Zionism (Hebrew: צִיּוֹנוּת Tsiyyonut [t͡sijo̞ˈnut] after Zion) is the nationalist movement of the Jewish people that espouses the re-establishment of and support for a Jewish state in the territory defined as the historic Land of Israel (roughly corresponding to Canaan, the Holy Land, or the region of Palestine). Modern Zionism emerged in the late 19th century in Central and Eastern Europe as a national revival movement, both in reaction to newer waves of antisemitism and as a response to Haskalah, or Jewish Enlightenment. Soon after this, most leaders of the movement associated the main goal with creating the desired state in Palestine, then an area controlled by the Ottoman Empire.
Until 1948, the primary goals of Zionism were the re-establishment of Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel, in gathering of the exiles, and liberation of Jews from the antisemitic discrimination and persecution that they experienced during their diaspora. Since the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, Zionism continues primarily to advocate on behalf of Israel and to address threats to its continued existence and security.
A religious variety of Zionism supports Jews upholding their Jewish identity defined as adherence to religious Judaism, opposes the assimilation of Jews into other societies, and has advocated the return of Jews to Israel as a means for Jews to be a majority nation in their own state. A variety of Zionism, called cultural Zionism, founded and represented most prominently by Ahad Ha'am, fostered a secular vision of a Jewish "spiritual center" in Israel. Unlike Herzl, the founder of political Zionism, Ahad Ha'am strived for Israel to be "a Jewish state and not merely a state of Jews".
Advocates of Zionism view it as a national liberation movement for the repatriation of a persecuted people residing as minorities in a variety of nations to their ancestral homeland. Critics of Zionism view it as a colonialist, racist and exceptionalist ideology that led advocates to violence during Mandatory Palestine, followed by the exodus of Palestinians, and the subsequent denial of their right to return to lands and property lost during the 1948 and 1967 wars.
- A Just Zionism: On the Morality of the Jewish State
- After Zionism: One State for Israel and Palestine
- The Jews of Baghdad and Zionism: 1920-1948
- Anti-Zionism and Antisemitism in the Contemporary World
- Army of Shadows: Palestinian Collaboration with Zionism, 1917–1948
- Plowshares into Swords: From Zionism to Israel
- Balfour's Shadow: A Century of British Support for Zionism and Israel
- Churchill's Promised Land: Zionism and Statecraft
- Class Struggle and the Jewish Nation
- Deconstructing Zionism: A Critique of Political Metaphysics
- Tortured Zionism: Messianism, Ambivalence, and Israel in Post-Holocaust Jewish American Literature
- Einstein on Politics: His Private Thoughts and Public Stands on Nationalism, Zionism, War, Peace, and the Bomb
- Ethnic Nationalism and State Power: The Rise of Irish Nationalism, Afrikaner Nationalism and Zionism
- Exiled in the Homeland: Zionism and the Return to Mandate Palestine
- Faith at the Crossroads: A Theological Profile of Religious Zionism
- The Hidden History of Zionism
- Introduction to Zionism and Israel
- Israeli Exceptionalism: The Destabilizing Logic of Zionism
- Jewish-Israeli National Identity and Dissidence
- Judaism or Zionism: What Difference for the Middle East
- Parting Ways: Jewishness and the Critique of Zionism
- Masters of Deception: Zionism, 9/11 and the War on Terror Hoax
- Messianic Religious Zionism Confronts Israeli Territorial Compromises
- Modernism and Zionism
- Nation and History: Israeli Historiography between Zionism and Post-Zionism
- New Zionism and the foreign policy system of Israel
- Diaspora and Zionism in Jewish American Literature
- Our Promised Land: Faith and Militant Zionism in Israeli Settlements
- Sovereign Jews: Israel, Zionism, and Judaism
- The A to Z of Zionism
- The Dark Side of Zionism
- The False Prophets of Peace: Liberal Zionism and the Struggle for Palestine
- The Founding Fathers of Zionism
- The Myths of Zionism
- The New American Zionism
- The Political Philosophy of Zionism: Trading Jewish Words for a Hebraic Land
- The Quotable Hitchens: From Alcohol to Zionism
- The Zionism of God: A Biblical view of the history and meaning of Zion
- Zellig Harris: From American Linguistics to Socialist Zionism
- Zionism & Racism
- Zionism and Land Tenure in Mandate Palestine
- Zionism and the Arabs, 1936-1939
- Zionism and the Biology of Jews
- Zionism and the Creation of a New Society
- Zionism and the Roads Not Taken
- Zionism in an Arab Country: Jews in Iraq in the 1940s
- Zionism: A Very Short Introduction
- Zionism and the State of Israel
- Zionism in the Age of the Dictators
- Reform Zionism – A Way of Life
- The Peace and Violence of Judaism: From the Bible to Modern Zionism
- The Persistence of the Palestinian Question: Essays on Zionism and the Palestinians
- A History of Zionism: From the French Revolution to the Establishment of the State of Israel
- Jews Against Themselves
- New Dictionary of Theology: Historic and Systematic
- The Origins of Israeli Mythology: Neither Canaanites nor Crusaders
- The Question of Zion
- America's Palestine: Popular and Official Perceptions from Balfour to Israeli Statehood
- What Does a Jew Want?: On Binationalism and Other Specters
- Ben-Gurion's Scandals: How the Haganah and the Mossad Eliminated Jews
- A History of Israel: From the Rise of Zionism to Our Time
- The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion