I also think some European states, Germany included, defend Israel because they don’t want Zionists back to Europe.
100% correct. Here is the perfect example when Poland in 1937 was worried that the Jews may not wind up going to Palestine and therefore Poland was shopping around for a place to get rid of the Jews in South America. Take a look:
1937 Poland:
The Polish Ambassador called to see me this morning. He said that the President had asked him, during a recent conversation which the President had had with the Ambassador, to come to see me with regard to the problem of Jewish emigration from Poland. The Ambassador stated that from the conversations which Colonel Beck had recently had with the leaders of the Zionist movement at Geneva, prospects for canalizing emigration from Poland to Palestine were discouraging, and that, while Poland would still continue to try to work out some plan for continued Polish emigration to Palestine as the basis for their present policy, his Government was very anxious to find other fields where Jewish emigrants from Poland could be settled. He said that the Polish Government had sent commissions to Madagascar, South Africa, East Africa and Australia, but had been able to find no willingness on the part of those governments to encourage Polish Jewish immigration.
history.state.goV/historicaldocuments/frus1937v02/d434