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Everyone knows about Herzl. Is it time for Max Nordau, the intermarried father of Zionism, to get his due?
(JTA) — In the weeks since Israel’s latest government was sworn in, questions relating to assimilation, defining Jewish identity and what it means to be a Zionist have been central to the public and political discourse, which in some ways is perhaps more heated and divisive than it has ever been.
One useful addition to the discourse might be recalling the thought and example of an author and Zionist leader who died 100 years ago last month. Max Nordau was a central figure in the early years of the modern political Zionist movement, literally founding the Zionist Organization (today’s World Zionist Organization) with Theodor Herzl and heading multiple Zionist congresses. A physician and renowned man of letters prior to his “conversion” to Zionism following the Dreyfus Affair in France, Nordau’s joining the Zionist movement gave it a notable boost in terms of renown and respectability.
He also coined the term “Muscular Judaism” — a redefinition of what it meant to be a Jew in the modern world; a critical shift away from the traditionally insular, “meek” Jewish archetype devoted solely to religious and intellectual pursuits. The “Muscular Jew” in theory and practice was necessary in order for a modern Jewish state to be established.
Reviving interest in Nordau now is a continuation of a conversation that an Israeli historian kicked off four decades ago. The historian, Yosef Nedava, embarked on a crusade to renew interest in and appreciation of Nordau. Nedava was a proponent of Revisionist Zionism, a movement led by Zeev Jabotinsky and later Menachem Begin that was considered to be the bitter ideological rival to the Labor Zionism of David Ben-Gurion and others. Broadly speaking, Revisionist Zionism was more territorially maximalist when it came to settling the Land of Israel, and favored liberal principles as opposed to the socialist ones championed by Ben-Gurion and his colleagues.
Nedava had a penchant for fighting the battles of unsung heroes of history who he thought should be better remembered. He led a crusade to clear the name of Yosef Lishansky, the founder of the NILI underground movement that assisted the British during World War I who was executed by the Ottomans. He also worked to exonerate fellow Revisionist Zionists accused of murdering Labor Zionist leader Haim Arlozorov — an event that shook Mandatory Palestine in the early 1930s and beyond.
About Nordau, Nedava said at the time, “For 60 years he wasn’t mentioned and he was one of the forgotten figures that only a few streets were named after.”
Nedava’s sentiment was clear, even if his words were somewhat hyperbolic. Nordau had in fact been studied and cited over the years, and there were in fact at least a few streets named after him in Israel. At the official state event marking six decades since Nordau’s death, Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin even declared, “We never forgot Max Nordau, his teachings and his historical merits.”
Following Nedava’s efforts leading up to the 60th anniversary of Nordau’s death in 1983, Begin set up an official committee to memorialize the Zionist leader. The committee was tasked with publishing Nordau’s works, establishing events and honoring him in other ways like getting his face on a stamp “and maybe on a monetary bill,” according to Nedava.
But no bill was ever printed with Nordau’s visage, and there’s no question that Nordau never has gotten nearly the credit nor recognition that Herzl received. If the streets referenced by Nedava are any indicator, there are currently a respectable 33 streets named after Nordau in Israel, though that’s just about half of what Herzl’s got. There’s a city called Herzliya, with a massive image of the Zionist founder overlooking one of Israel’s most-trafficked highways. Nordau has a beach in Tel Aviv, a neighborhood in Netanya and a small village far in the north — but no city of his own.
Trees line alongside Nordau Avenue in Tel Aviv, March 4, 2017. (Anat Hermoni/FLASH90)
That’s not to say he didn’t have his fans. The Revisionist movement and Begin’s Herut and Likud parties idolized him, often mentioning and depicting him alongside Herzl and Vladimir Jabotinsky. Revisionist historian Benzion Netanyahu, father of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, greatly admired Nordau, even editing four entire volumes of his writings.
“Alongside Herzl, the Revisionists loved him, as he was a liberal. Yet he was also accepted and respected by those on the other side of the political spectrum,” Hezi Amiur, a scholar of Zionism and the curator of the Israeli Collection at the National Library of Israel, told me.
Like many of his generation and ilk, Nordau, himself the son of a rabbi, rejected religion and tradition as a teenager, opting to join mainstream European secular culture. He changed his name from Simon (Simcha) Maximilian Südfeld to Max Nordau. The shift in surname from Südfeld — meaning “southern field” — to Nordau — meaning “northern meadow” — was very much an intentional act for Nordau, the only son in his religiously observant family who chose northern European Germanic culture over the traditions of his fathers. He even married a Danish Protestant opera singer, a widow and mother of four named Anna Dons-Kaufmann.
In a congratulatory letter sent to Nordau following his marriage to Anna, Herzl, who was also not a particularly observant nor learned Jew, wrote:
Your concerns regarding the attitudes of our zealous circles [within the Zionist movement] regarding your mixed marriage are perhaps exaggerated. … If our project had already been fulfilled today, surely we would not have prevented a Jewish citizen, that is, a citizen of the existing Jewish state, from marrying a foreign-born gentile, through this marriage she would become a Jew without paying attention to her religion. If she has children, they will be Jews anyway.
This particular vision of Herzl’s has certainly not come to fruition, and the topic remains a particularly heated one, continuing to roil the Israeli political system, and — no less — Israel-Diaspora relations.
Similar political forces to those that have kept this particular Herzlian vision at bay may have also been responsible for ensuring that Nordau’s impressively whiskered face never made its way onto Israeli currency.
According to one report, Begin’s Likud government abandoned its efforts to get Nordau’s onto a shekel note in 1983 in order to avoid a potential coalition crisis. The concern was that the religious parties that were part of the ruling coalition could become outraged at the prospect of having someone married to a non-Jew on Israeli money. Whether the report was fully accurate or not, the sentiments behind such a potential coalition scare are certainly familiar to anyone following contemporary Israeli politics.
Nonetheless, perhaps the two most influential religious Zionist rabbis of the 20th century, Rabbi Abraham Isaac HaKohen Kook and his son, Rabbi Zvi Yehuda, not only somewhat overlooked Nordau’s assimilationist tendencies and intermarriage, they even celebrated the man and his vision.
The elder Rabbi Kook, who served as the rabbi of Jaffa, Jerusalem and the Land of Israel in the opening decades of the 1900s, uncompromisingly criticized some of Nordau’s views, especially with respect to the separation of religion from Zionism. But he was a big fan of Nordau’s “Muscular Judaism,” writing among other things, that:
…a healthy body is what we need, we have been very busy with the soul, we have forgotten the sanctity of the body, we have neglected physical health and strength, we have forgotten that we have holy flesh, no less than we have the holy spirit… Through the strength of the flesh the weakened soul will be enlightened, the resurrection of the dead in their bodies.
Decades later his son, likely the most influential Israeli religious Zionist spiritual leader until his death in 1982, defined Nordau (as well as seminal Hebrew poet Shaul Tchernichovsky, who also married a non-Jew) as a “baal tshuvah” — a term imprecisely translated as “penitent” that is generally used to refer to non-observant Jews who become more religiously observant. Yehuda based his designation on a Talmudic teaching that “Anyone who transgresses and is ashamed of it is forgiven for all of his sins.”
Like anyone, Max Nordau probably regretted and felt ashamed of various decisions and actions in his life, but marrying a non-Jewish woman does not seem to be one of them. He and Anna stayed married for decades until his death in 1923.
Both Kooks were able to overlook the decidedly non-religious (if not outright anti-religious) life Nordau chose to lead. Instead of his personal choices, they focused on the central contribution he made to ensuring the reestablishment of a Jewish home in its ancestral land.
The majority of Israel’s current ruling coalition claims to be the ideological descendants of Begin and the Rabbis Kook, men who managed to have great admiration for the teachings and achievements of Nordau, even if they may have found his anti-religious, assimilationist tendencies and intermarriage reprehensible. Nedava wanted Israel to learn from Nordau 40 years ago. It’s possible the country still could today — if only the striking level of tolerance and respect with which he was considered in the past can still be summoned.
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Iran’s Internet Blackout Hits Record Length as Regime Tries to Crush Dissent in Digital Darkness
People attend the funeral of the security forces who were killed in the protests that erupted over the collapse of the currency’s value in Tehran, Iran, Jan. 14, 2026. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS
Iran’s internet blackout became the longest such nationwide shutdown ever recorded over the weekend, as the regime continued to face mounting military pressure, internal unrest, and growing isolation.
According to NetBlocks, an internet-monitoring watchdog that tracks global connectivity disruptions, Iran’s blackout entered its 37th consecutive day on Sunday, making it the longest nation-scale internet shutdown on record after authorities severed internet access as the war with the US and Israel broke out in late February.
The blackout continued on Monday, with the general public cut off from international networks for over 888 hours.
With the regime attempting to suppress internal opposition and silence domestic dissent, the blackout has effectively cut millions of Iranians off from independent reporting on the war and access to global news.
“We constantly find ourselves searching for ways to reconnect, just to be able to hear reliable news,” a 47-year-old woman in the central city of Isfahan told AFP on Saturday.
“Being without internet feels like being without oxygen to me. I feel trapped and suffocated,” a 53-year-old man in Tehran also said.
Iranian authorities have even warned that citizens suspected of accessing internet through virtual private networks (VPNs) — tools that bypass government censorship — could face arrest or imprisonment.
According to state media reports, Iranian security forces have arrested several citizens in recent weeks for using the Starlink satellite internet system, which allows users to bypass state-controlled terrestrial infrastructure.
Iran’s latest internet shutdown marks the second nationwide blackout in less than two months, after authorities previously imposed an 18-day outage in January during mass anti-government protests, which security forces violently crushed, leaving tens of thousands of demonstrators tortured or killed.
Human rights groups warn the regime has repeatedly used nationwide internet shutdowns as a tool to intensify its crackdown on opposition movements and conceal ongoing abuses from international scrutiny.
In recent years, Iranian authorities have accelerated efforts to sever the country’s reliance on the global web by advancing the regime-backed “National Internet” project aimed at consolidating state control over digital communications and information flows.
Meanwhile, the Islamist regime continues to face relentless pressure from US and Israeli strikes as the conflict escalates and prospects for negotiations become increasingly fragile.
In one of its latest attacks, Israel announced that Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) intelligence chief Brig. Gen. Majid Khademi and Quds Force special operations commander Asghar Bagheri were both killed over the weekend.
This latest strike on leadership represents a “significant blow to Iran’s intelligence leadership at a time when the regime is already under sustained pressure,” an Israeli security official told Fox News.
According to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), Khademi orchestrated overseas terrorist operations and oversaw surveillance targeting Iranian civilians during the regime’s brutal crackdown on protests.
Part of Iran’s elite military force, Bagheri coordinated the recruitment of terrorist operatives across the Middle East and directed deadly attacks against US and Israeli targets abroad.
On Monday, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz announced the IDF also struck Iran’s largest petrochemical facility in Asaluyeh, a blow that has effectively taken offline the two plants responsible for roughly 85 percent of the country’s petrochemical exports, crippling a key pillar of Iran’s economy and export capacity.
Katz described the strikes as “a severe economic blow to the Iranian regime, amounting to tens of billions of dollars.”
“Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and I have instructed the IDF to continue to attack the national infrastructure of the Iranian terror regime with all its might,” the Israeli defense chief said.
“The Iranian terror regime will discover that the continued aggression against Israel and the cowardly and criminal fire at Israeli citizens will lead to the deepening of the economic and strategic damage it is paying and the collapse of its capabilities,” he continued.
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Pressure Mounts on UK Government to Ban Kanye West After Festival Backlash
Rapper Kanye West holds his first rally in support of his presidential bid in North Charleston, South Carolina, US, July 19, 2020. Photo: REUTERS/Randall Hill
The British government was under growing pressure on Monday to bar US rapper Kanye West from entering the country after he was named as the headline act for the Wireless Festival of rap and hip-hop music set for July.
West, now known as Ye, has been criticized in the past for antisemitic remarks and celebration of Nazism, which have led on several occasions to his social media accounts, including X, being barred.
The decision to book Ye prompted several companies to pull their sponsorship of the festival, while the main opposition Conservative Party wrote to Home Secretary [interior minister] Shabana Mahmood urging her to ban him from coming to Britain.
Asked by Reuters for comment, a Home Office source said ministers were currently reviewing his permission to enter the country.
The Home Office does not usually comment on individual cases, but Mahmood has powers to personally request Ye to be excluded from the UK. In January, the department revoked the Electronic Travel Authorization of Eva Vlaardingerbroek, a Dutch far-right activist for spreading false information.
Festival organizers and Ye’s representative did not respond immediately to a request for comment.
The Jewish Leadership Council last week condemned the organizers for booking Ye after a rise in attacks on Jewish people and Jewish targets.
‘DEEPLY CONCERNING’
Prime Minister Keir Starmer also described as “deeply concerning” the decision to book Ye for the London festival.
“Antisemitism in any form is abhorrent and must be confronted firmly wherever it appears,” Starmer said in comments first reported by the Sun on Sunday.
“Everyone has a responsibility to ensure Britain is a place where Jewish people feel safe and secure.”
A spokesperson for London mayor Sadiq Khan said the rapper’s comments did not reflect the city’s values and that the decision had been made by festival organizers.
Australia cancelled the rapper’s visa last July after he released “Heil Hitler,” a song promoting Nazism. The ban came a few months after Ye advertised a swastika T-shirt for sale on his website.
Ye took a full-page advertisement in the Wall Street Journal in January to apologize for his antisemitic remarks, attributing his behavior to an undiagnosed brain injury and an untreated bipolar disorder. He also apologized for his past expressions of admiration for Adolf Hitler and use of swastika imagery.
The 48-year-old has not performed in Britain since he headlined Glastonbury in 2015.
Drinks companies Diageo and Pepsi, a long-running sponsor, said they had withdrawn their support for the Wireless event over the decision to invite Ye. Pepsi-owner PepsiCo also confirmed its Rockstar Energy brand had pulled its sponsorship.
A spokesperson for PayPal told Reuters on Monday its branding would not appear in any future Wireless festival promotional materials.
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Iran Rejects Ceasefire as Deadline Nears on Trump ‘Hell’ Ultimatum
President Donald Trump arrives from the Blue Room to speak about the Iran war from the Cross Hall of the White House on Wednesday, April 1, 2026, in Washington. Photo: Alex Brandon/Pool via REUTERS
Iran said on Monday it wanted a lasting end to the war with the US and Israel, and pushed back against pressure to swiftly reopen the Strait of Hormuz under a temporary ceasefire as the Americans and the Iranians weighed a framework plan to cease their five‑week-old conflict.
Iran conveyed its response to the US proposal for ending the war to Pakistan, rejecting a ceasefire and emphasizing the necessity of a permanent end to the war, the official IRNA news agency said on Monday. The Iranian response consisted of 10 clauses, including an end to conflicts in the region, a protocol for safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz, lifting of sanctions, and reconstruction, the agency added.
President Donald Trump, who has threatened to rain “hell” on Tehran if it did not make a deal by 8 pm EDT Tuesday (midnight GMT) to open the vital route for global energy supplies, rejected the Iranian proposal on Monday and said his deadline was final.
“They made a proposal, and it’s a significant proposal. It’s a significant step. It’s not good enough,” Trump told reporters at an annual White House Easter event, referring to Iran.
Trump, who had extended his initial deadline, gave no indication he would do so again.
“Highly unlikely. They’ve had plenty of time. In fact, they asked for seven days. I said, I’m going to give you 10. But at the end of 10, all hell’s going to break out if you don’t get there,” he said.
Iran responded to US and Israeli attacks in February by effectively closing Hormuz, a conduit for about a fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas supply. The waterway’s stranglehold on the global economy has proved a powerful Iranian bargaining chip and on Monday it showed reluctance to relinquish it too easily.
The Pakistani-brokered framework for ending the war emerged from intense overnight contacts and proposes an immediate ceasefire, followed by talks on a broader peace settlement to be concluded within 15 to 20 days, a source aware of the proposals said on Monday.
Pakistan’s army chief, Field Marshal Asim Munir, was in contact “all night long” with US Vice President JD Vance, special envoy Steve Witkoff, and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, the source said.
Iran‘s foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei said on Monday that Tehran’s demands “should not be interpreted as a sign of compromise, but rather as a reflection of its confidence in defending its positions.” He added that earlier US demands, such as a 15-point plan, were rejected as “excessive.”
CEASEFIRE PROPOSAL ‘ONE OF MANY IDEAS’
Trump later told reporters that Iran could be taken out in one night, “and that night might be tomorrow night,” warning Tehran it had to make a deal by Tuesday night or face the consequences.
“The entire country can be taken out in one night, and that night might be tomorrow night,” he told a White House press conference.
US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told the briefing that the largest volume of strikes since day one of the operation against Iran would take place on Monday and warned Tuesday would have even more.
A White House official told Reuters that the president is considering multiple options for how to proceed but that military operations will continue.
“This is one of many ideas, and [Trump] has not signed off on it. Operation Epic Fury continues,” they said, referring to the US name for the operation against Iran.
Brent crude futures LCOc1 were up 0.5% to $109.60 a barrel at 1545 GMT.
In a post laden with expletives on his Truth Social platform on Sunday, Trump threatened further strikes on Iranian energy and transport infrastructure if Iran failed to make a deal and reopen the Strait by Tuesday.
Anwar Gargash, an adviser to the president of the United Arab Emirates, said any settlement must guarantee access through Hormuz. He warned that a deal that failed to rein in Iran’s nuclear program and its missiles and drones would pave the way for “a more dangerous, more volatile Middle East.”
Fresh aerial strikes were reported across the region on Monday, more than five weeks since the US and Israel began pounding Iran in a war that has killed thousands and damaged economies by sending oil prices surging.
Iranian state media said the Revolutionary Guards’ intelligence chief, Majid Khademi, has died. Israel on Monday claimed responsibility for his death.
A US-Israeli attack hit the data center at Sharif University of Technology in Tehran, damaging infrastructure underpinning the country’s national artificial intelligence platform and thousands of other services, Fars News Agency said on Sunday. According to US and Israeli officials, the Iranian regime has used the facility for military purposes.
ISRAEL VOWS TO DESTROY IRAN‘S INFRASTRUCTURE
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz in a statement issued on Monday threatened to destroy Iran’s infrastructure and hunt down its leaders “one by one.” The Israeli military also said they had targeted Iran‘s air force through a series of strikes on the Bahram, Mehrabad, and Azmayesh airports over the previous night.
Iran said on Monday two of its petrochemical complexes were attacked.
Emergency and firefighting teams brought a blaze under control at the South Pars complex in Asaluyeh, Iran‘s National Petrochemical Company said. No casualties were reported.
An Israeli attack in mid-March on the South Pars gas field that Iran shares with Qatar prompted an escalation in the war, with Iran striking energy targets across the Middle East.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that the strike on the petrochemical facility in southern Iran was part of dismantling Iran‘s Revolutionary Guards “money machine.”
“Iran is no longer the same Iran, and Israel is no longer the same Israel. Israel is stronger than ever, and the terrorist regime in Iran is weaker than ever,” Netanyahu said in a statement.
Trump has repeatedly warned Iran he could expand US strikes to include civilian infrastructure, such as power plants and bridges. Critics have said such actions would be war crimes, while others have noted that Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), an internationally designated terrorist organization, has embedded itself in such infrastructure to enrich itself and fuel its operations.
IRAN CONTINUES TO FIGHT BACK
Iranian weekend strikes on petrochemical facilities and an Israeli-linked vessel in Kuwait, Bahrain, and the UAE underscored the country’s ability to fight back despite Trump‘s repeated claims to have knocked out its missile and drone capabilities.
Israel saw a heavy day of rocket volleys on Monday, with the sounds of sirens and missile interception booms ringing out across the country throughout the day.
Israel’s military told Reuters there had been 20 missile launches from Lebanon and five from Iran during the day. Several of the attacks resulted in impacts, although it was unclear whether it was from falling missile debris or direct strikes. A missile hit Haifa overnight tearing a building apart and killing four under the rubble, taking the death toll in Israel to 23, according to Israel’s ambulance service.
Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthis said on Monday that they also carried out missile and drones attack against Israel.
About 3,540 people have been killed in Iran in the war, including at least 244 children, said US-based rights group HRANA.
Israel has also invaded southern Lebanon and struck Beirut in a fight against Iran-backed Hezbollah terrorists, who initially launched rockets at northern Israeli communities, that has become the most violent spillover of the war on Iran.
Lebanon’s heavy casualties include 1,461 killed, including at least 124 children, Lebanese authorities say.
Thirteen US service members have died, and hundreds of others have been wounded.