Henry Wise:

To what extent did the holocaust ignite a movement to allow the Jews to
return to Palestine.

While the Holocaust did ignite the International Community’s understanding of the
Jewish need for a homeland, the Modern Zionist movement had begun this work
many years earlier. Almost sixty years before the War, a conglomerate of like-minded
Jews began to meet every year to discuss the issues surrounding Zionism. Despite
their large-scale operations, the Anti-Semitic governments of the time led to their
mission being largely unrealised. After the war however, the Media began to expose
the disgusting actions undertaken during the Holocaust, this created a mass feeling
of guilt within the worlds Majority of the World’s Governments, leading to them
finally realising the futility of absolute Jewish diasporic assimilation.1 Despite this
feeling of mass guilt, it did not translate into support for a Jewish Homeland.
However, when the disgusting conditions Displaced Persons (DP) were kept in was
exposed, the General Public finally declared its support for a Jewish State.
The notion of a Jewish homeland in Palestine was not, as the majority of the world’s
governments believed, a revolutionary idea. It had existed for thousands of years;
however, the modern form of Zionism had been developed nearly half a century
before the Holocaust.2 It begun in 1894, when a young journalist by the name of
Theodor Herzl came to a realisation, that the Jews will never be able to fully
assimilate.3 He refined his thinking into a pamphlet, Der Judenstaat, or the Jewish
State; Creating a World Zionist Congress, Herzl coordinated efforts to settle Palestine
and create a Jewish Homeland. Even though it was not a sovereign state, the view
was that by settling the area, they could establish a cultural centre of Judaism, to
ensure that Assimilation never came to fruition.4 Their efforts were recognised by
the British parliament in 1917, with the Balfour Declaration, a letter sent to Lord
Rothschild, a leader of the British Jewish Community.5 This letter shows that the
“Great Powers (of Europe)” had recognised the work of the Zionists, their inaction
highlights the lack of understanding regarding the urgency of the creation of a Jewish
Homeland. These actions of Early Modern Zionists created an infrastructure and a

1
The Jewish Virtual Library defines Assimilation as “the sociocultural process in which the sense and
consciousness of association with one national and cultural group changes to identification with another such
group, so that the merged individual or group may partially or totally lose its original national identity.”
2
Creation of the State of Israel n.d., viewed 08 March 2019, <
https://www.adl.org/resources/backgrounders/creation-of-the-state-of-israel >.
3
Herzl Theodore 1896, 'Society of Jews and Jewish State', in Der Judenstaat, Leipzig and Wien, Vienna.
viewed 8 March 2019, (online MidEastWeb).
4
This is a mixture of Spiritual Zionism and Practical Zionism.
5
Balfour, Arthur James 1917, Balfour Declaration, Letter on Behalf of the King, November 2, 1917.
culture in Palestine under the British Mandate. However, despite the increasing
Jewish population and the evident wishes of the Jewish Community for a Sovereign
State, the majority of the world’s governments never acted upon this.6
After the War, the Media’s exposure of the horrors of the Holocaust created deep-
seated feelings of guilt within the International Community. This helped the majority
of the world’s governments to finally understand the need for a Sovereign Jewish
Homeland. The blatant disgust towards the Nazis on trial at Nuremberg is very easy
for one to see when reading newspaper articles of the time. For example, after one
Nazi leader, Robert Ley killed himself the Guardian, a well-regarded English
newspaper remarked: “Robert Ley, a Nazi Leader, commits suicide, potentially
making the Nuremberg Trials shorter”.7 While it is unclear whether this was said in
jest or nor, it is easy to see how much hate the British held towards the Nazi
Leadership. The Milwaukee Journal describes a poster saying “Death to the Belsen
Men”8 that had been hung up by local civilians around Nuremburg. These posters
demonstrate that the German People were feeling guilty. This raising of awareness
led to the UN’s near unanimous decision to recognise the state of Israel as a
sovereign state, with Great Britain abstaining, and Egypt voting against.9 The Press’s
reporting of the Nuremberg Trials was instrumental in the creation of a sovereign
state of Israel
The major cause however, was the Refugee Crisis and the subsequent appalling
treatment of DPs; Mainly the official internment led by the Allies, however there
were also actions by the general public that exacerbated the problem. After the
liberation of the concentration camps, the allies, under the command of General
Patton decided to house them within the now liberated camps. Patton’s dismal view
of Jews no doubt led to their subsequent mistreatment. Patton once said in his diary
“In the second place, Harrison and his ilk believe that the Displaced Person is a
human being, which he is not, and this applies particularly to the Jews, who are
lower than animals”.10 Patton’s sentiments show that despite feeling sorry for DPs,
there were still anti-Semitic sentiments within the Allied Leadership. However, it was
not just those in control who contributed, in 1946, a group of Jews tried to resettle in
their home town of Kielce, in Poland. Local Police, and civilians rose and slew 42 of

6
Creation of the State of Israel n.d., viewed 08 March 2019, <
https://www.adl.org/resources/backgrounders/creation-of-the-state-of-israel >.
7
Writers at the Guardian 1945, 'Robert Ley, a Nazi Leader, commits suicide, potentially making the
Nuremberg Trials shorter', The Guardian, 27 October, p. 4.
8
N/A 1945, 'Jackson Wants Speed at Nuremberg Trials', The Milwaukee Journal, 2 November, p. 9.
9
United Nations General Assembly (1947), United Nations Special Committee on Palestine, vol. 1, Official
Records, Lake Success, New York.
10
Lichtblau, E 2015, Surviving the Nazis, only to be Jailed by America, The New York Times, New York.
these Jews in cold blood.11 Thus revitalising the Pogroms of the late 19th and early
20th centuries. Such pogroms continued throughout Eastern Europe, leading to Jews
who had refused repatriation to Israel, desperately rushing to Palestine. In order to
control this, the British (who were in control of Palestine) relocated refugees to
internment camps in Cyprus.12 Within these camps, Jews were kept in conditions
similar to the German Concentration Camps, even going so far as to forcing Jews to
take a shower, leading to some immediate heart attacks. As soon as the public found
out these camps, the tide turned against Britain. Britain subsequently presented the
United Nations General Assembly with a proposal to separate Palestine into states,
one Jewish and one Arabic13. While this proposal wasn’t successful, thus begun the
final, successful fight for a Sovereign Jewish Homeland in Palestine. The awful
treatment of the Jews after the Holocaust by the Allies and European Public was the
catalyst for the International Community’s realisation of the need for a Jewish
Homeland.
Jewish Luminaries had, for decades before the Holocaust, been pioneering Palestine
under the British Mandate in the hopes of creating a Jewish Homeland. However,
this all changed after the Second World War, the press’s fascination with the
holocaust led to the general public developing serious feelings of guilt regarding the
treatments of Jews. However, the straw that broke the camel’s back was the
inhumane treatment of Displaced Persons after the war. All these reasons led to the
International Community beginning a movement to establish a Jewish homeland in
what was then Palestine. Despite the holocaust influencing the United Nation’s
decision to establish a Jewish homeland in Palestine, the most influential reason was
the conditions the “Jewish Race” was kept in after the holocaust.

11
Post-war Refugee Crisis and the Establishment of the State of Israel n.d., viewed 22 March 2019, <
https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/postwar-refugee-crisis-and-the-establishment-of-the-
state-of-israel >.
12
Cyprus Detention Camps n.d., viewed 22 March 2019,
<https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/cyprus-detention-camps >.
13
Post-war Refugee Crisis and the Establishment of the State of Israel n.d., viewed 22 March 2019, <
https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/postwar-refugee-crisis-and-the-establishment-of-
the-state-of-israel >.
 Bibliography:
Assimilation n.d., viewed 08 March 2019, < https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/assimilation >.
Balfour, Arthur James 1917, Balfour Declaration, Letter on Behalf of the King, November 2, 1917.
N/A 2016, Creation of the State of Israel n.d., viewed 08 March 2019, <
https://www.adl.org/resources/backgrounders/creation-of-the-state-of-israel >.
N/A 2018, Cyprus Detention Camps n.d., viewed 22 March 2019, <
https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/cyprus-detention-camps >.
Friesel, E 1996, 'The Holocaust: Factor in the Birth of Israel?', in Major Changes Within the Jewish People
in the Wake of the Holocaust, Yad Vashem, Jerusalem, 519-544.
Herzl Theodore 1896, 'Society of Jews and Jewish State', in Der Judenstaat, Leipzig and Wien, Vienna.
viewed 8 March 2019, (online MidEastWeb).
Lichtblau, E 2015, Surviving the Nazis, Only to be Jailed by America, The New York Times, New York.
N/A 1945, 'Jackson Wants Speed at Nuremberg Trials', The Milwaukee Journal, 2 November, p. 9.
N/A 2015, Postwar Refugee Crisis and the Establishment of the State of Israel n.d., viewed 22 March
2019, < https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/postwar-refugee-crisis-and-the-
establishment-of-the-state-of-israel >.
Practical Zionism n.d., viewed 08 March 2019, < https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/practical-zionism >.
Spiritual Zionism n.d., viewed 08 March 2019, < https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/spiritual-zionism >.
United Nations General Assembly (1947), United Nations Special Committee on Palestine, vol. 1, Official
Records, Lake Success, New York.
Writers at the Guardian 1945, 'Robert Ley, a Nazi Leader, commits suicide, potentially making the
Nuremberg Trials shorter', The Guardian, 27 October, p. 4.