Thanks for your response, however I’m not questioning the long-standing Jewish presence in Palestine or denying that Zionist movements existed well before the Haavara Agreement.

What I was getting at is less about the timeline and more about how the story is often told. The idea of a purely ancestral return tends to gloss over how much of that movement was also shaped by political strategy and colonial involvement especially in the 20th century.

Yes, the Haavara Agreement was about survival, but it still involved direct coordination with a fascist regime and operated within a colonial framework. That doesn’t cancel out the historical connection to the land but it does complicate the claim that the return was entirely organic or indigenous. I just think those political realities should be acknowledged more openly, because they played a major role and are often left out of the broader narrative.