Jewish Territorialism and ‘Other Zions'

Abstract

This chapter brings together the histories of several non-Zionist Jewish political movements, parties, and organisations that can be labelled either Jewish Territorialist or Diaspora Nationalist. Rather than offering neatly delineated definitions of these movements and the ideologies they represented, their histories are mainly told through the prism of several of their protagonists. By focusing on the political trajectories of figures such as Israel Zangwill, Isaac Steinberg, Simon Dubnow, and Chaim Zhitlowsky, the complex reality of twentieth-century Jewish politics is laid bare and made comprehensible. Moreover, this chapter focuses on the way in which the Jewish Territorialist Movement and Diaspora Nationalist groups related – often in changing ways – to Zionism. Meanwhile, Jewish Territorialism and Diaspora Nationalism are also discussed on their own terms, independent of Zionism, to do full justice to the varying degrees of significance that these movements held on the Jewish political scene for over half a century.