It's very inconvenient when the founders of your movement are like "we explicitly want to invade this country, drive it's people in to exile, and steal their stuff. We're going to say this over and over so everyone clearly understands out intentions."
The colonialism was the their selling point to the British! Their whole sales pitch was that “hey, we’ll do colonialism in Palestine but will serve the interests of the British Empire!
Early Zionists literally self-described as colonialists
It's very inconvenient when the founders of your movement are like "we explicitly want to invade this country, drive it's people in to exile, and steal their stuff. We're going to say this over and over so everyone clearly understands out intentions."
100+ years later: “the history is complicated”.
The colonialism was the their selling point to the British! Their whole sales pitch was that “hey, we’ll do colonialism in Palestine but will serve the interests of the British Empire!
They literally met with Jan Smuts and Hendrik Verwoerd, the architects of apartheid in South Africa.
theodor herzl's letter to cecil rhodes
They also proudly and openly call themselves settlers lol.