|
Trending Topics
|
The 120th Anniversary of the First Zionist Congress
(Mosaic) Daniel Polisar - Theodor Herzl convened the First Zionist Congress in the Swiss city of Basel on August 29, 1897. As Herzl wrote in his diary on the eve of the gathering: "The whole thing is one of those balancing feats which look just as natural after they are accomplished as they seemed improbable before they were undertaken." The Congress led to explosive growth within the Zionist movement. In Russia, the 23 Zionist societies before the Congress were joined by 350 new ones in its aftermath. In the U.S., the number of societies rose from 10 to 60. The writer is executive vice-president at Shalem College in Jerusalem.