Prime Minister Tony Blair?s invitation to the thugs and killers that head up the PLO/Fatah/Palestinian Authority to come talk peace in London was not welcomed in Jerusalem. If there is one thing most decidedly not needed in the Middle East today, it is ?Great? Britain seeking to increasingly insert itself into the Arab-Israeli war.
Even if the so-called Palestinians? so-called leaders* did have a legitimate case for a state in Israel?s biblical heartland, we would much rather Mr. Blair and his right honorable friends busied themselves in another part of the world. For it is no exaggeration that the blame for a great number of the woes that have torn apart the Middle East in the last 100 years rests solidly on the podium in the British House of Commons. From the earliest days of the twentieth century, London has been unwaveringly committed to a conciliatory policy towards the Arabs. The sordid tale is well known to objective and fair-minded British history watchers.
Oh, it began promisingly enough, when the groundwork laid by great English leaders of courage, vision and honesty - men like Lords Shaftesbury and Palmerston - culminated in the official statement by Lord Arthur Balfour in 1916, in which the British government expressed its support for the establishment of a Jewish national home in Palestine (not to forget that the ?Palestine? referred to in those days included what is today ?Israel Proper,? Gaza, ?the West Bank? and the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan). Yet barely had the blotter dried the ink on Balfour?s parchment, when what can only be called the great British betrayal began.
The land on which Jewish close settlement had been granted was arbitrarily sawn into two unequal pieces, with the larger segment given to a son of the Emir of Mecca, and in which, to this day, Jewish land ownership is forbidden on pain of death. Thanks for that goes to Colonial Secretary Winston Churchill. Over the ensuing 26 years, the smaller section, less than a third of the original Palestine (which, not to forget, was an area, not a state or national home of any kind) was subjected to a string of expeditions, inquiries, white papers and plans, every one of which found in favor of Arab grievances and claims and against the Jews.
In case you think I am making this up, here is the lengthy list: The Haycraft Commission of Inquiry (1921); the Churchill White Paper (1922); the Shaw Commission (1929-30); the Hope-Simpson Report and the Passfield White Paper (1930); the Woodhead Commission (1938); the MacDonald White paper (1939); the rejection of the recommendations of the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry (1945-46); and the Morrison-Grady Plan (1946). I am not going to go into the details of each; any good Middle East/British history of the last century will fill you in.
It is shockingly noteworthy that the murder of two-thirds of Europe?s Jews did not even give the British pause as they continued trying to curry favor with the Arabs who, not to forget, had sided with Adolph Hitler against both the Jews and the Brits. This reality would perhaps have been less surprising had people known then as we do now that British governmental institutions like the BBC had been aware of the Holocaust even as it was taking place, but had chosen to keep mum.
Having exhausted all its efforts to quash the rebirth of Israel, Britain then carried out the most craven betrayal of them all, when it abstained in the 1947 United Nations vote on the Partition of Palestine. Within weeks of that vote, Great Britain?s Foreign Office handed the baton of its anti-Israel efforts to the US State Department, which released a memorandum describing partition as unworkable and calling for the revoking of the resolution or, at least, the postponement of its implementation. But that?s another nation?s story. And, thanks be to God, David Ben-Gurion then took matters into his own hands.
British pro-Arab efforts have continued uninterrupted during all the years of Israel?s new existence. From anti-Semitic comments in its diplomatic circles to the explaining away, understanding, and otherwise legitimizing of ?Palestinian? genocide bombings, the rivers of antagonism towards the Jews clearly run deep. Mr. Blair has made it his country?s 21st Century policy to finish what Britain failed to accomplish during the Mandate era: to steal the biblical heartland away from the Jewish people and, as it did with Jordan, give it to those who have no historical national right to it.
However, the Prime Minister is batting against the God of Israel, who has promised to bring the Jews back from the Diaspora and give them, specifically, the land Britain (and the rest of the world) wants to take away. That means Mr. Blair, and his once great nation, is set to be bowled right out.
*Not to forget - as Arafat says - that there is no such national as a Palestinian, nor do any democratically elected men and women lead this non-nation.
--------------------------------------------------------
Stan Goodenough is Editor of the Jerusalem Newswire.
Even if the so-called Palestinians? so-called leaders* did have a legitimate case for a state in Israel?s biblical heartland, we would much rather Mr. Blair and his right honorable friends busied themselves in another part of the world. For it is no exaggeration that the blame for a great number of the woes that have torn apart the Middle East in the last 100 years rests solidly on the podium in the British House of Commons. From the earliest days of the twentieth century, London has been unwaveringly committed to a conciliatory policy towards the Arabs. The sordid tale is well known to objective and fair-minded British history watchers.
Oh, it began promisingly enough, when the groundwork laid by great English leaders of courage, vision and honesty - men like Lords Shaftesbury and Palmerston - culminated in the official statement by Lord Arthur Balfour in 1916, in which the British government expressed its support for the establishment of a Jewish national home in Palestine (not to forget that the ?Palestine? referred to in those days included what is today ?Israel Proper,? Gaza, ?the West Bank? and the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan). Yet barely had the blotter dried the ink on Balfour?s parchment, when what can only be called the great British betrayal began.
The land on which Jewish close settlement had been granted was arbitrarily sawn into two unequal pieces, with the larger segment given to a son of the Emir of Mecca, and in which, to this day, Jewish land ownership is forbidden on pain of death. Thanks for that goes to Colonial Secretary Winston Churchill. Over the ensuing 26 years, the smaller section, less than a third of the original Palestine (which, not to forget, was an area, not a state or national home of any kind) was subjected to a string of expeditions, inquiries, white papers and plans, every one of which found in favor of Arab grievances and claims and against the Jews.
In case you think I am making this up, here is the lengthy list: The Haycraft Commission of Inquiry (1921); the Churchill White Paper (1922); the Shaw Commission (1929-30); the Hope-Simpson Report and the Passfield White Paper (1930); the Woodhead Commission (1938); the MacDonald White paper (1939); the rejection of the recommendations of the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry (1945-46); and the Morrison-Grady Plan (1946). I am not going to go into the details of each; any good Middle East/British history of the last century will fill you in.
It is shockingly noteworthy that the murder of two-thirds of Europe?s Jews did not even give the British pause as they continued trying to curry favor with the Arabs who, not to forget, had sided with Adolph Hitler against both the Jews and the Brits. This reality would perhaps have been less surprising had people known then as we do now that British governmental institutions like the BBC had been aware of the Holocaust even as it was taking place, but had chosen to keep mum.
Having exhausted all its efforts to quash the rebirth of Israel, Britain then carried out the most craven betrayal of them all, when it abstained in the 1947 United Nations vote on the Partition of Palestine. Within weeks of that vote, Great Britain?s Foreign Office handed the baton of its anti-Israel efforts to the US State Department, which released a memorandum describing partition as unworkable and calling for the revoking of the resolution or, at least, the postponement of its implementation. But that?s another nation?s story. And, thanks be to God, David Ben-Gurion then took matters into his own hands.
British pro-Arab efforts have continued uninterrupted during all the years of Israel?s new existence. From anti-Semitic comments in its diplomatic circles to the explaining away, understanding, and otherwise legitimizing of ?Palestinian? genocide bombings, the rivers of antagonism towards the Jews clearly run deep. Mr. Blair has made it his country?s 21st Century policy to finish what Britain failed to accomplish during the Mandate era: to steal the biblical heartland away from the Jewish people and, as it did with Jordan, give it to those who have no historical national right to it.
However, the Prime Minister is batting against the God of Israel, who has promised to bring the Jews back from the Diaspora and give them, specifically, the land Britain (and the rest of the world) wants to take away. That means Mr. Blair, and his once great nation, is set to be bowled right out.
*Not to forget - as Arafat says - that there is no such national as a Palestinian, nor do any democratically elected men and women lead this non-nation.
--------------------------------------------------------
Stan Goodenough is Editor of the Jerusalem Newswire.