Zionism In The 19th Century

From the inception of Zionism as a political movement, Europeans and Americans have been heavily involved. Although Zionism had been an religious/emotional longing for the Holy Land tied up in Jewish culture since the Diaspora, it did not begin to become widely politicized until the 19th century. (source?) The religious revivalism of the 1700s and the early 1800s led many Americans and Europeans to be brought up on the romanticization of Holy Land, and to the Jews, Palestine had always been that land of milk and honey. in addition, the Western ideas of and interests in Palestine were very relevant politically, as these powers had the potential make Zionism, or, if they so chose, Palestinian nationalism, a reality. To understand the Western …show more content…
Those who wrote about their travels in the Holy Land would often note how familiar the land seemed, noting that they “felt at home” in this foreign place. (quote from one of the accounts here). The telling Biblical stories of Palestine had become imbued with such romanticism and were told at such a young age that people longed for the Israel, of, essentially, their childhood. For example, the (monument?) at Lake Chautauqua in New York (explain), meant that the Palestine of the Bible became a regular part of people’s lives. Effectively, this all meant that a voyage to Palestine was seen by Westerners as a voyage to the ancient Holy Land, or, in other words, a Jewish land. This is not to say that those who journeyed to Palestine did not understand that they were traveling to a place changed since Biblical times, but rather that they were often willfully ignorant of the new and modern aspects of their Holy Land. So when the people who had actually been to the Holy Land brought back stories of the Holy Land as it had been described since their childhood, then why would the general public believe anything …show more content…
Nationalism was a European phenomenon (other word) adopted by the Zionists, influenced by the Enlightenments, which were themselves important, at least in the form of (the Jewish enlightenment (source?)). Seeing the other groups gaining national independence and their own state was an inspiration and fit in quite neatly with the cultural longing for Zion. More relevant, though, is the backing of Zionism by some Western powers, especially Great Britain with the publication of the Balfour Declaration. It is unlikely that without this support Israel could have become a state. As Gelvin states “…if it were not for the Balfour Declaration, Zionism might very well have gone the way of Confederate nationalism.” Zionists simply did not have personal access to the resources they needed to see their vision through; London did. Lastly, when one considers the relevance of the West to the early struggles in Palestine, it is important to remember that many of the Jews immigrating to Palestine were Westerners and heavily influenced by Western ideas. Because of this, many Jews felt stronger ties to the West they had left than their new