Balfour Declaration

The Balfour Declaration was a letter dated November 2, 1917 from British Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour, to Lord Rothschild (Walter Rothschild, 2nd Baron Rothschild), a leader of the British Jewish community, for transmission to the Zionist Federation, a private Zionist organization. The letter stated the position, agreed to at a British Cabinet meeting on October 31 1917, that the British government supported Zionist plans for a Jewish "national home" in Palestine, with the condition that nothing should be done which might prejudice the rights of existing communities there.

At the time, most of the area of Palestine was still under the control of the Ottoman Empire, and the borders of what would become Palestine had been outlined as part of the May 16 1916 Sykes-Picot Agreement between Britain and France. In exchange for the commitment in the declaration, the Jewish community would seek to encourage the United States to join World War I. That was not the sole reason, for there had long been considerable support in Britain for the idea of a Jewish homeland, but the timing was influenced by the possibility.

Language from the Declaration was later incorporated into the Sèvres peace treaty with Turkey and the Mandate for Palestine.

Text of the declaration

The declaration, a typed letter signed in ink by Balfour, reads as follows:

Foreign Office,
November 2nd, 1917.

Dear Lord Rothschild,

I have much pleasure in conveying to you, on behalf of His Majesty's Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet.

"His Majesty's Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours 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.

Yours sincerely,
Arthur James Balfour

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Development and differing views

The record of discussions that led up to the final text of the Balfour Declaration clarifies some details of its wording. The phrase "national home" was intentionally used instead of "state", and the British devoted some effort over the following decades to denying that a state was the intention, including the Churchill White Paper, 1922. However, in private, many British officials agreed with the interpretation of the Zionists that a state would be the eventual outcome.

An early draft used the word that in referring to Palestine as a Jewish homeland, which was changed to in Palestine to avoid committing to it being the whole of Palestine. Similarly, an early draft did not include the commitment to not prejudicing the rights of the non-Jewish communities. These changes came about partly as the result of the urgings of Edwin Samuel Montagu, an influential anti-Zionist Jew and Secretary of State for India, who, among others, was concerned that the declaration without those changes could result in increased anti-Semitic persecution.

Like the preceding Sykes-Picot Agreement, the declaration is viewed by many Arabs as a gross betrayal of Britain's undertakings to support Arab independence in the Hussein-McMahon Correspondence of 1915–1916.

Negotiation

One of the main Jewish figures who negotiated the granting of the declaration was Dr. Chaim Weizmann, the leading spokesman for organized Zionism in Britain. During the first meeting between Chaim Weizmann and Balfour, in 1906, the Unionist leader was impressed by Weizman's personality. Balfour asked Weizmann why Palestine—and Palestine alone—could be the basis for Zionism. "Anything else would be idolatry", Weizmann protested, adding: "Mr. Balfour, supposing I were to offer you Paris instead of London, would you take it?" "But Dr. Weizmann", Balfour retorted, "we have London", to which Weizmann rejoined, "That is true, but we had Jerusalem when London was a marsh."^[1]

Weizmann was a chemist who managed to synthesize acetone via fermentation. Acetone is needed in the production of cordite, a propellant needed to lob artillery shells. Germany had a corner on a key acetone ingredient, calcium acetate. Without calcium acetate, Britain could not produce acetone and without acetone there would be no cordite. Without cordite, then Britain may have lost the Great War. When Balfour asked what payment he would in return for the use of his process, Weizmann responded, "There is only one thing I want. A national home for my people." He eventually received both payment for his discovery and a role in the history of the origins of the state of Israel.

It has been reported that Balfour's sympathy with the plight of the Israelis was influenced by an ilicit relationship with the wife of a high-ranking Jewish official.^[2]

Contradictory assurances

In his November, 2002 interview with the New Statesman magazine[3], the UK Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, has blamed Britain's imperial past for many of the modern political problems, including the Arab-Israeli conflict.

"The Balfour declaration and the contradictory assurances which were being given to Palestinians in private at the same time as they were being given to the Israelis—again, an interesting history for us, but not an honourable one," he said.

Footnotes

1. ^  B. Dugdale (1939): "Arthur James Balfour", Vol I, p. 326 & 327
2. ^  Margaret MacMillan "Paris 1919 : Six Months That Changed the World"

See also

• 1922 Text: League of Nations Palestine Mandate
• 1947 UN Partition Plan
• Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel, May 14, 1948

External links

• The Balfour Declaration - Background and history of the declaration
• text of the 1922 White Paper from the Avalon Project
• Donald Macintyre, The Independent, 26 May 2005, "The birth of modern Israel: A scrap of paper that changed history"

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