Lord Arthur Balfour
On
this day, 105 years ago, one of history's most unjust declarations was
made, When on November 2, 1917 the British government issued the Balfour
Declaration, which laid the foundation for the establishment of a Jewish
state at the expense of the indigenous Palestinian population. The ramifications would be seen up until the present day and is
regarded as one of the most controversial and contested documents in
modern history.
It was named
after Lord Arthur James
Balfour, the British Foreign Secretary during the Word War 1, who on an order by United Kingdom’s Prime Minister at that time, David Lloyd
George,sent an official letter to Baron Walter Rothschild
(the 2nd Baron Rothschild), a leader of the British Zionist community,
who accepted it on behalf of Great Britain and Ireland.
The document was quite short, consisting of only 67 words in three paragraphs. However, the impact was enormous: the declaration was the beginning of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict which has not ended.The immortal words of the letter said the following:
" His Majesty's Government view with favor 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."
The Original Letter of the Balfour Declaration
" His Majesty's Government view with favor 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."
The Original Letter of the Balfour Declaration
With
the Balfour Declaration, London was seeking Jewish support for its war
efforts, and the Zionist push for a homeland for Jews was an emerging
political force. In 1917, Jews constituted 10% of the population, the
rest were Arabs.
Yet Britain recognised the national rights of a tiny minority and denied
it to the majority This was a classic colonial document which totally
disregarded the
rights and aspirations of the indigenous population. In the words of
Jewish writer Arthur Koestler: “One nation solemnly promised to a second
nation the country of a third.”And in the words of the late Palestinian academic Edward Said, the
declaration was “made by a European power … about a non-European
territory … in a flat disregard of both the presence and wishes of the
native majority resident in that territory.
The
indigenous Palestinian population’s political and national rights were
ignored in the Balfour Declaration, not to mention their ethnic and
national identity. Instead, Great Britain promised not to “prejudice the[ir] civil and religious rights,” and referred to Palestinians as “non-Jewish communities in Palestine.”
The percentage of Jews living in Palestine in 1917 did not exceed 7%,
yet the British attempted to rewrite history in order to justify their
colonial policy.
It
was a shock to the Arab world, which had not been consulted and had
received promises of independence of its own in the post-war break up of
the defeated Ottoman Empire. The Palestinians have always condemned the
declaration, which they refer to as the "Balfour promise" saying Britain was giving away land it did not own.
The Balfour Declaration constituted a dangerous historical precedent and a blatant breach of all international
laws and norms, and this act of the British Empire to “give” the land of another
people for colonial settlement
created the conditions for countless atrocities against the
Palestinian people. Balfour, in a 1919 confidential memo, wrote:
“Zionism,
be it right or wrong, good or bad, is rooted in age old traditions, in
present needs, in future hopes, of far greater import than the desires
and prejudices of the 700,000 Arabs who now inhabit that ancient land”
The
discriminatory language used by Sir Arthur Balfour and seen in the
Balfour Declaration and the British Mandate reveal the prejudiced
rational behind British foreign policy in Palestine. A month after the
Balfour Declaration on 2 December 1917,
the British army occupied Jerusalem. In 1923, the British Mandate for
Palestine came into effect, and included the entire text of the Balfour
Declaration. Through the Mandate, Britain would go on to rule Palestine
for three decades.
The Mandate for Palestine constituted the
entire legal framework for how Britain should operate during its
occupation of Palestine. Despite this, the Mandate made no mention of
the Palestinians by name, nor did it specify the right of Palestinians
to nationhood. Instead, it was during its rule in Palestine that
Britain sought to lay the foundations for the creation of a ‘national
home for the Jewish people’.
By the end of the 1920s, it became clear that this ambition would have violent repercussions.Between 1936 and 1939, thousands of Palestinians were killed and imprisoned as they revolted in protest against British policy.
The
British response took a heavy toll on the livelihoods of Palestinian
villagers, who were subjected to punitive measures that included the
confiscation of livestock, the destruction of properties, detention and
collective fines. During this time, British forces’ are said to
have carried out beatings, extrajudicial killings and torture as they
attempted to quell the uprising. To this day, there are still the
‘Tegart Forts’ in Palestine built and named by Sir Charles Tegart who
had been stationed in India to punish those fighting against the British
Raj and then later stationed in Palestine to control any Arab dissent.
For
Palestinians, Britain’s three decades of occupation in Palestine was a
turning point in the country’s history, laying the foundations for what
would become decades of occupation, displacement and insecurity.
When
the UK eventually decided to withdraw from Mandatory Palestine in 1947,
it left decisions regarding the future of Palestine to the United
Nations. In May 1948 the Israeli state was established. This time
is known by Palestinians as the Nakba or ‘catastrophe’, during which
750,000 and 900,000 Palestinian men, women and children were driven out
of their homeland by Jewish militias, and an estimated 500 villages and
towns were depopulated and demolished.
To this day, there are more
than 5 million Palestinian refugees registered with the United Nations
Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) in the occupied Palestinian territories,
Lebanon and Jordan as a result of the Nakba in 1948 and the
displacement that followed the Israeli occupation of Palestine in 1967.
Gaza,
the West Bank and East Jerusalem have now been under occupation for over 50
years, devastating the lives of millions of Palestinians.
The catastrophe of the Arab Palestinian people in 1948 continues today at the
hands of Israel, using the same old policies
and laws established by the British such as land confiscation laws,
home demolitions, ‘administrative’ detention, deportations, violent
repression, and the continuation of the expulsion of about 7.9 million
Palestinians who are denied their basic national and human rights,
especially their right to return and live normally in their homeland. Today,
the State of Israel, backed by the military and diplomatic might of the
United States, continues this century-long pattern of denying the
Palestinian people their right to self-determination. In violation of
international law, Israel refuses to allow Palestinian refugees their
right of return to the homes from which they or their ancestors were
forcibly displaced by Israel during the Nakba in 1948; denies
Palestinian citizens of Israel their equal rights; and imposes upon
Palestinians in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza
Strip a brutal military occupation and suffocating siege. This catastrophe of the Palestinian people could not continue without
the support of Israel by the United States and Britain.
In
the June 1967 war, Israel completed the conquest of Palestine by
occupying the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. By signing the Oslo Accord
with Israel in 1993, the Palestine Liberation Organisation gave up its
claim to 78% of Palestine. In return they hoped to achieve an
independent Palestinian state on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip with a
capital city in East Jerusalem. It was not to be.
On May 7, The Guardian newspaper regretted its support in 1917 for
the Balfour Declaration, describing it as its “worst errors of
judgment”.
The Guardian of 1917 supported, celebrated, and
could even be said to have helped facilitate the Balfour Declaration,”
the British daily wrote, adding that the then editor, CP Scott, was
“blinded” to Palestinian rights due to his support of Zionism.
The Palestinian people
still experience this declaration's catastrophic consequences to this
day, which bear witness to such a historic injustice due to the persecution, repression, killing, arrests and
demolition of homes and properties. that perpetuated
one of the longest-running settler-colonial occupations on a land that
was and remains exclusively Palestinian.
So far this year, 120 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli
forces. Hundreds more have been subjected to arbitrary arrests, racist
practices, forced displacement, and house demolitions.
Desperation is mounting, especially among young Palestinian refugees
and asylum seekers across the Middle East and in other parts of the
world. They are confronted with poverty, unemployment, and a general
lack of prospect. Some are risking their lives in search of a more
dignified life.
In Gaza, Lebanon and Syria, over 80 percent live below the poverty line.
In addition, the Palestinian people still face difficulties in
moving between the cities of Palestine due to the severe measures taken
by the occupation police at the checkpoints.
On
this dark day in Palestinian history, I
salute the continuing steadfastness of the Palestinian people in their
long-denied quest for justice, liberation, and their eventual
self-determination, and recommits itself to work towards that noble end,
in the face of continued Israeli violations ,resisting the occupation schemes insisting on the Palestinian Right of Return home and
establishing their sovereign state with Jerusalem as its capital.
Until measures are made by Israel to improve the standard of living, and
bring economic prosperity to the Palestinians living in Gaza, the West
Bank and East Jerusalem. Bringing some chord of social justice, and
recognition of the Palestinians identity, and stolen land given back to
them,and an end to their continuing use of apartheid practices., their
will be no peace. That is Balfours tragic legacy.
The UK is
fully accountable to the atrocities and dehumanizing of Palestinians.
But even till this day, the UK has not shown any remorse for the
historical sin it had made.
However the British Consulate in
Jerusalem on Tuesday refused to receive Palestinians who presented a
letter of protest to coincide with the 105th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration.
Activists from the Palestinian
National League of Independents and the International Institution for
Following Up Palestinian Rights staged a protest outside the consulate,
which is in the Sheikh Jarrah area of East Jerusalem
where Israel has tried to evict Palestinians from their homes in order
to turn them over to settlers recently..
But the consulate closed
its doors to the activists, forcing them to leave the letter, which was
signed by dozens of Palestinian activists, politicians, and religious
leaders at its gates.
The letter called on Britain to apologise for the Balfour Declaration.
In a statement, the Palestinian
Authority’s mission to the UK called the Balfour Declaration "the height
of imperial arrogance and disregard for the collective political rights
of millions of Palestinians, making the people of Palestine
disenfranchised and stateless in their own homeland ""When will the UK apologise and
make amends?" the statement asked, calling on the UK to recognise the
State of Palestine and its sovereignty over the West Bank and Gaza,
support the right of return for Palestinian refugees, and halt the trade in Israeli settlements.
Britain bears a moral and historical responsibility over the
displacement and dispossession of millions of Palestinians and should
therefore make every possible effort to remedy the wounds inflicted upon
the Palestinians as a result of the pledge.by apologizing to the Palestinian people, and
recognizing the Palestinian state on the June 4, lines with East
Jerusalem as its capital in support of achieving a just, lasting and
comprehensive peace in accordance with the vision of a two-state
solution to ensure that future generations of Palestinians can live
in dignity. Britain also has a duty to
acknowledge the basic political and human rights of the Palestinian
people, which have
been denied for more than a century.
At the same time, the UK government should not adopt the position of
former Prime Minister Liz Truss, who planned to move the UK embassy to
Jerusalem.
The international community should also speak up for the rights of
the Palestinians to establish an independent Palestinian State on the
1967 borders and the rights of millions of refugees to return to their
homeland. The Israeli occupation should be brought to an end and Israel
should be held accountable for its war crimes and crimes against
humanity.
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