zionists be like...

"Zionism emerged just as European nationa were dividing Africa. Taking advantage of the European interest in colonization, [Theodore] Herzl sought the backing of European governments in establishing a Jewish state.

To European leaders he argued that Zionism would serve their interests in the Middle East. 'For Europe,' Herzl said, 'we could constitute part of the wall of defense against Asia; we would serve as an outpost of civilization against barbarism.'

Yet Palestine was only one of several possible sites discussed for settlement. In 1903, at Herzl's request, Britain offered Uganda as a Jewish state. The 1903 Zionist congress voted to send a commission there but let the matter drop.

In 1904 Herzl approached King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy and asked for Tripoli (north Africa) as a Jewish state. The king refused. To the sultan of the Ottoman Empire, Abdülhamid II, Herzl argued that Jews would help prevent an Arab uprising against the empire.

Herzl approached Britain because, he said, it was 'the first to recognize the need for colonial expansion.' According to him, 'the idea of Zionism, which is a colonial idea, should be easily and quickly understood in England.'

In 1902 Herzl approached Cecil Rhodes, who had recently colonized the territory of the Shona people as Rhodesia. 'You are being invited to help make history,' he said in a letter to Rhodes. 'It doesn't involve Africa, but a piece of Asia Minor; not Englishmen, but Jews.

How, then, do I happen to turn to you since this is an out-of-the-way matter for you? How indeed? Because it is something colonial.'

Britain had already shown interest in Palestine. In 1839 Lord Palmerston as foreign secretary had opened a consulate in Jerusalem,

instructing it to protect the Jews. Then in 1840 Palmerston proposed to the Ottoman Empire that it encourage settlement of European Jews in Palestine and that Jews be permitted to make complaints against Ottoman officials through the British embassy in Constantinople

While nothing came of this plan, the British consul at Jerusalem carried out Palmerston's directive to assist Jews. When anti-Jewish violence erupted in Damascus in 1840, Britain extended protection to Jews in Palestine.

In encouraging the Jews to look to Britain for aid, Palmerston was following a technique already being used by rival powers. Cultivating a population group was a technique of European intervention in the Middle East in the nineteenth century.

France already had client populations in the Levant, and Russia courted the Orthodox population. A protected minority, it was hoped, would be loyal to the protecting power, so Palmerston encouraged Jewish dependence on Britain."

@threader_app compile