Blackwell Reference Online

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[ xxii ] A Jewish nationalist movement, the aim of which was the setting-up of a Jewish state in the H oly land as a homeland for the Jewish people [14 vol. 16: 1031]. The first Zionist congress was held in Basel in 1897 on the initiative of Theodor Herzl (1860–1904), the father of political Zionism. Herzl brought together the various groups of Zionists who had come to recognize the necessity of Jewish self-determination in their own country [40]. The World Zionist Organization (1897) became the umbrella body of the movement, although individual groups representing socialist, religious, cultural and revisionist forms of Zionism have maintained their separate identities [26]. With the founding of the state of I srael in 1948 the Zionist movement achieved its main political objective, and since then has concentrated on providing financial aid to Israel, supporting Jewish immigrants who have gone there ( aliyah ) from all over the world, and educating diaspora Jews. [11; 25; 44; 52; 58: 197; 70: 79] ... log in or subscribe to read full text