CHAPTER V
THE BALFOUR DECLARATION - PALESTINE AND THE WAR
Indirectly, the World War was fought for possession of the Near East. The natural route for expansion of the mushrooming industrial growths ofEurope lay in the direction of the great sluggish masses of Asia where vast consumer needs and untapped natural riches excited the cupidity ofEurope's imperialists.
All great conquerors whose interest was divided between East and West have considered the possession of the land bridge between theMediterranean and the Euphrates essential to their security. Assyria andEgypt spilled out their life blood for it.
It was pivotal to the empires of Macedon and Rome. Napoleon made a desperate bid for it when his ambitious eyes stretched longingly toward the rich mysterious East. It was the `Near East Question' which lay at the bottom of the plotting and maneuvering that led to the Balkan and Crimean Wars.
Here Great Britain, Russia, Germany and France engaged in a sometimes open, sometimes hidden, struggle for the most important intercontinental routes of this planet, and with them, world power and influence.
Britain was aiming at complete domination of Asia. She already held fabulously rich India by the throat. Her interests in China, and in lesser countries, had grown to gigantic proportions.
The only formidable competitor who developed during this period wasGermany whose great commercial barons were now looking at the wealthy East with scarcely concealed appetite.
The Kaiser and his entourage realized that here was the path to power. Moreover, it was here that they considered Britain to be vulnerable. The whole course of German policy centered around the Drang nach Osten (Drive to the East), whose undeclared objective was to cut the lifelines of British communications with India and the East. Berlin had already established a
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clear pathway through the Balkans. The dying Turkish Empire was flooded with German generals, engineers, diplomats and agents. "The BaghdadRailway was pushing rapidly down towards Mesopotamia. When it got to the Tigris and Euphrates, it would proceed to Basra, and thence, somehow, to Karachi and Calcutta and Delhi. Everyone in Whitehall and in The City knew that, and knew what it would mean." 1
Here was the most potent threat the British Empire had faced in generations. If the German plans were allowed to come to a head, the Reich would be in an infinitely better position to deal commercially in the East than Britain who held the paramount political position. It would mean whopping big orders for German goods of all kinds, from steel down to knickknacks. It would present the threat of a half million Teuton warriors who could be transported within a matter of days by train from Berlin to the very gates of India.
It was imperative to British strategy that the German drive to the East be halted at the gateway of the Asiatic continent. It was apparent that Great Britain must control the Near East if her Empire was to survive. Like two great patient cats England and Germany watched each other, unspoken challenge, suspicion and hate staring from their eyes. Another predatory creature, the Russian bear, as well as minor scavengers, stood by. The
two feline antagonists had stalked each other for a decade, tensely
awaiting der Tag, when the fight was unexpectedly precipitated by the explosion at Sarajevo which signaled the outbreak of the World War.
Though the primary struggle was between the rival economic ambitions of the English and Germans, the French too had their eye on this strategic sector. In March 1915, Paris made a claim for the ultimate control of allSyria including Palestine. In November 1915, M. Picot again insisted that the whole of Syria down to the Egyptian frontier must be assigned toFrance. Finally in May of 1916, a secret agreement was concluded known as the Sykes-Picot Agreement, dividing up the spoils of the `war for
democracy' in advance. Under this agreement Palestine was to be made International, with the exception of Haifa and neighboring Acre,
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which were to go to England. The entire Mediterranean littoral was to go toFrance, whose influence was also to be paramount in Damascus, Aleppoand Mosul.
From 1788 till 1914, Great Britain had fought some twenty wars to keep the route to India open. Now for this identical reason, to put a complete end to the German Drang nach Osten, she was fighting the Great War withGermany. With farsighted suspicion she saw the friend of today as the enemy of tomorrow, and looked askance at France and the French demands. Anxiously the British Foreign Office began casting its eyes around for some plausible method to forestall the ambition of it’s powerful ally.
EVENTS LEADING TO LORD BALFOUR'S COMMITMENT
By the autumn of 1917, after a startling attack by the Turks on the Suez Canal, a wholly new idea had taken possession of the minds of politicians and strategists. It was obvious that a protective bastion had to be created to buttress the artery of communications with India. Such a plan made necessary absolute possession of the Palestinian coast as well as the Judean hills that command it. Now, reasoned Britain's strategists, would be an auspicious time to revive the old Palestine. In this way, instead
of the proverbial two birds who were killed with one stone, a miracle could be maneuvered to make it three. First, an end would be put to French pretensions to control over this vital area. Scarcely less important, the enthusiastic support of the Jews all over the world to the Allied cause could be gained. And still a third factor, not to be overlooked, was the poverty ofJudea and the surrounding desert. If the Jews would undertake to form a country here and would invest the necessary money, Britain would achieve every result it hoped for; and this ideal fortress for the imperial lifeline, being self-supporting, would not cost the Royal Exchequer a penny.
All this sounded too good to be true, and the Government began putting out feelers to see if it could be finagled through. So
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potent, in fact, did this new policy appear that already on November 22, 1915 a leading article in the Manchester Guardian stated that Palestinemust be created as a Jewish Nation to act as a buffer state for Egypt, and concluded quite seriously that "on the realization of that condition depends the whole future of the British Empire as a sea empire.”
From a purely military viewpoint, the friends of this idea in Britain urged that "the only possible colonists of Palestine were the Jews." Only they could build up in the Mediterranean a new dominion associated withBritain from the outset in Imperial work, at once a protection against the alien East and a mediator between it and England .3
Still other factors of pressing importance were at work. Lloyd George, wartime Prime Minister, was anxious to bring over the United States to the Allied side and was attempting to make good on the propaganda that the War was fought for democracy and for the righting of old wrongs. There was also the fear that Germany itself would declare for Zionism. The German Government was fully alive to the importance of rallying Jewish opinion to her side. It was suspected that the Kaiser was thinking of following Napoleon's example in his Eastern campaign. The German
ruler had once declared to Herzl, when the two met in Palestine, that he was willing to undertake the `mandate' for the Zionist settlement inPalestine if Turkey would agree .4 News reached the British Foreign Office that Baron Rosen, German Ambassador to the Hague, had been in conference with leading Dutch Jews.
Aside from specifically British questions of policy, the hard-pressed Allied spokesmen were poignantly aware of the instability of their ally Russia, in whose army six hundred thousand Jews were serving, men who were fighting for a government they hated, and whose success could mean nothing but degradation for them and their families. The Allies were aware that the propaganda bureau of the Central Powers was exploiting this fact for all it was worth. Daily, proclamations were scattered over
the Eastern battlefront informing Jews that German victory
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meant liberty for them; s and in all neutral countries adroit advantage was being taken of the propaganda story which set the Kaiser's legions up as crusaders in a war of liberation.
Thus in a large sense the alliance of the Western Powers with Russia was a direct liability, souring any sympathy either Jews or Liberals might have had for their cause. This the declaration for a Jewish commonwealth was designed to correct. Said the British Foreign Office at the time: "The persecuting Governments became our friends, and Palestine was a most important factor in the war policy of the Allies." 6
Among the details is a significant aide-memoirs by the British Embassy inPetrograd to Sazanov, Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, on March 13, 1916, reading ". . . Although as is known, many Jews are indifferent to the
idea of Zionism, yet a numerous, and the most influential, part of Jewry in all the countries would very much appreciate an offer of agreement concerning Palestine which would completely satisfy the aspiration o f the Jews.
"If the above view is correct, then it is clear that by utilizing the Zionist idea important political results can be achieved.
Among them will be the conversion, in favor of the Allies, of Jewish elements in the Orient, in the United States, and in other places, elements whose attitude at the present time is to a considerable extent opposed to the Allies' cause.
". . . The only purpose of H. M. Government is to find some arrangement, sufficiently attractive to the majority of the Jews, which might facilitate the conclusion of an agreement ensuring the Jewish support."
The rumors that Germany was attempting to get Turkey's consent to some sort of pro-Zionist declaration crackled along the grapevine route. President Wilson, raised on Bible Prophecy, allowed it to be known in London that he would welcome a British pronouncement in favor of the Zionists.
When the inevitable happened and the great Russian bear began to collapse, the question of an alliance with Jewry took on even greater importance. Jewish influence in Russia was supposed to be considerable. Jews were playing a prominent part
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in the revolution - but they were greatly divided. "Some were for peace at any price, some for the maintenance of the alliance with the Western Powers; many were utterly uninterested in Zionism and had found a messiah in Karl Marx . . ." 7 But the great bulk of the Russian Jews were known to be Zionists; and with calculating eye the British computed that the alliance with Jewry might have permanent value. Zionism became an important political issue.
Negotiations were instituted with the Jewish leaders to sound them out on this pressing subject and to determine their demands.
By February 1917 the way had been prepared for a formal meeting
with Sir Mark Sykes of the British Foreign Office. Soon after, Mr. . Nahum Sokolov, representative of the Zionist Organization, opened discussion with the French and Italian Governments.
In July the Zionists submitted a memorandum to the British Cabinet suggesting the formula to be used in an official pronouncement of sympathy for their cause.
STRUGGLE WITH THE NON-ZIONISTS
If the purposes and aims of the Zionist movement needed clarification in anyone's mind, a circumstance at once occurred supplying that deficiency. The intentions of the Government were no sooner manifest than a loud and violent protest was set up by certain classes of Jews in England, France andAmerica.
Among them were the `new thinkers' who, enveloped in a cloud of Marxist pharisaism, saw the projected return to Zion as a reactionary
movement which violated their `deep Socialist convictions.'
Others were the great capitalists, who were afraid that any declaration in favor of a Jewish State might place their hard-won social position in jeopardy. Included in this strange gathering of the clans were the ultra orthodox fanatics who were awaiting the divine Messiah; and the Reform Rabbis whose tissue-paper houses this new movement seemed destined to destroy.
The Conjoint Committee, the most influential of all Jewish bodies inEngland, issued a public attack on the `political character’
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of the Zionist demands, asserting that the Jews were only a religious community and not a nation. "The granting of a charter for Palestine to the Jews," it declared heatedly, "would be a disaster for all Jewry, since the equal status of the Jews with the other citizens of different States would thereby be risked.”
Immediately the Zionists replied with vigor. The press of the day was full of the argument, with' the Government and the entire gentile world solidly on the pro-Zionist side .8
"Under the pressure of Allied needs," says the official British historian at the subsequent Peace Conference, "the objections of the anti-Zionists were either overruled or the causes of objections removed. . ." s At that time the Zionists could have practically written their own ticket, since there was no subject on which everyone but the Jews themselves were so unanimously agreed as the matter of a pro-Zionist declaration. The only powerful opponent of this course in the Government was the India Office,
ultra-Islamic under a Jewish Secretary of State.
Although the members of the Conjoint Committee had been hopelessly buried under an avalanche of public ridicule, certain changes were made in the wording of the Declaration to placate them.
As early as October 19 16, the Zionist leaders in Britain had already submitted to the Government a formal "program for a new administration of Palestine and for, a Jewish resettlement in accordance
with the aspirations of the Zionist movement.”
On February 7, 1917, Sir Mark Sykes communicated with Weitzman and Sokolov, together with M. Georges Picot, representing the French Government." This was the first of a series of round-table conferences. Its full minutes, as well as those of subsequent sessions, were transmitted to the American Zionist Organization by officials of the British War Office.
Throughout the negotiations President Wilson who, as early as 1911 had made known his profound interest in the Zionist idea, was intimately consulted; and all drafts of the proposed Declaration were submitted to the White House for approval.
The formula accepted in July 1917 by the British Cabinet read: "H. M. Government, after considering the aims of the
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Zionist Organization, accepts the principle of recognizing Palestine as the National Home of the Jewish people, and the right of the Jewish people to build up its national life in Palestine under a protection to be established at the conclusion of peace, following upon the successful issue of the War.
"H. M. Government regards as essential for the realization of this principle, the grant of internal autonomy to Palestine, freedom of immigration for Jews, and the establishment of a Jewish National Colonizing Corporation for the resettlement and economic development of the country.
"The conditions and forms of the internal autonomy and a charter for the Jewish National Colonizing Corporation should, in the view of H. M. Government, be elaborated in detail and determined with the representatives of the Zionist Organization." 11
One of the changes introduced to mollify the anti-Zionist Jews was the substitution of the phrase "the establishment of a Jewish National Home inPalestine" for the previous wording, "the establishment of the Jewish National Home in Palestine." 12
By November 2, 1917, after its wording had been sufficiently
emasculated to suit the `ideals' of Jews all around, Lord Balfour placed it in the form of a letter to the pro-Zionist, Lord Rothschild, reading as follows:
"I have much pleasure in conveying to you on behalf of His Majesty's Government the following declaration of sympathy with the Jewish Zionist aspirations, which has been submitted to and approved by the Cabinet.
"His Majesty's Government view with favor the establishment in Palestineof a National Home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.
"I should be grateful if you would bring this Declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.”
Ironically enough, the second part of the Declaration, which was since construed by Britain to make it a self-annulling document,
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was inserted on the insistence of the Zionists themselves, partly to meet the objections of Sir Philip Magnus, Mr. . Claude Montefiore and other powerful non-Zionist Jews; and partly as a symbol of that "nobility of social vision" with which the strangled ghetto mind was obscured. 13
Written by Achad Ha'am, this proviso was not in any remote sense considered as a modification of the Declaration but rather as a polite sop to quiet the fears of the non-Zionist Jews, and an equally considerate makeweight assurance to the various religious communities scattered over the Holy Land.
All of these alterations and changes in the British Government's
commitment, says Herbert Sidebotham, then secretary to Premier Lloyd George, "were inserted in deference to the opinion of a minority, in the hope of securing complete unanimity among Jews . . . It was certainly no British interest, either at this stage or later, that weakened the scope of the promise and infected it with ambiguity." 14
The Zionist negotiators, naive and inexperienced, felt that the introduction of these nice, virtuous phrases in their magna carat was a fitting and seemly gesture with which to begin their great adventure. Herzl, who had the gift of seeing beyond his nose, would have known better.
WHAT DID THE DECLARATION MEAN?
In view of the cool disclaimers which were to come later, it is interesting to note what interpretation was placed on the British Government's Declaration to the Jews at the time. Whatever bearing it might have had on the commendable questions of humaneness and justice, it could hardly be regarded as a wholly benevolent gesture. Balfour himself, handsome, clever and icy, was no mere romantic. He who had pacified Ireland with guns and was known as `Bloody Balfour' in consequence, could hardly be accused of suddenly developing a philanthropic complex in favor of Jews.
The benefits immediately accruing to the Allied cause need hardly be argued. Certainly the tremendous number of Jewish
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soldiers fighting in the Armies of the Western Powers were fired by this warm earnest of good faith. Nor can one estimate the weight of Jewish influence in neutral countries, which dropped heavily on the Allied side of the scales. Nor the enthusiastic aid given to the Allenby invasion ofPalestine. Nor the stirring effect of the Jewish Legion, fighting to right the oldest wrong in history, on the imaginations of Jewry and the world. Nor the fillip it gave the Allied claims when Palestine, the first conquered territory, was trumpeted to all humanity as newly liberated.
Not only was the effect of this superb piece of propaganda felt in all neutral countries but it was immediate in its reaction on the morale of the Central Empires, with their stew of subject races, accelerating the cleavage then taking place between the subject nationalities and their overlords. Worthy of note, too, is the boldness with which the German Zionist Conference inBerlin adopted and cabled a Resolution "greeting with satisfaction the fact that the British Government has recognized in an official declaration the right of the Jewish people to a national existence in Palestine." In fact, after the British announcement, the Central Powers did all they could to win the Zionist movement over to their side. They formulated a rival proposition, involving a chartered company with a form of self-government and the right of free immigration into Palestine; and "by the end of 1917 it was known that the Turks were willing to accept a scheme on those lines." 15
Wholeheartedly the great and important body of fundamentalist Christian opinion, hating war for any proclaimed purpose, rose to the bait. Jannaway expresses this profound conviction in his book, Palestine and the World, asserting that Biblical Prophecy was being fulfilled exactly as predicted, thus placing Jehovah squarely on the side of the Western Powers.
"Indeed," says a semi-official British publication, "support of the Zionist ambitions promised much for the Allies . . . That it is in purpose a direct contract with Jewry is beyond question." 18
This was acknowledged plainly by General Smuts, member of the War Cabinet, who speaking retrospectively some years later, asserted that "the Declaration was intended to rally the powerful
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Jewish influence for the Allied cause at the darkest hour of the War”; a statement which David Lloyd George, Winston Churchill and others, emphatically reiterated.
The Declaration was unreservedly endorsed by the other Powers.
On June 4, 1917 the French Government, through its Minister, M. Cambon, formally committed itself to "the renaissance of the Jewish nationality in that Land from which the people of Israel were exiled so many centuries ago." Even in faraway China, Wang, Minister of Foreign Affairs, assured the Zionists that "the Nationalist Government is in full sympathy with the Jewish people in their desire to establish a country for
themselves." 17
In America, echoed by practically every official of public importance,
President Wilson wrote that "the Allied nations, with the fullest concurrence of our own Government and people, are agreed that in all ofPalestine shall be laid the foundations of a Jewish Commonwealth."
In gratitude the American Jewish Congress cabled H. M. Government, onNovember 2, 1917, its desire that Great Britain should be given the trusteeship, "acting on behalf of such League of Nations, as may be formed, to assure the development of Palestine into a Jewish Commonwealth . . ."
In the United States Congress, members expressed general accord with "the British Declaration in favor of a Jewish State in the Holy Land." The minutes of its sessions show that this understanding had not altered by an iota five years later, when the American Congress was induced to put its seal of approval, by resolution, on the selection of Great Britain as the Mandatory for Palestine.
The utterances of the Cabinet ministers who framed the Declaration were no less emphatic. General Smuts asserted that "in generations to come you will see a great Jewish State rising there once more." Declared Lloyd George grandly ". . . Great Britain extended its mighty hand in friendship to the Jewish people to help it to regain its ancient national home and to realize its age-long aspirations." Said Lord Robert Cecil "Our wish is that Arabian countries shall be for Arabs, Armenia for the Armenians and Judea for the Jews." And on another
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occasion he lumped the whole matter in a nutshell, telling the excited Zionists: "We have given you national existence. In your hands lies your national future." Lord Balfour was no less clear. "The destruction of Judea 1900 years ago," he asserted, "was one of the greatest historical crimes, which the Allies now endeavor to remedy."
British newspapers were as one in their mighty paean of approval.
Without exception they spoke of "the new Jewish State which is to be formed under the suzerainty of a Christian Power.”
Across the water, the American newspapers echoed these remarks in the same expansive detail. A representative editorial of the time explains: "The Zionists are that group of Jews who wish to found a Jewish Republic inPalestine with Jerusalem as the capital.
. . The British cabinet has pronounced in favor of Zionism."18
HISTORICAL DOCUMENTS
A Chronological Collection of Historical Documents Relating to the Arab-Israeli Conflict...
