Uri Dromi, who was a spokesman for Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, said that liberal, secular Israelis feel “besieged and pessimistic” in the face of new security fears and the political power of the nationalist religious and ultra-Orthodox. Rather than trying to be a nation among nations, “today, without saying it, by what we are doing, we are a people that is alone.”

Religious Zionism is a relatively large tent, with more liberal and more nationalist wings. But it regards the settlements as “its most important creation in this generation,” said Yossi Klein Halevi, a senior fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute, a research center. “There is a growing sense that they are the true future of Zionism, because secular Zionism has been in decline for decades.” They have taken more leadership positions in the Army, have the most vital youth movements and are having a major impact in politics, so “they have a growing sense of self-confidence,” he said.

The real danger to religious Zionism comes not from the Palestinians or from abroad, nor even from the dwindling Israeli left. What settlers are really afraid of, Mr. Halevi said, is the secular right, still largely represented by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his party, Likud. He said religious nationalists “have an almost apocalyptic fear” that another pragmatic, secular, right-wing government like that of Ariel Sharon will betray them and undermine the settlement movement.

Mr. Sharon’s decision in 2005 to withdraw all Israeli settlers and troops from Gaza (and from four settlements in the West Bank) was an enormous shock to the religious Zionists. They learned their lesson and sought stronger allies in politics, including with Naftali Bennett of the pro-settler Jewish Home party, the religious parties and younger members of Likud. Mr. Bennett, for example, favors the annexation of what is known as Area C, which is 62 percent of the West Bank and includes most Israeli settlements.

Mr. Bennett is a prominent member of Mr. Netanyahu’s coalition government, but they are rivals for right-wing and settler votes. Mr. Netanyahu won last year’s elections after speaking on television of “droves” of Arabs being bused to vote. The left was furious and accused him of appealing to fear, but it worked: Many of the votes that went to Likud at the end came, in fact, from Mr. Bennett’s supporters, who also feel tricked by Mr. Netanyahu.

The relationship of religious Zionism to democracy is another of the hidden dramas now in Israel. The struggle for the future of democracy here, Mr. Halevi said, will be “between those who are legitimate democrats and those who don’t really understand it, who pay lip service to it but come from a nationalist and even theocratic place and view certain democratic norms as a threat.”

Still, the older Zionism is not dead yet and continues to create “facts on the ground,” noted Mr. Avishai. Every high-tech start-up, every new Thai restaurant and every successful film — and the very existence of a Hebrew-speaking, pluralistic, thriving Tel Aviv — speaks to the success of traditional Zionism and its continuing importance in Israeli life.