The history of the Jewish people
goes back roughly 4,000 years.
In order to understand the desire
by Jewish people in the late 1800s
and early 1900s for a Jewish homeland,
we have to go back roughly 17 or 1800 years
to the year 135 in the Common Era.
It was then that Judea was a province
of the Roman Empire. Judea is the biblical home
of the Jewish people. It's the location of
Jerusalem. In 135 of the Common Era the
Roman emperor, Hadrian, is able to suppress
a rebellion by the Jews in Judea and after
suppressing that rebellion, he expels the
Jews from Judea. Hadrian expels the Jews
from Judea. Not only did he expel them
from Judea, but he actually renamed the province.
This province up here in red was Roman Syria.
He merges these two provinces and calls them
Syria Palaestina. Let me write that down.
He renames it Syria Palaestina,
which is essentially why for the next
1700 years or so and even parts of it today
are referred to as Palestine.
Now, we will fast forward over the next
more than 1700 years. Over this period
most of the Jewish people are not now
living in what was then Judea.
They have settled in groups in Europe,
in the Middle East, in Africa. There were
even groups of Jews who had settled in India.
For the most part they thrived in their
various communities, but unfortunately
their history had a fairly large amount
of persecution, of discrimination, of kind of
using them as a scapegoat. This was particularly
the case in Europe where you have the
Christian church often kind of blamed the
Jews on religious grounds. They were an easy
scapegoat any time things went hard.
You had ethnic cleansing. You had pogroms.
This was the Russian empire, especially
as we get into the 1800s, was especially
infamous in its treatment of the Jews.
You have this long history of Jewish persecution.
In fact, much of Jewish tradition today
is around remembrances of these various
tragedies, these various persecutions.
With that as the context, we then get into
the late 1800s. Let's go to 1860. 1860.
You have the birth of Theodor Herzl.
1860. You have the birth of this gentleman
right over here. Theodor Herzl born.
He's born to a German-speaking Jewish family
in the Austro-Hungarian empire.
The family he's born into isn't particularly religious.
As a young man, he remains fairly secular.
He's not a particularly religious person.
As he grows and he becomes a journalist, he is
able to observe the anti-Semitism, especially
that's occurring especially in the late 1800s
in Russia, but throughout much of Europe.
In 1894, so at this point he's 34 years old,
still a fairly young man, in 1894 in Paris
he directly observes the Dreyfus affair.
The Dreyfus affair, in which a French Jewish
officer in the military is accused of treason,
accused of spying for the Germans.
This leads to all sorts of kind of public
anti-Semitism. It later is shown that it was
false claims on Dreyfus. Some people would
debate whether this directly led to
Theodor Herzl's articulation of a need
for a Jewish homeland, but it was something
that he directly observed, so it must have
influenced him in some way. It was this
and all the other anti-Semitism that he observed
either directly or indirectly his entire life,
or even that he was able to read in the history books.
Taking all of that in, and this is coming
from a fairly secular individual, in 1896
at the age of 36, he writes Der Judenstaat,
which literally translates as the Jewish State.
Der Judenstaat.
This was a very articulate description or
desire, or articulation I guess I should say, of the need
for a Jewish homeland and a Jewish State.
It's really the birth of political Zionism.
Political Zionism.
Now, where does the word Zionism come from?
The root is Zion from Mount Zion.
Mount Zion is essentially a hill in modern-day
Jerusalem, but the word Zion is often equated
with Jerusalem, with the Holy Land, with
kind of the home of the Jews.
That would be roughly right over here,
Jerusalem is roughly right over here.
I stress the modifier "political,"
political Zionism, because there was already
a movement to bring the Jewish people back
to their ancient homeland in Judea,
which could be referred to as Zionism.
It was really Herzl who articulated a need
to set up a political state and start to
organize around trying to create a political state.
Over here I quote some of what he wrote in Der Judenstaat.
"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 we are loyal patriots,
sometimes super loyal. 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.
Palestine is our unforgettable homeland."
This ends up getting huge traction,
resonates with the Jewish diaspora,
gives him the power to essentially, the next year,
organize in 1897 the first Zionist Congress,
first Zionist Congress
where he's able to bring together likeminded,
or at least people who are looking to organize
a way to eventually establish a Jewish State,
preferably in Palestine. I say preferably in
Palestine, and it's clear that this was the first
choice, to go back to the historical homeland
of Judea, but even Herzl himself had considered
Argentina, which at the time was very open-minded,
very open towards immigration. There was some talk
of East Africa, British East Africa.
In fact, the British offered Uganda in 1903
to the what would later be called the
Zionist Organization. It was considered
and I believe it was the sixth Zionist Congress.
These were things that were actually considered.
But Palestine was always, because of historical
reasons, the hopeful home of the Zionist Movement.
I fully realize this is an incredibly touchy issue
regardless of where people stand on their
views of Zionism or of Theodor Herzl.
Some would view him as a visionary,
view him as a hero, some would view him as
starting the seed that led to the eventual
occupation of Palastine and the settlements
that are going on there. I will try my best
to stay out of picking sides there.
Regardless of where you are in that argument,
it's pretty amazing how much foresight he
actually had and his ability to get this thing going.
Even from the get-go, he had some conversations
with the Ottomans and other folks about
being able to get land in Palestine and all the rest.
He wasn't successful in his own lifetime.
But even after that first Zionist Congress, which
was held in Basel, he understood what he was doing
and he was looking beyond his own lifetime.
This is a quote here from his journal and
it's pretty telling. "Were I to sum up the
Basel Congress in a word, which I shall guard
against pronouncing publically, it would be this:
At Basel I founded the Jewish State. If I said
this out loud today I would be greeted by
universal laughter. In five years perhaps,
and certainly in 50 years, everyone will
perceive it." This is an amazing impresison
because the state of Israel would come into
a reality in roughly 50 years.
With that said, and once again I know this is
an incredibly touchy issue, the one thing
that is probably surprising to many people is
that he was not an extreme individual. It comes
out from some of his other writing that
even though he wanted this Jewish State, he
was a fairly tolerant individual and he did not
view this only for the Jews and he didn't
feel that it should be taken by force or
in any other way. It comes out in his writing
right over here. This is from his diary.
"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."
So protect their property, honor and ...
using the harshest means of coercion to protect
their property, their honor and their freedom.
This is a tolerant thing to do.
"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 will not sell their
property to us." So, hey, if we want to go there
and properly buy land but people don't want
to sell it to us, "we shall simply leave them there
and develop our commerce in the direction of
other areas which belong to us."
He wasn't in the mood to really get into a
confrontation or to antagonize anyone.
And he recognized that there were other people
there that might not want to sell their land
to those that might settle this new State.
Later on his life, actually shortly before
his death, he actually writes a novel about
this potential State that might be created.
He writes, and this is written in Altneuland,
it literally translates to The Old New Land,
"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 decent, 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's only one
way to do it. The highest tolerance. Our motto must
therefore be, now and ever: Man, you are my brother."