World Jewish News

100 years since Balfour Declaration

"If these groups had spent the last 100 years making the positive case for Palestine that we make for Israel, there might now be two states living side by side and in peace,’’ said Jonathan Arkush, President of the Board of Deputies of British Jews in a response to Trade Unions backing of a pro-Palestinian march on Saturday November 4 which will mark 100 years since the Balfour Declaration.

“While they mope out in the cold, we'll be celebrating the Balfour Centenary in upbeat events right across the country. They should reflect on this as they continue their doomed campaign of rejectionism and negativity," Arkush added.

The rally is organised by the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign, the Stop The War Coalition, the Friends of Al Aqsa and the Muslim Association Of Britain. In the flyers to announce the march, they wrote: “For the past 100 years Palestinian rights have been disregarded. As we approach the centenary of the Balfour Declaration – on the 2nd November – which built the path for their dispossession, we are demanding justice and equal rights for Palestinians now.”

The Balfour Declaration was the British government’s pledge to help the Jewish community build a national home in Palestine. It took the form of a letter penned on 2 November 1917 by British Foreign Minister Lord Balfour to Lord Rothschild, then serving as the honorary president of the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland.

The Balfour Declaration reads: ‘’His Majesty’ 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.’’

Meanwhile, the London underground has banned a Palestinian poster campaign marking the centenary of the Balfour Declaration and showing contrasting images of Palestinians before and after 1948.

Transport for London (TfL) said the banners, which were to be displayed at main underground stations and on buses ahead of the November 2 centenary, ‘’did not meet guidelines that ban images or messages which relate to matters of public controversy or sensitivity.”

The poster campaign, titled “Make It Right,” was initiated by the Palestinian Authority representative in the UK, Manuel Hassassian. ‘’There has been a 100-year-long cover-up of the British government’s broken promise, in the Balfour declaration, to safeguard the rights of the Palestinians when it gave away their country to another people,” he said, adding that “here may be free speech in Britain on every issue under the sun but not on Palestine.”

Pro-Palestinians groups in the UK and the Palestinian Authority have called on the British government to “openly apologize to the Palestinian people for issuing the Balfour Declaration. The colonial policy of Britain between 1917-1948 led to mass displacement of the Palestinian nation.”

The British Foreign Office responded: “The Balfour Declaration is an historic statement for which her Majesty’s Government does not intend to apologize. “We are proud of our role in creating the State of Israel. The task now is to encourage moves towards peace.”

The first in a series of events to mark the 100th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration was held in the British Houses of Parliament in November 2016.

In a message on the occasion of the Jewish New Year last month, British Prime Minister Theresa May hailed the Balfour Declaration as an expression of the “UK’s support for the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is scheduled to join May at a celebratory dinner in London to mark the centenary.

EJP