Nineteenth-century Zionists believed landscape itself could generate Jewish art

Evidence

As Theodor Herzl, founding father of Zionism, observed in his allegorical manifesto/novel, ‘If I wish to substitute a new building for an old one, I must demolish before I construct.’ In a kind of realization that took place half a century later, one-time deputy-mayor of West Jerusalem Meron Benvenisti recalled, ‘As a member of a pioneering youth movement, I myself “made the desert bloom” by uprooting the ancient olive trees of al-Bassa to clear the ground for a banana grove, as required by the “planned farming” principles of my kibbutz, Rosh Haniqra.’ Renaming is central to the cadastral effacement/replacement of the Palestinian Arab presence that Benvenisti poignantly recounts. — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism, 929 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Zionist art invented an imagined local-oriental tradition to legitimize nationalist claims — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 624; Zionist art framed oriental Jews as living evidence of an authentic Jewish past — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 617; Zionist land imagery gendered the land and denied Arab history (+4 more)

Broader Connections

• Zionist settlement ideology deliberately demolished native landscapes before rebuilding. #complicates (0.72)
• Zionist land practices deliberately effaced Palestinian presence through demolition and renaming #complicates (0.72) — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism, 929