The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1900-09-03
JEWS DREAM OF ZION
WHY 1T is THAT THEY ARE FIXING
THEIR EYES on PALESTINE.
No Longer Content to Be Lodeers in
Any Land. They Want a Coun-
try All Their own.
!. Greenberr. in I,ondon Mail.


down: we wept when we remembered
Zion
The author of the short Psalm I'm which
these words occur, and which contain more
of tenderness and ferocity than are con-
tanned in almost any piece of literature OF
equal brevity. would seem TO have set the
prototype i'm imagination of the Zionist
Congress. And here. after lapse of be-
tween two and three thousand years. we
have been this week in congress by the
waters of modern Babylon-we have recol-
lected Zion--but we have not wept. For
the days of weeping for Zion are over.
DIR. Herzl has dried the tears of Jewry.
He has comforted its people by infusing
into them the spirit of determination no
longer to weep over their fallen land. but
to work. to strive and TO labor for the new
nation that is to be raised upon the ruins
of the old. What imagination is there suf-
ficiently gifted to realize what the interval
between that congress" by the waters OF
ancient Babylon and the congress which
has sat this week by the waters of modern
Babylon has contained for the jew? What
tragedy, what comedy-the tragedy forced
upon him, the comedy educed from his
never-failing fund of patient humor
UNFoRGoTTEN NATIONALISM
But whether he had been under the In
fluence of the tragedy from without or the
comedy from within the yearning for ma
tionality has never wholly deserted the
Jew.
h The clammy damp OF adversely and the
sun of prosperity have between Them how
81, t1or
shapes the aspiration for nationality. so
that often It is scarcely recognizable. Else
why is il that we Zionists have still 10
carry on nationalist propaganda work?
Why is ii that are still piled by Jews
themselves with remarkable questions as
to our aspirations and intentions; that we
should, at a congress like this, ten times
day have to declaim to all and sundry some
mere elementary truths-for ingtance, that
the Zionist movement is not a movement
for compelling every Jew TO go 10 Pales-
tine, nor a movement for providing LORD
Rothschild with the post Of ambassador TO
Judea at the court of st. James.
Zionism. to put IL shortly, is the rousng
of Jewry from its laissez-faire. 1t has had
enough and to spare of the buffetings, the
cruelty. the viciousness, the prejudice OF
this world. Too long has the Jew been
content to be ledger in every land. He
has determined now TO gain higher fran
chise In mems esteem and regain for him.
self a national home.
WHERE THE JEW is FREE.
In England. where the Jew is not even
free and tolerated-for these mere express
sions involve suspicion of inequality-but
where there is utter nondifferentiation be-
tween Jew and gentle. the reason why the
Jew desires a national existence of his own
is often misunderstood. But the 10000 Jews
in England are mere drop in the ocean of
twelve millions of Jews at present scat
tered across the world. And yet. OF these
twelve millions. the 10000 who are in the
United Kingdom. with perhaps another 100.-
600 in India and the colonies, are the only
Jews who are free from the Judenschmerz
pressing i'm varying degrees of harshness.
Thus the Jewish question: to be compre-
hended. must be looked al altogether apart
from England 1t must be looked at from
the point of view of the millions of our
brothers whose cry to-day goes up TO the
very heavens-"We cannot live. II must
be looked at from the point of vev, of the
Jew in the pale of settlement in Russia. i'm
the dirty. tumble-down novels of Galicia.
in Roumania. in Bulgaria. whose chorus of
despair is-"We cannot live
To appreciate the Jewish question. we
have to recol.ect that. in grim irony. these
Jews grow and multiply, so that their pales
of settlement become relatively smaller.
and from the disease and death against
which they fight they gain the only relief
that comes TO their social position. a few.
comparatively, have Travelled on to the
western world.
UNWELCOME IN THE WEST.
The Western world receives them but
charity. Some 10000 or 50,e0O. by all &C
counts. have settled here during the last
twenty years. and. even in free hospitabe
England. the cry of "alien invasion" and
the threat of the restriction of alien immi-
grafton has been the result. To America.
perhaps some 100000 or 500. 900 have gone in
the same period. and. though the virgin
territory of the western world is even to-
day practically limitless. yet America looks
narrowly upon tnese aliens. and Sits and
winnows her migra ton from the East.
Thus, the Eastern Jew-and he is prac-
tically the JEWS between a cleft stick
He cannot stay, he cannot go, for there Is
no place on earth that bids him welcome,
and the business of Zionsm Is to find some
place in which welcome will be unnecessary
publicly-recognized, legally-assured
home. For that purpose Palestine, with the
historical and religious associations which
bind il to the Jew, has been fixed upon,
and thus. it will be seen that the latter-day
needs of the Jew synchronize with his an
cient aspiration-that his poetic yearning
for Zion is backed by the rugged prose OF
the position in which he finds himself
1t is from persecution that the Jew suf-
fers. and from persecution he must rio
himself He must clear himself Of his pres
Thus the question resolves itself to-day into
one word-Where? and Zionists answer
'-Zion!"
NOT CHARITY, But A COUNTRY.
| Till DIR. Herzl formulated his scheme
charitable effort was the savorite panacea.
But people that relies for its existence
| upon charity might. indeed, far preferably
perish. But even charity has its limits
and the weather. Jews OF the Western
world themselves felt something like a
panic when, few weeks ago. only few
| hundred Roumanians trekked across Eu.
| rope westward.
| Yet there are 10000 Roumanian Jews
| there are close on million Galician Jews
| and | know not how many millions of Jews
| in Russia. They cannot all go to Palestine
| / hear ii objected. But Palestine would, II
| developed. at least support within rea.
| sonable time sufficient number TO relieve
| for the next century the congestion and
pressure in eastern Jewry.
And those who are likely 10 remain out.
| side Palestine Zionism also serves. For the
| would give a status TO Jews which would
mean much for those cast among the ma
| tions of the earth. National association
| the consciousness OF belonging TO a body
| polite, the historic bond-which the Jew
| cannot possess while he IL scattered-is &c
| people its very lifeblood-
GRADUAL MOVEMENT.
| To set the foundations of nationality, col
onizing operations. gradually. slowly. mus
take place But these cannot be commenced
with any safety until the Jew is accorded
his right as a Jew in the country which h,