In world history, the nineteenth century serves as the bedrock, the foundation for, so much of the intellectual and ideological landscape that defined much of the twentieth. The concept of the modern nation-state, Darwinian evolution, Marxism/Leninism, Rousseauism, Prussianism, Dispensationalism; the 1800’s set the stage for the implementation and failure, to one degree or another, of all of these ideas and the consequences of those movements can still be felt today.
And towards the end of the nineteenth century, Zionism would be added to that list as well. A number of social and political powder kegs that erupted during the turn of the century throughout Europe and Eurasia shed new emphasis and interest on the place and future of those of Jewish descent. The popularization of political and religious Zionism was the result and slowly but surely it took root and spread. And its history can largely be traced through a number of influential figures that helped to shepherd and spread the fledgling movement into the powerhouse that it is today.
Real Quick, What Do We Mean by Zionism?
In the environment of today’s modern dialog, evoking the term or concept of “Zionism” is perilous without including a definition. For the purposes of identifying the tenets of political Zionism in this discussion and rooting it in history, Zionism broadly denotes the concept of Jewish nationalism. Norman Finkelstein splits this movement into three distinct but interrelated facets, those of political Zionism, rooted in solving the issues of anti-Semitism via political means, labor Zionism, rooted in solving the lopsided nature of Jewish representation in economic life, and cultural Zionism, which viewed the secularization of cultures in western states as a threat to the identity of the Jewish people. No one facet can explain the breadth of what influenced Zionist leaders in their efforts and each contributed something unique to the motivations of those individuals detailed here.
Theodor Herzl
Theodor Herzl, living from 1860-1904, is generally considered the father of political Zionism and was instrumental in organizing its early efforts and influence. In many ways, Herzl was not a likely candidate to launch such a global movement. He was born upper class in then Austria-Hungary, a secular intellectual type, trained in law and working as a journalist in Paris. And it was in Paris that he witnessed events that would convince him of the need for a drastic change in identity and environment for the Jewish people. In the mid-1890’s, what is now widely known as the “Dreyfus affair”, with its wrongful conviction of a Jewish artillery officer and subsequent government cover-up, triggered anti-Semitic social conflict in France. This wave of anti-Semitic sentiment, combined with eastern European pograms both before and after, impressed upon Herzl the need for a solution to “the Jewish Question.”
In 1896, he published his “Der Judenstaat” (The Jewish State) in which he observed that everywhere Jewish people settled, they were met with hostility and marginalization. Assimilation was not an option, given the example of phenomena like the Dreyfus affair, and as long as Jews were consigned to the ghettoes of society, it would be impossible for them to transform themselves into a people worthy of honor and respect. In his own words, Herzl opined that “if the Jews are to be transformed into men of character…it cannot be done without migration.” As well, with his close confidant Max Nordau, they sought to transform the Jew into a more physically hardy and respectable sort through “muscular Judaism,” creating the “new Jew.”
In a sense, this solution to the Jewish Question was not only a necessary one but was also destined to be a popular one because governments the world over were eager to be rid of the Jews within their borders and the cultural turmoil that accompanied them. As Benny Morris puts it, “Herzl recognized that anti-Semitism could be harnessed to his own–Zionist–purposes.” Prior to Herzl’s efforts, Jewish migration to Palestine had been largely voluntary and peaceable and many leaders there and among the world powers of the day, such as Britain, France, and Austria-Hungary, believed that an increased push for immigration into Palestine might arouse the suspicion of the Turks and the animosity of the Arabs. But, gradually, Zionist groups began to agree with Herzl’s proposed solution which began in earnest with the creation of the Zionist Organization and its first congress which convened in Basel, Switzerland, August 29, 1897. “At Basel I [Herzl] founded the Jewish State…Perhaps in five years, and certainly in 50, everyone will know it.”
David Ben-Gurion
There is perhaps no figure in the history of Zionism whose work spans anywhere near as many decades than David Ben-Gurion. He first came to Palestine in 1906 as part of the second migration of Jews or second Aliyah. He was born David Gruen, 1886, of Polish/Russian descent. His father was a lawyer and participated in the Zionist movement. As a college student Ben-Gurion embraced the Social-Democratic Jewish Workers’ Party, or Poalei Zion. Throughout his time as a settler and socialist political leader he witnessed Arab backlash to Jewish immigration, the Ottoman crackdown and military buildup prior to and during WWI where he was imprisoned and at one point exiled to Egypt, and the British conquest and occupation of Palestine following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire.
Much of Ben-Gurion’s notoriety and success stem from his activity and assistance in working out the gritty details of the means and methods of realizing the vision of a Jewish state in Palestine. That work began in earnest shortly following the infamous Balfour Declaration of 1917. The next year, Ben-Gurion co-authored “The Land of Israel, Past and Present” which intended to explicitly set geographical bounds to the future Jewish national home. In the years building up to World War II, Ben-Gurion was a steadfast advocate of the partition of Palestine and was willing to take any official concession as a beginning to be built upon thereafter: “No Zionist can forgo the smallest portion of the Land of Israel”, and that the Jewish “possession is important not only for itself…through this we increase our power, and every increase in power facilitates getting hold of the country in its entirety.” Along with partition, he favored transfer of the existing Arab populations to the surrounding Arab states, both voluntary and, eventually, compulsory, famously stating that “I support compulsory transfer. I don’t see anything immoral in it.”
Ben-Gurion was a true believer in the Zionist cause and his words and deeds showed, at times, a ruthless determination to see it succeed. For instance, in a particularly candid moment, after having heard of the initiation of German oppression against its own Jewish population, he felt that “if I knew it was possible to save all the [Jewish] children of Germany by their transfer to England and only half of them by transferring them to Eretz-Yisrael, I would choose the latter.” He served as head of the Jewish Agency Executive and the World Zionist Organization and helped to draft and announce the official Israeli Declaration of Independence on May 14, 1948. After the resulting war, he became the first Israeli Prime Minister. He also presided over the disastrous Sinai invasion of 1956. His involvement throughout the early history of modern Isreal reads like a highlight reel of every major event during the time period.
Menachem Begin
Menachem Begin, living 1913-1992, was born in Brest-Litovsk in modern-day Belarus, the youngest of three, to a passionately Zionist family. Indeed, his upbringing was thoroughly dominated by Zionist influences: attending a Zionist grade school and scout program in his youth, forming a self-defense group at the University of Warsaw, and his participation in the Betar youth movement under Ze’ev Jabotinsky. He spent the WWII period escaping German capture only to be imprisoned by the Soviets. But after the German invasion of the Soviet Union, he was released, taken in by the Polish army and eventually sent to Palestine, choosing to stay and fight for the Zionist cause. His family was not so lucky, his parents and brother having died at the hands of the Nazis.
So Begin’s involvement in the Zionist military apparatus and resolve to see a national home created for the Jews comes as no surprise. Militias and defense groups within the Jewish political landscape were a varied and ever-changing thing during the many years between the initial migration and Israeli independence. In 1944, one such militia under his leadership, the IZL, Irgun Z’vai Leumi, or Irgun, for short, conducted wide-scale attacks on British government targets inside Palestine, viewing them as the last obstacle to independence. After independence was declared in 1948, those same forces were responsible for a wide array of military settlement occupations and expulsions of Arabs during the Nakba. Of particular note and infamy was the Irgun’s involvement in the Deir Yassin massacre, an exceptionally brutal episode where around 100 villagers were killed.
Begin remained active in Israeli politics after independence and well into the ’60’s and ’70’s. As the 1948 war ramped down, he helped form the right-wing Herut party, known for its almost fascistic strain of nationalism. Begin served throughout the episodes of the 1967 war, on which he later commented with damning honesty: “The Egyptian army concentrations in the Sinai approaches do not prove that Nasser was really about to attack us. We must be honest with ourselves. We decided to attack him.” Later, Begin headed the newly formed Likud party, descended from earlier Herut, and served as Prime Minister of Israel. The Likud party continues to this day and is the party of the current prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. He also participated in the 1978 Camp David Accords and the Israeli invasion of Lebanon of the early ’80s.
Chaim Weizman
It also seems pertinent to profile a couple of prominent and influential Zionists who found themselves supporting and participating in Zionist efforts more behind the scenes.
Of particular note is the person of Chaim Weizman. Chaim was born to a family of 15 children in modern-day Belarus, raised and educated in the traditional Jewish fashion. Like many other noteworthy Zionist figures, he was involved with the local Hovevei Zionist movement. Weizman began his professional life as a chemist, eventually immigrating to Great Britain and in 1915 assisted the British war effort during WWI. During that time, Weizman assisted the cause of Zionism as well, for instance, creating the Palestine Land Development Company in 1908 with the purpose of obtaining agricultural land for Jewish settlement in Palestine.
His truly meaningful involvement in Palestinian politics, however, began during his tenure as president of the British Zionist Federation. Along with Arthur Balfour, with whom Weizman had first become friendly during Balfour’s time as MP of Manchester, where Weisman lived and taught, he was essential in the promotion and eventual delivery of the Balfour Declaration, in which Britain expressed support for a national home for the Jewish people and committed itself to support thereof. During the early stages of implementing those promises, Britain formed the “Zionist Commission” whose purpose was to gather information and recommend possible courses of action in Palestine. Weizman went to great pains in the region to promote Jewish immigration as a net positive for the native Arab population: the claim that Jewish immigration would lead to shared prosperity had long been a positive talking point used in favor of the Zionist cause. Unfortunately, as even those within the Zionist Organization itself admitted, “little Jewish capital [had] entered the country and…there [had] been no conspicuous quickening of economic life. Zionist activity [had] not put enough money into the pockets of the Arabs to make any appreciable impression on their minds.”
Weizman continued to shepherd the cause throughout the middle period between the assumption of British control and Israeli independence. He successfully lobbied British authorities in loosening restrictions placed on Jewish immigration and land purchases. Weizman very much represented a true believer’s view of the Zionist cause, seeing the Arabs as “the forces of destruction, the forces of the desert” with the Jews representing “the forces of civilization and building. It is the old war of the desert against civilization, but we will not be stopped.” Weizman and Ben-Gurion actually experienced a bit of a falling out prior to partition due to disagreements in how to approach the matter, with Weizman being removed as head of the World Zionist Organization in 1946. One of his later claims to fame was indeed the eventual position as the first president of the State of Israel but the stain of his record followed him, with Benny Morris testifying of his being “firmly kept away from any exercise of influence” and even his being “prevented from signing the new state’s Declaration of Independence.” But perhaps his most tragic involvement for the average American was in his influence of president Harry Truman in supporting the UN resolution for Palestinian partition in favor of the Jews, much to the chagrin of the State Department.
Louis Brandeis
European and Palestinian Jewry did not produce the only important and influential figures that assisted in the eventual success of the Zionist cause.
Louis Brandeis, living 1856-1941, was born in Kentucky, a son to Jewish immigrant parents from modern day Czech Republic. He attended Harvard Law school, graduating with what is rumored to be the highest grade point average in its history, and settled nearby. He was nominated by Woodrow Wilson in 1916 as a Supreme Court justice but his nomination was both controversial and contested both because he was the first Jew to be named to the court and his ardent support for social justice and progressive causes. He was actually initially turned down for Wilson’s cabinet years earlier due to Wilson’s search for a readily recognizable and “representative” Jew which, due to Brandeis’s cultured and largely secular upbringing, disqualified him as such.
While growing up with some Zionist influence from his uncle, Brandeis appears to have found Zionism himself later in life, from the influence of Jacob De Haas, a journalist sent by none other than Theodor Herzl to America for the purpose of drawing Americans to the cause. Very quickly afterward he became the head of the international Zionist Central Office. Brandeis seems to have been tireless in his efforts to work in America toward promoting Zionism. He was evangelical in his outreach to American Jewry in their duty to Zionism, quoted as saying, “to be good Americans, we must be better Jews, and to be better Jews, we must become Zionists.” He participated in the Parushim, a secret society of Harvard intellectuals sworn to cooperation to one another for life and used by Brandeis for his own purposes. He also enlisted the help of eventual Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter as a secretive agent to conduct business that would have been considered untoward for someone in Brandeis’ position. He was very close to Woodrow Wilson, assisting in the formulation and defense of the Federal Reserve System and serving as a conduit for British pressure not only to enter WWI but also for the cause of Zionism.
In fact, Zionism played a little-known part in the eventual participation of the United States into WWI. William Yale, having worked in the Middle East for the US State Department, remarked on how some Zionist leaders thought that “the best and perhaps the only way (which proved so to be) to induce the American President to come into the war was to secure the cooperation of Zionist Jews by promising them Palestine, and thus enlist and mobilise the hitherto unsuspectedly powerful forces of Zionist Jews in America and elsewhere in favor of the Allies on a quid pro quo contract basis.” This was, of course, eventually done via the Balfour Declaration in 1917 but the content and origination of that statement span back two years prior. During those two years, the drafting of the declaration passed between the various involved parties, from British, American, and Zionist hands, under some influence of Brandeis himself. But the origination of the idea actually seems to have come from one Horace Kallen, interestingly enough, the Harvard founder of the Parushim itself.
The Bottom Line
Ralph Waldo Emerson is credited with once saying, “There is properly no history; only biography.” Sometimes, we can come away with a much better grasp of historical events and the spirit of the age not by memorizing places and dates but by better understanding the people that inhabited them.