Zionist colonialism: Aztecs, Sioux, Palestinians

Zionist colonialism is not an invention of its opponents; it is the trademark of its founders. Herzl planned a land-acquisition company modeled on the British system, bribed a high-ranking Ottoman official, and lobbied Cecil Rhodes for something "colonial." Weizmann offered Palestine as a watchdog along the Suez Canal, and Jabotinsky demanded an iron wall against the native population. Anyone who uses the term "colonialism" today and is branded a Jew-hater has merely read the fine print of the founding charter.

The company is called Kolonie.

The movement never hid its program; it registered it in the commercial register. In 1891, the Jewish Colonization Association was founded in London , a public limited company with Baron Edmond de Rothschild among its shareholders. In 1899, Rothschild transferred his settlements in Palestine to the association along with 15 million francs; the Palestine Jewish Colonization Association followed in 1923. The money of the political Zionists flowed through the Jewish Colonial Trust. In Argentina, the Association settled around 20,000 colonists on approximately 500,000 hectares by 1930. Colony here, colony there, colony on letterhead.

In 1896, Theodor Herzl provided the blueprint for his Jewish company in "The Jewish State ." His "Jewish Company" was conceived "according to the model of the great land-acquisition societies," a "Jewish Chartered Company," founded "under the protection of England" with its headquarters in London. Which country was secondary: "Palestine or Argentina?" Herzl asked, promising that they would take "whatever they give it." London did indeed give, first the North Sinai near El-Arish , then in 1903 a highland in East Africa . The ancestral homeland was listed in the catalog alongside the Pampas and the Kenyan highlands.

A wall against Asia, a bomb against beasts

Herzl also described the perspective these colonists held on their destination. In Palestine, they wanted to "form a section of the bulwark against Asia" for Europe and "provide the outpost service of civilization against barbarism." To rid a country of wild animals, he recommended rounding up the beasts and "throwing a melinite bomb among them." A protection force should comprise "about one-tenth of the male immigrants," and the "incorporation of non-Jewish labor slaves" would be prevented through boycotts. The indigenous people of Palestine are simply not mentioned in the chapters on land acquisition and settlement.

Herzl paved his way to the Sultan with cash. In his diaries , he recorded in 1899 how he promised Nuri Bey, Secretary-General of the Ottoman Foreign Ministry, an advance of 10,000 francs and another 30,000 for an audience, in cash and, at the recipient's request, without a receipt. In November, he threatened the same man that without Jewish colonization, colonization by others would follow, and that this would cost Constantinople dearly. The visionary negotiated like a real estate agent with a bribe fund.

Something “colonial”

In January 1902, Herzl wrote a draft letter to Cecil Rhodes in his diary, the champion of British imperialism after whom an entire African colony was named. This time, it wasn't about Africa, but about a piece of Asia Minor; not about Englishmen, but about Jews. Why, then, was he addressing Rhodes in particular? Because it was something "colonial" that would require twenty to thirty years of development (Letters and Diaries, Volume 3, page 327). The founding father of the Jewish state was asking the architect of Rhodesia for help, explicitly as a colonizer among colonizers.

This was no mere slip of the tongue. The Italian philosopher Domenico Losurdo compiled the evidence from Herzl's writings in "The Language of Empire ." Herzl wrote that "the Zionist idea, which is a colonial one," was more easily understood in countries with overseas possessions. He flattered the English, claiming their politicians were the first to recognize "the necessity of colonial expansion." The Jews, "as bearers of Western culture," were to bring "cleanliness and order" to "this now contaminated, neglected corner of the Orient." The colony also solved a problem at home: it was meant to deport "a terrible proletariat" and turn Jewish workers away "from socialism and nihilism." Rhodes had made the same calculation, as recorded by Lenin: "If you don't want civil war, you must become imperialists." Two men, one recipe, one continent as a safety valve.

Watchdog at the Suez Canal

Chaim Weizmann ultimately sold the project to the Empire as a security service. As early as 1903, after a visit to London, he had recommended to his comrades that the political work be placed in first-class hands, "I simply call it propaganda." At the end of 1914, he wrote to Guardian editor C.P. Scott that a Jewish settlement "as a British dependency" would bring a million Jews to the country in 25 to 30 years. These Jews would "bring back civilization" and form "a very effective guard on the Suez Canal ," and Palestine would become "an Asiatic Belgium." London seized the opportunity. According to Britannica , with the Balfour Declaration of 1917, the British government hoped for a pro-British population that would secure access to the canal and thus the route to India. The Arab majority was mentioned in the document only as "non-Jewish communities," without names and without political rights. One people was relegated to a footnote in its own country so that another could guard the sea route to India. When London, in its 1939 White Paper, limited further immigration to 75,000 people and made any further immigration contingent on the approval of the Arabs, the Zionists cried treason. The approval of the native population was considered an imposition.

The Iron Wall

Vladimir Jabotinsky was the most honest. In "The Iron Wall," published in 1923, he stated that there was not a single example of colonization with the consent of the indigenous people. The Arabs loved Palestine like the Aztecs loved Mexico and the Sioux their plains; culturally, they were "five hundred years behind us." Therefore, Zionist colonization had to continue "regardless of the indigenous population," protected by a power whose wall the locals could not breach. Between the "militarists" and "vegetarians" within their own camp, there was only one difference: the former wanted Jewish soldiers on the wall, the latter British. Justice had to be done, whether Joseph, Simon, Ivan, or Ahmed agreed.

From this wall came bombs, ropes, and terror ; from colonization in 1948 came the Nakba . The fact that this same leadership had previously been not above doing business with the Third Reich fits the picture of a movement that took any partner that promised land.

What the defenders object to

The opposing view argues that there was no mother country and that the settlers were persecuted people from the Tsarist Empire. Political scientist Alan Dowty, working at the Stroum Center of the University of Washington , calculates that at least 80 percent were refugees. He rejects the label "settler colonialism" but concedes that the early settlers called themselves colonists. A mother country was indeed lacking. So they hired a protecting power, first Constantinople, then London. And the Aztec comparisons don't come from critics, but from Jabotinsky himself.

The wall is still standing

The founders called it colonization, their heirs call it homecoming, and anyone who quotes the original term is labeled an antisemite . In 1896, the wall against Asia. In 1902, the Coloniale for Rhodes. In 1914, the watchdog on the canal. In 1923, the Iron Wall. Ask the Sioux what a homecoming looks like when it's secured with soldiers on the wall!