Zionism: What is it exactly?

Zionism (Hebrew: צִיּוֹנוּת, translit. Tsiyonut) is the national movement of Jews and Jewish culture that supports the creation of a Jewish homeland.

Zionism comes from the word Zion. Zion is the holiest part in Jerusalem. As you are aware Jerusalem has many significance to both Christians as Jews as it is the holiest cities for Jews and Christians.

At one time the ancestors of the Jews had lived in Israel and were exiled by the Romans. They had also face exiles before during the Babylonian and Persian empire.

The descendants of Israel recently returned to the homeland (promised land believed in the covenant), Israel, which was known as the land of Canaan and not Palestine.

Zionism is the belief that descendants of Israel have the right to return back to their ancestral and historic land. Throughout the world there is only 1 place that shows a lot of historical and archaeological evidence that this is the true Jewish homeland.

The original goal was a home land for the Jews scattered though out the world. That goal was reached in 1948, when approximately the present Israel boundaries were taken from some weak Arab nations, which had sided with Adolf Hitler in World War two. The movement has scattered in various ways since then. Sort of like United We Stand America, after the second USA presidential bid of Ross Perot.

The belief that the Jewish people should have a homeland, Israel, and, in the present day, support for the existence of the state of Israel.

Recognizing Israel's right to exist. That's it. I don't have to agree with everything Israel does, nr do I have to see Israel as having a high moral ground, just that they have a right to exist.

Several different meanings depending on religious affiliation.

The word Zion has various meanings in the scriptures. The most general definition of the word is “the pure in heart.” Zion is often used in this way to refer to the Lord's people or to the Church and its stakes. It has also been used to refer to specific geographical locations.

return of Jews to what is now Israel

yeah

.Zionism is the desire for the nation people Israel ( the Jews ) to live in the homeland of eretz Yisrael, ( Israel ) in peace. Zionism challenges the world to maintain standards of equal accountability and equal human rights. It is no more racist for Jews to wish to maintain self-determination and self-rule in our homeland than it is for any of the Muslim /Arab nations to exist that are often theocracies and dictatorships rather than the secular democracy that is the State of Israel whose laws protect the religious freedom of all citizens. The *political* movement of Zionism promotes the existence of the Democratic nation State of Israel to exist as a secular democracy, not a theocracy. The laws of the State of Israel protect the holy sites of other religions and protects the right of all citizens to worship their religions in peace. Torah does not teach us that God is exclusive to the Jews, it obligates the Jews to be exclusive to God. Judaism is the religion of the Jewish people.

http://zionism-israel.com/zionism_definitions.htm

http://zionism-israel.com/issues/

Because there are so many people who have worked so hard in efforts to misrepresent Zionism to mean something utterly repugnant to Zionists that violates the core ethics of Judaism, I will answer with detail backed with objective evidence and references rather than "short and simple". I very strongly recommend reading the references I will list below to best help the curious reader to understand this topic in detail.

Zionists are people who believe that the homeland of the Jewish people has a right to exist as such, and that the Jewish people should have the very same human rights as all other nation people to maintain laws of self-determination and self-rule. Every nation people have a beginning, a homeland. For the Jews, Israel is that land. There has never been a time in well over 2000 years that Israel was NOT seen as the eternal homeland of the nation of Israel and there shall never be a time as long as Jews exist on planet earth when it is not the homeland of Israel even if the surrounding nations were to wipe the government of the current state of Israel out. If they were to do so, it would violate the very precepts they claim to want for themselves.

Unfortunately, increasing propagandizing has falsely labeled Zionism to be something it actually stands against, racism.

Because Israel is not a theocracy, it does not violate the UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, as do many Islamic nations that complain that Zionism is racist! Why are the Jewish people excluded from the basic human right of self-determination afforded to all other peoples under the guidelines of the Declaration of Human Rights?

It is no more racist than the idea of any nation/people to have a homeland and exist in peace with their neighbors. Israel allows non-Jews full rights of citizenship, voting and other rights. Many other nations do not allow such things for Jews. Zionism is in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights that affirm the fundamental importance of the right of self-determination of all peoples, by virtue of which they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development.

British Mandate Palestine covered a much larger area than the land of Israel and thus, Jordan, a Muslim nation of the Trans-Jordanian portion of Palestine (ruled by the Hashemites of the Quraish tribe) was given sovereignty over 80% of the land of Palestine. Palestine was divided into what they then called Cis-Jordan and Trans-Jordan, the portion comprising approximately 80% of Palestine. The State of Israel was created 70% of Cis-Jordan. The Muslim states of Jordan and Syria were clearly the lion’s share, yet no one appears to have a problem with the Muslim Palestinians having not one, but two nation-states carved out of more than ¾ of Palestine.

The Palestinian nation (PLO) people who formed in the years after the state of Israel was established at the organizing of Gamal Abdul Nasser and Yasser Arafat and other Egyptian nationalists, have the right to their own nation people status, but not at the expense of another established nation. A state called Palestine COULD have existed for 70 years if the surrounding Arab/Muslim nations had followed the example of Israel in establishing through legal means, a state that was in accordance with UN Charter rights. Instead, they chose to declare war on Israel and make permanent refugees of millions of their own who have now gone into a fourth and fifth generation of people who are nothing more than their political pawns to be used to justify elimination of Israel. Zionism's impact on modern society challenges the world to live up to equal standards of accountability and Human Rights.

I've never met a Jew who was not a Zionist. Millions of non-Jews around the world also recognize the basic human right of the Jewish people to have established through legitimate means, Democratic autonomy, and their right to live in peace alongside their neighbors. The Jews who are against political Zionism and their relevance to negate the basic human right of the Jews as a people to live in self-determination in their homeland in a democratic State(acknowledged by the Declaration of Human Rights) is impotent and moot. This vocal fringe element does not represent the Jewish people or Israel as a whole any more than members of the Westboro Baptist church represent American Christian consensus. There is a far higher percentage of U.S. citizens who are Scientologists who believe we’re all descended from aliens called Thetans than there are Jews in the world who believe Israel should not exist in peaceful co-existence with her neighbors as a democratic country.55,000 in the U.S. believe we're all alien spawn from an unknown to the rest of us planet Theta. It is not questionable to claim they do not represent the consensus of Armericans in the United States. How can it be considered logical or honest to permit a far tinier fringe group of Jews, considered extremists, who want fundamentalist religious rule in Israel rather than the Democratic state that now exists, a legitimate voice for the 14 million others? Why would non Jews find it acceptable to lump them in with those who want to eliminate the world's Jews *including* that fringe element LIVING IN Israel?

Antizionism is against the right of the State of Israel to exist in peace.

Israel absorbed 800-900 thousand Jewish refugees expelled from 14 Arab/Muslim nations as citizens rather than keep them as political pawns/refugees