Theodor Herzl - Zionist Leader

Zionist Leader

As the Paris correspondent for Neue Freie Presse, Herzl followed the Dreyfus Affair, a notorious anti-Semitic incident in France in which a French Jewish army captain was falsely convicted of spying for Germany. He witnessed mass rallies in Paris following the Dreyfus trial where many chanted "Death to the Jews!" Herzl came to reject his early ideas regarding Jewish emancipation and assimilation, and to believe that the Jews must remove themselves from Europe and create their own state. There is, however, some debate on the extent of which Herzl was really influenced by the Dreyfus Affair. Indeed, some claim, such as Kornberg, that this is a myth that Herzl did not feel necessary to deflate, and that he also believed that Dreyfus was guilty.

June, 1895, he wrote in his diary: "In Paris, as I have said, I achieved a freer attitude toward anti-Semitism... Above all, I recognized the emptiness and futility of trying to 'combat' anti-Semitism." However, in recent decades historians have downplayed the influence of the Dreyfus Affair on Herzl, even terming it a myth. They have shown that, while upset by anti-Semitism evident in French society, he, like most contemporary observers, initially believed in Dreyfus's guilt and only claimed to have been inspired by the affair years later when it had become an international cause celebre. Rather, it was the rise to power of the anti-Semitic demagogue Karl Lueger in Vienna in 1895 that seems to have had a greater effect on Herzl, before the pro-Dreyfus campaign had fully emerged. It was at this time that he wrote his play "The New Ghetto", which shows the ambivalence and lack of real security and equality of emancipated, well-to-do Jews in Vienna. Around this time Herzl grew to believe that anti-Semitism could not be defeated or cured, only avoided, and that the only way to avoid it was the establishment of a Jewish state.

Beginning in late 1895, Herzl wrote Der Judenstaat, (The Jewish State). It was published February, 1896 to immediate acclaim and controversy. In the book he outlines the reasons for the Jewish people, who so desire, to leave Europe, either for Argentina or for their historic homeland, Israel, which he seems to prefer. The book and Herzl's ideas spread very rapidly throughout the Jewish world and attracted international attention. Supporters of existing Zionist movements such as the Hovevei Zion were immediately drawn to, and allied with, Herzl. Controversially, Herzl and his ideas are vilified by establishment Jewry who perceive his ideas both as threatening to their efforts at acceptance and integration in their resident countries and as rebellion against the will of God.

In Der Judenstaat he writes:

Herzl begins to energetically promote his ideas, continually attracting supporters, Jewish and non-Jewish. Norman Rose writes that Herzl "mapped out for himself the role of martyr... as the Parnell of the Jews".

March 10, 1896, Herzl is visited by Reverend William Hechler, the Anglican minister for the British Embassy. Hechler had read Herzl's Der Judenstaat. The meeting would be central to the eventual legitimization of Herzl and Zionism., Herzl later wrote in his diary "Next we came to the heart of the business. I said to him: (Theodor Herzl to Rev. William Hechler) I must put myself into direct and publicly known relations with a responsible or non responsible ruler – that is, with a minister of state or a prince. Then the Jews will believe in me and follow me. The most suitable personage would be the German Kaiser." Hechler arranged an extended audience with Frederick I, Grand Duke of Baden, April, 1896. The Grand Duke was the uncle of Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany. Through the efforts of Hechler and the Grand Duke, Herzl publicly met the Kaiser in 1898. The meeting significantly advanced Herzl's and Zionism legitimacy in Jewish and world opinion.

May, 1896, the English translation of his Der Judenstaat (The Jewish State) appears in London. Herzl earlier had confessed to his friend Max Bodenheimer, that he "wrote what I had to say without knowing my predecessors, and it can be assumed that I would not have written it, (Der Judenstaat) had I been familiar with the literature".

Constantinople, Turkey, June 15, 1896; Herzl sees an opportunity. With the assistance of Count Philip Michael Newleński, a sympathetic Polish émigré with political contacts in the Ottoman Court, Herzl attempted to meet the Sultan Abdulhamid II. Herzl wanted to present his solution to the Jewish State to the Sultan directly. He failed to obtain an audience with the Sultan. He did succeed in visiting a number of highly placed individuals, including the Grand Vizier who received him as a journalist representing the Neue Freie Presse. Herzl presented his proposal to the Grand Vizier that the Jews would pay the Turkish foreign debt, and attempt to help regulate Turkish finances, if they were given Palestine as a Jewish homeland under Turkish rule. Prior to leaving Constantinople, June 29, 1896, Nevlenski obtained for Herzl a symbolic medal of honor. The medal was a public relations affirmation for Herzl, and the Jewish world, of the seriousness of the negotiations, the "Commander's Cross of the Order of the Medjidie".

Five years later, May 17, 1901, Herzl did meet with Sultan Abdulhamid II. The Sultan refused Theodor Herzl's offers to consolidate the Ottoman debt in exchange for a charter allowing the Zionists access to Palestine.

Returning from Constantinople, Herzl traveled to London, to report back to the Maccabeans, a proto-Zionist group of established English Jewry led by Colonel Albert Goldsmid. November,1895, they had received him with curiosity, indifference and coldness. Israel Zangwill bitterly opposed Herzl. After Constantinople, Goldsmid agreed to support Herzl. In London's East End, a community of primarily Yiddish speaking recent Eastern European Jewish immigrants, Herzl addressed a mass rally of thousands, July 12, 1896. He was received with acclaim. They granted Herzl the mandate of leadership for Zionism. Within six months this mandate had been expanded throughout Zionist Jewry. The Zionist movement continued growing very rapidly.

In 1897, at considerable personal expense, he founded Die Welt of Vienna, Austria-Hungary and planned the First Zionist Congress in Basel, Switzerland. He was elected president (a position he held until his death in 1904), and in 1898 he began a series of diplomatic initiatives intended to build support for a Jewish country. He was received by the German emperor, Wilhelm II, on several occasions, one of them in Jerusalem, and attended The Hague Peace Conference, enjoying a warm reception by many other statesmen.

Herzl visited Jerusalem for the first time in October 1898. Herzl deliberately coordinated his visit with that of Kaiser Wilhelm II to secure, what he thought had been prearranged with the aid of Rev. William Hechler, a public world power recognition of himself and Zionism. Herzl and Kaiser Wilhelm first met publicly, October 29, at Mikveh Israel, near present day Holon, Israel. It was a brief but historic meeting. He had a second formal, public audience with the emperor at the latter's tent camp on Street of the Prophets in Jerusalem, November 2, 1898.

In 1902–03 Herzl was invited to give evidence before the British Royal Commission on Alien Immigration. The appearance brought him into close contact with members of the British government, particularly with Joseph Chamberlain, then secretary of state for the colonies, through whom he negotiated with the Egyptian government for a charter for the settlement of the Jews in Al 'Arish, in the Sinai Peninsula, adjoining southern Palestine.

In 1903, Herzl attempted to obtain support for the Jewish homeland from Pope Pius X. Cardinal Rafael Merry del Val explained to him the Church's policy of non possumus on such matters, saying that as long as the Jews deny the divinity of Christ, the Church certainly could not make a declaration in their favor.

On the failure of that scheme, which took him to Cairo, he received, through L. J. Greenberg, an offer (August 1903) on the part of the British government to facilitate a large Jewish settlement, with autonomous government and under British suzerainty, in British East Africa. At the same time, the Zionist movement being threatened by the Russian government, he visited St. Petersburg and was received by Sergei Witte, then finance minister, and Viacheslav Plehve, minister of the interior, the latter of whom placed on record the attitude of his government toward the Zionist movement. On that occasion Herzl submitted proposals for the amelioration of the Jewish position in Russia. He published the Russian statement, and brought the British offer, commonly known as the "Uganda Project", before the Sixth Zionist Congress (Basel, August 1903), carrying the majority (295:178, 98 abstentions) with him on the question of investigating this offer, after the Russian delegation stormed out.

In 1905, after investigation, the Congress decided to decline the British offer and firmly committed itself to a Jewish homeland in Palestine.