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Among the many journalists who covered the Dreyfus trial was Theodore Herzl, an assimilated Jew who, until the trial, accepted assimilation as the solution to anti-Semitism. Shocked at the violence of the crowd, Herzl concluded that in order to survive, Jews must leave Europe and establish their own state in the Land of Israel. Furthering the path set by the Chovevei Zion, he convened the first World Zionist Congress to determine how to implement his plan. Strange bedfellows were made amongst both the movement's supporters and its opponents, but the historical impact of Zionism is an indisputable fact of modern history.

• Baron de Hirsch, Mordechai Emanuel Noah, and their plans
• Sir Lawrence Oliphant - the first non-Jewish Zionist
• the diplomatic skill of Theodore Herzl
• the Uganda Proposal
• the varied opposition to Zionism within the Jewish world

For more on the philosophy of Zionism, including religious Zionism, see "On Zionism." And for the biographies of Herzl and his successors, see "Leaders of Secular Zionism."