When they heard about Theodor Herzl’s bold proclamations about the “Jewish people” and the “Jewish homeland,” American Jewish leaders scoffed.

“We consider ourselves no longer a nation but a religious community,” the leadership of Reform Judaism, the Central Conference of American Rabbis, declared as a principle at their 1885 conference in Pittsburgh. And Orthodox leaders were equally dismissive, opining that a Jewish state would be created only if God, not Theodor Herzl, willed it.

But as a growing number of immigrants from Eastern Europe crossed the Atlantic, memories of pogroms fresh in their minds and unconvinced that America would turn out to be Zion, the antipathy began shifting until Zionism became a central facet of American Jewish identity and life.

Three prominent scholars will join us to discuss the reasons behind the early hostility to Herzl’s ideas, how these views shifted and the challenges Zionism faces within our community today.

With:

Dr. Anita Shapira, Founder of the Yitzhak Rabin Center and winner of the Israel Prize. Shapira is professor emerita of Jewish history and former head of the Weizmann Institute for the Study of Zionism at Tel Aviv University. She has published 12 books, five of which were translated into English, the most recent being Israel: A History (Brandeis University Press) and David Ben Gurion, Father of Modern Israel (Yale University Press).

Dr. Jonathan Sarna is Director of the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies and Professor of American Jewish History at Brandeis University. He is the author of more than 30 books including the award-winning American Judaism: A History.

Dr. Mark Raider is a professor of Modern Jewish History at the University of Cincinnati. Raider has edited volumes about Zionist leaders and activists and is the author of The Emergence of American Zionism.

Moderated by Russell F. Robinson, Chief Executive Officer of Jewish National Fund-USA.