Zionism has always been  a part of Judaism - The ideological and cultural foundations of Zionism have always been present in Jewish tradition. Jews always thought of themselves as a nation or people. The concept of "am Yisrael" - the "people of Israel" or "nation of Israel,"  has been inherent in Jewish culture from ancient times. Jewish cultural and religious life always centered around the land of Israel. This did not change during two millennia of dispersion. 

Modern Zionism - The modern ideological expression of Zionism began to take shape in the nineteenth century. Zionism became a political movement with the first Zionist congress in 1897. The conference was in reality a rather modest milestone. Without the support of the Jewish masses, it was hard for Zionism to show great concrete achievements. Without such achievements, it was hard for Zionism to win the support of the Jewish masses for a project that seemed hopeless and Quixotic. Tenacity, gradualism, pragmatism, courage and daring leveraged the tiny, gradually accumulated achievements of Zionism from a few people in a conference hall to a movement, from a movement in Europe to Jewish settlement in the land of Israel, from a few settlements to the British mandate, from the mandate to a Jewish state. 

Achievements of Zionism - Zionism is the ideological success story of the twentieth century, overcoming seemingly insuperable obstacles to realize an impossible dream. The story of Zionism challenges the imagination. Zionism revived a dying people and brought them back to their land. Zionism changed the image of the land and of the people.

Zionism in Israel - Zionism brought water to a thirsty country. The Israel national water carrier pumps more water in a day than was consumed in all of Palestine in 1948. Thanks to Zionism, glass and steel towers rose from sand dunes; the forgotten and disease ridden armpit of the Ottoman Empire became the most technologically advanced society in the Middle East, where both Arabs and Jews enjoy a higher standard of living than anywhere else in the Middle East, except the petroleum sheikhdoms, the highest literacy rates in the Middle East, and the lowest infant mortality. Zionism benefited Jews and Arabs. The average Israeli Arab enjoys a higher standard of living than the average citizen of oil-rich Saudi Arabia.

Zionist Revolution - Zionism was more than a political movement to obtain a homeland for the Jewish people. Zionism proposed, and carried out, a revolution within Jewish thought and culture. Zionism gave a new life to the ancient Hebrew language.  Zionism changed the image of the Jewish people. Thanks to Zionism, merchants and students and peddlers came out of the ghetto to become Jewish mechanics, Jewish farmers, Jewish engineers and Jewish soldiers. Zionism made the "impossible" into reality. Zionism ended "the longest occupation in history" - the occupation of the land of Israel.

Benefits of Zionism - Zionism benefited Diaspora Jews as well as those living in Israel, Zionists and anti-Zionists, because it gave a different meaning to the reviled word "Jew." Zionism helped to save people and salvage the vestiges of the dignity and honor of the Jewish people in the Holocaust, bringing boatloads of immigrants to Mandate Palestine in the "illegal" immigration, sending parachutists behind enemy lines to save Jews and help the allied war effort, and leading ghetto revolts and partisan groups. By creating and defending the state of Israel, Zionism ended the 2,000 year nightmare during which Jews were despised and persecuted by almost every nation in the world, through no fault of our own.

Anti- Zionism

What is anti-Zionism? The basic premise of Zionism is that Jews have the same rights to nationhood as any other people. Anti-Zionism is based on the racist thesis that Jews are somehow different.

Zionism is opposed by a variety of groups:

Jewish anti-Zionism - Jewish religious anti-Zionism arose out of fear that a secular ideology would supplant religion as the mainstay of Judaism. Assimilationist Jews  were afraid that Zionism, with its insistence on Jewish nationhood, would hinder acceptance of Jews as equals in European nation-states. Marxist Jews and non-Jews opposed Zionism as a "reactionary" nationalist tendency, but later, paradoxically, came to support every "national liberation movement" except Zionism.  

Anti-Semitism, Marxism and anti-Zionism - The largest recruiting base for Anti-Zionism is simple racist anti-Semitism. Neo-Marxist radicals denounce Zionism as racism, starting from the premise that Zionism was a colonialist movement, and that all colonialism is racism. The notion that Zionism is racism was probably spawned by the Soviet doctrine of "Zionology," an anti-Semitic ideological invention that was aimed as much at bolstering state-sponsored anti-Semitism as it was intended to support the anti-Israel policies of the Soviet government.

Arab anti-Zionism - Most Arabs oppose Zionism because they believe that the entire Middle East belongs to them, and they encouraged the development of an opposing Palestinian (Arab) national identity. The creation of a Jewish national home and later, of the state of Israel, was increasingly opposed by the Arab states, and by the Arabs of Palestine.

Muslim and Islamist anti-Zionism - Most Muslims oppose Zionism and the existence of Israel, for different reasons. Some believe that all land that was once part of the Muslim territory (Dar al-Islam) must remain Muslim. For that reason, those opposed to Zionism sometimes also want to retake al Andalus (Spain). Some associate Zionism with the Christian Crusades, which conquered Palestine briefly and were viewed as an intrusion and an insult. Many Muslim leaders are afraid of Western ideas of progress and human rights, such as equality for women and homosexuals, that are transmitted through Zionism, as well as scientific doctrines that they view as pernicious such as evolution.

Anti-Zionism today - Current attitudes to Zionism, and the current image of Zionism, are influenced by the Israeli occupation of lands conquered in the Six day War, including the Golan Heights and the West Bank (Judea and Samaria). Anti-Zionism often insists that Zionism is identical with "Greater Israel" and "Likud" ideology, though Israel has repeatedly offered to withdraw from conquered territories in return for peace, and most Zionists support a two state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Some advocates of the Arab cause insist that the conflict began in 1967. However, Arab opposition to Jewish presence and settlement in Palestine began long before the creation of the Jewish State in 1948, and violent attacks on Israel are still initiated from Gaza, though Israel, under Likud party leadership, withdrew from Gaza.

False claims of anti-Zionists - Contrary to the claims of anti-Zionists, Zionism did not seek to set up a "Jewish exclusivist" state in the land of Israel, or plot to expel the Arabs of Palestine, nor was Zionism ever a militaristic, fascist type movement, though there were militaristic Zionists. Zionism was a non-militaristic movement in its foundation, rather pacifist in orientation. Early Zionists ignored the claims of Arab nationalism, because there was no Arab nationalism evident in the land of Israel, and because of their own ignorance of actual conditions in the land. Beginning about 1905, Zionists took cognizance of Arab nationalism, but usually assumed that Zionism and Arab nationalism could work together, and that Zionism could benefit the Arabs of Palestine. Theodor Herzl's utopia, Altneuland, described the future Jewish state as a multipluralistic democracy  where Jews and Arabs lived as equals.

The enemies of Zionism tend to identify "Zionism" with the worst and most unfortunate acts of misguided extremists. They insist that Zionism is racism, and accuse Zionism of crimes ranging to deliberately planning to expel the Arabs  to  instigating the French Revolution.  They often paint all Zionists as religious fanatics from Brooklyn intent on rebuilding the third temple, murdering or expelling the Arabs of Palestine and creating a "Jewish exclusivist" state that encompasses huge areas of the Middle East. They depict Zionism as a "pernicious plot" that controls European and American governments, just as anti-Semites depicted Jews as plotting to subvert governments and achieve world domination. They insist, nonetheless, that they are not anti-Semitic, though they deny the right of the Jews to self-determination.

The Zionism Controversy