If the original purpose of Zionism was to establish a home for the Jewish people in the Land of Israel, what is the purpose of Zionism once that home (the State of Israel) is established?  That is the question that was before the delegates to the 23rd Zionist Congress in Jerusalem which opened 75 years ago, on August 14,1951.  It was the first Congress held in Israel and the first Congress after the State was declared.

The Congress was held at the International Convention Center (or Binyanei Ha’Uma, the Nations Buildings) which, you can tell from this postcard, was not quite completed at the time of the Congress.  The ICC was established in 1950 as part of a plan to create a government campus in the nearby Givat Ram neighbourhood of Jerusalem.  The ICC was founded by the Jewish Agency, the Jewish National Fund and the Jerusalem Economic Development Corporation who collectively wished to build a conference centre to symbolize the sovereignty of the new State.

It was that very sovereignty that the delegates wrestled with for the 16 days of the Congress, as they tried to determine how Zionism and........

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