Summer 2010 Feature
A Concise History of the Zionist Congress from 1897 to 2006
by Cecil Bloom
The last three days of August 1897 should be etched on the heart of every Jew who believes in the future of his people because those were the days when Theodor Herzl convened the first Zionist Congress, which took place in Basle, Switzerland. The photograph of Herzl looking out over the River Rhine from his hotel room is a special memento of a very special milestone in Jewish history. It took him five months to organize this Congress. About eight-thousand Jews were represented at this first gathering by some 160 delegates, and present were seventeen women who had no voting rights; incredibly, there were also ten non-Jews in attendance. Four Americans were listed—Rev. Dr. Schaffer representing Baltimore and Boston, Dr. Tritsch and Adam Rosenberg from New York, and Mrs Rosa Sonneschein, publisher and editor of American Jewess. Herzl insisted that all delegates dress in formal wear (how dress has changed in more recent times!). And how times have changed in other ways too because at many of the Congresses held before the Second World War, debates were often ferocious and passionate, sometimes even savage though speeches were given by some of the great orators in Jewry. More recently, speeches have been much less turbulent.
Apart from Herzl, many colorful personalities attended various Congresses—Max Nordau, Chaim Weizmann, David Ben-Gurion, Menachem Ussishkin, Stephen S. Wise, Nahum Sokolow, Nahum Goldmann, David Wolfssohn, Louis Lipsky, Otto Warburg, Ze’ev Jabotinsky, and many others. Jabotinsky, who succeeded in splitting the movement on more than one occasion, was perhaps the most charismatic of them all, and he was often at the center of fiery debates. One observer wrote that there would be a stampede for seats when he spoke, although while delegates would listen, applaud, and admire him, they would then vote for his principal opponent Chaim Weizmann.
It has, in fact, been suggested that the first Zionist Congress motivated the writing of the infamous The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. There have been thirty-five such conferences—the last one was held in 2006, and the next is being held this June in Jerusalem. At first it was planned to hold these gatherings on a yearly basis, but with breaks for the two World Wars, it went to a two-year schedule from 1903 until 1939. Up to that time, all were held in European cities, mostly in Switzerland (ten in Basle), but they have been held in Jerusalem at four or five yearly intervals since the establishment of the State of Israel. Herzl wanted to hold the first Congress in Munich but moved it to Basle when the German rabbis managed to have it kept out of their country.
Herzl, clearly an extraordinary personality, opened the first meeting at which German was the official language. He was supported by Max Nordau, a man who had already established himself as an avant-garde writer of repute as well as being a physician, publicist, and a brilliant orator. Herzl argued for the formulation of Zionist aims based on sovereignty for the Jewish people. With Nordau he established the Basle Program that declared “Zionism strives to create for the Jewish people a National Home in Palestine secured by public law.”
Congress decided that the Zionist Organization was to be comprised of Federations in each country with each to communicate directly with a Central Office in Vienna where an Actions Committee was to be located to deal with affairs between Congresses. The first Committee had fifteen members, but this grew to seventy-seven by 1946. Any Jew who called himself a Zionist and who accepted the Basle Program was expected to pay a small annual tax of a shekel (equivalent to an English shilling—one twentieth of a pound sterling) to enable the Executive to operate. There were about 80,000 shekel holders in 1898, and by 1935 Ben-Gurion was able to announce that the sale of shekels, had reached one million. In 1946, there were over two million holders of shekels, but in 1968, it was decided to discontinue its sale.
To mark the 150th anniversary of Herzl’s birth this year, it is planned to issue a limited edition of the first shekel note. The great Hebrew poet, Chaim Nachman Bialik, immortalized the 1897 Congress with a poem entitled Mikra’ei Tziyyon (‘The Assemblies of Zion’), and at its end, Herzl wrote “I founded the Jewish State in Basle. In five years perhaps, but certainly in fifty, everyone will see it.” He was a little optimistic—it actually took eight and a half months more than he predicted!
Samuel Mohilever, a Russian rabbi and a founder of Hoveve Zion (Lovers of Zion), gave religious support to the event writing that “it is essential that the Congress unite all ‘Sons of Zion’ who are true to our cause to work in complete harmony and fraternity even if there be among them differences of opinion regarding religion.” These differences were to cause major problems as time passed, and as for general harmony in those early days, this was but a dream.
The world’s press did take some notice of this first Congress. The London Jewish Chronicle gave a quite detailed report of proceedings and printed the list of delegates, but it expressed the view that the Congress would “not be fruitful of good result.” It soon changed its view, and it favorably covered subsequent Congresses in detail.
One very negative opinion came from the Pope who opposed the Zionist plans that Catholics regarded with “some horror.” The Times of London reported the opening of Congress as well as noting that the program had been approved by the delegates, but it did publish a highly critical letter from a leading English Jew.
As for The New York Times, who called Herzl the “New Moses,” it reported his speech but it also had a headline “Zionist Congress in Disorder” over a report that there were stormy scenes as elections were being held to the Committee. It did however comment that Congress closed with “scenes of great enthusiasm.” The Chicago Israelite approach was quite different in that it pulled no punches in its evaluation of this first Zionist Congress. It accused both Herzl and Nordau of being avowed agnostics who were as indifferent to Judaism as they were to other religions and who occupied the anomalous positions of heading a movement that had no excuse for its existence if it lacked a religious basis. The journal called them hypocrites and likened them to Don Quixote and Sancho Panza. In reporting the Chicago Israelite’s venomous onslaught, The New York Times commented that these remarks were startling but seemed merely to put into plain words what critics of the Zionist intentions were expressing, and it complimented the Chicago Israelite on having the courage of its convictions.
At this first meeting, Asher Ginsberg, better known by his Hebrew pseudonym Achad Ha’am, the leading theorist of Russian Zionists, a great thinker and a spiritual Zionist, was present, but he showed little enthusiasm, believing that no achievement was possible until at least a hundred-thousand Jews were farming in Palestine. He disparaged what he called “a rabble of youngsters—in years and in knowledge” and was dismissive of the results that came from the Congress. On the 25th anniversary of this Congress, he contributed to a volume commemorating the event by reaffirming his belief that no charter could bring about fulfilment of Jewish national aims as long as there was no strong national determination to achieve them. But surely by 1922 there was much support for and action on achieving full statehood in Eretz Yisrael.
Two twenty-four year olds, Chaim Weizmann and Stephens S. Wise who later served as rabbi of New York’s Free Synagogue, were present at the 1898 Congress also held in Basle that had double the number of attendees. Socialists who asked for representation on the ruling body appeared for the first time. The Jewish Chronicle listed eleven delegates from America of whom Herzl was one, but he was also reported to be a delegate for six other communities including, incredibly, the small Jewish community of Limerick in Ireland. Weizmann was elected to the Standing Committee.
This Congress also saw the emergence of Sokolow and Ussishkin who became significant members of the movement. Sokolow was a prolific writer, and he became a formidable figure in the movement post-Herzl. Ussishkin was perceived as the ‘strong man’ of the Russian Zionists with an uncompromising attitude in support of Jewish nationalism. The key decision made here was the move to establish the Jewish Colonial Trust with a capital of two million pound sterling in one pound shares, a substantial sum equivalent to about three hundred million dollars in today’s currency. This was a bank intended primarily to provide financial support for plans that would accelerate the development of Palestine as a Jewish land.
In Basle in 1899, Herzl reported on his meetings with the German Kaiser in Constantinople and in Jerusalem, but the next meeting in 1900 was held in London and was the cause of much conflict between Herzl and the Russian Jewish delegation who were displeased by what they saw as his autocratic style. He was, however, supported by Haham Moses Gaster, the Sephardi Chief Rabbi of Great Britain, and by the rising star, the writer Israel Zangwill.
The next Congress returned to Basle where Herzl reported on his two meetings with the Turkish Sultan. The concept of a Hebrew University in Jerusalem was born here, proposed both by Weizmann and the great philosopher Martin Buber, and it was also decided to establish a Jewish National Fund for the purpose of acquiring land in Eretz Yisrael.
The 1903 meeting also in Basle two years later opened under the shadow of the Kishinev pogrom. It was the most controversial to date and led to disorderly scenes as the movement was rent in bitter conflict. No other Congress could claim to be as inharmonious as this one. The British Government had offered land in East Africa for a national home, and Nordau proposed that this offer should be examined further and possibly accepted if only as a temporary shelter. Among the 592 delegates, there was a large Russian contingent that was firmly against the project, but it was approved by 295 votes to 178 with 98 abstentions. The mass of Russians marched in unison from the hall and, although not yet the Zionist anthem, Hatikvah was sung in emotional protest. Many wept because they thought that the Land of Zion had been abandoned forever. Herzl pleaded unsuccessfully with them to return. This Congress marked twenty-three-year-old Jabotinsky’s first appearance although he did not speak in the East Africa debate, but he did, of course, vote against the resolution.
The 1905 meeting was the first without Herzl who died in 1904, and although Max Nordau opened the meeting with a eulogy of its founder, David Wolfssohn, a prosperous timber merchant and one of Herzl’s intimate friends, was elected President at a momentous meeting that saw the end of the East Africa (Uganda) project. But it did result in the secession of the ‘Ugandists’ led by Israel Zangwill who left the hall and formed their own Jewish Territorial Organization. Its aim was to procure a territory somewhere for those Jews who could not remain in the lands in which they were currently living. Although Congress rejected the idea of a Jewish home outside Eretz Yisrael, it did however thank the British Government for its offer of territory. It was following this meeting that, as a measure of support for Zangwill’s dream, Jacob Schiff provided funds so that about ten-thousand Jewish immigrants to the United States could settle in Galveston, Texas. But the crisis in Zionism had been averted, and the 1905 Congress concluded with the unified singing of Hatikvah, and this set the seal on its recognition as the Zionist anthem.
The 1907 Hague meeting in Holland featured a debate between the ‘political’ Zionists who were opposed to any activity in Palestine without political guarantees and the ‘practical’ ones led by Weizmann who pressed for work without such guarantees. Weizmann was, however, successful in bringing both groups nearer to each other into what he called “synthetic Zionism.” Following this agreement, a Palestine office headed by economist and sociologist Arthur Ruppin, soon to become an important person in the movement, was set up in Jaffa to develop the work of agricultural settlements.
Two key features of the next Congress were the presence of workers from Eretz Yisrael including Yitzchak Ben-Zvi, later to become Israel’s second President, and the decision to establish a settlement in Merchavyah in the Jezreel Valley. But the Congress was split by opposition to Wolfssohn from Weizmann, Ussiskin, and Sokolow.
Wolfssohn resigned at the following Congress and was succeeded by Otto Warburg, a German botanist, and the headquarters were then transferred from Cologne to Berlin. Proceedings were dominated by the practical Zionists, and many Mizrachi delegates walked out and formed Agudat Yisrael because they came to see Zionism as a secularist threat to religion. Arthur Ruppin gave an account of his years of activity on agricultural matters in Eretz Yisrael that made ‘practical’ Zionism possible and was enthusiastically received. Dr Harry Friedenwald of Baltimore, a Vice-President of the Zionist Organization of America was especially appreciative. This Congress was also notable for being the first to have a session spoken only in Hebrew.
The practical Zionists again dominated the 1913 Vienna Congress, but there was still conflict between this group and the political Zionists. One marked event was the decision to establish a Hebrew University in Jerusalem, and funds began to come in for this purpose. For the first time, there was substantial representation from Palestine, and these chalutzim showed contempt for those who spoke in English, German, and Yiddish.
Franz Kafka attended one session of Congress while on a business trip to the city but was unimpressed with what he called strange proceedings there. It was an event that was totally alien to him, and he told his friend Max Brod that he felt himself “cramped and distracted” by much that went on and could have “machine-gunned delegates.” He found it hard to imagine anything more useless than such a gathering. Despite his experience, five hundred delegates attended with a much larger contingent from the U.S. and Canada than previously. Among them was Solomon Schechter, head of the Jewish Theological Seminary of New York who had caused a sensation in the city by announcing his support for Zionism.
There was a special post-war Conference held in London in 1920, a Congress in all but in name. Weizmann was elected President, and he now became the undisputed leader of the movement.
There had been serious Arab riots in Jerusalem in 1920 and in Jaffa in 1921, and this motivated the 1921 Carlsbad Congress to pass a resolution that “Zionism seeks to live in relations of harmony and mutual respect with the Arab people.” Weizmann defended the role of British High Commissioner Herbert Samuel, but Jabotinsky, who wrote the political report wanted a stronger line to be taken against the British Government for failing to protect the Jews of Palestine. There was now an even larger Palestinian delegation, but Russian Jews were forbidden by their Communist masters to attend.
At the next Congress held in 1923, Weizmann wanted the Jewish Agency (that officially replaced the World Zionist Organization following Britain’s taking up the Mandate) to be enlarged to include non-Zionists, but he was defeated after a bitter debate. Although he left in protest at Congress’s failure to support him, he was elected President in his absence. Consideration was given here to establishing a World Jewish Congress.
Weizmann and Jabotinsky had serious clashes in Vienna at the 1925 Congress with the latter calling for mass immigration into Palestine. There were stormy scenes as Jabotinsky put forward his case. Congress’s rules specified a maximum of thirty minutes for each speaker, but after an angry vote, he was allowed by a large majority to continue. He launched into a massive criticism of official Zionist policy. Louis Lipsky, a leading American delegate, later wrote that Jabotinsky had poured acid onto open wounds, and he reminded Congress of its goals and made it ashamed of what it had achieved.
At the following Congress, Jabotinsky, who had just returned from Palestine, claimed to be the spokesman for the private sector in the Yishuv, and he proposed a Zionist NEP inspired by Lenin’s ‘New Economic Policy’ as a temporary alternative to the Mandate’s regime. He failed to win much support. Ben-Gurion was at this Congress, and he attacked British policy administered by High Commissioner Herbert Samuel who, he claimed, was responsible for the appointment of the violently anti-Jewish Haj Amin el Huisseini as Mufti of Jerusalem. This Congress marked the election of the first woman, Henrietta Szold, to the Zionist Executive.
In 1929 at the 16th Congress, Weizmann triumphed over Jabotinsky’s Revisionists in getting non-Zionists to join the Jewish Agency, and representative Jews from all over the world such as Albert Einstein, Leon Blum, Louis Marshall, Chaim Nachman Bialik, and Sholem Asch were recruited.
At the following Congress, however, Weizmann was defeated in a vote of confidence, and Sokolow became President. Ben-Gurion wrote to his wife Paula that he had never been to a Congress as difficult and as nerve-racking as this one with great and serious problems. There was a major battle between Jabotinsky’s Revisionists who demanded a proclamation of a Jewish state and the moderates led by Ben-Gurion. The moderates won, and while all other parties present had representation on the Executive, the Revisionists had none. Jabotinsky tore up his delegate’s card and cried out “This is no Zionist Congress!” as he left the hall, and this led to the Revisionists leaving the official movement in 1935 to call themselves the ‘New Zionist Organization.’
The 1933 Congress was held under the shadow both of Hitler’s accession to power in Germany (no delegates were able to attend from that country) and the assasination in Tel Aviv two months earlier of Chaim Arlosoroff, a leading Yishuv Labor politician who was Director of the Jewish Agency’s Political Department. A Revisionist Abraham Stavsky was found guilty of the murder although his conviction was later set aside, but it led to much dissension. Berl Katznelson, a Labor leader, accused the Revisionists of having terror groups within their organization, and he passed some documents to Congress that he claimed supported his accusation. The Actions Committee set up an inquiry but finally decided that these documents did not support Katznelson’s charge. It is of interest, however, to note that these documents eventually disappeared.
To counteract Revisionist recalcitrant behavior, Congress also passed a resolution affirming that Zionist Organization decisions took precedence over those of constituent bodies, and this was another nail in the Revisionist coffin. The 1935 Congress, was now without Jabotinsky’s followers. It also was a special congress because for the first time, Hebrew became the official language. Weizmann returned to leadership and became President again, but Ben-Gurion’s influence increased following his election to the Executive of the Jewish Agency.
Much of the penultimate Congress before the Second World War was held in camera and was the cause of a lot of dissension. The British Government had recommended partition of Palestine, and this dominated the debates with Weizmann and Ben-Gurion privately in favor. Ussishkin, supported by Wise and most American Zionists who wanted all of Palestine as the National Home, led the opposition. Abba Eban, later to be the Israeli Foreign Minister, described it as “one of the dramatic events in Jewish history” as partitionists and anti-partitionists raged against each other in a manner not dissimilar to those of the East Africa (Uganda) debates some thirty years earlier. The issue divided factions in Congress, split frendships, and resulted in new alliances being formed, but Weizmann eventually got a majority to empower him to negotiate with the British Government on its proposals with the objective of ensuring a better partition deal.
The 1939 Congresss took place in Geneva only a week before the outbreak of war, and many of those attending did not survive the Nazi onslaught. For once there was little disagreement following withdrawal of the British partition plan. The notorious British Government White Paper that severely limited immigration into Eretz Yisrael was bitterly opposed leading Golda Myerson (later Meir) to say that the delegates were determined to continue with immigration and, if necessary, to clash with the British on this issue. At its conclusion, the five hundred delegates sang Hatikvah fervently after Weizmann made a moving address to the delegates and concluded with the words: “I have no prayer but this: that we will all meet again alive.” Who then could have predicted the loss of six million souls?
The first post-war Congress and the only one remaining before the establishment of the State of Israel was a muted one that assembled following the tragedy of the Holocaust. Weizmann grieved (as did others) over the extermination of European Jewry, but he refused election as President because of opposition from Ben-Gurion and Abba Hillel Silver. Two thousand delegates attended including, for the first time, some from Mexico and Cuba, and some even came from the displaced persons’ camps. The Revisionists returned to Congress, but the Palestinians (Jewish Yishuv delegates) were essentially now in charge and demanded that Palestine should be established as a Jewish Commonwealth integrated into the structure of the democratic world and that its gates should be open to all Jews. They added that the Jewish Agency should be vested with control of immigration and with the necessary authority for the country’s upbuilding.
The British White Paper was condemned in absolute terms. Golda Meir was appointed head of the Political Department of the Jewish Agency in Jerusalem and Moshe Shertok (later Sharett) to the equivalent post in Washington. Meir spoke to say that Palestinian youth were committed to supporting immigration. One major debate referred to the Anglo-American so-called Morrison-Grady plan that proposed a form of cantonization of the country into four regions under British trusteeship. There were sharp divisions on this plan, and it was defeated by only a small majority. Weizmann was in favor of a British proposal for a Jewish-Arab conference to attempt to reach some agreement on all the issues, but the movement decided against this, and this resulted in his resignation as President of a Congress that then became leaderless.
After 1948, the World Zionist Organization gradually moved into being a political mobilization arm of the new State with many of its functions being taken over by the Israeli Government, but the Jewish Agency was not dismantled.
Congresses were never going to be the same as hitherto. All post-1948 Congresses have been held in Jerusalem and have been mild in activities and controversies compared to those pre-State years.
The first in 1951 opened symbolically at Herzl’s grave and declared the Basle program replaced by the ‘Jerusalem Program’ that specified that “the task of Zionism is the consolidation of the State of Israel, the ingathering of the exiles in Eretz Yisrael, and the fostering of the unity of the Jewish people.” A coalition of all factions except for the Revisionists—now called Herut and later Likud—was formed. Congress resolved that the Zionist Organization was representative of Jews the world over.
There was no lack of debate in the following meetings held at four-year intervals until 1972, and many of these debates centered on Israeli issues and interaction with Diaspora Jewry. Nahum Goldmann became President in 1956, thus filling a post vacant for ten years, and he served the movement in that capacity until 1968.
In 1961, Ben-Gurion expressed concern about the relationship of the Israeli Government with the Zionist Organization and leveled severe criticisms at it.
The Jerusalem program was amended in 1968 to emphasize that, in order to ensure the unity of the Jewish people, Jewish education, as well as Jewish spiritual and cultural values, must be preserved, and furthermore, that Jewish rights the world over should be protected.
In 1978, Congress eventually accepted the principle of religious equality so that the Reform and Conservative movements were now given equal status. Likud emerged as the major party at Congress outflanking their Labor opponents with 50% more delegates than Mapai.
There were unusual noisy scenes at the 1982 Congress following building construction on the West Bank and Gaza. Some delegates wanted this to cease, but a resolution was passed saying that Congress “agreed to disagree.” How times had again changed!
Congress in 1987, not satisfied with the decision in 1978 on religious equality, returned to this problem and passed a resolution calling for complete equality of all groups and for all rabbis to be allowed to carry out their appropriate religious functions. The Mizrachi delegation was understandably most unhappy with this decision.
The centenary Congress of 1997 was again concerned with the principle of religious pluralism, and it also decided that future Congresses should have at least a quarter of the delegates aged between 18 and 30. One unusual feature of this Congress was a resolution asking for clemency for Jonathan Pollard who had been convicted of spying in the United States for Israel (an American ally!) with President Clinton being urged to commute his harsh sentence.
The next Congress held in 2003 issued a lengthy resolution on the role of the State and its relationship with the Diaspora. It insisted on Israel being central to all Jewish needs and expressed the continued importance of immigration and the fight against antisemitism and anti-Zionism.
The most recent Congresss held in 2006 was quite different from many of its predecessors in that the controversies were relatively minor. Congress was worried about its future role vis à vis Jewish/Zionist politics, and it called for full implementation of the Jerusalem Program. It was worried that its status relative to that of the sovereign state was being diminished, and it pleaded for the Knesset to ensure that the country’s planned constitution would apply to all its citizens. There was also concern about integrating youth into society and ensuring that such youth got involved more in the activities of Congress. Had the 1997 resolution not been implemented? One other point of note was that whereas in the old days most of the Zionist Executive members were prominent, well-known individuals throughout the Jewish world, most of the present Executive were unknown outside Israel. Even those elected as honorary fellows of the movement were unfamiliar names.
What is the future of the Zionist Congress, and what is the rationale for its continuation? Questions have for some time been asked about the need for a World Zionist Organization (WZO) that has lost much of its influence since the early 1950s when Ben-Gurion actually considered its abolition, and many of its functions are now the Israeli Government’s responsibilty. In many ways, it has become more and more associated with propaganda on behalf of Israel. WZO has a large budget raised principally from Keren Hayesod, and the Jewish Agency plays a key role in facilitating economic development and absorption of immigrants as well as assisting in Jewish education. Congress has been described as being the Parliament of the Jewish people, and there is a role for it in resolving political issues resulting from WZO actions. One thing, however, is clear—the oratory at this year’s Congress will exhibit nothing like the passion and emotions shown by the great speakers at the historic Congresses of the past. •
About the author
Cecil Bloom, a resident of England, is a free-lance writer and researcher predominantly on Jewish and Israeli subjects. His essays have been published in many journals worldwide, from Midstream in the U.S.A. to Jewish Affairs in South Africa.