EXCERPTS FROM THE GREAT BETRAYAL

Stephen S. Wise and Jacob De Haas

(Published 1930)

Introduction

The Balfour Declaration was in the process of making for nearly two years. Its authorship was not solitary but collective. It was the work, in a very real sense, of the Allied War Cabinets and the American Government. But the attribution to England’s war statesmen of failure to understand the competing claims of Jew and Arab involves a still deeper blunder. There were no conflicting Arab and Jewish claims in Palestine during the War, any more than there were conflicting claims in Iraq or the Hedjaz. The British War Cabinet framed its policies on different bases in relation to the two peoples. In return in part for service rendered and to be rendered by Arab groups in Syria, Mesopotamia and the Hedjaz, England undertook to liberate the people of these lands from Turkish suzernity and to safeguard their establishment as national entities. That undertaking, except for French dominance in Syria, has been fulfilled.

On a wholly different basis, which at the time seemed to be held with entire sincerity, the decision was reached to reconstitute the Jewish National Home. The conception underlying the Jewish National Home happened to fit into the deepening faith of the nations that Jews, a minority people in all countries, needed a national home. From such a national center in the ancient Jewish Homeland, it was hoped that healing strength and inspiration would radiate to Jews everywhere, and again become an enriching gift to all peoples. The decision to reconstitute the Jewish National Home was inevitable in view of the professions of the Allied Nations that the Great War, beginning with Serbian resistance to the threat of Austro-Hungarian domination, was fought to maintain the national integrity of the smaller peoples, to reconstitute national entities in so far as these had been violated, and, above all, to restore and to safeguard the right of self-determination! It was on these grounds that the Allied Powers were impelled to bethink themselves touching the reconstitution of the Jewish National Home in Palestine, though nearly two millennia had passed since the day of exile of the Jewish people. A further grace was added to the rightful decision of the Allied Powers, with the eager cooperation of President Wilson, insofar as the Christian nations assumed the task of facilitating the establishment of the Jewish National Home in the spirit of reparation to a much-wronged people.

As a result of Britain’s pledge to the Jews and acceptance of the League Mandate, Jews in all parts of the world, - but, above all, politically homeless Jews, - uprooted themselves and took up the march to make a home, a new home, in the old land. One hundred thousand men and women, bravest of the brave, have within a decade settled in Palestine in the spirit of pioneers. Unlike other pioneering settlers, they would not selfishly hold what they have hardly won, but would share it with their brothers who are to follow. They have not pilgrimed in quest of self, nor have they pioneered for less than the most durable satisfactions of life that only sacrifice and selflessness can bestow. Even if there had been no Balfour Declaration and no League Mandate, it would still be meet that Britain, our country and other nations together consider the tragic facts of Jewish homelessness and hopelessness in many lands and of the one gleam that shines in Palestine as the land of a reconstituted home and a reborn hope for the Jewish people.

The decision to reconstitute the Jewish National Home was inevitable in view of the professions of the Allied Nations that the Great War, beginning with Serbian resistance to the threat of Austro-Hungarian domination, was fought to maintain the national integrity of the smaller peoples, to reconstitute national entities in so far as these had been violated, and, above all, to restore and to safeguard the right of self-determination!

It was on these grounds that the Allied Powers were impelled to bethink themselves touching the reconstitution of the Jewish National Home in Palestine, though nearly two millennia had passed since the day of exile of the Jewish people. 

A further grace was added to the rightful decision of the Allied Powers, with the eager cooperation of President Wilson, insofar as the Christian nations assumed the task of facilitating the establishment of the Jewish National Home in the spirit of reparation to a much-wronged people.

* * *