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# Zionist Flags (Israel)

##

Last modified: 2026-07-25 by martin karner
Keywords: israel | zionism |
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- Flag in German Newspaper (1941)
- Flag in Larousse Dictionary (1930s)
- Zionist Flags on Old Cards
- Wrong Flag in a Swedish Flag Book (1936)
- Flags on a Zionist Youth March (1937)
- Theodore Herzl Pall (1949)
- WW1 Flag Day Pin Badge (United Kingdom)
- "I am Zionist" badge tag label
- Wooden (?) Zionist Flags in Japanese POW Camp (1904/1905)

- Rishon LeZiyyon Flag (1885)
- Nes Ziyyona Flag (1891)
- Theodor Herzl's Proposal (1896)
- First Zionist Congress (1897)
- Proposal for American Jewish Congress 1918
- Proposal for Jewish Cultural (Youth?) Congress 1924
- Pre-1930 Zionist Flag
- Use of Zionist Flags in the Palestine Mandate
- Far East Jewish Conference 1937–1940 (China)
- 22nd Zionist Congress 1946
- NETZER – Progressive Zionist Youth
- Jerusalem Day Flags
- Media excitement over Zionist flag in Larousse

See also:

- Flags of Zionist Organisations
- World Zionist Organization
- Historical Flags (Israel)
- Other Political Flags (Israel)
- Flags of Non Governmental Organisations (Israel)
- Miscellaneous Flags (Israel e.a.) (Index)
- Israel

## Flag in German Newspaper (1941)

image by António Martins

Inside an old atlas I bought in Germany there was a loose map, entitled Der Nahe Osten (The Middle East, lit. "The Near East"). The map was from the Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper and printed in 1941. Along the side of the map are short political histories and pictures of flags from the following nations: Egypt, Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Iraq, Iran, Yugoslavia, Palestine, Romania, Saudi Arabia, the Soviet Union, Syria, Transjordan and Turkey.
The flag for Palestine is a simple blue over white. Maybe the German paper used that flag and omitted the Jewish symbol?
Roger Moyer, 9 November 1996

The overall design (as reported above), a horizontal bicolor of blue over white, is reported to have been a relatively widespread design for a Jewish flag, before the officialization of the Israeli national flag.
António Martins, 3 December 2025

## Flag in Larousse Dictionary (1930s)

image by Jaume Ollé

Flag of the Palestine Jews, according to the Larousse Dictionary [Examples from 1934 (picture) and 1939 (picture)].
Jaume Ollé, 11 January 1998

See also:

- Media excitement over Zionist flag in Larousse
- Pre-1930 Zionist flag (Israel)
- Hofiya Shipping Company (British Mandate of Palestine)

## Zionist Flags on Old Cards

I recently found here postcards showing items from an exhibition entitled Blue-White in Colours that took place in 1996–1997. I assume that the exhibition was about Zionism reflected in postcards, greeting cards, posters etc. Some of the cards have flags on them:

- A Zionist Calendar for the Jewish Year 5664, St. Petersburg, 1903. The flag is in b/w so I'm not sure about the colours. It is divided horizontally, the upper part is probably blue, the lower part white. On the blue half there are 7 stars, in gold/yellow or white. These are Herzl's 7 stars, but here they are 5-pointed instead of the usual magen-david like six-pointed stars. In the centre of the flag there is a large dark magen-david, probably in dark blue.
- The Ship of Redemption, greeting card for the new year, New York, 1925. There are two flags there, blue over white with a golden magen-david in the centre. Below the magen-david there are inscriptions in gold. On one flag, "... for out of Zion shall go forth the law" (which continues, "and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem", Isaiah 2:3). On the other flag: "The Labour Battalion". This was an organization of pioneers in the 1920's. Its members worked in road construction.
- The Daughter of Zion, greeting card for the new year, Germany, c. 1910. It shows a woman holding a long continuous flag (streamer?). It is white, has two blue stripes like in the Israeli flag, but also two narrower stripes, in a lighter shade of blue, close to the wider ones. Between the inner stripes and in the same shade of blue, there are small magen-davids, running along the flag, with the word "Zion" in Hebrew inside them.

Nahum Shereshevsky, 27 August 1998

## Wrong Flag in a Swedish Flag Book (1936)

image by António Martins, 23 August 2025

The book is called "Världens huvudstäder", which translates to "The capitals of the world" [FOTW Bibliography: s9e36]. It is also said that the book has a "complete" flag map, which it does not, since it e.g. does not show the flag for Liechtenstein and Manchukuo, even though the capitals of these countries are presented inside the book. Interesting is also the flag for Palestine, virtually the same as the flag for Israel from 1948 (even if the Magen David is black in this picture, but the flags are overall a bit inaccurate) [front cover, back cover].
Elias Granqvist, 22 April 2003

It is not the flag of "Palestine 1938", since in that era it was the British ensigns that should represent the Mandate government, while the current Israeli flag (always with blue Magen David) was the flag of the Zionist Federations and the de-facto flag of the Jewish population.
Dov Gutterman, 7 July 2003

## Flags on a Zionist Youth March (1937)

image located by William Garrison, 23 August 2021
(picture, source)

The photo above shows a memorial march in 1937 of a group of young Zionists on their way to the Tel Hai monument (erected in 1934, photo). In the article "1920–2020, Tel Hai between history and memory" from Smadar Sinai, this photo has the Hebrew caption: "Youth procession to the Trumpeldor memorial in Tel Hai (1937). Photo: Lazar Diner" (picture).
The flags with the S-shaped symbol belong to the Working Youth movement.
The photo is from a haaretz.com (paywall) article about the Jewish women Sarah Chizik (photo) and Deborah Drachler (photo), who took part in the Battle of Tel Hai in 1920 (see also Tel-Hai Trustees).
Sarah Chizik, immigrated from Russia in 1907, and Deborah Drachler, immigrated from Ukraine in 1913, met in 1920 when they volunteered to go up to the Galilee to join the fighters led by Joseph Trumpeldor (see also below) who were defending Tel Hai. On March 1 they both fell in battle, in each other's arms. The two were the first women fighters in the Yishuv (pre-state Jewish community) to be killed in action. Historian Smadar Sinai writes, that the two women "symbolized the determination not to give up women's right to bear arms" (Testimonial from a fellow fighter: "[Drachler] was the only girl who practiced using a rifle and bullets every single day"). The two women were initially mentioned more prominently than Trumpeldor's five male comrades-in-arms, who fell in the same battle. They were buried separately from the men and honored with a statue called "The Galilee and its Watchwomen" (source). Over time, however, the names of these women were increasingly forgotten, as were the names of the male fallen. Only Trumpeldor's name survived in Israel's collective memory.

Martin Karner/William Garrison, 28 August 2025

## Theodore Herzl Pall (1949)

image located by Esteban Rivera

image located by Esteban Rivera

On July 3, 1904, Theodore Herzl passed away in Edlach, a village inside Reichenau an der Rax, Lower Austria. At his request, his remains were brought to Israel in 1949 and buried on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem, which was named after him. The coffin was draped in a blue and white pall decorated with a Star of David circumscribing a Lion of Judah and seven gold stars recalling Herzl's original proposal for a flag of the Jewish state.
Source: https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/mystery-solved-missing-herzl-parochet-found-in-kkl-jnf-house-in-tel-aviv-597937

Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Herzel_coffin_honor_guard.jpg, source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodor_Herzl). This is an original version seen in a black and white photograph at the time.
https://images.jpost.com/image/..., source: https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/mystery-solved-missing-herzl-parochet-found-in-kkl-jnf-house-in-tel-aviv-597937). This is a reconstruction version.

Esteban Rivera, 13 September 2022

## WW1 Flag Day Pin Badge (United Kingdom)

images (merged) located by William Garrison

WW1 Zionist cause flag pin badge. Gold print on dark brown field. Obverse: Star of David with centered Lion of Judah.
Reverse: Star of David with centered inscriptions "ZION" in Hebrew and Latin script.
Picture caption: "These WW1 charity ‘flag day’ fundraising pin badges were sold during the Great War to raise money for a variety of causes; mainly supporting the troops fighting on the various fronts, supporting the war effort, supporting wounded soldiers, widows etc. On Saturday, 5th September 1914, Mrs Morrison (the founder of the World War One flag day movement) launched her first collection of the Great War. 3600 collecting tins were issued, and each collector carried a tray laden with flags. It soon became evident that the sellers – with their red, white and blue scarves, and members of the Boys’ Brigade and Boy Scouts who assisted them, ‘had entirely captured the sympathy of the public’, she said. The extraordinary success of Mrs Morrison’s flag day was widely noticed, and soon ‘received letters from all parts of the country’, she said, ‘asking for information and assistance, as others were anxious to take up the idea, when it was seen how easily large sums could be obtained, by such a simple method. The holding of flag days as a rewarding means of raising money for worthy causes was proved for all to see.’ One of the most worthy of causes was that of raising money through the sale of penny-flags to help British prisoners of war in Germany." (source: ebay.com)
located by William Garrison, 28 January 2023

## "I am Zionist" badge tag label

image located by William Garrison

An Israel flag-like "badge tag label". The grahic element in the center mimicks the Star of David, and at the same time it reads "I am Zionist" (אני ציוני) in two lines. (source: ebay.com)
located by William Garrison, 18 September 2023

## Wooden (?) Zionist Flags in Japanese POW Camp (1904/1905)

image located by William Garrison
(picture, source)

In the (paywalled) haaretz.com article cited also above is a photo of Jewish pioneer Joseph Trumpeldor, who was also the main figure in the Battle of Tel Hai (see also Betar (Youth organization)). The photo is from 1904/05, when he was a Russian prisoner of war in Takayama, Japan. The Russian prisoners in Japan received good conditions. They were divided into camps according to their religious affiliation, with 1739 of the approximately 70'000 Russian prisoners being Jewish. Trumpeldor spent about a year in Japanese captivity, and thanks to his personality he became the leader of the Jewish prisoners.
The same photo is also shown in Wikimedia, with the information: "... Above Trumpeldor's image the symbol of the captive camp is visible, a Star of David with the word 'Zion' in the center, flags on both sides with seven blue stars, and the inscription: 'From [camp] of the captives of Zion in Japan'." Why the author thinks that the stars are blue, we don't know. The flags themselves are unknown, perhaps the seven stars allude to Theodor Herzl's flag proposal.
Martin Karner/William Garrison, 28 August 2025