I'm under the impression that the incredibly developed western-style cities such as modern Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Ashdod would have been far smaller, non-western, less developed, and less important than in modern days.
Nowadays, Israel has a large population of mostly Hebrew-speaking Jewish people, a large economy, and is a strong regional power. Prior to the creation of an Israeli state, what did the area look like? Was the area poor? How was the economy? What were the demographics? Is there a modern comparison? Would it look like the many small Arab villages in Palestine?
It's impossible to say what the cities would have looked like. I will not take that tack.
The area prior to the advent of Zionism (not of Israel) was mostly agricultural, something which persisted among the Arab villages and areas throughout the period leading up to Israel. Part of this was due to the separation of Jewish and Arab economies, mainly by Jewish choice. Jews hoped to establish a strong, independent and industrial economy of their own, separate from that of the Arabs, and even tried to avoid or sanction those who used cheaper Arab labor for some time. The goal was to be independent and as such show their ability to create more "modern" cities compared to the "backwards" natives, and thus gain some form of international support.
To some degree, it did indeed work. While "making the desert bloom" is a narrative we typically hear about the Jewish areas, it is often disputed insofar as its actual occurrence. Industry did indeed attract Arabs to cities, but much of the population still relied on communal farming and working in cheaper labor jobs for the Zionist groups who were willing to employ them. This did lead to increases in prosperity among those Arabs, who were typically paid better than they would've been as farmers (especially since some became landless following land law revisions), but there was no end of hostility between the groups involved.
The economy was, as I said, fairly agricultural among non-Jewish areas. It was also largely dependent on the world around it, and the progress of the Jewish sectors. Poverty during the Great Depression era, for example, helped foment the Arab Revolt, which was a reaction against the British for their perceived pro-Jewish policies, but also a natural reaction against poor economic conditions. There is no comparison we can give, nor idea of what it looked like precisely, but descriptions of the members of the UN Partition Plan group who surveyed Palestine saw "dirty" villages and a "backwards" civilization in comparison to the clean and modern Jewish cities and towns.
Whether or not it would've stayed this way is debatable, but most lean towards no. Had Zionism not succeeded, British attempts to modernize the area had already held some sway among the native population, and modernity likely would've come along. It's also argued that the British, because of Zionism, took actions that harmed Palestinians or failed to protect them, which held their economic growth back. However, these are largely speculative ideas and heavily debated, so it's hard to say.
At any rate, the "dirty" villages were also at a disadvantage because the Partition Plan Committee Members were not particularly welcomed by the Arab villagers. They were viewed with suspicion and distrust, because of their job of possibly splitting the area. By contrast, Jewish areas welcomed and spoke to at length the Partition Plan members, making the perception gap even wider.
So did Israel create something that would not otherwise have been there? Very, very debatable. Were the Arab villages "uncivilized" by Western standards of modernity at the time? In many ways, yes, because they lacked industrial growth and a movement away from communal and private farming. Is there something wrong with that? I want to make clear there is nothing wrong with that, in my eyes, and it does not justify Israel's existence, nor does it mean Israel ought not exist.
Not intended as an answer, but there are plenty of videos on Youtube of this era.