Thursday, May 15, 2008

Gulf News

On November 2, 1917, Arthur James Balfour, then British Foreign Secretary, sent a short letter to Lord Walter Rothschild, a leader of the British Jewish community, in which he "declared" what passed for a formal statement of policy by the British government.

In his correspondence, Balfour expressed how London viewed "with favour" the establishment in Palestine of "a national home for the Jewish people" on the condition that "nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine".

Purposefully ambiguous, the declaration used the phrase "national home" instead of "state", which led to various interpretations. Even Winston Churchill, at the time a key colonial officer sympathetic to Zionist aspirations, rejected the state intention in his 1922 White Paper on the subject. Still, leading Zionist leaders throughout Europe saw a huge opening in the ambiguity, and masterfully tailored policies to accomplish their goal for an independent Jewish State.

These accomplishments notwithstanding, the Balfour Declaration was riddled with confusion, with long-term repercussions that spread over a bloody century.

First, it may be worth recalling that Balfour issued his proclamation two years after secret negotiations between Henry McMahon and Hussain Bin Ali, which promised the Sharif of Makkah control of some Arab lands.

In the event, Hussain proved to be a docile negotiator, and Balfour belatedly acknowledged that the British did not bother to consult Palestinian wishes regarding the massive incursion of European Jews into their midst. What followed was a series of catastrophes that led to the nakba.

Second, and this must be stated as clearly as possible, what the so-called great powers cared about was Zionism. They did so because of highly effective influences exercised by key Zionist leaders on impressionable politicians eager to please. The desires of more than 700,000 Palestinians who inhabited Palestine in 1917, could simply be overlooked or, at best, neutralised when no one lobbied their cause. They could be replaced with a "national home for the Jewish people", which is riddled with audacity since it presumes that such a home would be created in a geographical vacuum, where few would object. Simply stated, it was easier for morally challenged politicians to satisfy the wishes of friends who passionately believed in their cause, than worry about injustices being committed against another nation.

Third, protestations by members of the Muslim-Christian Association of Palestine in November 1918 over the Jewish parade that displayed new "white and blue banners with two inverted triangles in the middle", could easily be ignored by colonial authorities many of whom never perceived Palestinians as worthy interlocutors.

Fourth, and though this point was debated on and off throughout the years, Balfour clearly noted in his preamble that the declaration was a sign of "sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations". It seems that no one bothered to ask or seek to uncover any sympathies towards the Palestinians. Why bother with the downtrodden?

Finally, and no matter who convoluted Balfour's thinking may have been, the commitment towards the Jewish "nation" necessitated London's dedication to achieving said objectives, which was categorically extended.

Much has been written over the years on and about the Balfour "contribution", blaming the Sharif Hussain for hastily accepting unfavourable terms, or for various Jewish and Israeli officials for obfuscating British intentions. Most pretend to address both sides of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in what is an exercise in misplaced objectivity since the record illustrates how little of it was actually exhibited.

The condition that "nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine" was so vague that an elephant could easily pass through the thread of London's needle. In fact, this purposefully nebulous sentence reduced the legal residents of Palestine to the status of "non-Jewish communities", without any acknowledgment of their millennial origins. Non-Jews had civil and religious rights but no political constitutional privileges.

Even after all these years, the avowal remains a classic example of how a major wrong was never corrected, but could be. Although there is precious little that Britain can actually do about ongoing Palestinian-Israeli divergences, and in his capacity as the Quartet's envoy to the Middle East, Tony Blair should at least consider abrogating the Balfour Declaration. Such invalidation, for no other reason than to retain a semblance of honesty, would send a serious signal. That although politicians almost always look for the easy way out, wrongs can and should be corrected, to restore a blemished author's soiled dignity.

Dr Joseph A. Kechichian is a commentator and author of several books on Gulf affairs.

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