11 янв 1902 г. - Theodore Herzl Letter penned but not yet sent to Cecil Rhodes January 11, 1902 Vienna

Описание:

January 11, 1902 Vienna

Cowen informs that he is again making efforts to get a meeting
with Cecil Rhodes for me. The robber raider Dr. Jameson is acting
as the intermediary on the Rhodes side. However, on account of
my bread-givers, who might become angry, I cannot now risk a
trip that promises nothing certain. Therefore I wired that I could
come only if Rhodes were seriously interested in the matter. In
order to initiate this, I am sending the following memorandum to
London, to be translated by Zangwill and transmitted by Cowen:

Mr. Cecil Rhodes:
For some months mutual friends have been trying on my behalf to arrange a meeting between us. At the moment, however, I am so inordinately busy that it would hardly be possible for me to come to London, unless I knew in advance that you took serious interest in the matter. This, to be sure, would be a sufficiently strong reason to travel, for I need you. In fact, all things considered, you are the only man who can help me now. Of course, I am not concealing from myself the fact that you are not likely to do so. The probability is perhaps one in a million, if this can be expressed In figures at all.
But it is a big—some say, too big—thing. To me it does not seem too big for Cecil Rhodes. This sounds like flattery; however, it does not reside in the words, but in the offer. If you participate, then you are the man. If you don't, then I have simply made a mistake. You are being invited to help make history. That cannot frighten you, nor will you laugh at it. It is not in your accustomed line; it doesn't involve Africa, but a piece of Asia Minor, not Englishmen, but Jews.
But had this been on your path, you would have done it yourself
by now.
How, then, do I happen to turn to you, since this is an out-of-the way matter for you? How indeed? Because it is something colonial, and because it presupposes understanding of a development which will take twenty or thirty years. There are visionaries who look past greater spaces of time, but they lack a practical sense. Then again there are practical people, like the trust magnates in America, but they lack political imagination. But you, Mr. Rhodes, are a visionary politician or a practical visionary. You have already demonstrated this. And what I want you to do is not to give me or lend me a few guineas, but to put the stamp of your authority on the Zionist plan and to make the following declaration to a few people who swear by you: I, Rhodes, have examined this plan and found it correct and practicable. It is a plan full of culture, excellent for the group of people for whom it is directly designed, not detrimental to the general progress of mankind, and quite good for England, for Greater Britain. If you and your associates supply the requested financial aid for this, you will, in addition to these satisfactions, have the satisfaction of making a good profit. For what is being asked for is money.
What is the plan? To settle Palestine with the homecoming Jewish people.
When I started it 6 years ago, I was brutally derided. I disdained the scoffers and went ahead. In these 6 years the Jews in all parts of the world have been shaken up. At five Congresses there has been effected an organization with thousands of associations all over the world. The Zionists obey a mot d’ordre [command] from Manchuria to Argentina from Canada to the Cape and New Zealand The greatest concentration of our adherents is in Eastern Europe. of the 5 million Jews in Russia, surely four million swear by our program. We have party organs in all civilized languages. Eye single day there are mass meetings of our people in the most diverse places. Yet our demands are so formulated that no government has proceeded against them as yet, not even the Russian government. As early as 1898 I won the German Kaiser himself for the cause me in a lengthy audience at Yildiz Kiosk in Constantinople, in the presence of Bulow. Later he officially received me in Jerusalem with four of my associates, as the representatives of Zionism. I have transmitted a detailed memorandum to the Czar through another ruler, and thereupon the Czar bestowed his benevolent neutrality upon us. Last May I brought the matter before the Sultan in a long conference, and he granted me his grace. In England we have countless Christian friends, in the Church as well as in the press, and in the House of Commons there are 37 (?) members who have promised to support Zionism.
This cursory apercu [survey] of our political situation may suffice.
And this movement, which has had such an unprecedented development in 6 years, vainly cries out for money. Why? Because the big Jewish financiers against us. They are afraid, they have no imagination, they lend money only on dead pledges.

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