English Zionist Federation: "Anti-Zionists are Apes...Asses...and...Foxes"

At a meeting of the English Zionist Federation held in Shoreditch east London in 1901 British author and Zionist Israel Zangwill said that anti-Zionists can be divided into three classes “the apes, the asses and the foxes”.

The meeting discussed the resolution “This meeting declares Zionism the only possible solution to the Jewish question, and gives its whole sympathy and energy the furtherance this movement”

Zangwill is reported as saying that when he spoke to Christians “he was sure of finding sympathy with Zionism; if he went to Jews  he was not so sure of receiving sympathy”. Reading Jewish newspapers “published in English and printed in London, they were sure to find not only no sympathy, but even sneers”

“The Jewish Chronicle had alleged that the Zionist movement consisted entirely of sentiment and was impracticable”

Zangwill found that “anti-Zionists might be divided into three classes -  the apes, the asses, and the foxes. The first frankly wished for the extinction of the race, the second endeavoured to extinguish it by assimilating themselves with the peoples among whom their lot was cast and the third…..pretended that it was beneficial to the Jews that they were no longer a nation.”

“Zionism attempted to reunite a scattered people again establish them again as a nation, and it was futile for the “Jewish World” [newspaper] and similar silly papers to attempt to arrest the movement.”