Liverpool Echo: “From every point of view, political, social, and religious, Zionism has much to recommend it, and the enthusiasm with which it has been taken up by many of the most prominent thinkers of the Hebrew race affords the best augury for its ultimate accomplishment.”
Glasgow Evening News: “Such a scheme as the re-peopling of Palestine, while demanding careful handling at every stage, must be gradually evolved.... If the Zionist movement creates a Jew with the tastes and aspirations of his forefathers it will not have been started in vain.”
Glasgow Evening Citizen: “It is a matter of considerable importance, looked at from what side we may. Should any effective system be found of dealing with it, then the present Congress will probably have operated to the advantage of this country quite as much as to the Jews in whose interests it is being held.”
North British Daily Mail: “There is no reason why Christians should not wish them well. The movement should provide a refuge for the Jewish race from the Anti-Semitic hate which pursues them in so many countries, and it should help somewhat to restore to its former prosperity the land of Palestine, towards which the Jewish heart ever turns with love and devotion.”
Review of the Week: “Why should not this homogeneous, intelligent and powerful race (the Jews) form a State of their own, and thus free themselves from persecution in other States, and enforce respect for their nationality? Millions of Jews have probably asked themselves this question. Trustworthy leaders having been found, a movement has been set on foot for the establishment of a Jewish centre in Palestine. The idea is glorious enough to take possession even of the minds of such a practical, prudent and commercial race as the Jews.”
LXXXV.
Colonel Conder on the Value of the Jewish National Movement (1903)
“Enthusiasm is the power of feeling a strong interest in something that is not of personal material advantage. It is not a very common feeling anywhere, and is perhaps as rare among Jews as among others. It is generally regarded with suspicion: for it often upsets repose, and leads to unexpected and disturbing events. Ignorant enthusiasm has been the cause of many great troubles: but enthusiasm founded on real knowledge of events and of national movements has produced, in our own times, some of the greatest changes in history. It was the enthusiasm of the few which created a United Italy, or again which has made Japan the leading power in the Far East. It is the unexpected that comes to pass, because men’s attention is fixed on large and conspicuous objects, and because they find it so difficult to judge whether the new cause, advocated by the few, is based on reality, or whether it is merely a craze. Thus, while endless diplomacy and observation are directed to the management of affairs on the supposition that the facts are evident, there constantly comes a surprise which renders futile all the schemes of anxious Politicians, due to the silent action of some unsuspected element. The blind desires of the people find at length a definite expression, and the direction given by a few enthusiasts leads to new and startling events.... Enthusiasm for one’s own race and country, when genuine, is regarded with general favour: but when George Eliot raised her protest against the everlasting ‘Hep!’ which hounds the wandering Jew from land to land, people asked what she had to do with Judaism. Like Cain, we ask: ‘Am I my brother’s keeper?’ and especially when it is the poor brother whom we so much dislike. We can, however, understand that the great mass of poor and persecuted Jews feel for those who devote their time, money and thought to the raising up of their own people an amount of real affection and gratitude which renders them willing to be led to their realization of hopes that are not commonly regarded by the great mass of the prosperous and contented.... Among the higher class of those broad-minded Jews who sincerely believe in their ancient traditions, very noble efforts are made not only to help the poor and stem the tide of persecution, but also to raise the tone of the nation by appeal to its ancient memories and ideals. These men are the natural leaders to whom the destitute and oppressed turn for counsel and guidance, and it is among them that it has now become a fixed belief that the nation can only be raised from its misery by the creation of a national centre—a home to which all those who are scattered over the earth may turn their eyes: which must be one bound up with all that is best in the historic memories of the race, and which therefore must be the old home in Palestine itself. The Jew, they say, is tired of wandering and tired of being an alien. Emigration has not settled the eternal question, and a nation without a country must be content with toleration as all that it can expect.
“As regards ourselves, we should be only too glad to see Palestine increasing in civilization and prosperity as an outpost in the neighbourhood of Egypt.... It is clear that if the question of the Near East should again be raised, the Jews will have to be considered by statesmen in any settlement of the Syrian question: and that the solution of the question ... may be ... a ‘legally assured home for the Jewish People.’”