ABSTRACT
In sum, urban growth during the pre-State settlement period in Israel was largely haphazard and sporadic. The official Zionist bodies did not have particular interest in urban settlement in the country and, therefore gained no experience in urban planning and development. Urbanization during the period occured independently in the private enterprise market place. The original Zionist settlement ideology was not concerned with the establishment of towns as a means of populating the country. Zionism was based on a very pragmatic ideology whose aim was to establish a new society in the Land of Israel. Cultural and material means were needed to establish this aim and they were found in the framework of an ideology which emphasized the return to the soil and the establishment of a society of farmers and laborers thus changing the traditional occupation of Jews from services and commerce to agriculture.
