In 1973, Israel’s Ambassador to the UN, Yosef Tekoah, felt compelled to respond to attacks on Zionism at the Security Council.

He said:

“Zionism is the love of Zion. Zionism is the Jewish people’s liberation movement, the quest for freedom, for equality with other nations.”

He didn’t define it as a modern political invention. He defined it as a 2,700-year continuum:

“When the Jews sat by the rivers of Babylon and wept and sought ways to go home — that was Zionism.

“When they were the last people in the Mediterranean to resist the Roman Empire — that was Zionism.

“When, dispersed all over the world, they continued to dream and strive to return to Israel — that was Zionism.

“When they volunteered to fight with the Allies in WWI to end Ottoman subjugation, and formed the Jewish Brigade to fight Hitler in WWII — that was Zionism.

“When Jews went to Nazi gas chambers with the name of Jerusalem on their lips — that was Zionism.

Tekoah made two points that are often lost today:

1. Zionism is one of the world’s oldest anti-imperialist movements.

It was not born in the ghettos of Europe, but on the battlefield against imperialism in ancient Israel. It is the movement to secure for the Jewish people the rights possessed by other nations.

2. It harbors malice towards none.

As he put it: “It seeks cooperation and understanding with the Arab peoples and with their national movements.”

This statement is worth remembering in any debate about national movements at the UN:

“Zionism is as sacred to the Jewish people as the national liberation movements are to the nations of Africa and Asia.”

If there is to be hope for peace, he argued, there must be mutual respect for each other’s sacred national values — not distortion and abuse.

Source: Remarks to the UN Security Council by Yosef Tekoah, Permanent Representative of Israel to the UN, October 21, 1973 [UN Doc]
https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-178210/

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