Allow me to deal first with the truly insulting comments by mogold that the gedolim , who included virtually all of the chassidische rebbes and most of the litvishe roshei yeshiva in eretz yisroel, succumbed to the lure of money. This is insulting and , in this month of elul, you should ask mechila from the imrei emes zz’l ,the ponevitzher rosh yeshiva zz’l, the vishnitser rebbe zz’l , the klausenburger rebbe zz’l and many others.
BTW- the chassam sofer zz’l died in 1839, so let’s not include his shittah-that has nothing to do with zionism or eretz yisroel- in this debate.
As far as BIRUR’s explanation, it is indeed conspicuous that he is not able to comment on the second letter, and can only say “that we can get a fuller understanding if we study his words”. HOW?
As far as the story he tells about telshe in the earlier days- let me point out that it was fritten by R’Moshe Blau zz’l , a wonderful person but he was a member of Neturei Karta, which makes him a “nogea bedovor”.
And again, even if we accept his words, the stories happened way back in the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century, when zionism was indeed a party of haskoloh and incurred the wrath of many orthodox Gedolim.
It is incontrovertible that the Holocaust and the establishment of Medinat Israel were game changers. R”Itche Meir Levin- the gerrer rebbe’s brother-in-law, – signed the declaration of independence of israel! The Vishnizter rebbe zz’l (R’Chaim Meir) built his shikkun in Bnai brak- the Klausenburger rebbe zz’l left the United States and built his kirya in natanyah (Kiryat Zanz). Many other chareidi gedolim recognized this and, although they did not agree with the government in its appraoch to secularity, they realized that the medinah is here to stay and one should work within it to improve it.