Prior to the Balfour Declaration, chemist and later to be first president of the State of Israel, Chaim Weizman was asked by a member of the House of Lords, “Why are the Jews so fixated on Palestine while there are so many other underpopulated countries where they could much more easily reside?”

Weizman answered, “Why do you drive thirty miles every weekend to visit your mother, when there are so many elderly women on your street?”