Trudy Gold
Why the Balfour Declaration? Part 2

Trudy Gold | Why the Balfour Declaration? Part 2

- Well, good evening, everyone, from very, very hot London. And, of course, the area we are looking at today, the reasons behind the Balfour Declaration, and William was lecturing around it yesterday. They are really amongst the most controversial in history. And it’s fascinating because all of the people on lockdown attempt to teach objective history, and I think this is an incredibly interesting exercise because with the Balfour Declaration, it is one of the most contentious documents in history, in my view. And I’d just like to read it to you again before we go on. “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 will bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.” So what on earth does the Balfour Declaration mean? And just to sum up, because I began to give you a group of notions to think about. Now, Yehuda Bauer, the great Yehuda Bauer, he said, “You have to take on that the majority of folk believed in the occult power of world Jewry.” And it’s seen by some, certainly by Leonard Stein, as a present to Weizmann, who of course had come up with that incredibly important invention, he was a chemist, remember, which helped the British War effort.

And he was there when Churchill was in charge of the admiralty. As we’ve already discussed, he had very close relations with many members of the British government. There had been a change of government in December 1916, and this is what William talked about yesterday, Lloyd George, who was a Christian evangelical, and Arthur Balfour, who had formerly the Prime Minister, was now foreign minister. And as you all know, he also was an evangelical Christian. And this association of philosemites with the people of the book, they knew… I mean, Lloyd George said he knew every stick and stone in Palestine. He knew the names, he knew them better than the Welsh Valleys because that is what he had been brought up with. And also you’ve got to remember that Britain is fighting a war against the Turks, the Turks who were known as the sick man of Europe. For years, British foreign policy had been to keep the Turkish Empire alive as a buffer against French and Russian empire building. The balance of power that was always the main, certainly it was the main pillar of conservative politics, going back to Palmerston, Disraeli, Salisbury. Gladstone, on the other hand, hated the Turkish Empire, particularly because of its attitude to minorities. And there were those atrocities perpetrated in the Balkans against Christians. So conservative policy had always been to bolster up the Turkish Empire, but then the Turkish Empire put themselves on the side of the Germans. There’s a war to win.

And what comes out, and this is what I looked at with you last time, is that the British, the De Bunsen report, when the British decide that one of their aims is of course to win the war, but once the war is over, to safeguard British interests, it’s in their interest to stop French and Russian empire building. Also, they believed, and this sounds absolutely fantastical, but take Bauer’s point, they actually believe that a pro-Zionist declaration would bring Russia into the war again. Remember that after the Kerensky Revolution, the Bolsheviks were determined, they took power in Russia: “Workers of the world, unite. You have nothing to lose, but your chains,” bearing in mind that so many of the leaders were Jews, completely misunderstanding the nature of being a Jew to Trotsky, how Jewish was Trotsky. he was an internationalist. They actually believed it might help Russia come into the war on the side of the allies. Plus, believe it or not, they thought it would shoo America into the war because if a Balfour Declaration was issued, world Jewry would love it. Also, there were rumours that the kaiser was about to issue a declaration himself and there were memos saying that the Jews of the Arab world would support a declaration. Now, the problem is, if you look at that document very, very carefully, what on earth does it mean? And tragically, in 1939, May, the British government said it didn’t really mean much at all. But at that stage, it was seen as a huge triumph for the Zionists in Britain. The declaration was given in the form of a letter to Lord Walter Rothschild, who was one of the few Zionist members of the Rothschild family.

It was given at the Royal Opera House to 2,000 people. It was celebrated. But we’ve got to go back now to look at events before then. So if you remember… Can we have a look at the next map? Can we go onto the map? Unfortunately, William, the maps William sent didn’t arrive. That’s the one I want. Thank you. Now, let’s win the war. The Turkish Empire is huge. They had taken Egypt and the Middle East in the 16th century, but as I said, it’s falling to bits. Now, although the Turks are Muslims, they are not Arabs. What the British do is they contact one of the most powerful men in the Arab world, of course, the Emir Faisal, who is Sharif of Mecca. Now, to be Sharif of Mecca makes you guardian of the Islamic holy places. His son was already in Cairo because, of course, the British, after the building of the bath of the Suez Canal and its purchased by the British, the whole of Egypt was now British. On the eve of the First World War, they’d already taken Egypt. And they dreamt of an empire that stretched from Egypt to India, and they didn’t want the French or the Russians anywhere in the Mediterranean. So on one level, we’re going to see pragmatism, self-interest, but we’re also going to see a bit of idealism as well. So there are letters between McMahon, who is the viceroy of Egypt, and the Emir Hussein. And stirring up Arab nationalism, he promises… Now remember, all these countries, all the countries within the Turkish Empire do not exist, they are divided up into administrative districts. It’s very important you remember this. It’s at the end of the First World War that new countries are going to be created. Now, that’s not to say there aren’t cities as old as history. And also remember that Damascus was very precious to the Arab people because it was once the seat of the great Umayyad Dynasty.

A hundred years later, Baghdad was the seat of the next dynasty, the Abbasid. And there was always conflict between the two capitals. and also within the Arab world. And wonderful Norman Stillman’s going to be talking to you about this later on, the divisions within the Arab community. But the Emir Hussein is a very important figure, and he does a deal with the British that if the Arabs would rise up against the British, then after the war is over, what he hoped for was land based on Damascus. Now, Palestine, the Arabs called it Greater Syria. The word Palestine, or Palestrina, a was actually given to the area after the Jews were expelled by the Romans. It was an insult because, of course, it’s named for the Philistines. It was used in the Renaissance by Christian scholars. But in the main, that area was referred to by the Arabs as Greater Syria; it was unimportant to them. Now, the Arabs kept their promise. And if we see the next slides… Can we go on? There you see Emir Faisal I. He’s the third son of Hussein and he is going to lead the revolt in the desert. And the next slide, please. Lawrence of Arabia, of course, had huge publicity. It was very, very fashionable to sort of… He becomes one of the most adored men in England, the great Lawrence of Arabia. He was the sort of icon of the era. And let’s have a look at the other brother, the second son of Hussein. There you see the Emir Abdullah. Later on, when the British carve up the Middle East with the French, Abdullah is going to become King of Jordan and Faisal is going to become king of Iraq. They’re a very, very important family. But as William told you yesterday, there was another very important family in the Hejaz, which is today called Saudi Arabia: the Saud dynasty who were Wahhabis.

The British chose to go with.. In 1924, they are going to defeat the Husseini clan and the Emir is going to flee to his son. So basically these are the figures who were involved in the Arab Revolt. Now, what is the next stage in this extraordinary story? Can we go on, please? Next slide, please. Here you see Sir Mark Sykes. Now, Sir Mark Sykes was a very interesting character, very important character. He’d been the prime mover on the De Bunsen report. If you remember, the De Bunsen report, very important, that’s the report that says British interests in the Middle East are best served by holding back French and Russian empire building. He was one of those extraordinary English adventurers. He came from a very wealthy, unconventional background, Cambridge educated. By the age of 25, he’d published four books, including one of his travels in Asia Minor and the Middle East. This is a description of him by Aubrey Herbert: “An effervescent personality. He could turn any gathering into a party, a party into a festival. Babbled with ideas and swept up his listeners with enthusiasm. He had more vitality than anyone else I have ever met.” So he’s got a hugely compelling personality. He was also the heir to a huge estate in Yorkshire, but much too active for that. He joined the Green Howards. He was in the Boer War. After the war, he travelled again extensively. He becomes the parliamentary secretary in the last year of Balfour’s premiership in 1908.

And then he becomes very friendly with Balfour, which is going to be important later on. His next post is the honorary attache to the embassy in Constantinople. He’s also a grandee. He inherits the estate and he starts breeding racehorses. He married, it was terrible, a bit mess, but he managed to have six children. He entered Parliament in 1911. He was a friend of Gertrude Bell. And he is one of the main advisors to the Foreign Office on the Middle East. In World War I, he goes into the intelligence service, he works for Kitchener. And it was he, on the De Bunsen report, that really advised, he was the prime mover. And it was he that actually warned the British government that the Turks were about to side with the Germans. And of course they joined the war in November 1914. And it was on his advice that the British government set up an Arab bureau in Cairo. He actually designed the flag of the Arab Revolt: green, red, black, white. Fascinating if you think what’s happening today… It later served, where ideas on that served as flags of Iraq, Egypt, Syria, Sudan, Kuwait, and the United Arab Republic, and Palestine, none of which, and I must reinforce this, were separate nations before the war. He had long agreed with Foreign Office policy of bolstering Turkey up because of Russian expansionism in the Mediterranean.

Now, the problem was the French also had aspirations in the Middle East and the British were bogged down in the Dardanelles. The French want a deal. So Mark Sykes, with… Can we see the next slide, please? With his French counterpart, Francois Picot, created a secret agreement, the Sykes-Picot Agreement, and you’re going to see the map on that. And later on this agreement… And remember, the Russians were made aware of it because they’re involved, and you’re going to see when you look at the map, but it was later leaked by the Bolsheviks on the 23rd of November 1917. and it was reported in the “Manchester Guardian” on the 26th of November 1917. It embarrassed the British, it dismayed the Arabs, and made the Turks delighted. Also was the beginning of the huge resentment. The Arabs, they believed they’d been promised land. And also the Kurds were totally unhappy with it because they had also dreamt of land. Now, George Picot, he was actually the grand-uncle of Giscard d'Estaing. He was a lawyer. He was very, very right wing. He was loathed in the Arab world. Faisal regarded him as a war criminal because he wrote up papers that exposed Arab nationalists, which led to their executions. Also, later on he withdrew the French army, leaving the Armenian’s defenceless. He’s not a particularly, pretty ghastly character. But can we please have a look at the map? Now, I want you to look at this map very, very carefully. This is from Martin Gilbert: The Allied Plan for Palestine. And if you look at it, Martin Gilbert, wonderful Martin Gilbert, I’m just going to read what Martin said. “On the 5th of November, 1914, the British government declared war on Turkey. And during ‘15, the first plans were drawn up for the partition of the Turkish Empire.

In May, 1916, Britain and France accepted the Sykes-Picot Agreement as the basis for the future of the Palestine area. This agreement envisaged the setting up of two new Arab states in place of the Turkish Empire from Damascus to Aqaba, but sought to establish British, French, and international control on the Palestine coast and on the West bank of the Jordan. The plan was abandoned at the time of the Paris Peace Conference.” Now, if you actually have a look that little black area, which is, of course, around Haifa and Acre, that was to be under British control. They wanted the ports. Think of the British Navy. So the area around, the grey area at the top is to be French area. The cross next to it is an Arab state to be under French protection. And down the bottom, the British have reserved the white area that’s going to be under British and French protection. But the big grey area is an Arab state under British protection. So where is the independence for the Arabs? So this is the Sykes-Picot Agreement. So you’re beginning to see why this is such a complicated area. So this is May 1960. How come then, within a year and a bit later, in November 1917, the Balfour Declaration was issued? Because there’s absolutely no mention of Jews. And it did have a lot to do with personalities. Let’s talk… Can we see the next slide, please? There you have, that’s another map showing the divisions, because I thought it’d be useful for you to keep that in your heads if possible.

No wonder the muddle has never really been sorted out here. Of course, you see Chaim Weizmanm, the brilliant diplomat who’d already converted a lot of Jews to Zionism and also non-Jews. And I’m going to be talking about that in my lectures next week, I’m going to be talking about British Zionists and anti-Zionists and also about German Zionist and anti-Zionist. Because even though Chaim Weizmann is in London and has the charm of the devil, the majority of Anglo Jews were non-Zionist or anti-Zionist. So, but Chaim Weizmann, he is an very important chemist. He’s already close to Churchill because remember he was at the embassy… I beg you pardon. He was at the university in Manchester when Churchill was a young man and he had a seat in Manchester. He was also close to Arthur Balfour. They were so different, but they were very close. And he was pushing and pushing away. Remember after 1904 and the death of Herzl, nobody really emerged to take on the world as far as Zionism was concerned. Yes, the socialist Zionists were building up the settlement in Palestine, but here you have Chaim Weizmann who is the perfect statesman, and he’s charming, he’s clever, he’s also ruthless, terribly, terribly ruthless. And he worked with… Can we have a look at the next slide, please? He worked with Nahum Sokolow, who was one of another born Pale of Settlement. Both Weizmann and Sokolow were of the soil. They understood the Jews.

He was, by the age of 10 he’s a renowned he Hebrew scholar. His father wants him to be a rabbi, but the governor, the Russian governor of Plock intervened because of his brilliance and enrolled him in a secular school. He married, he moved to Warsaw, and he became a regular contributor to a Hebrew paper. And in 1914, he’s a committed Zionist. He moves to London to work with Weizmann. By 1906, he was already General Secretary of the World Zionist Conference. He crisscrossed Europe, always in Zionism, in Zionist dreams. Now, he and Weizmann, very ruthlessly, they seized power from Moses Gaster and were finally granted an audience with the British government. Meanwhile, he’s been politicking everywhere and he had already managed to secure a letter from the French government in June 1917 announcing support for the Zionist project in Palestine. And this comes from… This is the Cambon letter: “You were good enough to present the project to which you are devoting efforts, which has for its object the development of Jewish colonisation in Palestine. You consider that circumstances permitting and the independence of the holy places being safeguarded on the other hand, it will be a deed of justice and of reparation to assist, by the protection of the Allied powers, in the renaissance of the Jewish nationality in the lands from which the people of Israel was exiled so many centuries ago. The French government, which entered this present war to defend a people wrongfully attacked and which continues the struggle to assure the victory of right over might, can but feel sympathy for your cause, the triumph of which is bound up with the Allies.” He also secured the support of Pope Benedict the 15th, the 4th of May 1917. He, again, was a brilliant diplomat. And Benedict, quote, “Described the return of the Jews as providential. God has wield it.”

So he has France and he now has the Pope on his side. And it’s through another interesting character that C. P. Scott, Weizmann gets to meet the new prime minister Lloyd George. Remember he’s already close to Churchill, he’s close to Balfour, and now he has his opportunity. Can we see the next slide, please? Now, this is C. P. Scott, a fascinating man, very clever. He took the greats at Oxford and he went on.. . His family were journalists, owned newspapers rather. He went to train on “The Scotsman” while still at Oxford. His cousin ran the London office of “The Manchester Guardian,” decided that the paper needed an editor based in Manchester, offered it to Scott. His father was the owner. He became editor in 1872. He was a supporter of Gadsden’s Liberals. He was finally elected into parliament for Manchester Northeast as a Liberal back bencher. And as the editor of the very influential “Manchester Guardian,” which now of course is “The Guardian,” and president of the Manchester Liberal Federation, he’s very influential, and he owns the paper. And he, as I said, was responsible for introducing Weizmann to Lloyd George. Now, it’s fascinating if you think about it because “The Guardian,” quite recently issued a statement saying how much they regretted their participation in the Balfour Declaration. Charles Prestwich Scott was a Zionist.

The paper was incredibly pro-Zionist. So it’s rather funny how, funny if you’re a cynic, which I am, I’m afraid, that at this period they’ve actually issued an editorial saying how much they regret the Balfour Declaration, that it was the most serious error they ever made. Anyway, can we see the… I’m sure you all have a lot to talk about when we come to questions. And there we see Lloyd George. And I’ll be talking more about him next week. March the 13th, remember he becomes prime minister in December 1916. He establishes a war cabinet. And on March the 13th, C. P. Scott introduces Weizmann to Lloyd George. And on April, Lloyd George tells Weizmann and Scott that the British army’s advanced into Palestine was the only real thing that interested him. He said, “A politician is a person whose politics you don’t agree with. If you agree with him, he’s a statesman.” He’s going to be leader of the Liberal Party between 1916 and 1922. And it was he who guaranteed that the Zionist idea should be on the agenda. He also ensured that the government gained international support and later on legal authority. Why was he drawn to it? And this is something that William was talking about yesterday. He comes from an evangelical background. He’d first come into contact with Zionism in 1903 when his law firm drafted the Uganda Offer. And there was only one Jew in the cabinet, and that was Herbert Samuel. I’ll talk about him later. And he actually said to him, “I’m very keen to see a Jewish state in Palestine.” And so when he already met Weizmann, he’s already receptive. He’s anti-Turk, he’s horrified by the Armenian massacres.

And also remember, the Turks had also gone against the Greek Christians. And also he wanted Britain to oversee the Christian holy places. He wrote at length about how well he knew the land of Israel. And this is what he later wrote: “I know, with the issue of the Balfour Declaration, I shall please one group, Zionist, and displease another, assimilationists. I have decided to please your group because you stand for a great ideal.” Now, this is in his memoirs on the Balfour Declaration: “As to the meaning of the words national home, it was contemplated if the Jews had responded to the opportunity offered them and had become a definite majority of the inhabitants, then Palestine would become a Jewish commonwealth. The notion that Jewish immigration will have to be artificially restricted in order that the Jews should be a permanent minority never enter the heads of anyone enjoying in enframing the policy.” And in fact, after the San Remo Peace Conference, because the Balfour Declaration is going to be written into the British mandate on Palestine, he said to Weizmann, “Now you have got your state. It all depends on you.” And don’t forget, he is the man who appoints a Jew and a Zionist to the post of high commissioner. By October the 19th, 1922, he’s out of office Britain’s last Liberal MP. And this is what he wrote in 1927, out of office, to a Jewish audience, that: “We were confronted by your people in every country in the world,” very powerful.

“You have to say that you’ve been oppressed and persecuted, that has been your power. You have been hammered into fine steel, and therefore we wanted your help, we thought it would be very, very useful.” And this, of course, echoes that incredible point of Yehuda Bauer. When Bauer said, “People believed in the almost occult power of world Jewry.” And he is going to be a pro-Zionist to the end even though in the 30s he became an admirer of Hitler. He was a philosemite; he was an antismite. More about that next week. This is a dinner where he addressed the Zionist Federation in 1931: “Words can hardly express the gratitude I feel to you for the enduring hand you have conferred on me by attaching my name to a colony in the veil of Jezreel. The names of these villages and hills are as sacred to the Gentile as the Jew. I heard of Jezreel, of Carmel, and Zion before I know of the existence of my land in the Valley of Glamorgan. I was prime minister at the time of the Balfour Declaration and secured for it the sanction of the Allies. I was principal delegate of the British Empire at San Remo, where the mandate received its final shape. Mandatory power must discharged its function with fidelity and resolution. Whatever doubts were raised by the egregious white paper which had been laid to rest.” Yet one of the problems is that, and we’re going to be seeing this over the next few weeks, with different scholars looking at it, the British are going to gradually, realising they’re going to have problems with the Arabs are gradually going to pull back or say, “What on earth did it mean?”

He said this: “Jews have a special claim to Canaan: only people who have made a success of it during the past 3,000 years and as a race have no other home.” And also this is a speech he made, which was a response in 1931, a response given by Weizmann and Sir Herbert Samuel. So I think this really gets you into philosemitism. “There has never been such an experiment in this, attempted in the history of the world.” You know, Churchill also made such speeches, that you’ve got to know it’s not just the Evangelicals. Britain is a Protestant, Bible-reading country in Victorian and Edwardian and Britain. It’s very important to remember that. “Here it is a race which made a greater contribution to the spiritual elevation of humanity than any that ever dwelt on this earth, the people from which sprung Moses and Jesus of Nazareth and Isaiah, the same people that were scourged by the oppressor from their native land for they have acquired experience no other race can claim. Driven into exile 1,900 years ago, scattered over the face of the globe, mingling with every nation, yet preserving their own strong individuality, absorbing the best of every civilization, yet retaining their own ideals. They have impulse to rebuild their national home, their national named old home.” This is the point: “We are entitled to expect great things from such an experiment, not for Palestine alone, not only for the children of Israel, but for all the children of men.” So in his war cabinet… Can we go on, please?

Obviously he had Lloyd George and Balfour. And Balfour, by the way, on his deathbed declared, “Making the Jewish restoration possible was the most worthwhile thing I’ve ever done.” You had Jan Smuts who William, of course, talked about, who was reformed church. And he was always reconstructionist as far as the Jews were concerned. You had Edward Curzon, who was a fiery alstured criminal lawyer. He was also in favour. Andrew Bonin Law, who was a Canadian, raised by Presbyterians, very religious. You had the labour politician because it was a war cabinet, remember? Arthur Henderson, he was evangelical. George Barnes was a philosemite. Lord Milner was a great supporter. And who was against, there were two; Lord Curzon, who was the former Viceroy of India. He was worried about what would happen to the Muslims. And Edwin Montagu, who was a Jew, he was originally left out of the cabinet, but by August, 1917 was Secretary of State for India. But he wasn’t part of the inner circle. So let’s have a look at Lord Curzon. He’s the main Christian objector to the Balfour Declaration. He was one of the premier aristocrats in Britain. His family was of Norman ancestry. He was born at Kedleston Hall where his family had lived since the 12th century. His mother died when he was 16. She kept on having far too many children. His father lived another 41 years.

The father was very remote and indulgent. He believed that landowners should actually remain on the land and not go roaming. He had little sympathy when his son did that. He crossed Asia, making him one of the most travelled men ever to join a British cabinet. Again, this is the British as adventurers. Also, he had a lot of psychological problems. He was brought up by a very sadistic nanny. The usual story, educated at Eaton and Oxford. He was president of the Oxford Union, president of the Canning Club, which was very political. He was a good scholar. He got a fellowship to All Souls. There was a about him though. He wasn’t that popular. Though he was a brilliant, there was something about him. “My name is George Nathaniel Curzon. I’m a most superior person. My cheek is pink, my hair is sleek. I dine at Blenheim once a week.” Of course, Blenheim the home of the Devonshires. He enters politics as a private secretary to Salisbury. He was very much involved in foreign affairs. He tours Russia, central Asia, Persia, Siam, et cetera. And he was the one who really believed the real threat to Britain and therefore India was Russia. He wrote very many articles in “The Times” on Persia. He married an American heiress, a woman called Mary Leiter, who was of German origin. Those of you who are American, her father actually founded the Chicago department store Field and Leiter, now Marshall Field. Don’t forget that so many American heiresses, some of whom were Jewish, came to England to find husbands. They wanted titles. And because of the Entailment of Estates, a lot of aristos, particularly second sons, wanted American wives.

He had three daughters from her. And this is where it gets very interesting because his daughter, Cynthia was Oswald Mosley’s first wife and another daughter married a man called Fruity Metcalfef, who was equiry to Edward VIII, who of course I’ll be talking about later on. And it’s interesting because Oswald Mosley exercised a huge fascination for the Curzon women. But so Lord Curzon, he’s a very well-traveled British diplomat, very cold man in many ways. And he is against Zionism. Now let’s have a look at the other character who is anti-Zionist. And this is Edwin Montagu. And this is when I’m going to bring in another strand, which I’m going to be developing next week, which is the anti-Zionism of certain pillars of the Jewish community. Now Edwin Montagu, he was educated at Clifton College, which had a Jewish house. Then he went to University College, which if you remember was the godless institution in Goer Street, which had been founded by free thinkers and Jews because no one could grad… Unless you swore on the Protestant Bible, you couldn’t graduate from Oxford or Cambridge. Then he goes to Trinity, he’s president of the Cambridge University Liberal Club and becomes president of the Cambridge Union close to as Asquith. And he becomes an MP in 1906. Asquith’s protege, he becomes Under Secretary of State for India.

And in the war, he’s finance secretary to the Treasury 1916 Minister of Munitions. And as I said, he was initially excluded from Lloyd George’s coalition. But in August, 1917, he’s appointed Secretary of State for India. He called Zionism a mischievous political creed. And he said the Balfour Declaration is anti-Semitic. Now I’m going to give you a taste of this now, but we’ll take it up later next week because it deserves a lot of thought. His cousin, by the way, Herbert Samuel was also in the cabinet, and he’d issued a pro-Zionist declaration as early as 1915. This is his problem with the Balfour Declaration because it’s going to go through various phases. “I assert that there is not a Jewish nation. The members of my family, for instance, who have been in this country for generations, have no sort of kind of community or view or desire with any Jewish family in any other country beyond the fact that they profess to a greater or lesser degree the same religion. It is no more true to say that a Jewish Englishman and a Jewish more of the same nation than to say a Christian Englishman and a Christian Frenchman are of the same nation. Of the same race, perhaps traced back through the centuries, those centuries of history of a peculiarly adaptable race, the Prime Minister and Mr. Breon, I suppose, related through the ages. One as a Welshman and the other as a Britains. But they certainly do not belong to the same nation.” So he’s saying he’s going for the emancipation contract, going back to the French Revolution. And remember Napoleon’s envoy to the Jews as individuals. Everything to Israel as a nation, nothing. Give up your notions of nationhood.

And by 1878 the Jews have been emancipated in every country in central and Western Europe. And of course America. Not true of the great pale of settlement under Russia. But he is an Englishman that he goes on to say, “When the Jews are told that Palestine is their national home, every country will immediately desire to get rid of its Jewish citizens. And you’ll find a population in Palestine driving out at the present inhabitants, taking all the best in the country, drawn from all quarters of the globe, speaking every language on the face of the earth and incapable of communicating with one another except by means of interpreter. I have always understood that this was the consequence of the building of the Tower of Babel, if ever it was built. And I certainly do not want to dissent from the view commonly held as I have always understood by the Jews, before Zionism was invented. To bring the Jews back to a form of nation in the country from which they were dispersed would require divine leadership. I have never heard it suggested even by their most fervent admirers that either Mr. Balfour or Lord Rothchild would prove to be the Messiah. I claim the lives that British Jews have led, the aims they have had before them, that the part they have played in our public life and our public institutions have entitled them to regard it not as British Jews, but as Jewish Britains. I would willingly disenfranchise every Zionist.

I would be almost tempted to prescribe the Zionist organisation as illegal and against the national interest. But I would ask of the British government’s sufficient tolerance to refuse a conclusion which makes aliens and foreigners by implication, if not at once by law, of all their Jewish fellow citizens. I deny that Palestine is today associated with the Jews or properly to regarded as a fit place for them to live. The 10 Commandments were delivered to the Jews on Sinai. It’s quite true that Palestine plays a large part, but so it does in modern Mohamadan history. And after the time of the Jews, surely it plays a larger part than any country in Christian history. The temple may have been in Palestine, but so was the Sermon on the Mount and the crucifixion. I would not deny to Jews in Palestine equal rights to colonisation with those who profess other religions. But as a religious test of citizenship, seems to me to be only admitted by those who take a bigoted and narrow view of one particular epoch in the history of Palestine. If my memory serves me right, there are three times as many Jews in the world as could now possibly gets to Palestine.” Okay, and I will be discussing that with you later on. So he’s violently opposed to the Balfour Declaration and he writes a letter, he’s involved with the Anglo Jewish Association. More about that next week.

And they write a letter to “The Times”. Can we see the next slide please? He works with a man called Lucien Wolf. Now, Lucien Wolf was another fascinating character. He was the child of Jewish immigrants. His father was a pipe manufacturer from Bohemia. His mother was from Vienna. He was a very, very good journalist. He was age 17, he’s writing for the Jewish world. He becomes the editor, specialises in foreign affairs. 1909 editor of “The Daily Graphic.” He wrote as diplomaticas. He was deeply affected by the pogroms of 1881. And he wrote a huge supplement for the JC in darkest Russia. He had a huge enthusiasm for Jewish history. He organised, and this is important, Anglo Jewish historical exhibition and the immigration of Jews to Britain. He wanted to show the British that the Jews could be loyal citizens. Because he was an important journalist, he was also a real snob. He loved the English upper classes. He had access to government ministers and he was very anti-Zionist. He said, “No wonder all anti-Semites, are an enthusiastic Zionist.” To wolf, to be a Jew was to be religious. But he was a friend of Israel’s . And he joined the conjoint committee of the Board of Deputies and the Angular Jewish Association. And he was actually part of the Anglo Jewish delegation to the Paris Peace Conference. And he was advisor to the League of Nations on refugees. He wrote some very, very good books. He wrote about Menasseh Ben Israel. He wrote about the Treves family. The Montefiore family. He wrote a book called “The Queen’s Jews.” He loved being a British Jew. This is what Israel Feinstein said about him. “He was a robust defender of Jewish interests as he saw them.

He was not only a journalist, historian and communal civil servant, but a pragmatic politician connected with his power of articulating cases, his mastery of European languages, his vast knowledge and contacts. He had a deep and self-conscious loyalty to Britain. This was combined with an intense desire to save Jews, protect and advance their civil rights and encourage the development of a recognisable Jewish culture. He saw the Jewish cause as part of the whole human cause. And he couldn’t bear to bring himself to regard the expansion of liberalism in the West as a flash in the pan.” So basically, Lucien Wolf was an English gentleman who had a huge respect for Jewish history and culture. He put together the first ever historical exhibition of the Jews. But he thought, he and his colleagues thought that, like for example, Edward Montagu, thought that the Balfour Declaration was a betrayal of Anglo jury and also a betrayal of the Arabs in Palestine. Can we go on, please? This is the conjoint letter that I’m going to talk about next week. Next one, please. Here you see Herbert Samuel, who is a Jew and a friend of Asquith, marries into the English aristocracy.

And in fact, that’s another story that I’ll tell you next week. And he was a committed Zionist and it’s he who is going to go to Palestine as the first British high commissioner, the first Jew to have power in Palestine for 2000 years. But, and this is something that William highlighted yesterday, he went very much as an English diplomat and he tried to be even handed. And that is unfortunately for the piece of Palestine going to be absolutely… We will get there. Can we go on, please? And of course the other reason that the British issued the Balfour Declaration was America. Woodrow Wilson, President. And let’s have a look at two of his advisors who other colleagues have discussed. Louis Brandeis, the great lawyer, the first Jew to serve on the American Supreme Court. Dennis Davis has lectured on him. And also on Felix Frankfurter. So you have incredibly important characters and the British believe this would help them, if they issue the Balfour Declaration that’s going to please the Americans. And then the final piece of the puzzle, the Russians. Next slide, please. The Russian revolution of October, November, which calendar you want to take and of course . Next slide, please. Trotsky, okay, now I want to show you some maps and I want you to look at them very, very carefully. Can we go onto the maps, please, if you don’t mind. And Kaiser Wilhelm, remember he was about to issue his own declaration. Can we have a look? There’s the Balfour Declaration again.

Now this is an interesting one, Britain and the Arabs, and I think we keep on putting these maps up and if you actually have a look at it, mandates are going to be granted to the British on Palestine and Iraq and the French are going to get Syria and they are going to carve out Lebanon. Very important Britain and the Arabs. I’m reading Martin Gilbert of this concerned, “Largely as a result of Britain’s victories over the Turks, more than 10 million Arabs were liberated from Turkish rule. The total area of Arab lands in Arabia was 1,184,000 square miles. Palestine, the only portion of former Turkish territory set aside from Jewish home covered current less than 11,000 square miles.” And this is Balfour on the 12th of July, 1920. “So far as the Arabs are concerned, I hope they will remember this, we the who have established an independent Arab sovereignty in the Hijaz,” they make what is today Saudi independent. “I hope they remember, is we who desire in Mesopotamia to prepare the way for the future of a self-governing, autonomous Arab state. And I hope that remembering all that they will not grudge that small notch, which is no more than that geographically, where whatever it may be historically, that small notch in which are now Arab territories being given to the people who for all those hundreds of years have been separated from it.” Now I want to have a look at Britain and the Jewish national home. Let’s have a look.

As you know, the British were granted a mandate on Palestine. Palestine is that black line, which today encompasses Jordan, Israel, parts of the West Bank and Gaza. That is the mandate that was given to the British. Without redress to the League of Nations, Churchill takes off two thirds of it and creates Jordan, as a British mandate, is part of the British mandate. And they put Abdullah in. But the problem, and this is the problem goes wrong. And we come back to this many times, General Allenby had his army on the soil. Remember how Neely helped, et cetera, how Jabotinsky was fighting. What happens is that having taken Be'er Sheva and then Jerusalem, he pushes onto Damascus with Lawrence of Arabia. The British hold back at the gates of Damascus and the Emir Faisal goes in at the head of an Arab army. And it’s at this stage, this is the Emir Faisal to Felix Frankfurter. “We Arabs, especially the educated amongst us, look with deepest sympathy on the Zionist movement, we will wish the Jews a hearty welcome home. We are working together for a reform to revise near East. And our two movements compliment one another. The movement is national and not imperialistic. There is room in Syria for us both. Indeed, I think that neither can be successful without the other.” This is Winston Churchill. “It may well happen that there should be created in our own lifetime by the banks of the Jordan, a Jewish state under the protection of the British crown, which might comprise three or 4 million Jews. An event which have occurred in the history of the world, which would from every point of view be beneficial and will be especially in harmony with the true interests of the British Empire.”

'Cause what happens at the San Remo Peace Conference, the French said, hold on a minute, that’s for us. And they want to expel Faisal. There is a battle, the battle of Maysalun, where the Arabs, Faisal is defeated by the French. Fighting with Faisal, is a man called al-Husseini, who of course later on becomes Haj Amin al-Husseini. They are fighting for greater Syria. When the French are ensconced in Syria, they chop off and create a new state, Lebanon, for the minorities. This is when they feel the Arabs felt they’ve been completely betrayed because they dreamt of an empire centred on Damascus. Churchill gives Abdullah Transjordan. Faisal has Iraq, and he hopes that therefore that area left can become Palestine for the Jews. But it all goes terribly, terribly wrong. And this is where the real naughty problem starts. And under the military administration, Herbert Samuel goes to Palestine with all the dreams. Already, Lord Curzon is very worried. And so there are motions in the House of Lords that it’s all going to go horribly wrong for us. But this is really the crux of the matter that both sides feel that they are betrayed. Plus many of the British army officers who are sent to Palestine have come straight from Russia where they have been supporting the white Russians against the Bolsheviks. And they have in their napsacks the protocols of the elders of Zion. And in fact, the main secretary to Sir Herbert Samuel, there’s a man called Colonel Richmond who is violently anti-Semitic. Not only that, is he who persuades Herbert Samuel to appoint Haj Amin el-Husseini to the post of Mufti of Jerusalem. So all these events come together, we will go into them in more detail. I just want to show you one more map. Can we see the last map, if you don’t mind?

That was the Zionist plan. That’s what the Zionist wanted. Jabotinsky is going to become completely disillusioned by the British. There are riots, the Nebi Musa riots against the Jews in 1920. Weizmann, on the other hand, believes the British will come through because they are honourable. And in the end, that’s going to lead to this huge split between the revisionists and the rest of the Zionists. And of course, who’s on the land, who’s working the land? The first and second Aliyah. Then you’re going to have the third Aliyah mainly from Poland. And gradually the situation will unravel. I hope I’ve clarified and remember when one teaches history, we choose our sources and our documents. I’ve tried as much as possible to be even handed. And please don’t forget that when we are dealing with the Arab nations, even though today there is violent anti-Judaism and anti-Semitism amongst certain sections of the Arab world, in the main, it’s going to be a Christian import. And I know that Norman Stillman will be lecturing on that. So let’s have a look at questions and thank you for sorting them maps up for me, Hannah. Let’s have a look at questions.

Q&A and Comments:

Tim, “I had a lovely .”

Q: And Shelly asks, “Are you familiar with the synagogues in Dagestan that were destroyed?”

A: Yes. It’s terrible.

Yes, Gerald, yes, of course. “Sokolof’s previous success with the French.” Yes, as I mentioned with the Chambon letter.

Q: “What was that about shoring up the Turks?”

A: Well, historically, this is before the first World War British policy was they wanted to bolster up the Turks against French and Russian empire building because of India mainly. And also they didn’t want a French fleet in the Mediterranean or a Russian fleet. The British wanted, look, there’s a certain amount of philosemitism, but it’s also about the interest of the British state.

Q: “William mentioned yesterday about promising land to people. Then it was divided up between Britain and France. Do you know why that was done?”

A: Look, be careful because at the San Remo Peace Conference and the mandate, listen to Judge Dennis Davis’s lecture on this. He’s going to be talking about mandates. What we’re all trying to do, Tim, is give different angles on an incredibly thorny issue.

Q: “To the best of your knowledge, did Picot after World War II, comment on the establishment of Israel as a Jewish day?”

A: I met his granddaughter who was violently the anti-Israel. So I’m not sure about that.

“Jeremy has the proposed mandate stamp. I can email you a copy.” Jeremy, I would love that. Thank you.

Q: “Why are the British Jews, or any Jews for that matter anti-Zionist when so much of Jewish liturgy reflects a yearning for Zion, particularly in a time of national?”

A: Well, it’s fascinating. Don’t forget that apart from Misraki, which I’m going to talk about next week, the majority of really religious Jews were not Zionists because they believed the Mishra would bring the Jews back. And even though Zion is at the centre of our prayer system, I think Pesa think the direction of the bima. Nevertheless, the majority of Jews in the West are trying very hard to be citizens of the countries in which they lived.

Q: “How can someone like Lloyd George,” asked Shelly, “believe in the almost occult power of the Jews in the face of the pogroms in the Russian Empire and the anti-Jewish immigrant feeling in Britain? Jewish immigrants were considered poor and criminals as well as foreign.”

A: You are looking for rationality in a totally irrational subject, I’m afraid. Prejudice is totally irrational. How come today people still think there’s a world Jewish conspiracy? You know, I mean it’s beyond imagination. I think maybe 2000 years of us being the different ones. I’ve lectured a lot on anti-Semitism and you can find the lectures in lockdown. But honestly you are making a huge mistake, Shelly, by being rational. This is irrational. That’s the tragedy. That’s the tragedy. If we were all rational, then maybe we could have had a solution.

“My grandmother,” says Serena, “who died in London, was worried about Lord Beaverbrookand anti-Zionist.” Oh yes and Lord Beaverbrook, quite liked Hitler.

Q: “Montagu married Asquith daughter. Might that have contributed to his anti-Zionism?”

A: No, not really. I think he wanted to be an English gentleman, desperately Jonah. You’ve got to remember there is the law of England. And I’m really going to discuss this more next week 'cause it’s a very important point you’ve raised.

“I wonder what,” I don’t understand, would’ve said after the Holocaust? “What would’ve been said after the Holocaust?” You know, there are evil people today who actually say that the Zionists were in collusion with the Nazis over the Shoa. That’s how evil it’s become, I’m afraid. The fact that they point to things like the agreement, the Kaiser affair, I personally would’ve spoken to the devil if it would’ve saved my family. So, you know, even after the Shoa, we are still seen as, you know, the protocols are alive and well.

Q: Monty says, “Are you British listeners aware of the assult on Jewish school children of Belsize Park tube station?”

A: Monty, “Also the Dead Sea Scrolls date back to the 3rd century BC written in Hebrew.” Yeah. You see, this is the point again, well apart from telling us of a horrible, horrible incident, I boiled with rage over this. I’ve got Jewish grandchildren. I’m so angry the way, one of my grandsons goes to a Jewish school, the way that school is guarded, it has to be, no other community. I’m also angry that, speaking personally now, this is not me being rational that my grandson’s university is going to have to be chosen not on his ability or how good he is at whatever, on where is safest for a Jewish boy. And that is disgusting. If it’s any consolation, I did speak to Howard Jacobson this week and he’s been going to the book festivals and he thinks the tide is beginning to turn a little, that there is still a reasonable people out there.

Q: And I also believe those students at Oxford who had their exams disrupted are all now violently against Islamism? Of course they are. Does anyone else see a physical resemblance between Chaim Weizmann and Lenny?“

A: A lovely point,

Dennis. "If Herbert Samuel is a member of H. Samuel…” No, I will talk about the Samuel family. I don’t know about that link. I’m not sure about that link. I’ll try and find out more for you, Denise.

Rita says, “You are right, Dennis, thank you.” Yeah, it is incredibly compli…

Q: “Did Montagu say Zionism is anti-Semitic?

A: Let me go back to the article so I don’t misspeak. This is so important. He said the British government supportive Zionism is anti-Semitic. We’ll talk about that more.

Denise Samuel, "Sydney was one of four children. He was the oldest and was followed by his three ugly sisters, family joke. It was what he called them. He was born in 1898 and died in Florida, just shy of his 100th birthday. Jack and I have three sons, my three Musketeers, Darren, Bruce and Rowan.” Lovely Denise.

Q: “If an educated, liberal, religious person like Lloyd George can believe in Jewish power, what good is rationalism in the enlighten?”

A: Oh, please don’t say that. You know, the last conversation I ever had with Robert Wistrich, I dropped him off at the airport. He’d come to England to debate with Mehdi Hasan, nobody else would take him on. And I dropped him off at the airport and we had a discussion about the enlightenment and wave goodbye. Then he came back to the car and I wound down the window and he said, “Trudy, the enlightenment is a blip. I’ll see you in Jerusalem.” Tragically he died two months later. But the point is, I am not going to give up on the enlightenment. I have many, many friends who still are espouse the idea. And can I say to you, we’re going through a very bad patch in the world because there’s economic, social, and political chaos. But when things ease off economically, people stop hating so much. People only hate, I really believe this. Look, there’s always going to be a psychotic element in any society, but the majority of people only hate when they feel they don’t have a decent place in the world. That’s what we have to cling onto.

Oh yes, consider a professional genealogist. Yes.

Samuel, “Jesus of Nazareth, were trained by the this.” There is a theory that Jesus was in a scene but then you’ve got Hyman Maccoby’s theory that in fact Jesus was a zealot. Anyway, I’ll stop there. I hope I’ve clarified rather than obfuscated. This is such a complicated period of history, but that’s why we keep on going back to it over the next few weeks because this is really the basis of it, of the history of Zionism, isn’t it?

Anyway, take care everyone. And look, never forget, we are the people of the book. I still believe in the Jewish future, believe me. Anyway, take care all of you. God bless.