http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zionism Zionism (Hebrew: ציונות, Tsiyonut) is the international political movement that originally supported the reestablishment of a homeland for the Jewish people in Palestine. The area was the Jewish Biblical homeland, called the Land of Israel (Hebrew: Eretz Yisra’el). Since the creation of Israel, the Zionist movement continues primarily as support for the modern state of Israel.[1] Zionism is based on the foundation of historical ties and religious traditions linking the Jewish people to the Land of Israel, where the concept of Jewish nationhood first evolved somewhere between 1200 BCE and the late Second Temple era (i.e. up to 70 CE).[2][3] Two millennia after the Jewish diaspora, the modern Zionist movement, beginning in the late 19th century, was mainly founded by secular Jews, largely as a response by European Jewry to antisemitism across Europe, especially in Russia.[4] The re-creation of a Jewish national homeland was also strongly advocated by American scholars, such as Louis Brandeis, as a solution to this “Jewish problem” and a way to “revive the Jewish spirit.”[5]
