Heres a humdinger for ya:
The state of Israel is formed in the 1890s. What impact, if any, will there be on the 20th century?
The state of Israel is formed in the 1890s. What impact, if any, will there be on the 20th century?
WI: Israel established sooner.
- Thread starter JimmyJimJam
- Start date
Straha
Banned
well if the brits get palestine earleir and estalbish jewish settlemetns by 1933 europe has a mcuh smalller jewish populace as alot are in isreal(think OYL's isreal plus the sinai and golan heights). This state would be jewish majority so the palestninans are all deported. By 2004 the middle east doesn't really care too mcuh about isreal, the only complains are the fact that its secular and democratic. 9/11 doesn't happen. Fundamentalism is weaker.
Xen
Banned
WngMasterD said:
There likely wont be a Hitler. So in the 1890s the Ottomans give the Jews Palestine, perhaps forcing the Arabs out? The Jews fight with the Ottomans in World War I, if it still happens.
Instead of heading to America, Jews from Europe make the shorter trip to Israel. Which means alot more people can afford it, probably cheaper housing and property too. If we still have a WWI, and it goes the same way as OTL. The British take Israel at Versailles, or even perhaps Israel declares independence and goes off as the Republic of Israel. Post-war anti-semitism increases the Jews population in Israel, and IF we have a Hitler like lunatic come to power in Germany, he will simply put the Jews on a leaky boat and send them all to Israel. He wouldnt care what happened to them there. There would likely not be a final solution though.
How can we get the Ottomans to give up political control of the Holy Land? I think we'd need to the Empire to be put through a severe wringer for that to happen.
John'll love this.
John'll love this.
I think a joint arab-jewish uprising is possible, what it ceates is more interesting. I mean i'd imagine the US, and europe would quickly deport a number of troublesome activists while russia instead of launching pogroms would have deported a large jewish population to the area.
After this brutal and traumatic experience the jewish and arab population, beset at all sides by various enemies would be bound together in a loose federation.
Instead of moving to america emma goldman and alexander berkman travel to israel, excited by the new Federation of Middle Eastern States arising there.
Can't see it lasting very long though. Every power would be massively anti-semetic and racist coupled with the threat of this new radical region populated by jewish intellgentsia and anti-imperialist arabs.
After deportation the region would be demonised, villified, insurgencies by foreign powers, foreign powers would try and back different groups to destabilise the region, and it would certainly go under in the early 20th century.
To be blunt, i don't think a jewish state would have survived before WW2 for a number of reasons. Mianly the horrific level of anti-semetism in western society.
After this brutal and traumatic experience the jewish and arab population, beset at all sides by various enemies would be bound together in a loose federation.
Instead of moving to america emma goldman and alexander berkman travel to israel, excited by the new Federation of Middle Eastern States arising there.
Can't see it lasting very long though. Every power would be massively anti-semetic and racist coupled with the threat of this new radical region populated by jewish intellgentsia and anti-imperialist arabs.
After deportation the region would be demonised, villified, insurgencies by foreign powers, foreign powers would try and back different groups to destabilise the region, and it would certainly go under in the early 20th century.
To be blunt, i don't think a jewish state would have survived before WW2 for a number of reasons. Mianly the horrific level of anti-semetism in western society.
Here's a twist
1. Hitler's Germany wanted Jews out.
1. The German's would have benefited from capture of the mideast oil resources.
(There were plans for the conquest of the middle east once Rommel defeated the UK and crossed the Suez Canal)
Rather than tying up resources in maintaining concentration/death camps and in an effort to get more support from other countries, Hitler had decided to 'deport' all the Jews to Palestine. In effect, using his unwanted population to build a country in the middle east, that would oust the British.
This would leave the German army free to seize the oil fields.
That would have created some interesting dynamics.
1. Hitler's Germany wanted Jews out.
1. The German's would have benefited from capture of the mideast oil resources.
(There were plans for the conquest of the middle east once Rommel defeated the UK and crossed the Suez Canal)
Rather than tying up resources in maintaining concentration/death camps and in an effort to get more support from other countries, Hitler had decided to 'deport' all the Jews to Palestine. In effect, using his unwanted population to build a country in the middle east, that would oust the British.
This would leave the German army free to seize the oil fields.
That would have created some interesting dynamics.
raharris1973
Gone Fishin'
Perhaps a Jewish "Rhodesia" in the Levant
I was thinking it would be really hard to accomplish an Israel in the 1890s, something in the 20s or 30s is much more imaginable.
However, if the Ottoman Empire had been partitioned in the 19th century, an opportunity for a substantial Jewish settlement in Palestine could have opened up. However, it would most likely not be an independent republic but a colony of white settlement, loyal to Britain or possibly France, like Rhodesia or Algeria. The Jews wouldn't start out with the idea that they would have an exclusively Jewish state or province, they would just like the idea of settling there under Jewish protection, thinking of King Edward as a latter-day Cyrus. In turn, without an unwelcome 'Balfour Declaration' policy forced upon British administrators, the British would often side with the Jewish settlers on occassions when the Arabs rebelled. It would probably acquire a subset of Christian European settlers and Jaffa might end up with a Chinatown and an Indiatown depending how the local economy develops.
Midway through writing this an off the wall way occurred to me where you could have a Jewish Republic. Here's the rough timeline:
1. The Russo-Turkish war turns into a Christendom on - Turkey pile-up.
Bismarck gets the ball rolling when he suggests that in 1878 that the Austrians, instead of annoying the Russians by trying to limit their gains, should instead grab compensatory gains out of the Ottoman hide in the western Balkans. This sets off the scramble. Italy intervenes to grab some islands and Tripoli, France goes into to secure Lebanon and Tunis, Britain, rather than resist the tide, flows with it, and preempitively seizes Palestine, Cyprus and Ottoman territory on the Persian Gulf.
Maybe partition occurs all at once, maybe it is iterative and maybe there's a rump Turkish state in Anatolia left. Anyway.
2. In part 2, from 1882 Jewish settlement begins in British Palestine which is more attractive than OTL's Ottoman province because of British administrative improvements. The movement really picks up pace in the 1890s, and the Russian empire is the main source of immigrants. The Jews seek and get rights greater than those granted to non-whites but are not thinking in terms of independence at this point.
3. Meanwhile this earlier Ottoman partition has shaken up the scramble for Africa and gotten the butterflies flapping. Germany may end up with a somewhat larger share in Afrika. However, there is an ATL analogue to the Boer war which occurs by the end of the 1890s. This ends up escalating into a hegemonic war, with a continental league attacking the British, using the Boers and other British activities as a pretext. Southwest Asia is a principle theater where allied Russo-German-Austrian-French allied forces can get at the British and vice versa. Palestine may be partially overrun by the continental powers but at the final peace conference for their own reasons the Europeans and British agree to have Israel be a buffer state, accepting certain conditions of pilgrimage. There is no reason to suppose a direct or even indirect deportation effort against Arabs, but lets just say that at this juncture in time the Jews have a majority, and once independent, work to maintain it. The independent state attracts yet more immigration from the Russian empire after independence. Over several decades a Jewish majority isn't necessarilly guaranteed, but alot depends on the level of anti-semitism in Europe, and also the size of the Jewish state and concentration of its population, and how Israel is used in great power politics. By 2004 we could have an Israel, or we could have a one-man, one-vote situation having replaced Israel at some prior point, leading to anything from an Algerian style colon exodus to something like Rhodesia or South Africa. We might even have something a little more benign, like a Malaysia or Singapore
I was thinking it would be really hard to accomplish an Israel in the 1890s, something in the 20s or 30s is much more imaginable.
However, if the Ottoman Empire had been partitioned in the 19th century, an opportunity for a substantial Jewish settlement in Palestine could have opened up. However, it would most likely not be an independent republic but a colony of white settlement, loyal to Britain or possibly France, like Rhodesia or Algeria. The Jews wouldn't start out with the idea that they would have an exclusively Jewish state or province, they would just like the idea of settling there under Jewish protection, thinking of King Edward as a latter-day Cyrus. In turn, without an unwelcome 'Balfour Declaration' policy forced upon British administrators, the British would often side with the Jewish settlers on occassions when the Arabs rebelled. It would probably acquire a subset of Christian European settlers and Jaffa might end up with a Chinatown and an Indiatown depending how the local economy develops.
Midway through writing this an off the wall way occurred to me where you could have a Jewish Republic. Here's the rough timeline:
1. The Russo-Turkish war turns into a Christendom on - Turkey pile-up.
Bismarck gets the ball rolling when he suggests that in 1878 that the Austrians, instead of annoying the Russians by trying to limit their gains, should instead grab compensatory gains out of the Ottoman hide in the western Balkans. This sets off the scramble. Italy intervenes to grab some islands and Tripoli, France goes into to secure Lebanon and Tunis, Britain, rather than resist the tide, flows with it, and preempitively seizes Palestine, Cyprus and Ottoman territory on the Persian Gulf.
Maybe partition occurs all at once, maybe it is iterative and maybe there's a rump Turkish state in Anatolia left. Anyway.
2. In part 2, from 1882 Jewish settlement begins in British Palestine which is more attractive than OTL's Ottoman province because of British administrative improvements. The movement really picks up pace in the 1890s, and the Russian empire is the main source of immigrants. The Jews seek and get rights greater than those granted to non-whites but are not thinking in terms of independence at this point.
3. Meanwhile this earlier Ottoman partition has shaken up the scramble for Africa and gotten the butterflies flapping. Germany may end up with a somewhat larger share in Afrika. However, there is an ATL analogue to the Boer war which occurs by the end of the 1890s. This ends up escalating into a hegemonic war, with a continental league attacking the British, using the Boers and other British activities as a pretext. Southwest Asia is a principle theater where allied Russo-German-Austrian-French allied forces can get at the British and vice versa. Palestine may be partially overrun by the continental powers but at the final peace conference for their own reasons the Europeans and British agree to have Israel be a buffer state, accepting certain conditions of pilgrimage. There is no reason to suppose a direct or even indirect deportation effort against Arabs, but lets just say that at this juncture in time the Jews have a majority, and once independent, work to maintain it. The independent state attracts yet more immigration from the Russian empire after independence. Over several decades a Jewish majority isn't necessarilly guaranteed, but alot depends on the level of anti-semitism in Europe, and also the size of the Jewish state and concentration of its population, and how Israel is used in great power politics. By 2004 we could have an Israel, or we could have a one-man, one-vote situation having replaced Israel at some prior point, leading to anything from an Algerian style colon exodus to something like Rhodesia or South Africa. We might even have something a little more benign, like a Malaysia or Singapore
I thought of an "Israel sooner" as part of a POD "the Aztecs wipe out Cortez's army". After that, Spain leaves America alone and attacks North Africa. That starts a European scramble for North Africa and the Middle East. The Arab population was much less then, and mass European settlement results in European majority (plus Hindu Indians imported to make numbers up) in many areas. That could easily result in a semi-independent and then independent Israel including the West Bank and Transjordan. With so many Europeans wandering about, oil is discovered in Arabia sooner than OTL. That finances Islamic troublemaking, which leads to retaliation culminating in a march on Mecca. After that, the European authorities forbid and (aided by air patrols) prevent the desert nomadic life mode; as a result the natural vegetation in the deserts slowly starts to recover. Some big European settlement areas might be:-
(1) Israel (by Jews)
(2) Nile Delta (much of it was papyrus swamp)
(3) Reclaiming the marshes in southeast Iraq.
(1) Israel (by Jews)
(2) Nile Delta (much of it was papyrus swamp)
(3) Reclaiming the marshes in southeast Iraq.
Anthony Appleyard said:
I'm not sure how a Spanish failure in the Americas will make their efforts in North Africa more successful, it only gives them a couple of thousand more men and, in the long term, they'll be significantly weaker than in OTL without the silver of Mexico and Peru.
This isn't the nineteenth century, and the Muslim middle East should be quite capable of containing anything but a full scale assault mobilising all the resources of Europe, which is obviously impossible.
Abdul Hadi Pasha
Banned
JimmyJimJam said:
I don't believe it's possible for there to be an Israel so long as there is a German Empire. There was significant German settlement in Palestine in the late 19th c, and I don't see the Germans allowing anyone else to have this area.
Also, the Jewish population was wayyyyy too small to support a Jewish state in the 19th c.
raharris1973 said:
I think that underestimates the level of anti-semetism in the western world, especially in britain and Russia which had also become mixed up with anti-'red' hysteria given the large presence of jewish intellectuals in certain insurrectionist movements.
john
Abdul Hadi Pasha
Banned
JimmyJimJam said:
I meant as a proportion of the population of Palestine. The Jews were a tiny fraction of the population in the 1890s - most Jews in the Ottoman Empire lived in Istanbul and Salonika.
That is OTL. Not if there was much more migration sooner.
In WW2 Israel would likely send as much of its armed forces as it could spare to the war against Hitler.
Abdul Hadi Pasha
Banned
Anthony Appleyard said:
The Ottomans strictly limited immigration, for precisely this reason - the empire was a delicate patchwork of sects and ethnicities, and they were careful to avoid a sudden imbalance. That is why this scenario needs both the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire and no German unification, and probably a POD quite far in the past.