Al Jazeera June 7, 2025 Settler-colonial mentality; Since its founding in 1948 Israel has sought to convince the world and its Jewish citizens that it was created “on a land without a people”.
While this narrative has successfully caught on — particularly among the younger generations of Israelis — the forefathers of the Israeli state openly spoke about “colonisation” and settling a land with a hostile native population.
Theodor Herzl, considered the father of modern Zionism, planned to reach out to well-known British colonialist Cecil Rhodes, who led the British colonisation of Southern Africa, for advice on and approval of his plan to colonise Palestine.
Vladimir Jabotinsky, a revisionist Zionist who founded the far-right Zionist group Betar in Latvia, strategised in his writings on ways to address native resistance.
In his 1923 essay The Iron Wall, he wrote; “Every native population in the world resists colonists as long as it has the slightest hope of being able to rid itself of the danger of being colonised. That is what the Arabs in Palestine are doing.”
This settler-colonial mentality played a central role in shaping the domestic, foreign and military policies of the newly founded Israel. Today, almost 80 years after the creation of the Israeli state, expansionism and aggressive military posturing continue to define the Israeli regional strategy.
Despite official rhetoric about seeking peace and normalisation of relations in the region, the Israeli aspiration to achieve a Greater Israel — one that includes not only occupied Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem, but also parts of modern-day Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan — persists.
