It is my honor and duty to bring before this assembly the question of the relationship between the State of Israel and the Jewish diaspora. This relationship is unique in the world today and in all of human history. This fact must be stated boldly, but nonetheless with humility—and with an emphasis on why it is perfectly legitimate, and at the same time with an appreciation for the complex situations which may arise as a result. The uniqueness of this relationship is the direct and natural result, on the one hand, of the seemingly miraculous survival of the Jewish people over thousands of years, and, on the other hand, of the spectacular rise of an independent Israel in our time. The case of the Jewish people is unique in the annals of mankind. Equally unparalleled is the way Israel reached sovereign statehood, particularly when one looks at how other peoples attained their independence, whether recently or at any time in the past. The nature of the two sides of the relationship indicates that its distinctiveness and vitality spring from both deep historical roots reaching to antiquity and compelling political and psychological forces operating in our own day.

These ideas, with all that they imply, will probably be accepted as axiomatic when uttered from the podium at the World Jewish Congress. Here there is no need to demonstrate and rationalize yet again the elementary facts of Jewish self-perception—or, for that matter, of the world’s perception of the Jews—which certain Jewish groups, coming from different and even contradictory schools of thought, still try so unprofitably and ingloriously to discredit. The first of these cardinal facts is that, irrespective of geographical location or state allegiance, the Jews have always constituted a single people—a worldwide entity cutting across frontiers and braving great distances. The second is that the State of Israel is today the central unifying and galvanizing force for Jewish life everywhere.

These two facts are organically linked. In theory one can imagine the Jewish people continuing to exist, scattered throughout the world, even without a State of Israel to serve as its creative focus. Conversely, and again in theory, we can imagine Israel existing without all the manpower, physical support, and moral encouragement that it constantly receives from the diaspora. But in the light of history and contemporary realities, such ideas ought to be dismissed as idle speculation.

What is important to realize is that these historic concepts and the inherent unity among them, for all that they differ from the normal patterns in the life of nations, are by no means limited to the realm of perceptions. At a certain turning point in Jewish as well as world history, they merited authoritative international expression—they were, in fact, accorded full and formal international recognition.

By the terms of the Palestine Mandate, which incorporated the Balfour Declaration and made its fulfillment obligatory, the international community, as organized at the time in the League of Nations—and with the express approval of the United States, which had remained outside the league—adopted a truly revolutionary arrangement concerning the status of the Jewish people and the future of the land of Israel. That arrangement comprised a whole series of fundamental provisions, each of which was far-reaching in nature.

First and foremost, the Jewish people as a worldwide entity was officially recognized and accorded status in international law. The powers of the world recognized the existence of “the Jewish people” without awaiting the outcome of the internal dispute then being waged among the Jews themselves as to whether they were really a people or merely a religious community. And these powers formally acknowledged its existence not merely as an ethnic unit or a concept in history, but as a body collectively possessing certain political rights of a dynamic nature, which it was entitled to exercise in practice.

Second, recognition was given to the historic connection between the Jewish people and the land of Israel as a basis for the people’s rights in that land; the heritage of the ancient past was thus accepted as a determining factor for the policy of the future.

Third, as a clear outcome of this last point and the territorial settlement which accompanied it, the political identity of the land of Israel was re-established. The land did indeed re-emerge as a distinct territorial and administrative unit, which it had not been for centuries; and, as a separate unit, it was singled out for the application of a new and creative policy. Fourth, that policy, which was the axis for the revolutionary turn, was that of the reconstitution in Palestine of a Jewish national home, acknowledged as a fundamental right of the Jewish people. Fifth, this right was spelled out in more concrete terms by a provision which entitled Jews to settle the country in unlimited numbers, provided that they did not do so at the expense of its existing inhabitants; it signified, in effect, the right of the Jews to become the majority of Palestine’s population and eventually to turn it into a Jewish state. Sixth and last, the right was conferred on all Jews, irrespective of country of residence or state allegiance, to join together in forming a representative body possessing independent status, which would be entitled to promote the interests of the Jewish people regarding the future of its national home; thereby Jewish citizens of other lands were given the right to join an extraterritorial organization, and, through it, collectively and independently, to adopt positions and to express views on the subject of Palestine’s future which might conceivably differ from, and even be contrary to, those of their respective governments.

Altogether, it was an epoch-making decision which integrated the basic tenets of political Zionism into the framework of modern international law and completely revolutionized the international position of the Jewish people. One has to go back to the period of 1917-1922—from the year this policy was initiated by Great Britain until the year of its formal ratification by the League of Nations—and from that vantage point look back on the state of affairs which had prevailed until then, in order to realize in full its tremendous importance. Everlasting credit for this historic achievement is due to the inspiration and initiative of Dr. Chaim Weizmann, who, assisted by his colleagues, worked for this with all his might, as well as to the imaginative statesmanship of a group of British leaders, headed by David Lloyd George and including James Balfour, Jan Smuts, and others.

Attention must here be drawn to one crucial aspect of the new political order. Neither the Jewish people nor the land of Israel was recognized per se, on its own independent merits and without reference to the other. On the contrary, it was only through its historic connection with the land and for the purpose of rebuilding it that the Jewish people achieved its international recognition, just as it was only owing to its connection to the people, and its designation as an area that would be its national home, that the land of Israel was retrieved from political oblivion and re-established as a separate entity.

About thirty years later Jewish statehood was achieved. It received international approval by the November 1947 resolution of the United Nations General Assembly, and in May 1948 its founding was proclaimed by the Jews themselves. Statehood naturally transformed the entire international framework of the problem that I am addressing. Yet the substance of the basic Mandatory provisions governing the relationship of the people to the land must be regarded as having retained its full moral validity. By becoming a state, the land of Israel has not ceased to be the national home of the Jewish people, and this connection continues to be a part of the international order.

At first glance, the fact that this connection has been invested with an international imprimatur might seem to be of little significance. The attachment of the people to the land preceded its political legitimization by thousands of years. Indeed, had it not been a paramount fact of Jewish history and of contemporary Jewish life—had it not already resulted in the creation of new realities in the land, born of the will of the Jewish people—this attachment would never have been sanctioned by the outside world. Rather, even without formal recognition it may well have persisted, gathering momentum as the movement of the Return to Zion was growing apace, and bursting onto the scene of history in full force immediately upon the proclamation of Israel’s statehood. Yet, if we look more deeply, it is highly questionable whether the movement and its concrete achievements would ever have attained their full dimensions without the encouragement derived from the world’s recognition and the functioning of the institutions that were created as a consequence. In any event, the fact that the historic tie attained solemn, international legal expression is of great significance.