It all comes together!

I'm reading Walter Laqueur's "A History of Zionism." A real page-turner. I'm not being sarcastic--the blog subhead doesn't lie. But check this out:

"This was [late 19th-century father of political Zionism, Theodor] Herzl's first visit to the Holy Land but he was not overwhelmed. The landing at Jaffa was uncomfortable. He was struck by the confusion in the streets and in the hotel - poverty, heat and 'misery in gay colours'."

Laqueur goes on to describe Herzl's underwhelmedness, but then there's this:

"Herzl was favourably impressed, on the other hand, by the cavalcade of twenty young and daring Jewish horsemen who, singing Hebrew songs, welcomed him in Rehovot. They reminded him of cowboys of the American west: 'I had tears in my eyes...'. It showed into what the young trouser-salesmen could be transformed."

Zionist cowboys! Gay colors! (OK, not that kind of gay, but still).