by some critics of Zionism and the state of Israel, particularly supporters of the Palestinians and anti-Zionists who reject the concept of Israel as a Jewish state.

Some commentators, particularly in the context of the Arab-Israeli conflict consider aspects of Zionist ideology or Zionist practice to be racist. They refer to the way Palestinian Arabs were considered by Zionism in the period of Mandatory Palestine, to some implications of the creation of a Jewish State, and to discrimination against Arab Israelis that still exists in Israel.

Others, such as Robert Wistrich, have rejected this view, arguing that Zionism is a legitimate national liberation movement and claim that criticism singles out Zionists, Jews and Israel, while ignoring similar failings in other countries. Some argue that accusations that Zionism is racist are themselves antisemitic.

References

Definitions of Zionism and Racism. Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://www.zionismontheweb.org/antizionism/Zionism_and_Racism_definition.htm

Rabee' Sahyoun. 2001. Why Zionism Is Racism. Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://www.albalagh.net/current_affairs/zionism_racism.shtml

The Jewish State Theodor Herzl's Program for Zionism. Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://www.zionism-israel.com/js/Jewish_State.html

Zionism = Racism. Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://web.inter.nl.net/users/Paul.Treanor/zionism.html

Zionism is Racism - True or False? . Retrieved May 26, 2013 from http://www.zionism- israel.com/issues/racism.htm

Chapter 5 Zionism and the creation of Israel

Introduction The Zionist movement developed against the background of events in Palestine/Israel and influenced those events. This account of Zionism is meant to be read together with the brief history of Israel and Palestine and History of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict since the Oslo Accords. Likewise, the Labor Zionist movement was a major force in the early implementation of Zionism, and therefore the history of Zionism cannot be intelligible without understanding the history of Labor Zionism.

The word "Zionism" has several different meanings: 1. An ideology - Zionist ideology holds that the Jews are a people or nation like any other, and should gather together in a single homeland. Zionism was self-consciously the Jewish analogue of Italian and German national liberation movements of the nineteenth century. The term "Zionism" was apparently coined in 1891 by the Austrian publicist Nathan Birnbaum, to describe the new ideology, but it was used retroactively to describe earlier efforts and ideas to return the Jews to their homeland for whatever reasons, and it is applied to Evangelical Christians who want people of the Jewish religion to return to Israel in order to hasten the second coming. "Christian Zionism" is also used to describe any Christian support for Israel.

2. A descriptive term - The term "Zionism" was apparently coined in 1891 by the Austrian publicist Nathan Birnbaum, to describe the new ideology. It is also used to describe anyone who believes Jews should return to their ancient homeland.

3. A political movement - The Zionist movement was founded by Theodor Herzl in 1897, incorporating the ideas of early thinkers as well as the organization built by Hovevei Tziyon ("lovers of Zion").

"Zionism" derives its name from "Zion," (pronounced "Tzyion" in Hebrew) a hill in Jerusalem. The word means "marker" or commemoration. "Shivath Tzion" is one of the traditional terms for the return of Jewish exiles. "Zionism" is not a monolithic ideological movement. It

includes, for example, socialist Zionists such as Ber Borochov, religious Zionists such as rabbi Kook, revisionist nationalists such as Jabotinsky and cultural Zionists exemplified by Asher Ginsberg (Achad Haam). Zionist ideas evolved over time and were influenced by circumstances as well as by social and cultural movements popular in Europe at different times, including socialism, nationalism and colonialism, and assumed different "flavors" depending on the country of origin of the thinkers and prevalent contemporary intellectual currents. Accordingly, no single person, publication, quote or pronouncement should be taken as embodying "official" Zionist ideology.75

False beliefs about Zionism76

A number of false beliefs and myths have been circulated about Zionism - both by detractors and by supporters of the movement:

Zionism and religion - Zionism is not a religious movement, and Israel is not the state of the Jewish religion. The Jewish religious establishment was originally opposed to Zionism, and then tried to take over or direct the movement. There are religious Zionists, who have their own motivations for adhering to Zionism, and Zionism was certainly meant to include religious Jews, but Herzl, Weizmann and other Zionist leaders were not observant Jews and approached Zionism as a national problem, not as a religious issue.

Zionism and Land - Several misconceptions about Zionism and land exist. The first is that Zionism did not particularly aim to settle the "Holy Land" (Palestine) and that Zionists were willing to settle in places such as East Africa and Cyprus. The latter were considered for a time as temporary asylums in order to alleviate the suffering of Russian Jews, but they were never accepted as end goals for settlement by the Zionist movement. In order to further the goal of settlement outside Palestine, Israel Zangwill left the Zionist movement and founded the Territorial Zionist movement, a separate political and ideological stream, that tried to secure a national home for the Jews in other territories. Zangwill also became a champion of immigration to America and of assimilation. Another myth is that Zionism aspires to extend the throughout the Middle East. Zionists certainly wanted the largest possible territory for the Jewish state, but the main goal was always to have a national home for the Jewish people within the ancient territory of Israel and Judea, and the Zionist movement accepted partition of the British mandate in 1922, a tiny truncated state offered in 1937 and the UN partition resolution of 1947. A peculiar claim of anti-Zionists offered as "proof" of "Zionist expansionism" is the claim that Israel is the only country whose constitution does not define its borders. Israel does not have a constitution, and many or most constitutions do not define the borders of the state, as for example the United States constitution. The Declaration of Independence of the State of Israel does not declare its borders, but neither does the United States declaration of Independence.

After Israel conquered the West Bank in 1967, religious Zionists and the Greater Israel movement tried to claim that settlement of the newly conquered lands in what the

75 The history of Zionism and the creation of Israel. Retrieved May 27, 2013 from http://www.mideastweb.org/zionism.htm

76 Ibid

Jordanians called the West Bank since 1945, and what was historically part of Judea and Samaria, was a central goal of Zionism. But the fact is that even when there was an opportunity for free purchase of land and settlement in the 1920s and 1930s, the Zionist movement did not purchase much land in those areas. Of the territories taken by Israel in 1967, only Jerusalem and perhaps Hebron have real national symbolic significance.

Zionism and expulsion of the Arabs - Anti-Zionists have insisted that Zionism plotted to expel the Arabs from Palestine. The claim has also been taken up by right-wing Zionist extremists, who can document it with various statements of leaders made at different times in favor of transfer of Arabs. It is true that some Zionist leaders made statements in favor of voluntary transfer of Arabs out of Palestine. There was no Zionist transfer policy however, except in acquiescence to the British Peel plan, which called for voluntary transfer of Arabs, and there was never an official Zionist policy or directive or order calling for mass expulsion of Arabs by force as a general policy. Plan Dalet (Plan D) issued in 1948, before Israeli independence, called for temporary expulsion of inhabitants of areas where it was necessary to secure roads that communicated between Jewish towns. This was necessitated by the road ambushes set up by Arab inhabitants in those villages.

A land without a people for a people without a land - The myth that this is a major slogan of Zionism was propagated by Edward Said (Edward Said, The Question of Palestine (New York: Times Books, 1979), p. 9)and Rashid Khalidi (Rashid Khalidi, Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997), p. 101.), and opponents of Zionism insisted that it meant that Zionism assumed or taught its enthusiasts that no people lived in Palestine. The slogan was coined by a Christian Zionist, a British advocate of the restoration of the Jews, Alexander Keith, who wrote that the Jews are "a people without a country; even as their own land, as subsequently to be shown, is in a great measure a country without a people." (Alexander Keith, The Land of Israel According to the Covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob (Edinburgh: William Whyte and Co., 1843). This was soon shortened to "a land without a people and a people without a land" (The United Secession Magazine(Edinburgh), vol. 1, p. 189). The phrase did not evidently mean to imply that there were no people living in Palestine. The intent of the phrase was apparently that there was no nation or nationalist entity other than the Jews who claimed Palestine as its homeland, as the Arabs of Palestine identified themselves variously as Arabs, Syrians, Nabulsi, Qudsi etc. and did not have a concept of Palestinian Arab nationhood or any Palestinian national organizations at that time. That this was the intent is shown by Lord Shaftesbury's version of the slogan, "There is a country without a nation; and God now in his wisdom and mercy, directs us to a nation without a country." (Shaftsbury, quoted in Albert Hyamson, "British Projects for the Restoration of Jews to Palestine," American Jewish Historical Society Publications, 1918, no. 26, p. 140). Diane Muir reviews the extensive use of the phrase by Christian Zionists including the American Blackstone, and its use in Jewish Zionism. Israel Zangwill is the first prominent Zionist recorded to have used the phrase and probably the only one who used it with serious intent in 1901 (Israel Zangwill, "The Return to Palestine," New Liberal Review, Dec. 1901, p. 615.). There was also apparently an isolated use of the phrase in the American Zionist journal, The Maccabean in 1901 (Raphael Medoff, American Zionist Leaders and the Palestinian Arabs, 1898-1948 (Ph.D. diss., Yeshiva University, 1991), p. 17. ). By 1914, Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann was referring to the phrase retrospectively (Paul Goodman, Chaim Weizmann: A Tribute on His Seventieth Birthday (London: V. Gollancz, 1945), p. 153) and other Zionists have since used the phrase ironically, in view of the bitter struggle with the Arab inhabitants of Palestine. It would probably be an exaggeration to conclude that "a land without a people for a people without a land" was never a slogan of Zionism at all, as

most Jewish Zionists were familiar with it, but it was not a particularly important slogan or part of any political action platform, and Zionists certainly did not understand it to mean that there were no people in Palestine.

Zionism and Judaism - Opponents of Zionism and anti-Semites have sometimes identified all Jews as "Zionists" and used the terms "Jew" and Zionist interchangeably. For example, the Hamas charter lays the blame for the French Revolution on "Zionists" - though there were no Zionists in the 18th century. They clearly mean "Jews." Conversely, others have claimed that Zionism is not, and was never, representative of views of the majority of Jews. From its inception, Zionism enjoyed wide popular support, particular in Eastern Europe and Russia. Most German Jews were probably not Zionists, but Germany was the center of the Zionist movement for many years. Jewish financiers and philanthropists, however, most of whom were Western Europeans, were largely indifferent to Zionism and reluctant to finance settlement in Palestine. In the United States, Zionism became popular among Jews thanks to the leadership of Justice , but most American Jews supported Zionism as a solution for other Jews. They have been active Zionists in the sense of contributing money for settlement in Palestine and Israel and offering political support, but not to the extent of settling in Palestine or Israel themselves. A small minority of American Jews remains actively and vocally anti-Zionist, and many profess indifference. Some new groups, such as Brit Tsedek veshalom and J Street use the term "pro-Israel" and avoid the words "Zionism" and "Zionist." Their motivation for avoiding the word "Zionism" is not clear, since they claim to support Israel as the state of the Jewish people, which is the heart of Zionist ideology. Some studies have shown that "Zionism" and "Jew" have negative connotations even among Jews.

Background his*

Zionism did not spring full blown from a void with the creation of the Zionist movement in 1897. Jews had maintained a connection with Palestine, both actual and spiritual, even after the Bar Kochba revolt in 135, when large numbers of Jews were exiled from Roman Palestine, the remains of their ancient national home. The Jewish community in Palestine revived and, under Muslim rule, is estimated to have numbered as many as 300,000 about 1000 AD, prior to the Crusades. The Crusaders killed most of the Jewish population of Palestine or forced them into exile, so that only about 1,000 families remained after the reconquest of Palestine by Saladin. The Jewish community in Palestine waxed and waned with the vicissitudes of conquest and economic hardship, and invitations by different Turkish rulers to displaced European Jews to settle in Tiberias and Hebron. At different times there were sizeable Jewish communities in Tiberias, Safed, Hebron and Jerusalem, and numbers of Jews living in Nablus and Gaza. A few original Jews remained in the town of Peki'in, families that had lived there continuously since ancient times.

In the Diaspora, religion became the medium for preserving Jewish culture and Jewish ties to their ancient land. Jews prayed several times a day for the rebuilding of the temple, celebrated agricultural feasts and called for rain according to the seasons of ancient Israel, even in the farthest reaches of Russia. The ritual plants of Sukkoth were imported from the Holy Land at great expense.

From time to time, small numbers of Jews came to settle in Palestine in answer to rabbinical or messianic calls, or fleeing persecution in Europe. Beginning about 1700, groups of followers led by rabbis reached Palestine from Europe and the Ottoman Empire with various programs. For example, Rabbi Yehuda Hehasid and his followers settled in Jerusalem about 1700, but the rabbi died suddenly, and eventually, an Arab mob,

angered over unpaid debts, destroyed the synagogue the group had built and banned all European (Ashkenazy) Jews from Jerusalem. Rabbis Luzatto and Ben-Attar led a relatively large immigration about 1740. Other groups and individuals came from Lithuania and Turkey and different countries in Eastern Europe.

At no time between the Roman exile and the rise of Zionism was there a movement to settle the holy land that engaged the main body of European or Eastern Jews. The condition of Jews both in Europe and Eastern countries made such a movement unimaginable. Many, however, were attracted to various false Messiahs such as Shabetai Tzvi, who promised to restore Jews to their land. For most Jews, the connection with the ancient homeland and with Jerusalem remained largely cultural and spiritual, and return to the homeland was a hypothetical event that would occur with the coming of the Messiah at an unknown date in the far future. European Jews lived, for the most part in ghettos. They did not get a general education, and did not generally engage in practical trades that might prepare them for living in Palestine. Most of the communities founded by these early settlers met with economic disaster, or were disbanded following earthquakes, anti-Jewish riots or outbreaks of disease. The Jewish communities of Safed, Tiberias, Jerusalem and Hebron were typically destroyed by natural and man-made disasters and repopulated several times, never supporting more than a few thousand persons each at their height. The Jews of Palestine, numbering about 17,000 by the mid-19th century, lived primarily on charity - Halukka donations, with only a very few engaging in crafts trade or productive work.

Proto-Zionism Following the French Revolution and the emancipation of European Jewry however, the vague spiritual bonds of the Jews to the "Holy Land" began to express themselves in more concrete, though not always practical ways. About 1808, groups of Lithuanian Jews, followers of the Vilna Gaon (a famous rabbi and opponent of Hassidism) arrived in Palestine and purchased land to begin an agricultural settlement. In

1836, Rabbi Zvi Hirsch Kalischer petitioned Anschel Rothschild to buy Palestine or at least the Temple Mount for the Jews. In 1839-1840, Sir Rabbi Zvi Hirsch Moses Montefiore visited Palestine and negotiated with the Khedive of Kalischer Egypt to allow Jewish settlement and land purchase in Palestine. However, the negotiations led to nothing, possibly frustrated by the outbreak of an anti-Semitic blood-libel in Damascus. Thereafter, Montefiore continued with less ambitious philanthropic schemes in Palestine and in Argentina. In the 1840s,

British Zionism - The idea of a Jewish restoration also took the fancy of British intellectuals for religious and practical reasons. It had been championed by Protestants since the seventeenth century. The restoration was championed in the 1840s by Lords Shaftesbury and Palmerston, who in addition to religious motivations, thought that a Jewish colony in Palestine would help to stabilize and revive the country, Jewish national stirrings were also voiced by novelists and writers such as Lord Byron, Benjamin Disraeli, George Eliot and Walter Scott. (see also British Zionism and off-site: Christian Zionism)

Role of Sephardic Jews - Through an accident of history, European (Ashkenazy) Jews took the lead in organized Zionism for many years. However, Sephardic (Spanish) Jews and Jews in Arab lands maintained a closer practical tie with the holy land and with the Hebrew language than did Ashkenazy Jews and also influenced and participated in the the Zionist movement from its inception. Sarajevo-bornJudah ben Solomon Hai Alkalai (1798-1878,) is considered one of the major precursors of

modern Zionism. Alkalai believed that return to the land of lsrael was a precondition for the redemption of the Jewish people. Alkalai's ideas greatly influenced his Ashkenazy contemporary, Rabbi Zvi Hirsh Kalischer. Alkalai was also a friend of the grandfather of Theodore Rabbi Solomon Herzl, the founder of modern Zionism. Another Sephardi Jew, David Hai Alkalai Alkalai, a grand-nephew of Judah Alkalai, founded and led the Zionist movement in Serbia and Yugoslavia., and attended the first Zionist Congress in Basel (1897). Early Zionists

The modern formulation of Zionism was at least partly divorced from religious aspirations. The rise of modern nation states and the 18th and 19th century enlightenment and emancipation movements allowed the Jews to leave the ghettos of Europe for the first time, catalyzing a host of changes in Jewish society and culture, many of which were expressed in the Haskalah movement. While the Haskalah movement in Germany promoted assimilation, Haskalah in Germany and later in Russia also set in motion a number of processes that would ultimately make possible a Jewish national movement, including the study of Hebrew as a secular language, the creation of a Hebrew press and literature, the creation of a Jewish cultural life outside the framework of rabbinical and religious Judaism, and the movement to bring Jews into "productive" occupations and agriculture.

Some Jews converted to Christianity and assimilated to surrounding society. Others, exposed to a general education, dropped their religious beliefs, but considered themselves Jews, and understood that others still considered them to be Jews. This suggested a conundrum. If one could be a non-believer and still be a Jew, then "Jew" must be more than just the name of a religion. German racists solved this conundrum by inventing a racial theory, which lacked any real scientific basis. Socialists cited the aberrant class structure of Jewish society and labeled Jews a "caste." Zionists solved the conundrum by declaring that Jews are a people, a fact implicit and explicit in the Jewish biblical and cultural concept of "t;am Yisrael." The Jews were a people without a country however, and would remain politically powerless as long as they did not have a national home. They would be guests everywhere and at home nowhere, according to Zionist ideology. This homelessness was the cause of the "Jewish Problem," and it could not fail to be exacerbated by the rise of nationalism and nations in the 19th century. This explained why, paradoxically, anti-Jewish sentiment might become more pronounced in "enlightened" Europe than it had been in previous centuries, when nationalism had been less pronounced.

Moses Hess, a relatively secular Jew and a socialist, was probably the first to enunciate these ideas in so many words in his book Rome and Jerusalem: The Last National Question, published in 1862, calling for a Jewish national movement similar to the Italian risorgimento nationalist movement. These and similar sentiments were adopted by numerous small groups that formed primarily in Eastern Europe, but also in Britain and in the United States.

The "first aliya" - The first groups of immigrants who came to the land of Israel (it had no official name in the Ottoman Empire) with the idea of turning the land into a national home for the Jews are known as the "first Aliya." "Aliya" literally means "going up" and it is a term Jews have used for a long time for coming to the holy land. Beginning in the 1870s, religious and nonreligious Jews established several study groups and societies for purchasing land in Palestine and settling there. In 1870 the Alliance Israelite, an ostensibly non-Zionist organization, founded the Miqveh Yisraelagricultural school near Beit Dagan.

In 1882, the BILU (an acronym for "Beyt Ya'akov Lechu Venelcha" - House of Jacob let us go) and Hibbat Tziyon (love of Zion) groups were established. They were inspired by the impetus of the wave of anti-Jewish violence that had swept Russia in 1881. Hibbat Tziyion began as a network of independent underground groups. These and similar groups established a number of early Jewish settlements including Yesod Hamaalah, Rosh Pinna, Gedera, Rishon Le Tziyon, Nes Tziyonna and Rehovot on land purchased from Arab owners with the aid of Jewish philanthropists, chiefly Lord Rothschild. Joel Solomon led a Petah Tiqva group of orthodox Jews out of Jerusalem to found in 1878.

The settlements were characteristically vineyards and orange orchards. The settlers were mostly religious Jews at least nominally, though the religious Jewish establishment frowned on Zionism. In 1882, 150 Yemenite Jews also found their way to Palestine. The first Aliya numbered about 25,000 persons, primarily from Eastern Europe. Many of them returned home defeated by disease, poverty and unemployment.

Revival of Hebrew - Among the first arrivals of the first Aliya was Eliezer ben Yehuda (Perelman). Inspired by European, particularly Bulgarian nationalism, Ben Yehuda was moved to settle in Palestine. He arrived in 1881 and undertook to revive the Hebrew language. With the help of Nissim Bechar, principal of a school operated by the Alliance Israelite Universelle, Ben Yehuda began teaching Hebrew. Later he founded and published the Hatzvi newspaper, and set up a linguistic council. Ben Yehuda's work was the major force in the revival of Hebrew as a modern language.

Leon Pinsker and Hovevei Tziyon - Inspired by the anti-Semitic violence in Russia, Leon Pinsker formulated the modern idea of Zionism in a small pamphlet called Auto- Emancipation, published in 1882. Pinsker believed that anti-Semitism was inevitable as long as Jews were guests in every country and at home nowhere, and wrote that the Jews' only salvation lay in liberating themselves and settling in their own country. Pinsker favored Argentina or other countries as sites for the Jewish homeland. However, Western Jews who might have favored this idea rebuffed him. In his native Russia, however, his ideas were well received, but they were channeled to settlement in Palestine. In 1882, Pinsker was made head of the Hovevei Tzion organization, which united many small and scattered groups, primarily in Russia, into a single organization. Pinsker favored "political Zionism," that is, organization of Jews in Europe and petitioning the great powers for land on which to establish a national home. However, his efforts in this direction were rebuffed by the Russian government. Instead, he directed his energies to the gradual purchase of land and settlement of small groups in Palestine.

Early settlers faced innumerable cultural and economic difficulties. In 1800, the ravages of misadministration and war had reduced the population to about 200,000. By the 1880s, the land had recovered somewhat, but it was still poor and disease ridden. The total population was about 450,00. Jerusalem was a small town of 25,000 inhabitants, slightly more than half Jewish. The first settlement of Petah Tikva in 1878 failed and was later refounded. The Ottoman government barely tolerated the settlers, especially those who retained their foreign nationality, and occasionally the government restricted immigration. Early Jewish Settlers Settlers who adopted Ottoman nationality were liable for the Turkish draft. Disease, poverty and unemployment caused many to leave. Theodore Herzl and the Foundation of the Zionist Movement The Dreyfus Affair, in which a Jewish officer of the French army was falsely convicted of treason in 1894, initiated waves of anti-Semitism in the French press and in the street. It cast doubt on the notion that Jews could achieve acceptance in modern liberal democracies, and made Western European Jews conscious of their national identity. In particular, it affected a young Vienna journalist, Theodor Herzl . Theodor Herzl His pamphlet Der Judenstaat, The Jewish State, was published in 1896. Herzl's plan for creating a Jewish State, arrived at after contemplating other solutions as well, provided the practical program of Zionism, and led to the first Zionist Congress in Basle, Switzerland, in August, 1897.

After the first Basle Congress, Herzl wrote in his diary, ―Were I to sum up the Basle Congress in a word- which I shall guard against pronouncing publicly- it would be this: ‗At Basle, I founded the Jewish State. If I said this out loud today, I would be answered by universal laughter. If not in 5 years, certainly in 50, everyone will know it.‘‖

There had been lesser Zionist political gatherings with the same aims in the years just prior to the Zionist Congress, but they did not attract the attention that Herzl's congress did, and were largely forgotten. The Basle congress marked the foundation of Zionism as a world political movement.

In 1902, Herzl published a utopian novel to popularize the Jewish state, Altneuland, (old- new land) a vision complete with monorails and modern industry. The novel concludes, "If you will, it is no legend."

Herzl thought that diplomatic activity would be the main method for getting the Jewish homeland. He called for the organized transfer of Jewish communities to the new state. Of the location of the state, Herzl said, "We shall take what is given us, and what is selected by public opinion."

Herzl attempted to gain a charter from the Sultan of Turkey for the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine, then ruled by the Ottoman Empire. To this end he met in 1898 with the German Kaiser, Wilhelm II, in Istanbul and Palestine, as well as the Sultan, but these meetings did not bear fruit.

Herzl negotiated with the British regarding the possibility of settling the Jews on the island of Cyprus, the Sinai Peninsula, the El Arish region and Uganda. After the Kishinev pogroms, Herzl visited Russia in July 1903. He tried to persuade the Russian government to help the Zionists transfer Jews from Russia to Palestine. At the Sixth Zionist Congress Herzl proposed settlement in Uganda, on offer from the British, as a temporary "night refuge." The idea met with sharp opposition, especially from the same Russian Jews that Herzl had thought to help. Though the congress passed the plan as a gesture of esteem for Herzl, it was not pursued seriously, and the initiative died after the plan was withdrawn. In his quest for a political solution, Herzl met with the king of Italy, who was encouraging, and with the Pope, who expressed opposition. A small group, the Jewish Territorial Organization ("Territorial Zionists") led by Israel Zangwill, split with the Zionist movement in 1905, and attempted to establish a Jewish homeland wherever possible. The organization was dissolved in 1925.

The insistence of Eastern European Jews on Palestine as the Jewish homeland, coupled with the failure of alternatives, maintained the focus of the Zionist movement on Palestine.

The Second Aliyah and Socialist Zionism

The "political Zionism" approach originally tried by Montefiore, Pinsker and Herzl, which attempted to obtain a Jewish homeland from colonial powers, failed to attain results at least initially. Meanwhile, however, practical settlement efforts gradually increased the Jewish population of Palestine from about 25,000 in 1882 to approximately 85,000 to 100,000 just prior to World War I.

A fresh wave of anti-Semitic pogroms in Russia provided the impetus for a second wave of immigration, beginning about 1904 and called the Second Aliyah. At the same time, the rise socialist - Zionist stirrings had inspired several socialist Zionist movements. Thousands of new immigrants dedicated to the conquest of labor ethic and socialist ideals arrived in Palestine. Their Zionism was typified by the thinking of men like Ber Borochov andA.D. Gordon,. Hapoel Hatzair, ("The young worker") was founded by A.D. Gordon, Poalei Labor Zionism - Detail of Tziyon ("workers of Zion") , and later Hashomer photo showing delegates to Hatzair ("the young guard) were inspired by Ber the fourth meeting of the Borochov. Borochov, an ideologue of the Poalei Tziyon Hapoel Hatzair, about movement, did not cite anti-Semitism as the basis or motivation of Zionism. According to him, the Diaspora 1909. Click here for full produced aberrant social conditions that made Jews photo and more about Labor economically inferior and politically helpless. The normal Zionism and socialist organization of society was a pyramid, according to Zionism. Borochov, with a large body of workers and smaller groups of intelligentsia, land owners and capitalists. The Diaspora had created an 'inverted pyramid' in Jewish society, with no Jewish peasant or worker class. Self-liberation of the Jews would come about by proletarianization of the Jews in their homeland, and the nascent Jewish proletariat would join the socialist international. Similarly, A.D. Gordon, inspired by 19th century romanticism, called for a Jewish return to the soil and virtually made a religion of work. These ideas fused into the ideals of "productivization" (returning the Jews, who

engaged mostly in professional and mercantile trades, to productive labor) and "conquest of labor" (Kibbush Haavoda). "Conquest of labor" later took on additional meanings. (See also Labor Zionism and Socialist Zionism )

The new immigrants arrived with the ideals of socialist Zionism, but reality was not favorable to implementing those ideas. The Zionist movement attempted to find them work. but the new immigrants , who had no training in agriculture and poor physical stamina, were unable to compete with Arab peasants. Arabs certainly would not hire Jewish workers, who could not work well and could not speak Arabic. Arab labor was also preferred by the plantation and vineyard owners of the first Aliya. Arabs were experienced and hard workers, and were able to work for much lower wages because they were often members of an extended family that made its main income from sharecropping. The plantation owners had also developed a superior colonialist mentality which suited the hiring of "natives," and clashed with the egalitarian ideas and social demands of the newly arrived socialists.

The socialist Zionist movements tried to force plantation owners to grant higher wages, and also began to insist that plantation owners hire only Jewish workers. This aspect of "conquest of labor" was controversial within the socialist-Zionist movements because it engendered lack of solidarity with the Arab working class and was discriminatory. One labor Zionist leader wrote:

"How can Jews, who demand emancipation in Russia, rob rights and act selfishly toward other workers upon coming to Eretz Israel? If it is possible for many a people to hide fairness and justice behind cannon smoke, how and behind what shall we hide fairness and justice? We should absolutely not deceive ourselves with terrible visions. We shall never possess cannons, even if the goyim shall bear arms against one another for ever. Therefore, we cannot but settle in our land fairly and justly, to live and let live. " (Meir Dizengoff (writing as "Dromi") "The Workers Question," Hatzvi, September 21, 22, 1909)

At the same time, Conquest of Labor was a central part of Labor Zionist ideology, as a means of rebuilding the Jewish people, not a discriminatory ideology. A.D. Gordon wrote:

But labour is the only force which binds man to the soil… it is the basic energy for the creation of national culture. This is what we do not have, but we are not aware of missing it. We are a people without a country, without a national living language, without a national culture. We seem to think that if we have no labour it does not matter - let Ivan, John or Mustafa do the work, while we busy ourselves with producing a culture, with creating national values and with enthroning absolute justice in the world.

(A.D. Gordon, "Our Tasks Ahead" 1920)

The boycott of Arab labor, only partly successful, was carried out reluctantly as a matter of necessity, and because the establishment of Jews as a class of colonial plantation owners seemed worse than the alternative. The discriminatory program of "conquest of labor" also provoked bitterness among some Arabs, particularly watchmen who lost their jobs to Jews. In the main however, the "conquest of labor" movement was initially unsuccessful, nor could it have much real influence on the economic prospects of Arabs. Only a few thousand Jewish workers were involved. Gershon Shafir (Land, Labor and the Origins of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, 1882–1914, University of California Press, 1996)

estimates that about 10,000 such workers passed through Palestine in the second Aliya, many leaving in discouragement. Other sources claim there were about 3,000 workers out of approximately 33,000 who came to Palestine in the second Aliya. Because of the wage differential and because of the expertise of Arab workers, Arab labor continued to find employment in Jewish settlements. It was only with the massive Jewish immigration of the 1930s, coupled with Arab unrest and sabotage attempts, that Jewish workers began to replace Arab workers in most of the Jewish economy. Of course, few Jews worked in the Arab economy.

The kibbutz collective settlements were started as a practical method of settling Jewish laborers on the land and overcoming the preferences of plantation owners for Arab labor. A small group of Jewish immigrants was settled in an economic cooperative in Sejera, later founding Kibbutz Degania in 1909. The arrangement, originally thought to be temporary, proved to be practical, as well as suited to the socialist ideals of the new settlers and the practical requirements of Zionism. It soon inspired several other kibbutzim (collective farms). The kibbutz movement was to become the backbone of Labor Zionism in Palestine, and eventually provided political and military leadership. Kibbutzim provided ideal places for hiding arms from the British and recruiting and training troops, as well as for organizing local defense and guarding borders.

The Zionist movement did not give up efforts to find a political solution. The political Zionism and practical settlement approaches were merged into "Synthetic Zionism" advocated by Chaim Weizmann . The efforts ultimately bore fruit in the Balfour Declaration, a promise by Britain to further efforts for a Jewish national home in Palestine. and in the League of Nations Mandate,which give international sanction to the Jewish national home. Weizmann became head of the Zionist organization and later was the first Chaim President of Israel. Weizman

Zionism and the Arabs

When Zionism had its first beginnings, in the early 19th century, there were about 200,000 Arabs living between the Jordan river and the Mediterranean in the approximate area that later became "Palestine," mostly concentrated in the countryside of the West Bank and Galilee, and mostly lacking in national sentiment. Palestine was, in Western eyes, a country without a nation, as Lord Shaftesbury wrote. Early proto-Zionists did not trouble themselves at all about the existing inhabitants. Many were heavy influenced by utopianism. In the best 19th century tradition, they were creating a Jewish utopia, where an ancient people would be revived. They envisioned a land without strife, where all national and economic problems would be solved by good will, enlightened and progressive policies and technological know-how. Herzl's Altneuland was in in fact just such a utopia. In the novel, Herzl envisioned a modern pluralistic society, in which Jews and Arabs had equal rights. A demagogic politician who wanted to form a narrow hyper- nationalist Jewish state, was defeated in elections.

In reality, Jewish population grew, but Arab population grew more rapidly. By 1914, there were over 500,000 Arabs in Palestine, but only about 80,000 to 100,000 Jews. Arab opposition to Jewish settlement grew as Arabs perceived that the Zionist goal was more than just a myth, and as they increasingly identified Zionism with British interests in the Middle East.

At the same time, early Zionist pronouncements and outlook were often frankly colonialist, especially when addressing leaders of foreign powers. The plantations sponsored by Baron Rothschild were modeled on plantation settlement in Algeria and other colonies. Colonialism was fashionable and "progressive," and some early Zionist leaders saw nothing wrong in assimilating this idea to Zionism along with other modern ideas such as socialism, utopianism and nationalism.

Later Zionists were heavily influenced by socialism and embarrassed at the colonialist aspects of the Zionist project. They were also aware, of course, that Palestine was already occupied by Arabs. Many however, including the young David Ben-Gurion, who headed the Executive committee of the Zionist Yishuv (Jewish community) in Palestine and was later the first Prime Minister of Israel, initially thought that the Arabs could only benefit from Jewish immigration and would welcome it. Others, such as Eliezer ben Yehuda, frankly envisioned removal of the Arabs from Palestine.

One of the earliest warnings about the Arab problem came from the Zionist writer Ahad Ha'am (Asher Ginsberg), who wrote in his 1891 essay "Truth from Eretz Israel" that in Palestine "it is hard to find tillable land that is not already tilled", and moreover:

From abroad we are accustomed to believing that the Arabs are all desert savages, like donkeys, who neither see nor understand what goes on around them. But this is a big mistake... The Arabs, and especially those in the cities, understand our deeds and our desires in Eretz Israel, but they keep quiet and pretend not to understand, since they do not see our present activities as a threat to their future... However, if the time comes when the life of our people in Eretz Israel develops to the point of encroaching upon the native population, they will not easily yield their place.

Ahad Ha'am, believed that the Jews would need to first build a strong Jewish culture abroad, and that this culture and awareness would then make the dream of a Jewish homeland possible. The Jewish community in Palestine, he felt should be a cultural center for Jews of the Diaspora, that would catalyze this revolution in Jewish life and eventually bring about mass Jewish support for the Zionist project. Contrary to the impression that some modern interpretations give, Ahad Ha'am was not anti-Zionist and was not an opponent of the formation of a Jewish national home. In fact, he was an enthusiastic supporter of Zionism. Hed wrote an article eulogizing Leon Pinsker in glowing terms and he emigrated to Palestine and lived in Tel Aviv.

Arab opposition to Zionism grew after 1900. The birth of Arab nationalism and Arab political aspirations in the Ottoman empire coincided with the arrival of fairly sizeable number of Zionists with the announced program of settling the land and turning it into a Jewish national home. In his book, Reveil de la Nation Arab in 1905, Najib Azouri stated that the Jews want to establish a state stretching from Mt Hermon to the Arabian Desert and the Suez Canal. Azoury wrote:

Two important phenomena of the same nature but opposed, are emerging... They are the awakening of the Arab nation and the latent effort of the Jews to reconstitute on a very large scale the ancient kingdom of Israel. These movements are destined to fight each other continually until one of them wins.

(Mandel, Neville, The Arabs and Palestine, UCLA, 1976)

Rashid Khalidi (Palestinian Identity, Columbia, 1997) notes that beginning about 1908 Palestinian newspapers offered extensive evidence of anti-Zionist agitation. Actual conflicts flared up because the Zionists purchased large tracts from landowners and subsequently evicted the tenant farmers. The former tenants, though they had received some compensation, continued to insist that the land was theirs under time honored traditions and tried to take it back by force. A notable case was Al-Fula, where Zionists had purchased a large tract of land from the Sursuq family of Beirut. Local officials took the side of the Arab peasants against the Zionists and against the Ottoman government, which upheld the legality of the sale. 150 Palestinian notables cabled the Ottoman government to protest land sales to Jews in March 1911. Azmi Bey, Turkish governor of Jerusalem responded:

We are not xenophobes; we welcome all strangers. We are not anti-Semites; we value the economic superiority of the Jews. But no nation, no government, could open its arms to groups... aiming to take Palestine from us.

(Benny Morris, Righteous Victims, Knopf 1999 Page 62)

Likewise, the "conquest of labor" movement displaced some Arab watchmen and led to violence. While the actual number of persons displaced or dispossessed may have been small, and may have been offset by real economic benefits and increased employment provided by Zionist investment, the feeling grew among the Arabs that the Zionists had arrived to dispossess them. A Nazareth group complained that the Zionists were "a cause of great political and economic injury... The Zionists nourish the intention of expropriating our properties. For us these intentions are a question of life and death."(Morris, loc cit.) As the conflict intensified, the Zionists formed a guard association, Hashomer, to guard the settlements in place of Arab guards. The attempts to retake land and disputes with Jewish guards led to increased violence beginning in the second half of 1911. ry zionism * history

Following World War I, Palestine came under British rule. Even before they had conquered Palestine from the Ottoman Turkish Empire, owing to the efforts of Zionists, the British government declared its intentions, in the Balfour declaration, of sponsoring a "national home" for the Jews in Palestine. Britain was given a League of Nations Mandate to develop Palestine as a Jewish National home. The Arabs of Palestine were appalled at the prospect of living in a country dominated by a Jewish majority and feared that they would be dispossessed. Anti-Jewish rioting and violence broke out in 1920 and 1921. By this time, Zionist leaders could no longer ignore the conflict with the Arabs. By 1919, representatives of the Jaffa Muslim-Christian council were saying

"We will push the Zionists into the sea or they will push us into the desert"

(Benny Morris, Righteous Victims, Knopf 1999 Page 91)

Arab opposition to Zionism was not based only on economic and social issues. It was colored by the traditional Muslim vision of the Jews as second class citizens. By the 1920s, it was also motivated by a strong admixture of Western anti-Semitism. In 1920, Musa Kazim El Husseini, deposed as Mayor of Jerusalem because of his part in riots earlier that year, told Winston Churchill:

The Jews have been amongst the most active advocates of destruction in many lands... It is well known that the disintegration of Russia was wholly or in great part brought about

by the Jews, and a large proportion of the defeat of Germany and Austria must also be put at their door.

(Benny Morris, Righteous Victims, Knopf 1999 Page 99)

It is not clear how Churchill received this amazing and unwitting testimonial to the aid proffered to his country's war effort by the Jews, or what Husseini thought to accomplish by it. Aref Dajani had earlier voiced similar sentiments to the King- Crane Commission

It is impossible for us to make an understanding with them or or even to live with them... Their history and all their past proves that it is impossible to live with them. In all the countries where they are at present they are not wanted... because they always arrive to suck the blood of everybody...

(Benny Morris, Righteous Victims, Knopf 1999 Page 91)

While Palestinian Arabs viewed themselves as a small group of helpless victims of powerful British and Jewish "interests," the Zionists saw the opposite side of the coin. The militant Zionist leader, Vladimir Jabotinsky, asked in 1918:

The matter is not ... an issue between the Jewish people and the Arab inhabitants of Palestine, but between the Jewish people and the Arab people. The latter, numbering 25 million, has [territory equivalent to] half of Europe, while the Jewish people, numbering ten million and wandering Vladimir Ze'ev the earth, hasn't got a stone...Will the Arab people stand opposed? Will it Jabotinsky resist? [Will it insist] that...they...shall have it [all] for ever and ever, while he who has nothing shall forever have nothing?

(Caplan, Neil, Palestine Jewry and the Palestine Question, 1917-1925, Frank Cass, 1978)

Soon after World War I, Zionist leaders clearly recognized the problem. David Ben Gurion told members of the Va'ad Yishuv (the temporary governing body of the Jewish community in Palestine) in June 1919:

But not everybody sees that there is no solution to this question. No solution! There is a gulf; and nothing can bridge it.... I do not know what Arab will agree that Palestine should belong to the Jews...We. as a nation,. want this country to be ours; the Arabs, as a nation, want this country to be theirs.

(Benny Morris, Righteous Victims, Knopf 1999 Page 91)

In 1923, in his Iron Wall article, Jabotinsky replied to his own question. He asserted that agreement with the Arabs was impossible, because they:

...look upon Palestine with the same instinctive love and true fervor that any Aztec looked upon his Mexico or any Sioux looked upon his prairie. To think that the Arabs will voluntarily consent to the realization of Zionism in return for the cultural and economic benefits we can bestow on them is infantile.

Jabotinsky, was initially against expulsion of the Arabs, which he was "prepared to swear, for us and our descendants, that we will never [do]". Rather in The Iron Wall, he claimed that the Jewish presence should be imposed by a strong defense that would show the Arabs that the Jews could not be forced out of Palestine. However, while The Iron Wall expressed a comprehensive philosophy, its practical background and intent were much more limited. Jabotinsky wanted the British authorities to allow the Jews to form a separate defensive force under British supervision, to combat attacks such as the riots that had occurred in 1920 and 1921. The British refused, and the Zionist organization resigned themselves to the British decision, but Jabotinsky wanted to continue with the formation of such a force. Though the Haganah defensive underground was founded in 1920 by Jabotinsky, it didn't become a major project of the Zionist movement until after the riots of 1929. These riots, and not any intrinsic aspect of Zionist ideology, were the real trigger for the birth of militant Zionism as a political force, as well as the progressively more important role played by self-defense and military prowess in Zionist thought, action and society.

Meanwhile the Arab and Jewish communities grew progressively apart. Arabs refused to participate in a Palestinian local government which gave equal representation to the Jewish minority. The British, nearly bankrupt after WW I, insisted that the mandate should be self-sufficient. Mandate services were paid for from taxes paid by the Jewish and Arab inhabitants of Palestine. Additional services were funded by philanthropists from abroad and from membership dues in various organizations. Zionist philanthropy and organization far-outstripped what Palestinian Arabs could provide. Neither Arabs nor Jews wanted integrated schools. Zionist groups funded religious, secular and labor-Zionist educational networks for Jewish children in Hebrew, but few comparable schools were set up for Arabs. The Zionists founded the Histadruth Labor federation to encompass Jewish workers, providing Hebrew education, medical care, worker-owned enterprises and cultural facilities as well as representation of labor rights. No comparable association was created by the more numerous Arabs of Palestine, though the Histadruth made some efforts to organize Arab labor beginning in 1927, and the Palestine Communist party attempted to represent both Jewish and Arab labor.

As the conflict unfolded, attitudes hardened on both sides. Some Zionist factions called for expulsion or "transfer" of Arabs "voluntarily" or otherwise. Beginning with the Husseini clan led by Hajj Amin El Husseini, the Grand Mufti, different factions of Palestinian Arabs, successively allied themselves with Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany and, after WW II with communist countries. Arab rhetoric became increasingly colored by European anti- Semitism, and adopted many of the claims and ideas of Holocaust deniers such as Roger Garaudy as well as the anti-Zionist ideology of radical Jewish intellectuals.

The conflict was intensified and complicated by the 1948 war. About 700,000 Palestinian Arabs fled or were expelled during the war, and Israel did not allow them to return. Many Palestinian refugeeswere settled in camps under miserable conditions, where they have remained for several generations. The Israeli point of view had in mind the recent convulsions of World War II, and the exchange of populations that occurred when India and Pakistan were created. Most Israelis believed the Palestinians became refugees through their own fault. Their exile was the result of the war which the Palestinians themselves had started by rejection of the UN partition plan, just as, for example, the Germans of Sudetensland, who helped instigate the German occupation of Czechoslovakia, were eventually banished as the result of their own mischief. For the Arabs of Palestine, their Nakba, or catastrophe, vindicated their fears that the Zionists were bent on dispossessing them.

Zionism and the Conflict With Britain

The British government increasingly understood that its promises to the Zionists and Mandate obligations were very unpopular in the Arab world. They split off a large part of the Palestine Mandate territory to form Transjordan and issued the Passfield White Paper that proposed limiting Jewish immigration to Palestine. The Passfield White Paper was quietly withdrawn under pressure from Zionists, from British public opinion and from the League of Nations. However, the British eventually did impose a limit on immigration. These policies turned the once-friendly British into antagonists of the Zionist movement. Labor Zionists and the Zionist Executive were in favor of moderate policies that would try to work around the British opposition to Zionism. A faction led by Ze'ev Jabotinsky believed in confronting the British and the Arabs, and if necessary, using force. In 1923, Jabotinsky split from the main Zionist movement and formed the Revisionist movement. In 1925, an Arab Revolt (The Great Uprising) broke out in Palestine, triggered by rising Jewish immigration and systematic agitation by extremists. In 1937, the British proposed tentatively to partition Palestine in the Peel report. This caused additional divisions in the Zionist movement. Some believed in a bi-national Jewish Arab state and objected to the idea, contained in the Peel recommendations, of transferring Arabs "voluntarily" out of the territory to be allotted to the Jewish state. The revisionists and religious Zionists, on the other hand, objected to giving up any part of the territory of Palestine. Subsequently the British issued the White Paper of 1939, severely limiting Jewish immigration. The Arab revolt and the reaction to it crystallized the Zionist ethos of self-defense and emphasis on military service. The Revisionists formed the Irgun underground army, which attacked British soldiers and administrators and perpetrated terror attacks against Arabs in retaliation for Arab attacks on Jews. Atrocities committed by the Arabs, as well as counter-terror by Jewish groups, inculcated in both Jews and Arabs the idea that any means at all may be used against the enemy, even though the Hagannah officially maintained a military ethic of "purity of arms" - forbidding needless violence. The Arab revolt and the Peel report also legitimized, to some extent, the idea of "transfer," and solidified and entrenched the idea that conflict between Arabs and Jews in Palestine was inevitable.

The Zionists, attempting to rescue Jews from the Nazis, organized illegal immigration. The Revisionist Zionist movement began to organize immigration, both legal (with certificates) and illegal, in 1937, from Austria, and later from the free city of Danzig. At least 20,000 Jews were saved in this way. The Jewish agency opposed illegal immigration until the promulgation of the British White Paper of 1939, which stopped Jewish immigration. Thereafter, they founded and supported the Mossad l'aliya Bet ("B immigration institution") to bring immigrants from abroad. This operated between 1939 and 1942, when a tightened British blockade and stricter controls in occupied Europe made it impractical, and again between 1945 and 1948. Rickety boats full of refugees tried to reach Palestine. Additionally, there were private initiatives, an initiative by the Nazis to deport Jews and an initiative by the US to save European Jews. Many of the ships sank or were caught by the British or the Nazis and turned back, or shipped to Mauritius or other destinations for internment. The Patria (also called "Patra") contained immigrants offloaded from three other ships, for transshipment to the island of Mauritius. To prevent transshipment, the Haganah placed a small explosive charge on the ship on November 25, 1940. They thought the charge would damage the engines. Instead, the ship sank, and over 250 lives were lost. A few weeks later, the SS Bulgaria docked in Haifa with 350 Jewish refugees and was ordered to return to Bulgaria. The Bulgaria capsized in the Turkish straits, killing 280. The Struma, a vessel that had left Constanta in Rumania with about 769 refugees, got to Istanbul on December 16, 1941. There, it was forced to undergo

repairs of its engine and leaking hull. The Turks would not grant the refugees sanctuary. The British would not approve transshipment to Mauritius or entry to Palestine. On February 24, 1942, the Turks ordered the Struma out of the harbor. It sank with the loss of 428 men, 269 women and 70 children. Apparently, it had been torpedoed by a Soviet submarine, either because it was mistaken for a Nazi ship, or more likely, because the Soviets had agreed to collaborate with the British in barring Jewish immigration. Illegal immigration continued until late in the war, apparently without the participation of the Mossad l'aliya Bet. The illegal immigrant Mefkure, organized with the help of the United States government, was sunk by a Soviet submarine in 1944. Despite the many setbacks, tens of thousands of Jews were saved by the illegal immigration.

To circumvent British regulations against creating new settlements, the Zionists initiated the "stockade and tower" ("homa umigdal") program, that allowed overnight creation of a new "settlement," consisting of a wall and watch tower. Under the law, the British could not destroy such an 'established' settlement.

Reports of Nazi atrocities became increasingly frequent and vivid. Despite the desperate need to find a haven for refugees, the doors of Palestine remained shut to Jewish immigration. The Zionist leadership met in the Biltmore Hotel in New York City in 1942 and declared that it supported the establishment of Palestine as a "Jewish Commonwealth." This was not simply a return to the Balfour declaration repudiated by the British White Paper, but rather a restatement of Zionist aims that went beyond the Balfour declaration, and a determination that the British were in principle, an enemy to be fought, rather than an ally. This was a defeat for the left-wing party of the Labor Zionists, Mapam, who wanted a bi-national Zionist state, and for Chaim Weizmann, who opposed confrontation with the British and favored partition. The Revisionists rejoined the Zionist movement, but were still called "dissidents" and did not merge their underground armies, the Irgun and the Lehi (also called the "Stern Gang") into the Hagannah defense organization of the mainstream Zionists.

On November 6, 1944, members of the Lehi underground Eliyahu Hakim and Eliyahu Bet Zuri assassinated Lord Moyne in Cairo. Moyne, a known anti-Zionist, was in charge of carrying out the terms of the 1939 White Paper. The assassination turned Winston Churchill against the Zionists. The Jewish Agency and Zionist Executive believed that British and world reaction to the assassination of Lord Moyne could jeopardize cooperation after the war, that had been hinted at by the British, and might endanger the Jewish Yishuv if they came to be perceived as enemies of Britain and the allies. Therefore they embarked on a campaign against the Lehi and Irgun, known in Hebrew as the "Sezon" ("Season"). Members of the underground were to be ostracized. Leaders were caught by the Hagannah, interrogated and sometimes tortured, and about a thousand persons were turned over to the British.

Following World War II, Britain continued to limit Jewish immigration to Palestine. The Zionist factions united and conducted an underground war against the British, as well as applying pressure on the British government through the United States. In June of 1947, the British rammed the Jewish illegal immigrant ship Exodus (formerly "President Warfield") on the high seas. They towed it to Haifa where it was the subject of extensive publicity, generating public sympathy for the Zionist cause. The passengers were eventually disembarked in Hamburg. The incident set world, and particularly US, opinion against the British, and caused the British to intern illegal immigrants thereafter in Cyprus, rather than attempting to return them to Europe. On November 29, 1947, the United Nations voted to partition Palestine into Jewish and Arab states. The Arabs did not accept the partition plan,

and a war broke out. The state of Israel was established on May 14, 1948. The civil war that took place beginning on December 1, 1947, between Arab and Jewish Palestinians, and the subsequent invasion of the state of Israel by Arab States on May 15 1948, shaped the ideological development of Zionism, and the conflict and propaganda surrounding the Arab invasion of Israel and subsequent refusal to recognize the state, as well the Arab Palestinian refugee that was created, shaped the perception of Zionism in the Arab world and in the West.

Labor Zionism vs Revisionism - After independence, the Labor Zionist movement became, for many years, the leading political force in Israel. Mapai (Miflegeth Poalei Eretz Yisrael - the party of the workers of the land of Israel) party led by David Ben-Gurion and his successors held power continuously until 1977. The Zionist movement had split when Jabotinsky led the revisionists out of the Zionist organization in the 1930s. The Zionist executive was led by Labor Zionism under David Ben-Gurion. Revisionists David Ben-and Labor Zionists had separate underground armies. Revisionists and

Gurion Labor Zionists cooperated against British after World War II. However, the "Sezon" in 1944-45, the massacre perpetrated at Deir Yassin by the Revisionists in April 1948, and the subsequent sinking of the "Altalena" Irgun arms ship by the Israeli government, as well as numerous smaller incidents, helped to deepen the split between mainstream Labor Zionism and Revisionist Zionism. Begin, the leader of the Revisionist Zionists, was distrusted by Ben-Gurion and viewed a dangerous extremist. It was not until the 6-day war in 1967 in 1967 that revisionists were allowed to participate in a government coalition.

Anti-Zionism

Anti-Zionism is often defined as "opposition to the existence of Israel," but that definition is a historical distortion and probably detracts from understanding the nature of anti- Zionism and its diverse ideological roots. It is true that anti-Zionists are necessarily opposed to the existence of a Jewish state, but it is not the essence of their ideology. Anti- Zionism existed long before there was a Jewish state and long before the Zionist movement formally adopted the goal of founding an independent Jewish state in 1942. Anti-Zionists were and are opposed to Zionism for a variety of reasons. Assimilationist Jews denied that there is a "Jewish people." Marxists admitted that there is a separate Jewish group, but believed that it is undesirable to perpetuate its existence (se

. Marx's views of Judaism are more or less indistinguishable from those of anti-Semites. In "A World Without Jews," Marx wrote,

The bill of exchange is the real god of the Jew. His god is only an illusory bill of exchange.

The Jew is perpetually created by civil society from its own entrails.

The chimerical nationality of the Jew is the nationality of of the merchant, of the man of money in general.

Contempt for theory, art, history, and for man as an end in himself, which is contained in an abstract form in the Jewish religion

We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time, an element which through historical development -- to which in this harmful respect the Jews have zealously contributed.

Ultra-orthodox Jews are anti-Zionist because, while they recognize the existence of the Jewish people, they believe that redemption of the Jews must come through the agency of the Messiah rather than through any actions of the Jews, and that certainly it cannot come about through the agency of a non-religious political organization such as Zionism.

Arab nationalists are anti-Zionists because Zionism conflicted with their nationalism, though Feisal himself envisaged cooperation with the Zionists.

Zionism was popular among Jewish people as a movement they might support with money or at political meetings. However, few, especially in Western countries, thought of coming to Palestine or Israel until the latter decades of the twentieth century, except when in danger of persecution. Palestine was too far, economically backward and dangerous to draw many immigrants. Nonetheless, non-Zionist groups like Alliance Israelite Universelle and many others helped Zionist efforts in Palestine and joined the Jewish Agency for Palestine.

Jews who sought to assimilate in their own countries claimed that they were loyal citizens of a different faith, sometimes styling themselves "of the Mosaic persuasion" as did early reform Jews (see Reform Jewish anti-Zionism )They felt that the Zionist movement and the concept of a "Jewish People" would raise questions about their own loyalty, and they resented the fact that Zionists often spoke as though they represented all Jews. This movement was particularly prevalent in Germany, where Jews were staunch supporters of German nationalism. Valuable insight into the prevailing ideologies of the time can be gained from Amos Elon's book, "The Pity of it All" (Henry Holt, 2002) which chronicles the tragic history of German Jewry. At one point, the reform Jewish movement went so far as to systematically remove all references to the Holy Land and Jerusalem from their liturgy. A large segment of ultraorthodox Jews were displeased by the secular ideas that dominated Zionism, and insisted that the rebuilding of Israel must await the coming of the messiah. In Europe, the agitation of assimilationist and ultraorthodox Jews helped to actively block Zionist rescue efforts in the 1930s, when it began to be apparent that Nazism would soon make Europe very dangerous for Jews. Jewish communists were and are opposed to Zionism because Marxism posited the disappearance of the Jews as a historic anomaly, once international atheistic communism triumphed over nationalist particularism, and religion, the opium of the people, died out. In the USSR, as part of his "nationalities" policy, which assimilated or murdered numerous national groups, Stalin tried to handle the Jewish problem by creating an autonomous Jewish republic in the wastelands of Birobidjan. This project was never supported very seriously and was later abandoned. Though the USSR supported the creation of the state of Israel, Stalin was opposed to Zionism inside Russia and the USSR suppressed Zionist activities and at times persecuted Jews as well as Zionists.

Most religious Jews and the reform movement, initially anti-Zionist, reconciled themselves with Jewish state, after the Holocaust seemed to bear out the basic thesis that Jews required a homeland of their own and would not necessarily be safe even in the best circumstances, and after creation of Israel proved that Zionist aspirations could become a reality. Success has many fathers. Nonetheless, anti-Zionist ideologies and their representatives persist among religious groups such as the ultraorthodox Neturei Karta and writers such as Noam Chomsky.

This ideological opposition to Zionism later dovetailed with the anti-Israel cold-war politics of the Soviet Union and the Arab antagonism to Israel, as well as with anti-Semitism. Retrospectively, communist ideologues pegged Zionism as a colonialist ideology bent on exploiting and dispossessing the native inhabitants of Palestine, and creating an apartheid colonialist fascist Jewish state. In 1975, a pro-Soviet and pro-Arab majority in the UN passed General Assembly Resolution 3397, branding Zionism as racism. The resolution was repealed in 1991, but similar sentiments were repeated at a conference of non- government organizations in Durban, South Africa in 2001. The rationale for this idea is that Zionism is a colonialist movement that assumes that the racial superiority of the Jews gives them the right to dispossess the Arabs of Palestine. However, Zionist ideology is not based on racial notions and didn't assume superiority of the Jews. Zionist theorists assumed that the Jews are socially inferior and "abnormal" because they did not have a national home. The "abnormal" Diaspora character of Jews would be corrected when the people returned to their own land, realized their right to self-determination and renewed their nation existence. Zionists believe that the Jewish right to the land is based on ancient historical links, not racial superiority. Some Zionists see the Arabs as usurpers, just as the Arabs see the Zionists as usurpers. As the conflict between Arab and Jew escalated, some Zionists favored voluntary or not so voluntary transfer to remove the Arabs, and others seem to have thought the Arabs could be wished away. However, Zionism as an ideology did not posit dispossession of the Arabs.

It is undeniable that early Zionist leaders used the language and rhetoric of colonialism and established organizations with names like "The Jewish Colonial Trust." In part, this reflects the influence of the 19th century European cultural milieu, when colonialism was a perfectly acceptable concept. In part, it reflects efforts of Zionist leaders to sell leaders of the great powers on the idea of supporting a Jewish colonization scheme that would support German or British or French interests in the Middle East. The Socialist-Zionist movement certainly did not see themselves as colonialists and were opposed to colonialism and imperialism, nor did the USSR originally oppose Zionism on the basis that it is a colonialist movement.

Anti-Semitic writers identify Zionism with the spurious program enunciated in the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion," a nineteenth century forgery of the Russian secret police, and insist that Zionists are intent on taking over the world.. A related notion, perhaps inspired by the writings of Najib Azouri, is that Zionism insists on expanding the Jewish state to the borders promised in the Old Testament - the Nile and Tigris Euphrates rivers. Though there are at present some religious and nationalist extremists in Israel who want such borders, Zionism never had any such program. Early Zionists did not always envision a national home in the Middle East, and "Palestine" did not exist as a political entity before 1922. The map of Zionist borders presented by Zionists to the Paris conference in 1919 was somewhat larger than modern Israel. It covered parts of what are now Jordan and Lebanon and Syria, ending just west of the Damascus-Hejaz railway. However, this optimistic (from the Zionist point of view) proposal was a bargaining position, had little to do with biblical promises, and did not reflect any deep seated ideology.

Zionism After the Establishment of the State of Israel

The Zionist organization has continued to function after the establishment of the Jewish state. It has helped to bring millions of new immigrants to Israel, encourages the teaching of Hebrew and Jewish culture abroad, lobbies for Israel with the US and other governments, and rallies support to Israel in times of crisis. However, in Israel, "Zionism" became somewhat of a pejorative, associated with government propaganda, super-

patriotism and regimentation. The Labor Zionist movement, that had founded the state, eventually found itself in a minority, replaced in large part by more militant religious Zionists and the Likud party, which inherited the mantle of revisionism, carried on by a Begin after the death of Ze'ev Jabotinsky.

Zionism and the 6-day War- The 6-day war, which resulted in a dramatic victory for Israel, had a profound affect on the attitude of Jews in Israel and abroad to Zionism and Israel. The war and lightning victory taught many Arabs that Israel was here to stay, and in fact, it did the same for Jews. In Israel, it lifted the populace out of the doldrums of economic stagnation and frustration, and gave them renewed faith in the Zionist idea and the state. Abroad, the war had a more profound effect. The United States and Canada held the largest concentration of Jews outside the USSR. The vast majority of American Jews had looked upon Israel benignly and condescendingly as a refuge for persecuted Jews, and as a charitable cause that they would support with the same feelings of superiority that they supported their less fortunate relatives in Europe. Among secular American Jews, Zionism was regarded as the aberration of misfits and dreamers, somewhat as it had been at the beginning of the twentieth century. The state of Israel, had after-all been founded and Zionism had therefore "accomplished its purpose," they felt. They had seen the penniless immigrants, the wretched of the earth, arriving in the displaced-persons refuge called Israel with their pitiful bundles and strange clothing, coming off the gangplanks of ships in Haifa on newsreels. This was all very well for those poor unfortunates, who needed a place to live, but surely, it could have nothing to do with them or their lives, living in the United States or Canada and building their futures there. As an ideology, Zionism threatened their own sense of identity as Americans perhaps, or even worse, threatened to take their sons and daughters to a far-away land.

The ultra-orthodox Hassidic Jews were opposed to the Zionist state, or at best neutral. The focus of religious Zionism was the dovish Mizrachi movement, whose representatives in the Israeli government, the National Religious Party (NRP) had opposed the war.All this changed rapidly in June of 1967. Israel became a source of pride for most Jews. They all wanted to be partners in this successful enterprise and to claim pride of ownership. Socialists came to volunteer in kibbutzim. Capitalists brought investment capital. Willing donors were found for the beautification and revitalization of Jerusalem. The NRP began to mobilize to settle and retain the conquered territories. Ultra-orthodox rabbis who did not recognize the Zionist state, nonetheless issued injunctions against returning any part of the "liberated" "holy land."

Zionism and Occupation - For many people in Israel and abroad, "Zionism" came to imply support for the settlement of Jews in the territories occupied by Israel in the 6-day war. It assumed a very negative connotation for those who oppose the occupation. The word "Zionism" in the sense of support for settlers is used both by right wing Zionist extremists, and by anti-Zionists. Right wing Zionist extremists insist that withdrawal from the occupied territories will mean the "end of Zionism." Anti-Zionists insist that "expansionism" is part of Zionist ideology. Historically, this view does not seem to have ideological support, since "Greater Israel" was the ideology of the breakaway religious movement created after 1967, and was never the ideology of mainstream Zionism except perhaps for a few decades following the Six Day war. Messianism was part of proto- Zionism, but the Zionist movement was pragmatic in all that it said and did. Expansionism became popular as a result of historical accidents, and not because of ideology. The territory that might be allotted to the Jewish state shrank during the British mandate, creating a sort of irredentism. Rather than being friendly neighbors, it became apparent that the Arab countries would be hostile, generating a desire for "strategic depth" to

protect against invasion. It was easy for Israeli governments to say they would return territories for peace, and at the same continue to build Greater Israel, since peace or anything approaching it appeared to be a remote abstraction.

A part of the religious Zionist movement grafted itself on to the temporary realities created after the 6 day war, and evolved a radical messianic ideology. They insisted that they, and only they, represent the "real" Zionism. A quiet coup had transformed Zionism. Unfortunately, a considerable part of the world took them at their word. The image of Zionism in the world was transformed from that of a progressive movement of liberation to a movement of fanatics who wanted to create a religious state and disenfranchise a native population.77

The Promised Land78

The history of the Jewish people begins with Abraham, and the story of Abraham begins when G-d tells him to leave his homeland, promising Abraham and his descendants a new home in the land of Canaan. (Gen. 12). This is the land now known as Israel, named after Abraham's grandson, whose descendants are the Jewish people. The land is often referred to as the Promised Land because of G-d's repeated promise (Gen. 12:7, 13:15, 15:18, 17:8) to give the land to the descendants of Abraham.

The Land of Israel • Israel is the land promised to Abraham in the Bible • Israel is central to the Jewish religion • Zionism is a political movement to establish a Jewish homeland Level: Basic • Israel is a democratic country • Israel is home to more than 1/3 of the world's Jews • 20% of Israel's citizens are not Jewish

The land is described repeatedly in the Torah as a good land and "a land flowing with milk and honey" (e.g., Ex. 3:8). This description may not seem to fit well with the desert images we see on the nightly news, but let's keep in mind that the land was repeatedly abused by conquerors who were determined to make the land uninhabitable for the Jews. In the few decades since the Jewish people regained control of the land, we have seen a tremendous improvement in its agriculture. Israeli agriculture today has a very high yield.

Jews have lived in this land continuously from the time of its original conquest by Joshua more than 3200 years ago until the present day, though Jews were not always in political control of the land, and Jews were not always the majority of the land's population.

The land of Israel is central to Judaism. A substantial portion of Jewish law is tied to the land of Israel, and can only be performed there. Some rabbis have declared that it is a mitzvah (commandment) to take possession of Israel and to live in it (relying on Num. 33:53). The indicates that the land itself is so holy that merely walking in it can gain you a place in the World to Come. Prayers for a return to Israel and Jerusalem are included in daily prayers as well as many holiday observances and special events.

77 Ibid 78 The Land of Israel. Retrieved May 27,2013 from http://www.jewfaq.org/israel.htm

Living outside of Israel is viewed as an unnatural state for a Jew. The world outside of Israel is often referred to as "galut," which is usually translated as "diaspora" (dispersion), but a more literal translation would be "exile" or "captivity." When we live outside of Israel, we are living in exile from our land.

Jews were exiled from the land of Israel by the Romans in 135 C.E., after they defeated the Jews in a three-year war, and Jews did not have any control over the land again until 1948 C.E.

Zionism and the Formation of the State of Israel

The Jewish people never gave up hope that we would someday return to our home in Israel. That hope is expressed in the song Ha-Tikvah (The Hope), the anthem of the Zionist movement and the state of Israel.

Kol od baleivav p'nima Nefesh Y'hudi homiya Ul'fa-atey mizrach kadima Ayin L'Tziyon tzofiya Od lo avda tikvateynu Hatikva bat sh'not alpayim Lih'yot am chofshi b'artzenu Eretz Tziyon v'yirushalayim. Lih'yot am chofshi b'artzenu Eretz Tziyon v'yirushalayim.

As long as deep within the heart The Jewish soul is warm And toward the edges of the east An eye to Zion looks Our hope is not yet lost, The hope of two thousand years To be a free people in our own land In the land of Zion and Jerusalem. To be a free people in our own land In the land of Zion and Jerusalem.

But for a long time, this desire for our homeland was merely a vague hope without any concrete plans to achieve it. In the late 1800s, Theodor Herzl and Chaim Weizmann founded Zionism, a political movement dedicated to the creation of a Jewish state. They saw a state of Israel as a necessary refuge for Jewish victims of oppression, especially in Russia, where pogroms were decimating the Jewish population.

The name "Zionism" comes from the word "Zion," which was the name of a stronghold in Jerusalem. Over time, the term "Zion" came to be applied to Jerusalem in general, and later to the Jewish idea of utopia.

Zionism was not a religious movement; it was a primarily political. The early Zionists sought to establish a of Israel, recognized by the world, through purely legal means. Theodor Herzl, for example, was a completely assimilated secular Jewish journalist. He felt little attachment to his Jewish heritage until he covered the trial of Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish

captain in the French military who was (unjustly) convicted of passing secrets to Germany. The charges against Dreyfus brought out a wave of anti-Jewish sentiment that shocked Herzl into realizing the need for a Jewish state. Early Zionists were so desperate for a refuge at one point that they actually considered a proposal to create a Jewish homeland in Uganda. Alaska and Siberia were also discussed. But the only land that truly inspired Jewish people worldwide was our ancient homeland, at that time a part of the Ottoman (Turkish) Empire known as Palestine.

During World War I, the Zionist cause gained some degree of support from Great Britain. In a 1917 letter from British foreign secretary Lord Balfour to Jewish financier Lord Rothschild, the British government expressed a commitment to creating a Jewish homeland in Palestine. This letter is commonly known as the Balfour Declaration. Unfortunately, the British were speaking out of both sides of their mouth, simultaneously promising Arabs their freedom if they helped to defeat the Ottoman Empire, which at that time controlled most of the Middle East (including the modern states of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Iraq, as well as significant portions of Saudi Arabia and northern Africa). The British promised the Arabs that they would limit Jewish settlement in Palestine mere months after the Balfour Declaration expressed support for "the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people."

After World War I, Palestine was assigned to the United Kingdom as a mandated territory by the newly-formed League of Nations. The Palestinian Mandate initially included the lands that are now Israel and Jordan, but all lands east of the Jordan River were later placed into a separate mandate known as Transjordan (now the nation of Jordan). The document creating the Palestinian mandate incorporated the terms of the Balfour Declaration, promising the creation of a national Jewish homeland within the mandated territory. Many Arab leaders were initially willing to give Palestine to the Jews if the rest of the Arab lands in the Middle East were under Arab control. However, the Arabs living in Palestine vigorously opposed Jewish immigration into the territory and the idea of a Jewish homeland. It is around this time that the idea of Palestinian nationality (distinct from Arab nationality generally) first begins to appear. There were many riots in the territory, and the British came to believe that the conflicting claims were irreconcilable. In 1937, the British recommended partition of the territory.

The Holocaust brought the need for a Jewish homeland into sharp focus for both Jews and for the rest of the world. The Jews who tried to flee Nazi Germany were often turned back due to immigration limitations at the borders of every country, including the United States, Britain and Palestine. Many of those who were sent back to Germany ended up in death camps where they were systematically murdered.

The British were unable to come up with a solution that would satisfy either Arabs or Jews, so in 1947, they handed the problem to the newly-founded United Nations, which developed a partition plan dividing Palestine into Jewish and Arab portions. The plan was ratified in November 1947. The mandate expired on May 14, 1948 and British troops pulled out of Palestine. The Jews of Palestine promptly declared the creation of the State of Israel, which was recognized by several Western countries immediately.

However, the surrounding Arab nations did not recognize the validity of Israel and invaded, claiming that they were filling a vacuum created by the termination of the mandate and the absence of any legal authority to replace it. The Arabs fought a year-long war to drive the Jews out. Miraculously, the new state of Israel won this war, as well as every subsequent Arab-Israeli war, gaining territory every time the Arabs attacked them.

Israel Today

Today, approximately five million Jews, more than a third of the world's Jewish population, live in the land of Israel. Jews make up more than eighty percent of the population of the land, and Jews are in political control of the land, though non-Jews who become citizens of Israel have the same legal rights as Jewish citizens of Israel. In fact, there are a few Arab members of the Knesset (the Israeli parliament).

About half of all Israelis are Mizrachim, descended from Jews who have been in the land since ancient times or who were forced out of Arab countries after Israel was founded. Most of the rest are Ashkenazic, descended from Jews who fled persecution in Eastern Europe starting in the late 1800s, from Holocaust survivors, or from other immigrants who came at various times. About 1% of the Israeli population are the black Ethiopian Jews who fled during the brutal Ethiopian famine in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Jews continue to immigrate to Israel in large numbers. Immigration to Israel is referred to as aliyah (literally, ascension). Under Israel's Law of Return, any Jew who has not renounced the Jewish faith (by converting to another religion) can automatically become an Israeli citizen, somewhat similar to the way Ireland gives automatic citizenship to second or third generation descendants of Irish citizens. Gentiles may also become citizens of Israel after undergoing a standard naturalization process, much like the one required to become a United States citizen.

Israel is governed by a legislative body called the Knesset (literally, "Assembly"), made up of 120 members. Under the Israeli electoral system, each party presents a list of candidates, and voters vote for the list rather than for individual candidates. The party receives a number of seats proportional to the number of votes it received, thus a party getting 10% of the vote will get 10% of the available seats. As a result, no Israeli party ever has a majority of the seats in the Knesset, and governmental business is conducted by coalition building. This system can give minority groups a significant amount of power, because their support may be needed to gain a majority. Israel also has a president, elected by the Knesset, and a Prime Minister, formerly elected directly but this system is in flux.

Most Jews today support the existence of the state of Israel, though not necessarily all of the policies of its government (as one would expect in any democracy). There are a small number of secular Jews who are anti-Zionist. There is also a very small group of right- wing Orthodox Jews who object to the existence of the state of Israel, maintaining that it is a sin for us to create a Jewish state when the messiah has not yet come. However, this viewpoint does not reflect the mainstream opinion of Orthodoxy. Most Orthodox Jews support the existence of the state of Israel as a homeland, even though it is not the theological state of Israel that will be brought about by the messiah.79

Conclusion

79 Ibid

The modern State of Israel was formed in 1948 from part of Palestine, the ancestral homeland of the Jewish people and a region sacred to Jews, Christians, and Muslims alike. In biblical times the area was controlled by the kingdoms of Israel, Judah, and Judea. After the 1st century AD, it was held successively by virtually every power of the Middle East. The founding of Israel was the climax of the modern Zionist movement of the late 19th century, which sought the reestablishment of a Jewish national state in Palestine. At the time, the region was ruled by the Ottoman Turks, and most of the people living there were Palestinian Arabs. On May 14, 1948, in Tel Aviv, Zionist leaders led by David Ben-Gurion proclaimed the State of Israel. The next day British troops withdrew, relinquishing the mandate. The surrounding Arab countries—Egypt, Jordan (then called Transjordan), Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon—immediately invaded Palestine to help the Palestinian Arabs and to try to crush the Jewish state.

References

The history of Zionism and the creation of Israel. Retrieved May 27, 2013 from http://www.mideastweb.org/zionism.htm

The Land of Israel. Retrieved May 27,2013 from http://www.jewfaq.org/israel.htm

Chapter 6 Coclusion: Zionism And Nationalism of Jews

Let‘s briefly look at Zionism. In the present epoch it has become open Israeli chauvinism — i.e., extreme Israeli nationalism. Zionism began in the mid-nineteenth century as a movement of middle and upper class Jews seeking a way out of the vicious anti-semitism prevailing in many European countries, particularly marked by pogroms (mass slaughter of Jews) in Tsarist Russia, of which Poland was a part.

Zionism grew up in Europe at a time when the revolutionary working class movement had resulted in a great growth of socialism. The socialist (Marxist, that is) solution to the Jewish question was in general similar to its solution to all antagonisms namely, the overthrow of capitalism which used the national question to divide the working class on the basis of religious differences, instead of unifying the workers; irrespective of creed or colour, to overthrow their oppressors, the capitalist class. Nevertheless, Marxists fought for all the demands of political democracy even within imperialism, includmg the right to the self- determination of nations — i.e., independence. 80

A so-called ‘Jewish State’ By contrast Zionism was from the beginning a bourgeois national movement. It claimed that the only real protection for Jews worldwide was the establishment of the Jewish state. Early in its history, the Zionists would have gladly accepted settlement in any tolerable territory made available to them by one or other bourgeois government. None was offered them. So they utilised religion to try to influence the western bourgeois world to allow them to settle in Palestine.

At the close of the nineteenth century they were active collecting funds to buy land in Palestine, hoping in time to get enough bought to give the Jews political power, with Palestine (as it was then) as a Jewish state.

80 Zionism and the Creation of Israel. [Reproduced from the October 8, 2000 issue of the fortnightly ‗The Spark‘ — Organ of the Workers‘ Party of New Zealand]. Retrieved May 27, 2013 from http://www.bannedthought.net/India/PeoplesMarch/PM1999- 2006/archives/2000/dec2k/zionism.htm

Imperialism at work In Russia, many Jewish workers belonged to an organisation called ‗The Bund‘. In the Social-Democratic Party which was based on Marxian socialism and led by V I Lenin, they had a considerable amount of autonomy. However, they used this to oppose and agitate against the unity of all Russian workers for the overthrow of Tsarism. As a result, they were expelled.

While the Zionists kept up their land buying, the Palestinian Arabs — the main body of the population became aware that they were losing their country. This tendency gathered strength after World War I, when the Anglo-French imperialists seized Palestine — with great help from the Arab armed forces who were promised Palestine for themselves once Turkey was defeated.

Betrayal, plus ‘divide and rule’ This promise was callously betrayed. Playing their long-practised imperialist game of divide and rule, Britain and France secretly signed a promise to the Zionists to ‗establish a national home for the Jews in Palestine‘, and shortly afterwards secretly signed the ‗Sykes-Picot Agreement‘ promising Palestme to the Arabs in return for a revolutionary Arab liberation war against the Ottoman Empire (Turkey); which war in fact largely won the war in the Middle East for the Allied Powers.

What became Palestme was actually only a part of the original territory. The newly-formed ‗League of Nations‘divided that territory between Britain and France, the latter getting Syna and Lebanon while Britain got Iraq, Palestine and semi-colonial rule over Jordan. The so- called ‗mandates‘ handed by the League to Britain and France over these lands were simply the transfer of colonial rule from Turkey to Britain and France. These were the spoils of the imperialist world war. The Arab peoples got absolutely nothing except lies. In Palestine, Britain played up to both Jews and Arabs. In 1924 Sir Alfred Mond, head of the armaments combine Brunner Mond, (later to become Imperial Chemical Industries) wrote to the British Government promising that Britain would have a loyal ally m Zionism in the Middle East.

Growth of the Arab National Movement Britain welcomed this with the ‗Balfour Declaration‘, knowingly inflaming Arab nationalism by its promise of a ‗Jewish National Home‘. At that time the Arab national movement was a

force to be reckoned with in the Middle East. Much of British policy was designed to weaken it in order to hold on to the Suez canal. For that reason, while keeping the Arabs at arm‘s length, Britain kept the Zionist settlement in Palestine within limits. A rightwing group of Jews took up a ‗terrorist‘ struggle against British forces. Ex-premier Shamir was a prominent leader and proudly proclaimed his terrorist past.

They did not at all mind using terrorism to seize Palestine and throw out the British. However, when Palestinians fought against Israel for their land — theirs for centuries past, they were denounced as terrorists.

Israeli expansionism and land grabs When the United Nations partitioned Palestine between Israel and its Arab occupants, war broke out in 1948 between Israel and neighbouring Arab states. With imperialist backing, Israel annexed a large swath of Arab land, expellmg the Arab inhabitants. There have been five Arab-Israeli wars, each won by Israel. Each time Israel has annexed more Arab land. All this has only been made possible by Israel receiving full backing of the main imperialist powers. At first these were mainly Britain and France. Later, after the failure of a combined British, French and Israeli attack in 1956, the US became top dog which it has been ever since. It has kept Israel supplied with $4 billion of aid a year and also the latest in high-tech weaponry. In return, Israel plays the role of defender of US strategic and oil interests in the Middle East. Ofcourse, periodically, as in the Gulf War, these mterests become a single strongpoint for oil magnates and the military.

Zionism — an anti-working class, pro-imperialist movement Thus, even before the state of Israel was established, Zionism proved itself a force hostile to the interests of the international working class. It‘s aim was to turn Jewish workers away from the class struggle for socialism. It co-operated fully with Anglo-French imperialism, and then particularly with US imperialism.

Israel, once established, small as it was, itself became an imperialist power, seizing Arab territory by force and expelling its inhabitants in order to expand its control over the region. Thanks to imperialist control over the world‘s media an enormous brainwashing exercise has taken place with Israel the hero and Arab nationalists the villains. In reality, while there are many shortcomings in the Arab world, the boot is on the other foot.

Lack of working class leadership the main Arab fault As to the Arab national movement, after its betrayal by Britain and France following World War I, it has tended towards anti-imperialism. This still remains a potent force among the Arab masses of the Middle East and North Africa, heightened by the 1991 US-led imperialist invasion of Iraq. However, while it is anti-imperialist, the movement has suffered from a succession of bourgeois nationalist leaders who regularly led the masses to costly failures.

The problem has been the lack of working-class leadership of the liberation movement and in particular, the lack of a proletarian revolutionary party capable of uniting the masses under proletarian and not bourgeois or religious fundamentalist, leadership.

Both Nasser and Saddam Hussein began with the aim of securing a secular Arab state. As a bourgeois to his bones, Nasser suppressed the Communist Party by jailings and torture. This foul record did not stop Khrushchev — to his eternal disgrace — from awarding him the Order of Lenin. In Iraq, the Communists were crushed by the Baath Party. Such ‗secularism‘ was certainly opposed to Moslem fundamentalism, but it equally certainly did nothing for united struggle against imperialism.

Arafat and the PLO Let us consider the role of Arafat and the PLO. For years, they were considered Israel‘s main enemy, with some justification They refused to recognise Israel‘s right to exist as a state on the basis of Israeli seizure of Palestinian land and forcible expulsion or enslavement of its inhabitants. The PLO carried on guerrilla warfare, invariably called terrorism by the West, for the restoration of Palestinian sovereignty. Most Arabs agreed with this stand, and the PLO was recognised by them as their spokesman. However, the increase in development by the Arab states of their own national interests and economic concerns steadily weakened support for the Palestinian cause, despite periodical upsurges. Nonetheless, the Arabs of Gaza Strip and the West Bank of Jerusalem have courageously fought against Israel‘s concentration camp treatment. In 1987 they began the Intifada or uprising, despite being without weapons other than stones. This was met under both the Shamir and Rabin regimes by ruthless brutality which sickened many who watched it on television screens round the world.81

81 Ibid.

In 1917 Zionism was to be awarded international recognition by British foreign secretary, Lord Balfour. The Balfour Declaration was submitted to Lord Rothschild in which the British Empire committed itself to the Zionist objectives. In this declaration the British Government advocated the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine however the declaration also outlined the need to uphold the civil and religious rights of the indigenous people, namely the Palestinian Arabs. The significance of this declaration was substantial since it was the first time the Zionist movement had been given principle backing by one of the major world powers at the time.

International recognition of Zionism was an important feature for the flourishing ideology. If Zionists could present their case to the world‘s leading powers and recruit their support it would stabilise the foundations required against its critics to the eventuality of a nation Jewish home. This recognition was initially founded by way of the Balfour Declaration and manifested itself in its entirety in the establishment of the State of Israel thirty years later, British policy would vastly influence the shaping of the Middle East and the futures of both Arab and Jew.82

Refernces

Babak Mayamey. Zionism: A Critical Account 1897-1948. The Development of Israel and the Exodus of Palestine from A ―New Historian‖ Perspective. University of Leeds. Retrieved May 27, 2013 from http://www.polis.leeds.ac.uk/assets/files/students/student-journal/ma-winter- 10/mayamey-e.pdf

Zionism and the Creation of Israel. [Reproduced from the October 8, 2000 issue of the fortnightly ‗The Spark‘ — Organ of the Workers‘ Party of New Zealand]. Retrieved May 27, 2013 from http://www.bannedthought.net/India/PeoplesMarch/PM1999- 2006/archives/2000/dec2k/zionism.htm

82 Babak Mayamey. Zionism: A Critical Account 1897-1948. The Development of Israel and the Exodus of Palestine from A “New Historian” Perspective. University of Leeds. Retrieved May 27, 2013 from http://www.polis.leeds.ac.uk/assets/files/students/student-journal/ma-winter-10/mayamey-e.pdf