Balfour Declaration

Balfour Declaration
The Balfour Declaration, contained within the original letter from Balfour to Rothschild
Created	2 Nov 1917
Location	British Library
Author(s)	Walter Rothschild, Arthur Balfour, Leo Amery, Lord Milner
Signatories	Arthur James Balfour
Purpose	Confirming support from the British government for the establishment in Palestine of a "national home" for the Jewish people, with two conditions

The Balfour Declaration was a British government public statement made during World War I, to announce their support for the establishment of a "national home" for the Jewish people in Palestine, then part of the Ottoman Empire. The declaration was contained in a letter dated 2 November 1917 from the United Kingdom's Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour to Lord Walter Rothschild, a leader of the British Jewish community, for transmission to the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland. The text of the declaration was published in the press on 9 November 1917.

During the period of the British War Cabinet discussions leading up to the declaration, the wider war had reached a period of stalemate; the US was yet to fully deploy, and the Russians were distracted by internal upheaval. A British War Cabinet secretary, Mark Sykes, initiated formal discussions with the Zionist leadership on 7 February 1917, and Balfour requested Rothschild and Chaim Weizmann to submit a draft of a public declaration on 19 June. Further drafts were discussed by the British Cabinet during September and October, with input from Zionist and anti-Zionist Jews but with no representation from the local population in Palestine, and the release of the final declaration was authorised by 31 October. The Cabinet discussion on approval described perceived propaganda benefits amongst the worldwide Jewish community for the Allied war effort. It read:

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.

The first part of the declaration was the first public support for Zionism by a major political power. The term "national home" had no precedent in international law, and was intentionally unclear as to whether a Jewish state was contemplated. The intended boundaries of Palestine were not specified, and the British Government later confirmed that the words "in Palestine" meant that the whole of Palestine was not intended as the Jewish national home.

The second part of the declaration was added to satisfy opponents of the policy, who had claimed that it would otherwise prejudice the position of the local population of Palestine and encourage antisemitism against Jews worldwide. Whilst the declaration provided political rights in Palestine for Jews, rights for the Palestinian Arabs who comprised the vast majority of the local population were limited to civil and religious. In 2017, the British Government acknowledged that the Declaration should have called for the protection of political rights.

The issue of the declaration had many long-lasting consequences. It galvanized popular support for Zionism, led to the creation of Mandatory Palestine, which later became Israel and the Palestinian territories, and was the origin of the ongoing Israeli Palestinian conflict, considered the world's most intractable conflict. There remains ongoing scholarly controversy over a number of areas, including whether the declaration contradicts earlier promises the British may have made to Hussein ibn Ali al-Hashimi, the Sharif of Mecca, in the McMahon–Hussein correspondence.

Background

Early British support

Lord Shaftesbury's "Memorandum to Protestant Monarchs of Europe for the restoration of the Jews to Palestine", as published in the Colonial Times, in 1841

The basis for British support for an increased Jewish presence in the region of Palestine was linked to geopolitical calculations,^{[1][lower-roman 1]} though 19th-century dispensationalist evangelical Christian beliefs had motivated Lord Shaftesbury and other lobbyists initially in the mid-19th century and created a supportive sentiment among the British political elite towards the "restoration of the Jews" to Palestine.^{[lower-roman 2]}

Early British political support was precipitated in the late 1830s and led by Lord Palmerston, following the Eastern Crisis after Muhammad Ali occupied Syria and Palestine.^[4][5] French influence as protector of the Catholic communities began to grow in the wider region, as Russian influence began to grow as protector of the Eastern Orthodox, leaving Britain without a sphere of influence.^[4] The British Foreign Office worked to encourage Jewish emigration to Palestine, exemplified by Charles Henry Churchill's 1841–42 exhortations to Moses Montefiore, the leader of the British Jewish community.^{[6][lower-alpha 1]} Such efforts were premature,^[6] as Zionism was not to emerge within the world's Jewish communities until the last decades of the century, spearheaded by the efforts of Theodor Herzl, a Jewish journalist living in Austria-Hungary, whose efforts to gain international support for his ideas were not to succeed in his lifetime.^[7]

With the geopolitical shakeup occasioned by the outbreak of World War I, the earlier calculations, which had lapsed for some time, led to a renewal of strategic assessments and political bargaining over the Middle and Far East.^[8]

Early Zionism

The "Basel program" approved at the 1897 First Zionist Congress, of which the first line states: "Zionism seeks to establish a home for the Jewish people in Palestine secured under public law"

Zionism arose in the late 19th century in reaction to anti-Semitic and exclusionary nationalist movements in Europe.^{[9][lower-roman 3][lower-roman 4]} Romantic nationalism in 19th-century Central and Eastern Europe had helped to set off the Haskalah, or "Jewish Enlightenment", creating a split in the Jewish community between those who saw Judaism as their religion, and those who saw it as their ethnicity or nation.^{[9][lower-roman 3]} The 1881–84 Anti-Jewish pogroms in the Russian Empire encouraged the growth of the latter identity, resulting in the formation of the Hovevei Zion pioneer organizations and the publication of Leon Pinsker's Autoemancipation.^{[12][13][lower-roman 3]}

In 1896 Herzl published the foundational text of political Zionism, Der Judenstaat ("The Jews' State" or "The State of the Jews"), in which he asserted that the only solution to the "Jewish Question" in Europe, including growing anti-Semitism, was the establishment of a state for the Jews.^[14][15] A year later, Herzl founded the Zionist Organization, which at its first congress called for "the establishment of a home for the Jewish people in Palestine secured under public law". Proposed measures to attain that goal included the promotion of Jewish settlement there, the organisation of Jews in the diaspora, the strengthening of Jewish feeling and consciousness, and preparatory steps to attain those necessary governmental grants.^[16] Herzl died in 1904 without the political standing that was required to carry out his agenda of a Jewish home in Palestine.^[7]

Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann, later President of the World Zionist Organisation, moved from Switzerland to the UK in 1904 and met Arthur Balfour, then Prime Minister, during his 1905–06 election campaign^[17] in a session arranged by Charles Dreyfus, his Jewish constituency representative.^{[lower-roman 5]} During this meeting, Balfour asked what Weizmann's objections had been to the 1903 Uganda Scheme to give a portion of British East Africa to the Jewish people as a homeland.^{[lower-alpha 2]} The scheme, which had been proposed to Herzl by Colonial Secretary Joseph Chamberlain following his trip to East Africa earlier in the year,^{[lower-roman 6]} had been subsequently voted down following Herzl's death by the Seventh Zionist Congress in 1905,^{[lower-roman 7]} after two years of heated debate in the Zionist Organization.^[22]

In January 1914 Weizmann first met Baron Edmond de Rothschild, a member of the French branch of the Rothschild family and a leading proponent of the Zionist movement,^[23] in relation to a project to build a Hebrew university in Jerusalem.^[23] The Baron was not part of the World Zionist Organization, but had funded the first Jewish agricultural colonies of the first major wave of Jewish immigration to Palestine in the 1880s, and transferred them to the Jewish Colonization Association in 1899.^[24] This connection was to bear fruit later that year when the Baron's son, James de Rothschild, requested a meeting with Weizmann on 25 November 1914, in order to enlist him and the Zionists in influencing those deemed to be receptive within the British Government to their agenda of a "Jewish State" in Palestine.^[25] Through James's wife Dorothy, Weizmann was to meet Rózsika Rothschild, who introduced him to the English branch of the family – in particular her husband Charles and his older brother Walter, a zoologist and former MP.^[26] Their father, Lord Nathan Rothschild, head of the English branch of the family, had a guarded attitude towards Zionism, but he died in March 1915 and his title was inherited by Walter.^[26][27]

Many British Jews at this time were not Zionists; prior to the declaration only 8,000 out of Britain's 300,000 were considered Zionists.^[28]

Early Palestine

The Turks had applied a restrictive policy to Jewish immigration to Palestine as early as 1882, the time of the retroactively named First Aliyah that can be considered as the first Zionist arrivals. Although there was a certain amount of tension with the local population (mainly among the merchant and notable classes), Constantinople in 1901 gave Jews the same rights as Arabs to buy land and the percentage of Jews in the population rose to 7% by 1914. Also by 1914, with growing distrust of the Young Turks and the Second Aliyah, Arab nationalism in general was on the rise and in Palestine anti-Zionism was a unifying characteristic.^[29][30] "The Balfour Declaration was not, in and of itself, the source of trouble in a land that previously had been more or less at peace, but nor was it a mere signpost on a road heading undivertibly toward a cliff. No one can say what the course of events in Palestine might have been without it. What did come was the product of forces and factors entirely unforeseen."^[31]

World War I

1914-16: Initial Zionist–British Government discussions

Herbert Samuel's cabinet memorandum, The Future of Palestine, as published in the British Cabinet papers (CAB 37/123/43), as at 21 January 1915

In July 1914 war broke out in Europe between the Triple Entente (Britain, France, and the Russian Empire) and the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, and, later that year, the Ottoman Empire).^[32] On 9 November 1914, four days after Britain's declaration of war on the Ottoman Empire, of which the Mutasarrifate of Jerusalem – often referred to as Palestine^[33] – was a component, Zionism was first discussed at a meeting of the British Cabinet. At the meeting David Lloyd George, then Chancellor of the Exchequer, and whose law firm Lloyd George, Roberts and Co had been engaged a decade before by the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland to work on the Uganda Scheme,^[34] "referred to the ultimate destiny of Palestine".^[35]

Weizmann's political efforts picked up speed,^{[lower-alpha 3]} and on 10 December 1914 he met with the British cabinet member Herbert Samuel, a Zionist, who believed Weizmann's demands were too modest.^{[lower-alpha 4]} Two days later, Weizmann met Balfour again, for the first time since 1906.^{[lower-alpha 5]}

A month later, Samuel circulated a memorandum entitled The Future of Palestine to his cabinet colleagues. The memorandum stated: "I am assured that the solution of the problem of Palestine which would be much the most welcome to the leaders and supporters of the Zionist movement throughout the world would be the annexation of the country to the British Empire".^[39] Samuel discussed a copy of his memorandum with Lord Nathan Rothschild in February 1915, a month before the latter's death.^[27] It was the first time in an official record that enlisting the support of Jews as a war measure was proposed.^[40]

Many further discussions followed, including the initial meetings in 1915–16 between Lloyd George, who had been appointed Minister of Munitions in May 1915, and Weizmann, a leading Zionist who was also a scientific advisor to Lloyd George's Ministry of Munitions.^[41] Seventeen years later in his War Memoirs Lloyd George described these meetings as being the "fount and origin" of the declaration although this claim has been rejected by historians.^{[lower-alpha 6]} Lloyd George was however, the Prime Minister at the time of the Balfour Declaration, and ultimately responsible for it.^[47]

1915-16: Prior British commitments over Palestine

Map from FO 371/4368 (1918) showing Palestine in the "Arab" area.^[48]

Excerpts from CAB 24/68/86 (Nov. 1918) and the Churchill White Paper (Jun. 1922)

The Cabinet document states that Palestine was included in the McMahon pledge to the Arabs, whereas the White Paper states that it "has always been regarded" as being excluded.^{[49][lower-roman 8]}

In late 1915 the British High Commissioner to Egypt, Henry McMahon, had exchanged ten letters with Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca, in which he had promised Hussein to recognize Arab independence "in the limits and boundaries proposed by the Sherif of Mecca" with the exception of "portions of Syria" lying to the west of "the districts of Damascus, Homs, Hama and Aleppo", in exchange for Hussein launching a revolt against the Ottoman Empire.^{[51][lower-alpha 7]} In the decades after the war, the extent of this coastal exclusion was hotly disputed^[53] since Palestine lay to the southwest of Damascus and was not explicitly mentioned.^[51]

Palestine in the Sykes–Picot Agreement map under "international administration", with Haifa Bay, Acre and Haifa as a British enclave, and excluding the area from Hebron south.^{[lower-alpha 8]}

On the basis of the correspondence, the Arab Revolt began on 5 June 1916. However, in May 1916 the governments of the United Kingdom, France, and Russia had also secretly concluded the Sykes–Picot Agreement, which Balfour described later as a "wholly new method" for carving up the area, after the 1915 agreement "seems to have been forgotten".^{[lower-alpha 9]} This secret agreement was negotiated in early 1916 between Mark Sykes and François Georges-Picot. Sykes was a British MP whose role had developed from his seat on the 1915 De Bunsen Committee to have a significant influence on British policy in the region, including initiating the creation of the Arab Bureau, whilst Picot was a French diplomat and former consul-general in Beirut.^[58] The agreement defined their proposed spheres of influence and control in Western Asia should the Triple Entente succeed in defeating the Ottoman Empire during World War I.^[59][60] It divided many Arab territories into British- and French-administered areas and allowed for the internationalisation of Palestine,^[59][60] proposing that the form of the Palestine administration would be confirmed after consultation with both Russia and Hussein.^[59]

These wartime initiatives, inclusive of the Declaration, are frequently considered together by historians because of the potential, real or imagined, for incompatibility between them, particularly in regard to the disposition of Palestine.^[61] For a fuller discussion of these and other issues, the reader is referred to the relevant article. Suffice it to say, in the words of Albert Hourani, “The argument about the interpretation of these agreements is one which is impossible to end, because they were intended to bear more than one interpretation.”^[62]

1916-17: Change in British Government

In terms of British politics, the declaration resulted from the coming into power of the Lloyd George and his cabinet, which had replaced the Asquith led-cabinet in December 1916, since he and Balfour had favoured a post-war partition of the Ottoman Empire in contrast to Asquith and Grey who favoured reform.^[63][64]

Lloyd George had wanted to make the destruction of the Ottoman Empire a major British war aim, and two days after taking office told General Robertson, the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, that he wanted a major victory, preferably the capture of Jerusalem, to impress British public opinion.^[65] Lloyd George immediately consulted his War cabinet about a “further campaign into Palestine when El Arish had been secured.”^[66] Subsequent pressure from Lloyd George, over the reservations of Robertson, resulted in the recapture of the Sinai for British-controlled Egypt with the capture of El Arish in December 1916 and Rafah in January 1917, and the arrival of British forces at the southern borders of the Ottoman empire.^[66] Following two unsuccessful attempts to capture Gaza, a stalemate in Southern Palestine began in April 1917,^[67] and the Sinai and Palestine Campaign would not make any substantial progress until 31 October 1917.^[68]

1917: British-Zionist formal negotiations

Following the change in government, Sykes was transferred to the War Office Secretariat as political secretary for Near Eastern Affairs, and charged with reopening discussions with the Zionists. In early 1917, despite having previously built a relationship with leading British Zionist Moses Gaster,^{[lower-roman 9]} he began looking to meet other Zionist leaders and was introduced to Weizmann and Nahum Sokolow at the end of January 1917.^{[lower-alpha 10]} On 7 February 1917, official negotiations began between Sykes and the Zionist leaders.^{[lower-alpha 11]}

Late 1917: Progress of the wider war

During the period of the British War Cabinet discussions leading up to the declaration, the wider war had reached a period of stalemate. On the Western Front the tide would first turn in favour of the Central Powers in spring 1918,^[71] before decisively turning in favour of the Allies from July 1918 onwards.^[71] Although the US had declared war on Germany in the spring of 1917, they would not suffer their first casualties until 2 November 1917,^[72] by which point President Wilson would still be hoping to avoid the dispatch of large contingents of troops into the war.^[73] The Russian forces were known to be distracted by the ongoing Russian Revolution and the growing support for the Bolshevik faction, but Alexander Kerensky's Russian Republic had remained in the war, and would only withdraw after the final stage in the revolution on 7 November 1917.^[74]

Motivation

Historiography

Avi Shlaim says there were two main schools of thought on the origins of the Balfour Declaration,^[61] one represented by Leonard Stein,^[75] the other by Mayir Vereté.^[76] He says that Stein does not reach any clear cut conclusions, that implicit in his narrative is that it was the activity and skill of the Zionists whereas according to Vereté, it was the work of hard-headed pragmatists motivated by British imperial interests in the Middle East.^[61] Much of modern scholarship on the decision to issue the declaration focuses on the Zionist movement and rivalries within it,^[77] with a key debate being whether the role of Weizmann was decisive or whether the British were likely to have issued a similar declaration in any event.^[77]More recently, Historian Martin Kramer has argued that securing the assent of Britain's French and American Allies, and of the Vatican, which controlled many Christian Holy Sites in Palestine, was a necessary precondition of the Balfour Declaration^[78] and Gutwein assays a twist on an old idea, asserting that Sykes approach to the Zionists was so as to pursue a radical political agenda on behalf of the British government.^{[lower-roman 10]}

The geopolitical calculations behind the decision to release the declaration were debated and discussed in the following years.^[79] Some historians argue that British government's decision reflected what James Gelvin calls 'patrician anti-Semitism' in the overestimation of Jewish power in both the United States and Russia.^[79] In addition, the British intended to preempt the expected French pressure for an international administration.^{[lower-roman 11]}

The British believed that expressing support would appeal to Jews in Germany and particularly America, given two of Woodrow Wilson's closest advisors were known to be avid Zionists;^{[lower-roman 12][lower-roman 13][84]} they also hoped to encourage support from the large Jewish population in Russia.^[85]

In his Memoirs, published in 1939^{[lower-alpha 12]}, Lloyd George listed nine factors motivating his decision as Prime Minister to release the declaration,^[79] including the view that a Jewish presence in Palestine would strengthen Britain's position on the Suez Canal and reinforce the route to Great Britain's imperial dominion in India.^[79] Lloyd George told the Palestine Royal Commission in 1937 that the declaration was made "due to propagandist reasons... In particular Jewish sympathy would confirm the support of American Jewry, and would make it more difficult for Germany to reduce her military commitments and improve her economic position on the eastern front".^{[lower-alpha 13]}

Approvals

April to June: Allied Discussions

According to Schneer, Sykes had as objective the mobilizing of Zionism to the cause of British suzerainty in Palestine so as to have arguments to put to France in support of that objective. At this point the Zionists were still unaware of the Sykes-Picot Agreement although they had their suspicions. In regard to the Arabs, citing Stein (from Sokolow’s notes of the meeting), Schneer writes that Sykes said “The Arabs professed that language must be the measure [by which control of Palestine should be determined] and [by that measure] could claim all Syria and Palestine. Still the Arabs could be managed, particularly if they received Jewish support in other matters."^{[88][lower-alpha 14]}

The War cabinet had previously agreed to allow a detachment of French Muslim troops to accompany British forces when they finally entered Palestine. The French chose Picot as French High Commissioner for the soon to be occupied territory of Syria and Palestine. The British appointed Sykes as Chief Political Officer to the Egyptian Expeditionary Force. On 3 April 1917, Sykes met with Lloyd George, Curzon and Hankey to receive his instructions in this regard, namely to keep the French onside while pressing for a British Palestine and “the Prime Minister suggested that Sir Mark Sykes ought not enter into any political pledges to the Arabs, and particularly none in regard to Palestine”.^[90] En route to the East, Sykes first went to France, arriving a few days after Sokolow who in the meantime had met Picot and other French officials (According to Schneer, each of Sykes and Picot, representing his respective government, was trying to undercut the Sykes-Picot Agreement at the other’s expense. “The French are determined to take the whole of Palestine,” Sokolow reported to Weizmann) and then convinced the French Foreign Office to accept for study a statement of Zionist aims, their “desiderata in regard to facilities of colonization, communal autonomy, rights of language and establishment of a Jewish chartered company.”^[91]

The French position in regard to Palestine (and the Levant) during the lead up to the Balfour Declaration were largely dictated by the terms of the Sykes-Picot Agreement and were complicated from 23 November 1915 by increasing French awareness of the British discussions with the Sherif of Mecca.^[92] Italy's participation in the war, governed by the Treaty of London (1915), eventually led to the Agreement of Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne in April 1917; at this conference, Lloyd George had raised the question of a British protectorate of Palestine and the idea "had been very coldly received" by the French and the Italians. The War cabinet, reviewing this conference on 25 April, "inclined to the view that sooner or later the Sykes-Picot Agreement might have to be reconsidered...No action should be taken at present in this matter". ^{[93] [lower-roman 14][lower-alpha 15]}

June and July: Decision to Prepare a Declaration

A copy of Lord Rothschild's initial draft declaration, together with its covering letter, 18 July 1917, from the British War Cabinet archives.

By 13 June 1917, it was acknowledged by Ronald Graham, head of the Foreign Office’s Middle Eastern affairs department, that the three most relevant politicians – the Prime Minister, the Foreign Secretary, and the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Lord Robert Cecil – were all in favour of supporting the Zionist movement;^{[lower-alpha 16]} on the same day Weizmann had written to Graham to advocate for a public declaration.^{[lower-alpha 17][100]}

On 19 June, Balfour met with Lord Rothschild and Weizmann, and asked them to submit a formula for a declaration.^[101]

Following receipt of Lord Rothschild's 18 July draft declaration by the Foreign Office, the matter was brought to the Cabinet for formal consideration.^[102]

September and October: American Consent and War Cabinet Approval

As part of the War Cabinet discussions, views were sought from ten "representative" Jewish leaders. Those in favour comprised four members of the Zionist negotiating team (Rothschild, Weizmann, Sokolow and Samuel), Stuart Samuel (Herbert Samuel's elder brother), and Chief Rabbi Joseph Hertz. Those against comprised Montagu, Philip Magnus, Claude Montefiore and Lionel Cohen.

The decision to release the declaration was taken by the British War Cabinet on 31 October 1917. This followed discussion at four War Cabinet meetings (including the 31 October meeting) over the space of the previous two months.^[102] Consent from the U.S. President was sought over the same time period.^[103]

British officials asked President Wilson for his views on the matter on two occasions – first on September 3, when he replied the time was not ripe, and later on October 6, when he agreed with the release of the Declaration.^[103] Following the US entry into the war in early April, for a month during April and May 1917, Balfour had been in the United States on the Balfour Mission, and spent significant time discussing Zionism with Wilson's advisor and leading Zionist Louis Brandeis.^{[lower-alpha 18]}

With respect to the War Cabinet, in order to aid the discussions, the Cabinet Secretariat solicited interministerial clarification as well as the views of President Woodrow Wilson, and in October, formal submissions from six Zionist leaders and four non-Zionist Jews.^[102]

Excerpts from the minutes of these four War Cabinet meetings provide a description of the primary factors that the ministers considered:

• 3 September 1917: "With reference to a suggestion that the matter might be postponed, [Balfour] pointed out that this was a question on which the Foreign Office had been very strongly pressed for a long time past. There was a very strong and enthusiastic organisation, more particularly in the United States, who were zealous in this matter, and his belief was that it would be of most substantial assistance to the Allies to have the earnestness and enthusiasm of these people enlisted on our side. To do nothing was to risk a direct breach with them, and it was necessary to face this situation."^[105]
• 4 October 1917: "... [Balfour] stated that the German Government were making great efforts to capture the sympathy of the Zionist Movement. This Movement, though opposed by a number of wealthy Jews in this country, had behind it the support of a majority of Jews, at all events in Russia and America, and possibly in other countries... Mr. Balfour then read a very sympathetic declaration by the French Government which had been conveyed to the Zionists, and he stated that he knew that President Wilson was extremely favourable to the Movement."^[106]
• 25 October 1917: "... the Secretary mentioned that he was being pressed by the Foreign Office to bring forward the question of Zionism, an early settlement of which was regarded as of great importance."^[107]

British War Cabinet minutes approving the release of the declaration, 31 October 1917

• 31 October 1917: "[Balfour] stated that he gathered that everyone was now agreed that, from a purely diplomatic and political point of view, it was desirable that some declaration favourable to the aspirations of the Jewish nationalists should now be made. The vast majority of Jews in Russia and America, as, indeed, all over the world, now appeared to be favourable to Zionism. If we could make a declaration favourable to such an ideal, we should be able to carry on extremely useful propaganda both in Russia and America."^[108]

Drafting

Authors and evolution of the draft

"Palestine and the Balfour Declaration", Cabinet Paper reviewing the background to the declaration, January 1923

Lloyd George and Balfour remained in government until the collapse of the coalition in October 1922.^[109] Under the new Conservative government, attempts were made to identify the background to the drafting.^[110] A Cabinet memorandum was produced in January 1923 asserting that the primary authors were Balfour, Sykes, Weizmann, and Sokolow, with "perhaps Lord Rothschild as a figure in the background", and that "negotiations seem to have been mainly oral and by means of private notes and memoranda of which only the scantiest records seem to be available."^{[lower-alpha 19]}

In subsequent decades, declassification of Government archives allowed scholars to piece together the choreography of the drafting of the declaration; in his widely cited 1961 book, Leonard Stein published four previous drafts of the declaration.^[112] Stein illustrated the evolution of the drafting from the original proposal by the Zionist Organization, followed by various iterations.^[112] The drafting began with Weizmann's guidance to the Zionist drafting team on its objectives in a letter dated 20 June 1917, one day following his meeting with Rothschild and Balfour, that the declaration from the British government should state: "its conviction, its desire or its intention to support Zionist aims for the creation of a Jewish national home in Palestine; no reference must be made I think to the question of the Suzerain Power because that would land the British into difficulties with the French; it must be a Zionist declaration."^[113][63]

Subsequent authors have debated as to who the "primary author" really was. In his posthumously published 1981 book The Anglo-American Establishment, Georgetown University history professor Carroll Quigley explained his view that the primary author of the declaration was Alfred, Lord Milner,^{[lower-roman 15]} and more recently, William D. Rubinstein, Professor of Modern History at Aberystwyth University, Wales, wrote that Conservative politician and pro-Zionist Leo Amery, as Assistant Secretary to the British war cabinet in 1917, should be considered the main author of the declaration.^[115]

Terms

The agreed version of the declaration, a single sentence of just 67 words,^[118] was sent in a short letter from Balfour to Walter Rothschild, for transmission to the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland, on 2 November 1917.^[79] The declaration contained four clauses, of which the first two promised to support "the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people", followed by two "safeguard clauses"^[119][120] with respect to "the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine", and "the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country".^[79]

Jewish national home vs. Jewish state

The phrase "national home" was intentionally used instead of "state" because of opposition to the Zionist program within the British Cabinet,^{[lower-roman 16]} although the chief architects of the declaration considered that a Jewish State would emerge in time.^{[lower-roman 17]} The term "national home" was intentionally ambiguous.^[123] For example, the phrase 'national homeland' had no legal value or precedent in international law,^{[lower-roman 16]} so its meaning was thus unclear when compared to other terms such as 'state'.^{[lower-roman 16]}

Explication of the wording has been sought in the correspondence leading to the final version of the declaration. Following discussion of the initial draft, the Cabinet Secretary, Mark Sykes, met with the Zionist negotiators to clarify their aims. His official report back to the Cabinet categorically stated that the Zionists did not want "to set up a Jewish Republic or any other form of state in Palestine or in any part of Palestine."^[124] but rather preferred some form of protectorate as provided in the Palestine Mandate.^[124] In approving the Balfour Declaration, Leopold Amery, one of the Secretaries to the British War Cabinet of 1917–18, testified under oath to the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry in January 1946 from his personal knowledge that:

The phrase "the establishment in Palestine of a National Home for the Jewish people" was intended and understood by all concerned to mean at the time of the Balfour Declaration that Palestine would ultimately become a "Jewish Commonwealth" or a "Jewish State", if only Jews came and settled there in sufficient numbers.^[125]

David Lloyd George, who was Prime Minister at the time of the declaration, told the Palestine Royal Commission in 1937 that it was intended that Palestine may become a Jewish Commonwealth if and when Jews "had become a definite majority of the inhabitants":

The idea was, and this was the interpretation put upon it at the time, that a Jewish State was not to be set up immediately by the Peace Treaty without reference to the wishes of the majority of the inhabitants. On the other hand, it was contemplated that when the time arrived for according representative institutions to Palestine, if the Jews had meanwhile responded to the opportunity afforded them by the idea of a national home and had become a definite majority of the inhabitants, then Palestine would thus become a Jewish Commonwealth.^[87]

Both the Zionist Organization and the British government devoted efforts to denying that a state was the intention over the following decades, including in Winston Churchill's 1922 White Paper.^[126] However, in private, many British officials agreed with the interpretation of the Zionists that a state would be established when a Jewish majority was achieved;^[127] in particular, at a private meeting on 22 July 1922 at Balfour's home, Richard Meinertzhagen claims both Balfour and Lloyd George admitted that an eventual Jewish state had always been their intention.^{[128][lower-alpha 20]} Note however that Meinertzhagen has been subject of criticism, notably by Brian Garfield, "he pretended his vast ”diaries“ were records of events as they were occurring. but in fact they are memoirs, created and re-created long after the events, with the author’s retrospective (and often fictional spin”)"^[130]

Scope of the National Home "In Palestine"

The choice of stating such a homeland would be found 'in Palestine' rather than 'of Palestine' was also no accident.^{[lower-roman 16]} With respect to the scope of the Jewish National Home, the initial draft of the declaration, contained in a letter sent by Rothschild to Balfour, referred to the principle "that Palestine should be reconstituted as the National Home of the Jewish people."^[131] In the final text, following Lord Milner's amendment, the word "reconstituted" was removed and the word that was replaced with in.^[132][133]

This text thereby avoided committing the entirety of Palestine to the Jewish National Home, resulting in controversy in future years over the intended scope.^[132][116] This was subsequently clarified by the 1922 Churchill White Paper, which wrote that "the terms of the declaration referred to do not contemplate that Palestine as a whole should be converted into a Jewish National Home, but that such a Home should be founded 'in Palestine.'"^[134]

The declaration did not include any geographical boundaries for Palestine.^[135] Following the end of the war, three documents – the declaration, the Hussein-McMahon Correspondence and the Sykes-Picot Agreement – became the basis for the negotiations to set the boundaries of Palestine.^[136]

Civil and religious rights of non-Jewish communities in Palestine

The declaration's first safeguard clause referred to protecting the civil and religious rights of non-Jews in Palestine. The clause had been drafted together with the second safeguard by Leo Amery in discussion with Lord Milner, with the intention to "go a reasonable distance to meeting the objectors, both Jewish and pro-Arab, without impairing the substance of the proposed declaration".^{[138][lower-alpha 21]}

The "non-Jews" constituted 90% of the population of Palestine;^[121] Ronald Storrs, Britain's Military Governor of Jerusalem between 1917 and 1920, described that this community had observed that they had been "not so much as named, either as Arabs, Moslems or Christians, but were lumped together under the negative and humiliating definition of 'Non-Jewish Communities' and relegated to subordinate provisos".^{[lower-alpha 22]} The community also noted that there was no reference to protecting their "political status" or political rights, as there was in the subsequent safeguard relating to Jews in other countries.^[140][141] This protection was frequently compared against the commitment to the Jewish community, and over the years a variety of terms were used to refer to these two obligations as a pair.^{[lower-alpha 23]} The obligation proved to be untenable,^[145] having been put into effect via the British Mandate for Palestine, which was confirmed in 1922 as the vehicle for delivering the promises of the Declaration.^[146] Fifteen years after the Mandate was confirmed, the 1937 Palestine Royal Commission report, the first official proposal for partition of the region, referred to the requirements as "contradictory obligations",^[147][148] and with respect to the wider situation that had arisen in Palestine noted that the "disease is so deep-rooted that, in our firm conviction, the only hope of a cure lies in a surgical operation".^[149] The continuing intercommunal conflict had proven to the British that it was impossible for them to pacify the two communities in Palestine by using different messages for different audiences; as James Renton described it in 2007, "The attempt to create different messages for different audiences regarding the future of the same place, as had been attempted since the fall of Jerusalem, was untenable."^[145]</ref>^{[lower-alpha 25]}

Balfour stated in February 1919 that Palestine was considered an exceptional case in which "we deliberately and rightly decline to accept the principle of self-determination,"^{[lower-alpha 26]} although he considered that the policy provided self-determination to Jews.^[152] Avi Shlaim considers this the declaration's "greatest contradiction".^[61] This principle of self-determination had been declared on numerous occasions subsequent to the declaration – President Wilson's January 1918 Fourteen points, McMahon's Declaration to the Seven in June 1918, the November 1918 Anglo-French Declaration, and the June 1919 Covenant of the League of Nations that had established the mandate system.^{[lower-alpha 27]} In an August 1919 memo Balfour acknowledged the inconsistency among these statements, and further explained that the British had no intention of consulting the existing population of Palestine.^{[lower-alpha 28]} The results of the then ongoing American King–Crane Commission of Enquiry consultation of the local population were subsequently suppressed for three years until the report was leaked in 1922.^[158] Subsequent British Governments have acknowledged this deficiency, such as the 1939 committee led by the Lord Chancellor, Frederic Maugham, which concluded that the government had not been "free to dispose of Palestine without regard for the wishes and interests of the inhabitants of Palestine",^[159] and the April 2017 statement by the British Minister of State, Baroness Anelay, that the government acknowledged that "the Declaration should have called for the protection of political rights of the non-Jewish communities in Palestine, particularly their right to self-determination."^{[lower-alpha 29]}

Rights and political status of Jews in other countries

Edwin Samuel Montagu, the only Jew in a senior government position,^[162] wrote a 23 August 1917 memorandum stating his belief that: "the policy of His Majesty's Government is anti-Semitic in result and will prove a rallying ground for anti-Semites in every country of the world."

The second safeguard clause was a commitment that nothing should be done which might prejudice the rights of the Jewish communities in other countries outside of Palestine.

The original drafts of Rothschild, Balfour, and Milner did not include this safeguard, which was drafted together with the preceding safeguard in early October. It reflected opposition from influential members of the Anglo-Jewish community. The Conjoint Foreign Committee of the Board of Deputies of British Jews and the Anglo-Jewish Association had published a letter in The Times on 24 May 1917 entitled Views of Anglo-Jewry, signed by the two organisations' presidents, David Lindo Alexander and Claude Montefiore, stating their view that: "the establishment of a Jewish nationality in Palestine, founded on this theory of homelessness, must have the effect throughout the world of stamping the Jews as strangers in their native lands, and of undermining their hard-won position as citizens and nationals of these lands."^[163] This was followed in late August by Edwin Samuel Montagu, an influential anti-Zionist Jew and Secretary of State for India, and the only Jewish member of the British cabinet, who wrote in a Cabinet memorandum that: "The policy of His Majesty's Government is anti-Semitic in result and will prove a rallying ground for anti-Semites in every country of the world."^[164]

Lord Rothschild took exception to the new proviso on the basis that it presupposed the possibility of a danger to non-Zionists, which he denied.^[165]

Reaction

The text of the declaration was published in the press one week after it was signed, on 9 November 1917.^[166]

Sykes-Picot Agreement Exposed

The Tsarist government was a minor party to the Sykes–Picot agreement, and when, following the Russian Revolution, the Bolsheviks published the agreement in Izvestia and Pravda on 23 November 1917 and in the British Guardian on November 26, 1917,^[167][168] "the British were embarrassed, the Arabs dismayed and the Turks delighted."^[169] The Zionists had been aware of the outlines of the agreement since April and specifically the part relevant to Palestine, following a meeting between Weizmann and Sir Ronald Cecil where Weizmann made very clear his objections to the proposed scheme. ^[170] At a private meeting in London on 1 December 1918, French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau and Lloyd George were to agree to certain modifications to the Sykes-Picot Agreement, including British control of Palestine. ^[171]

Zionist reaction

Balfour Declaration as published in The Times, 9 November 1917

The publication of the intent galvanized Zionism, which finally had obtained an official charter. It was first published in newspapers on 9 November, and leaflets were circulated throughout Jewish communities. These leaflets were airdropped over Jewish communities in Germany and Austria, as well as the Pale of Settlement, which had been given to the Central Powers following the Russian withdrawal.^[172]

Weizmann had argued that one consequence of such a public commitment by Great Britain, making the establishment of a Jewish homeland in Palestine one of the Allies' war aims, was that it would have three effects: it would swing Russia to maintain pressure on Germany's Eastern Front, since Jews had been prominent in the March Revolution of 1917. It would rally the large Jewish community in the United States to press for greater funding for the American war effort, underway since April of that year; and, lastly, that it would undermine German Jewish support for Kaiser Wilhelm II.^[173]

American Zionism was still in its infancy; in 1914 the Zionist Federation had a small budget of about $5,000 and only 12,000 members, despite an American Jewish population of three million.^{[lower-roman 18]} However, the Zionist organizations had recently succeeded, following a show of force within the American Jewish community, in arranging a Jewish congress to debate the Jewish problem as a whole.^{[lower-roman 19]} This impacted British and French government estimates of the balance of power within the American Jewish public.^{[lower-roman 20]}

In the ongoing Sinai and Palestine Campaign, both Gaza and Jaffa fell within several days. Once under British military occupation, large transfers of funds were possible, and a major effort began to drain the marshy land of the Valley of Jezreel, whose redemption as the breadbasket of Palestine became the priority of the Third Aliyah settlers, mainly from Eastern Europe.^[176]

The declaration spurred an unintended and extraordinary increase in the number of adherents of American Zionism; in 1914 the 200 American Zionist societies comprised a total of 7,500 members, which grew to 30,000 members in 600 societies in 1918 and 149,000 members in 1919.^{[lower-roman 20]} Whilst the British had considered that the declaration reflected a previously established dominance of the Zionist position in Jewish thought, it was the declaration itself that was subsequently responsible for Zionism's legitimacy and leadership.^{[lower-roman 21]}

In August 1919 Balfour approved Weizmann's request to name the first post-war settlement in Mandatory Palestine, "Balfouria", in his honor.^[178][179] It was intended to be a model settlement for future American Jewish activity in Palestine.^[180]

Hebert Samuel, the Zionist MP whose 1915 memorandum had framed the start of discussions in the British Cabinet, was asked by Lloyd George on 24 April 1920 to act as the first civil governor of British Palestine, replacing the previous military administration that had ruled the area since the war.^[181] Shortly after beginning the role in July 1920, he gave a reading at the Hurva Synagogue in Jerusalem, which, according to his memoirs, led the congregation of older settlers to feel that the "fulfilment of ancient prophecy might at last be at hand".^{[lower-alpha 30][182]}

From 1918 until World War II Jews in Mandatory Palestine celebrated Balfour Day as an annual national holiday on 2 November.^[183] The celebrations included ceremonies in schools and other public institutions and festive articles in the Hebrew press.^[183]

Opposition in Palestine

The most popular Palestinian Arab newspaper, Filastin (La Palestine), published a four-page editorial addressed to Lord Balfour in March 1925.

The local Christian and Muslim community of Palestine, who constituted almost 90% of the population, strongly opposed the declaration.^[121] As described by the Palestinian-American philosopher Edward Said in 1979, it was perceived as being made: "(a) by a European power, (b) about a non-European territory, (c) in a flat disregard of both the presence and the wishes of the native majority resident in that territory, and (d) it took the form of a promise about this same territory to another foreign group."^{[lower-roman 22]}

According to the 1919 King–Crane Commission, "No British officer, consulted by the Commissioners, believed that the Zionist programme could be carried out except by force of arms."^[185] A delegation of the Muslim-Christian Association, headed by Musa al-Husayni, expressed public disapproval on 3 November 1918, one day after the Zionist Commission parade marking the first anniversary of the Balfour Declaration.^[186] They handed a petition signed by more than 100 notables to Ronald Storrs, the Occupied Enemy Territory Administration (OETA) military governor:

We have noticed yesterday a large crowd of Jews carrying banners and over-running the streets shouting words which hurt the feeling and wound the soul. They pretend with open voice that Palestine, which is the Holy Land of our fathers and the graveyard of our ancestors, which has been inhabited by the Arabs for long ages, who loved it and died in defending it, is now a national home for them... We Arabs, Muslim and Christian, have always sympathized profoundly with the persecuted Jews and their misfortunes in other countries... but there is wide difference between such sympathy and the acceptance of such a nation... ruling over us and disposing of our affairs.^[187]

The group also protested the carrying of new "white and blue banners with two inverted triangles in the middle",^[188] drawing the attention of the British authorities to the serious consequences of any political implications in raising the banners.^[188] Later that month, on the first anniversary of the occupation of Jaffa by the British, the Muslim-Christian Association sent a lengthy memorandum and petition to the military governor protesting once more any formation of a Jewish state.^[189]

Broader Arab response

In the broader Arab world, the declaration was seen as a betrayal of the British wartime understandings with the Arabs.^[173] The Sharif of Mecca and other Arab leaders considered the declaration a violation of a previous commitment made in the McMahon–Hussein correspondence in exchange for launching the Arab Revolt.^[61]

Following the publication of the declaration, the British had dispatched Commander David George Hogarth to see Hussein in January 1918 bearing the message that the "political and economic freedom" of the Palestinian population was not in question.^[60] Hogarth reported that Hussein "would not accept an independent Jewish State in Palestine, nor was I instructed to warn him that such a state was contemplated by Great Britain".^[190] Hussein had also learned of the Sykes–Picot Agreement when it was leaked by the new Soviet government in December 1917, but was satisfied by two disingenuous telegrams from Sir Reginald Wingate, who had replaced McMahon as High Commissioner of Egypt, assuring him that the British commitments to the Arabs were still valid and that the Sykes–Picot Agreement was not a formal treaty.^[60]

Continuing Arab disquiet over Allied intentions also led during 1918 to the British Declaration to the Seven and the Anglo-French Declaration, the latter promising "the complete and final liberation of the peoples who have for so long been oppressed by the Turks, and the setting up of national governments and administrations deriving their authority from the free exercise of the initiative and choice of the indigenous populations".^[60][191]

The 3 January 1919 Faisal–Weizmann Agreement^[192] was a short-lived agreement for Arab–Jewish cooperation on the development of a Jewish homeland in Palestine, which Faisal had mistakenly understood was to be within the Arab Kingdom.^{[lower-alpha 31]} Faisal did treat Palestine differently in his presentation to the Peace Conference on 6 February 1919 saying "Palestine, in consequence of its universal character, be left on one side for the mutual consideration of all parties concerned".^[194][195] The agreement was never implemented.^{[lower-alpha 32]}

The Holy See

Zionist diplomat Nahum Sokolow was granted an audience with Pope Benedict XV in early May, Jewish settlement in Palestine and the status of the Holy Places were discussed. The Pope expressed general sympathy and support for the Zionist desire for immigration and colonization, restricted under Ottoman rule.^{[78][198][199][200][lower-roman 23]}

With the advent of the Balfour Declaration and the British entry into Jerusalem on December 9, the Vatican reversed its earlier sympathetic attitude to Zionism and adopted an oppositional stance that was to continue for some time to come.^[203]

Response by Central Powers

Immediately following the publication of the Balfour Declaration, it was met with tactical responses from the Central Powers.^[204] Two weeks following the declaration, Ottokar Czernin, the Austrian Foreign Minister, gave an interview to Arthur Hantke, President of the Zionist Federation of Germany, promising that his government would influence the Turks once the war was over.^[205] On 12 December, the Ottoman Grand Vizier, Talaat Pasha, gave an interview to the German newspaper Vossische Zeitung^[205] that was published on 31 December and subsequently released in the German-Jewish periodical Jüdische Rundschau on 4 January 1918,^[206][205] in which he referred to the declaration as "une blague"^[205] (a deception) and promised that under Ottoman rule "all justifiable wishes of the Jews in Palestine would be able to find their fulfilment" subject to the absorptive capacity of the country.^[205] This Turkish statement was endorsed by the German Foreign Office on 5 January 1918.^[205] On 8 January 1918, to advocate for further progress, a German-Jewish Society was formed, named the Union of German Jewish Organizations for the Protection of the Rights of the Jews of the East (VJOD).^{[lower-alpha 33][207]}

Following the war, the Treaty of Sèvres was signed by the Ottoman Empire on 10 August 1920.^[208] The treaty dissolved the Ottoman Empire, requiring Turkey to renounce sovereignty over much of the Middle East.^[208] Article 95 of the treaty incorporated the terms of the Balfour Declaration with respect to "the administration of Palestine, within such boundaries as may be determined by the Principal Allied Powers".^[208] Since inclusion of the Balfour Declaration in the Treaty of Sevres did not affect the legal status of the Balfour Declaration or the Mandate, there was also no effect when Sevres was superseded by the Treaty of Lausanne, which did not include any reference to the Balfour Declaration.^[209]

In 1922, German anti-Semitic theorist Alfred Rosenberg in his primary contribution to Nazi theory on Zionism, Der Staatsfeindliche Zionismus ("Zionism, the Enemy of the State"), accused German Zionists of working for a German defeat and supporting Britain and the implementation of the Balfour Declaration, in a version of the stab-in-the-back myth.^{[lower-alpha 34]}

United States

In 1922 Congress officially endorsed American support through passage of the Lodge–Fish Resolution^{[212][213][103]} notwithstanding opposition from the State Department.^[214]

Davidson argues that President Wilson and Congress ignored democratic values in favour of "biblical romanticism" when they endorsed the declaration ^[215] and points to a pro-Zionist lobby, which was active at a time when the small number of unorganized Arab Americans were not heard.^[215]

Evolution of British opinion

Although in the end nothing came of them, during 1917 and 1918, the Turks made informal peace overtures to the British. In the second and third weeks of November, after the signing of the Balfour Declaration, the War Cabinet considered what terms it might offer in order to detach Turkey. Both Milner and Smuts were willing to permit leaving Palestine under nominal Turkish sovereignty and this view, backed by Lloyd George, prevailed even over the objections of the Foreign Office and Curzon.^[216]

In October 1919, Lord Curzon succeeded Balfour as Foreign Secretary. Curzon had opposed the Balfour Declaration prior to its publication and therefore determined to pursue a policy in line with its "narrower and more prudent rather than the wider interpretation".^[217] Following Bonar Law's appointment as Prime Minister in late 1922, Curzon wrote to Law that he regarded the declaration as "the worst" of Britain's Middle East commitments and "a striking contradiction of our publicly declared principles".^[218] Curzon had been a member of the 1917 Cabinet that had approved the declaration, and according to Sir David Gilmour, Curzon had been "the only senior figure in the British government at the time who foresaw that its policy would lead to decades of Arab–Jewish hostility".^[219]

In August 1920 the report of the Palin Commission, the first in a long line of Commissions of Inquiry on the question of Palestine during the Mandate period,^[220] noted that "The Balfour Declaration... is undoubtedly the starting point of the whole trouble". The conclusion of the report mentioned the Balfour Declaration three times, stating that "the causes of the alienation and exasperation of the feelings of the population of Palestine" included:

• inability to reconcile the Allies' declared policy of self-determination with the Balfour Declaration, giving rise to a sense of betrayal and intense anxiety for their future;^[221]
• misapprehension of the true meaning of the Balfour Declaration and forgetfulness of the guarantees determined therein, due to the loose rhetoric of politicians and the exaggerated statements and writings of interested persons, chiefly Zionists;^[221] and
• Zionist indiscretion and aggression since the Balfour Declaration aggravating such fears.^[221]

British public and government opinion became increasingly less favourable to the commitment that had been made to Zionist policy. In February 1922 Churchill telegraphed Samuel, who by then had been appointed High Commissioner for Palestine, asking for cuts in expenditure and noting:

In both Houses of Parliament there is growing movement of hostility, against Zionist policy in Palestine, which will be stimulated by recent Northcliffe articles.^{[lower-alpha 35]} I do not attach undue importance to this movement, but it is increasingly difficult to meet the argument that it is unfair to ask the British taxpayer, already overwhelmed with taxation, to bear the cost of imposing on Palestine an unpopular policy.^[223]

Following the issuance of the Churchill White Paper in June 1922, the House of Lords rejected a Palestine Mandate that incorporated the Balfour Declaration by 60 votes to 25, following a motion issued by Lord Islington.^[224][225] The vote proved to be only symbolic as it was subsequently overruled by a vote in the House of Commons following a tactical pivot and variety of promises made by Churchill.^{[224][lower-roman 24]} The wording of the declaration was thus incorporated into the British Mandate for Palestine, a legal instrument that created Mandatory Palestine for the explicit purpose of putting the declaration into effect.^[228] Unlike the declaration itself, the Mandate was legally binding on the British Government.^[228]

Long-term impact

The declaration had two indirect consequences, the emergence of a Jewish state and a chronic state of conflict between Arabs and Jews throughout the Middle East.^[173][229] With respect to the latter, the declaration has been described as the "original sin" with respect to Britain's failure in Palestine^[230] and for wider events in Palestine.^[231] Starting in 1920, the Intercommunal conflict in Mandatory Palestine broke out, which widened into the regional Arab–Israeli conflict, often referred to as the world's "most intractable conflict".^{[232][233][234]} The Arab-Israeli conflict in a wider sense ran primarily from 1948–73, but continues today, mainly in the form of the more localized Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Britain's involvement in this became one of the most controversial parts of its Empire's history, and damaged its reputation in the Middle East for generations.^{[lower-roman 25]}According to Elizabeth Monroe, "measured by British interests alone, [the Declaration was] one of the greatest mistakes in [its] imperial history."^[235]

Jonathan Schneer's 2010 study concluded that because the buildup to the declaration was characterized by "contradictions, deceptions, misinterpretations, and wishful thinking", the declaration sowed dragon's teeth and "produced a murderous harvest, and we go on harvesting even today".^{[lower-roman 26]} The foundational stone for modern Israel had been laid, but the prediction that this would lay the groundwork for harmonious Arab-Jewish cooperation proved to be wishful thinking.^{[238][lower-roman 27]} Following the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine, the British House of Commons approved the White Paper of 1939^{[lower-roman 28]} and although this policy lasted until the British surrendered the Mandate in 1948, it served only to highlight the fundamental difficulty for the Mandatory in carrying out the Mandate obligations.

The declaration also had a significant impact on religious Jews, with some seeing its coming as a divine providence; this encouraged Religious Zionism and discouraged traditional religious anti-Zionism.^{[lower-roman 29]}

The document

Lord Balfour's desk, in the Museum of the Jewish Diaspora in Tel Aviv

The document was presented to the British Museum in 1924 by Walter Rothschild; today it is held in the British Library, which separated from the British Museum in 1973, as Additional Manuscripts number 41178.^[242] From October 1987 to May 1988 it was lent outside the UK for display in Israel's Knesset.^[243] The Israeli government are currently in negotiations to arrange a second loan in 2018, with plans to display the document in Independence Hall.^[243]

See also

• Proposals for a Jewish state
• British Mandate for Palestine (legal instrument)
• Diplomatic history of World War I

Notes

Primary supporting quotes

Explanatory notes and scholarly perspectives

External links

• UK Commons 2017 Centennial Debate on the Balfour Declaration

Citations

Bibliography

Specialized works

General histories

Works by involved parties

Key documents of Mandatory Palestine
1910s	Damascus Protocol The Future of Palestine McMahon–Hussein Correspondence Sykes–Picot Agreement Balfour Declaration Hogarth Message Bassett Letter Declaration to the Seven Anglo-French Declaration Faisal–Weizmann Agreement King-Crane Commission Report
1920s	San Remo Resolution Palin Commission Report Paulet–Newcombe Agreement Haycraft Commission Report Churchill White Paper League of Nations Mandate Palestinian Citizenship Order
1930s	Shaw Commission Report Hope Simpson Report Passfield White Paper MacDonald Letter Peel Commission Report Woodhead Commission Report White Paper of 1939
1940s	Biltmore Programme Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry Report (Survey of Palestine) Statement of Information Relating to Acts of Violence United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine American trusteeship proposal for Palestine Israeli Declaration of Independence
History Timeline Aftermath

Zionism
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