by
Stuart Littlewood
In a letter to a local
newspaper about Brexit and
the way prime minister
Theresa May is handling it,
I happened to mention in
passing the Balfour
Declaration, criticising her
plans to celebrate the
centenary “with pride” and
invite Israel’s PM Netanyahu
to the fun. This drew a
sharp response from someone
spouting the usual Israeli
propaganda ‘facts’ and
saying my attitude harmed
the Jewish community
worldwide.
The Balfour Declaration is a
deadly serious subject. It
is a cause of great horror
and grief, of justifiable
international anger, and a
matter for profound regret.
This is a right time and
proper time for debate.
Let’s focus on it for the
next few months because
justice groups are urging
the British Government to
mark the Balfour Declaration
centenary by saying sorry.
Mrs May could do some real
good here. She could, at a
stroke, help quell the
destructive turmoil in the
Middle East and begin repair
to Britain’s tattered
prestige. She could even
open new trade routes into
Islamic markets, vitally
important as we leave the
EU.
By eating a little humble
pie and apologising on our
behalf for 100 years of
agony inflicted on lovely
people in a lovely part of
the world Mrs May could take
a giant step for mankind on
the world stage. She has
between now and November to
do it. Will she?
No, she’ll be celebrating
Balfour in style with the
Israeli prime minister and
not giving a toss about the
people Britain wronged.
Which is shocking when a UN
report recently branded
Israel an apartheid regime.
It’s even more regrettable
considering the desperate
cry for help from the
National Coalition of
Christian Organizations in
Palestine in an open letter
to the World Council of
Churches and the ecumenical
movement, signed by over 30
organisations in Jerusalem,
the West Bank and Gaza.
Here’s an extract: “We are
still suffering from 100
years of injustice and
oppression that were
inflicted on the Palestinian
people beginning with the
unlawful Balfour
declaration… followed by the
Israeli occupation of the
West Bank including East
Jerusalem and Gaza and the
fragmentation of our people
and our land through
policies of isolation and
confiscation, and the
building of Jewish-only
settlements and the
Apartheid Wall…”
Mrs May needs a jolt.
When I enquired whether the
Balfour Declaration is
taught in our schools I was
told ‘no’. So what exactly
is it?
Arthur Balfour, British
foreign secretary in 1917,
penned a letter to the most
senior Jew in England, Lord
Rothschild – pledging the
Government’s “best
endeavours” to facilitate
the establishment in
Palestine of a national home
for the Jewish people.
Balfour also wrote: “We do
not propose even to go
through the form of
consulting the wishes of the
present inhabitants of the
country.”
It amounted to a betrayal of
our Arab allies in WW1. Many
in Parliament objected,
including Lord Sydenham who
remarked: “What we have
done, by concessions not to
the Jewish people but to a
Zionist extreme section, is
to start a running sore in
the East, and no-one can
tell how far that sore will
extend.”
At the Paris Peace
Conference in 1919 when the
Great Powers carved up the
territorial spoils of war a
Zionist delegation produced
Balfour’s promissory note.
It planted a powder-keg in
the Middle East and the fuse
was now lit. Britain
accepted the mandate
responsibility for Palestine
and eventually in 1947 the
Great Powers pushed the
United Nations into
partitioning the territory,
again without consulting
those who lived there.
So what made Balfour do it?
The more you delve, the more
incredible the answers to
those unaware of the growing
influence of worldwide
Zionism. Support for the
movement and its ambition to
create a New Israel was
quite fashionable in the
corridors of power around
the time of WW1. The story I
find compelling is that,
while Britain struggled
desperately against German
U-boat successes and
ammunition shortages, the
Zionist power-brokers of
Germany and Eastern Europe
consulted with their
opposite numbers in America
and decided, given their
grip on money and media,
they could bring the US into
the war against Germany and
its Ottoman ally if Britain
were to promise them
Palestine for a Jewish
homeland afterwards.
Balfour was a Zionist
convert (as were many others
including prime minister
David Lloyd-George) and in
the right position. The
proposition was put to
Britain in 1916. The
Zionists delivered. The US
entered the war. In the
meantime immigrant
Polish-Zionist chemist Chaim
Weizmann offered a solution
to the production of enough
acetone, a critical
ingredient in cordite for
artillery shells, to satisfy
the war effort. He demanded
the same promise. Balfour
handed them their ‘receipt’
in November 1917 even though
Palestine was not, and never
could be, Britain’s to give
away.
‘Name of the game: erasing
Palestine’
Balfour had inserted into
his ‘declaration’ that
“nothing shall be done which
may prejudice the civil and
religious rights of existing
and non-Jewish
communities….” on the
insistence of the only Jew
in the British Cabinet, Lord
Montague, who was
anti-Zionist and opposed the
deal. But this safeguard was
jettisoned as soon as
Britain lost control of
events.
Not content with the
territory allocated to them
under the UN Partition Plan
the Israelis declared
statehood ignoring all
boundaries. Their ‘Plan
Dalet’ offensive, begun
beforehand, had seized much
Arab-designated land at
gunpoint. Jewish militia –
the Irgun, Haganah, Palmach
and Lehi – raided towns and
villages forcing inhabitants
to flee. Numerous
attrocities were committed
including the bombing of the
King David Hotel in
Jerusalem (headquarters of
the British administration)
in 1946 murdering 91, and
the massacres at Deir Yassin
and Lydda in 1948.
Today Israel illegally
occupies the West Bank and
East Jerusalem, including
the Old City, and has Gaza
in a stranglehold so
pitiless as to have caused a
long-term humanitarian
crisis and irreparable
environmental damage. For
nearly 70 years millions of
dispossessed Palestinians
and their families have
languished in refugee camps,
and those who remain in
their homeland – Christian
and Muslim alike – live a
miserable life under brutal
military occupation.
The situation stands as a
monumental stain on the flag
of the United Nations, which
hasn’t the backbone to take
action. And the continuing
repercussions throughout the
Holy Land should concern all
true Christians and Muslims
especially regular
churchgoers like Mrs May.
Miko Peled, the son of an
Israeli general and a former
soldier in the Israeli army
– and now an important
figure in the struggle for
justice – confirms what many
have been saying for years:
“The name of the game:
erasing Palestine, getting
rid of the people and
de-Arabizing the country… By
1993 the Israelis had
achieved their mission to
make the conquest of the
West Bank irreversible….
That is when Israel said,
OK, we’ll begin
negotiations…”
My critic in the local
newspaper called Hamas
terrorists. Peled describes
the Israeli army, in which
he served, as “one of the
best trained and best
equipped and best fed
terrorist organisations in
the world.” Take your pick.
But Hamas’ political wing is
not proscribed as a
terrorist organisation in
the UK.
The accusation that
criticising the Israeli
regime harms Jewish
communities is unacceptable.
There are many admirable
Jewish groups vehemently
campaigning against Israel’s
crimes. One-time Israeli
Military Intelligence chief
Yehoshafat Harkabi warned
that Jews throughout the
world would pay the price of
Israel’s misconduct. So the
problem appears to be
‘family’ matter between Jews
everywhere.
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Posted by
Stuart Littlewood on
July 22, 2017, With 1416
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