This chapter, within the context of the Balfour Declaration, con-tinues to examine the moral right to immigrate. It also examines the moral right of a people to self-determination, and the morality of Woodrow Wilson's support of the Declaration.
   World War I moved Zionism's center to London. Britain became much more immersed in Zionism because of Britain's Balfour Declaration and its postwar mandate over Palestine. The debate over Balfour initiated America into the Zionist-Palestinian conflict. Both the declaration and the mandate would create moral issues for Britain and America.

I. British Duplicity With Arabs, 1914-16.

   When the war began, Britain tried to foment revolt among Arabs, who comprised most of the non-Turks in the Asiatic part of the Ottoman Empire. Fomenting revolt was difficult because the Ottoman sultan was also the religious leader of many of the largely Muslim Arabs; moreover, the Allies were non-Muslims, "infidels." Britain also wanted to win worldwide Jewish support for the Allies, especially in America. This too was difficult because Rus-sia, abhorred by Jews because of its brutal anti-Semitism, was an Ally. Germany, despite much subtle and some open anti-Semitism, treated Jews much better. To win over both Arabs and Jews Brit-ain made contradictory promises about Palestine to each. This helped create the problem that America still faced in 1995.
   Britain promised Arabs that if they revolted and the Allies won, it would work to see that Arabs could form their own independent countries. In various documents Britain declared that Allied war aims included: (a) guaranteeing the liberation of the peoples subject to Germany and its allies, (b) establishing national governments which derive their authority from the initiative and free choice of the indigenous peoples, (c) recognizing Arab independence as soon as effectively established, (d) ensuring impartial and equal justice to all, and (e) facilitating economic development and education.
   Between July 1915 and March 1916, Sir Henry McMahon, British High Commissioner in Cairo, and Sherif Hussein of Mecca, an Arab leader in the Ottoman Empire, exchanged ten letters - the Hussein-McMahon Correspondence. They contain the two men's negotiations about Arab participation in the war and independence after it. The bargaining produced a conditioned British pledge of independence for Arabs. Arabs maintain that this included independence for Palestine. With the Allied victory, Britain contended that Palestine was not included. Arguments to back Britain's position are complex; their validity is disputed. Britain asserted that Sherif Hussein failed to create a widespread revolt and so did not fulfill his part of the bargain; therefore Britain was freed from its part.  However, even a British committee, appointed in 1939 to study the letters, rejected the British arguments. The committee concluded that it was
 evident from these statements that His Majesty's Government were  not free to dispose of Palestine without regard for the wishes and interests of the inhabitants of Palestine and that these statements must all be taken into account in any attempt to estimate the responsibilities which...His Majesty's Government have incurred towards these inhabitants as a result of the Correspondence.
   The inherent moral right of Palestine's inhabitants to determine their own future did not, of course, belong to Britain. It certainly had no moral right to grant or withhold independence. However, the Allies won the war and Britain engineered its own acquisition of the legal power to deny the inhabitants of Palestine the exercise of their moral right to self-determination.
   While Britain bargained with Arabs it also secretly negotiated primarily with France and secondarily with Russia over the division among themselves of Ottoman lands in Asia. Their Sykes-Picot Agreement of May 1916 provided independence for Saudi Arabia and Yemen; France was to get Lebanon and Syria, and Britain was to get Iraq and Trans-Jordan. Sykes-Picot said that in certain areas these two Allies were "to establish such direct or indirect administration or control as they desire and as they may think fit to arrange with the Arab State or Confederation of Arab States."  Part of Palestine was to be put under "an international administration, the form of which is to be decided upon after consultation with Russia and subsequently in consultation with the other Allies, and the representatives of the Shereef of Mecca."
   Despite the euphemisms, Arabs would have no real voice in the decisions. David Lloyd George (1863-1945), who became British prime minister in December 1916, approved Sykes-Picot even though he called it "a foolish document."  Britain did not tell Hussein of it because it basically undid Britain's agreement with him in the McMahon-Hussein Correspondence. After the war Britain and France implemented a modified version of Sykes-Picot; most of Palestine went under British control; its northern section went under French control.
   Britain was also trying to coax America into the war. Many U.S. Jews had come from Russia; Britain hoped to offset their anti-Russian hostility so that they would not oppose this. Because of repeated German attacks on its merchant ships America entered the war in April 1917. This was six months before Britain adopted the Balfour Declaration, in which it pledged to support a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Nevertheless, in 1937 Lloyd George told the Palestine Royal (Peel) Commission: "Zionist leaders gave us a definite promise that, if the Allies committed themselves to giving facilities for the establishment of a national home for the Jews in Palestine, they would do their best to rally Jewish sentiment and support throughout the world to the Allied cause. They kept their word."

II. The British Debate Over the Balfour Declaration, 1917.

   The British War Cabinet's adoption of the Balfour Declaration on October 31, 1917, was a major development in the Zionist-Palestinian conflict. It stated:
 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.
   The political and diplomatic maneuvering preceding the declaration extended over several years and involved President Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924). It is briefly summarized here.
   Prime Minister Herbert Asquith's Liberal government, which was in power during the first two years of the war, did not want to be solely responsible for Palestine after the war; nor did it want to form a Jewish national home there. In December 1916 Asquith was succeeded by Lloyd George, who thought that postwar British control of Palestine would help protect the nearby Suez Canal, which Britain controlled. British Zionists supported this idea, but stressed that the canal would be even safer if Palestine had a Na-tional Home populated by Jews sympathetic to Britain.  Chaim Weizmann, a chemist, lived in England and developed explosives for Britain. He and other European Zionists began negotiating with the new foreign minister, Arthur Balfour (1848-1930), about a British statement that would support a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Weizmann, a major author of the proposed declaration, was in frequent contact with Balfour. Lloyd George supported such a statement because of its potential wartime propaganda value among Jews, especially in America. He also thought it would help Britain gain sole postwar control of Palestine rather than share it with France, as Britain had recently agreed to do in Sykes-Picot. Lloyd George knew that Zionists wanted their homeland to be under Britain's initial protection rather than France's.

III. Wilson's Approval of the Proposed Declaration, 1917.

   Despite support for Zionism within the Lloyd George War Cab-inet, several of its members strongly opposed cabinet endorsement of a Jewish national home. Edwin Montagu, a cabinet member and an assimilated Jew, opposed the concept as "anti-Semitic." Lord George Curzon (1859-1925), chairman of the cabinet committee on Middle East acquisitions, thought such a homeland unfeasible because Palestine was already inhabited. Due to the controversy, the cabinet on September 3, 1917, voted to learn if Wilson ap-proved of such a declaration. Lord Robert Cecil, a Foreign Office official, cabled Colonel Edward House, Wilson's chief foreign af-fairs adviser: "We are being pressed here for a declaration of sym-pathy with the Zionist movement and I should be very grateful if you felt able to ascertain unofficially if the President favours such a declaration."  House himself said he saw "many dangers lurk-ing" in it. On September 10 House cabled Cecil that Wilson was reluctant to endorse it: "The time was not opportune for any def-inite statement further, perhaps, than one of sympathy, provided it can be made without conveying any real commitment."  Wil-son's situation was delicate: America was not at war with Turkey but only with its allies. For him publicly to endorse the proposed statement, which would impinge on Ottoman sovereignty, would certainly worsen U.S.-Ottoman relations - relations already severely strained by the war. This Wilson did not want.
   Weizmann soon learned of House's reply. On September 19 he cabled the draft declaration's text to a U.S. Supreme Court justice, Louis Brandeis (1856-1941), the preeminent Zionist leader in America and Wilson's close friend and confidant. Weizmann also cabled other U.S. Zionists urging them to change Wilson's mind. House later complained about the pressure put on himself: "The Jews...descended in force, and they seemed determined to break in with a jimmy, if they are not let in."  Despite his complaints, House met with Brandeis on September 23 and gave him what he wanted. O'Brien contends that "Brandeis...was an extremely impressive character, both intellectually and morally....But Wilson was a practical politician, and he knew that there was a political force behind Brandeis's argument."  After that meeting, Brandeis told Weizmann, "From talks I have had with President and from expressions of opinion given to closest advisers...I can answer that he is in entire sympathy with declaration."  Thus within two weeks Zionists got Wilson to reverse his position. O'Brien notes: "Brandeis's contribution to the securing of the Balfour Declaration had been second only to Weizmann's own."  O'Brien's statement indicates that he considers Wilson's approval vital to the passage of the declaration.
   In mid-October Wilson more formally sent Britain his approval. However, he asked London not to make it known publicly, for after Britain would make the declaration itself public, American Jews would ask him for his approval of it and he would publicly give it.  Wilson therefore decided to risk harming U.S. relations with Turkey rather than alienate a powerful segment of his own political constituency. London saw his approval of the draft declaration both as support for the Jewish national home and as a strong sign that America would support Britain's postwar bid to gain Palestine as a protectorate. Thus Wilson strengthened the position of the pro-declaration members of the War Cabinet. In doing this he seriously undermined the fulfillment of the moral right of Palestinian Arabs to self-determination.

IV. The Balfour Declaration's Final Debate and Passage, 1917.

   In late October Curzon told the cabinet that he would favor increased immigration of eastern European Jews to Palestine and letting them have the same religious and civic rights as Palestine's other inhabitants, but that he was still against the special privileges which would go with a homeland. Zionists considered his anti-homeland position unacceptable. However, Zionist leaders told Leopold Amery, whom Balfour had commissioned to help draft the declaration, that "the argument that the Jews wanted a state was 'wholly fallacious', that it was not in fact part of the Zionist programme."  If that were the case, these Zionists were stepping back from Herzl's stated goal of a Jewish state. Did Zionists in fact not want the national home to be an independent state but only a political entity with less independence? The goal perhaps varied among Zionists. Were some Zionists not sure at that point in time? Were some keeping their goal of an independent state hidden? At least some Zionists undoubtedly wanted a state; their position soon became very prominent at the postwar peace talks and in the jockeying over Britain's mandate over Palestine. Therefore, if "the argument that the Jews wanted a state was 'wholly fallacious'" in October 1917, it was clearly not wholly fallacious by July 1920, only thirty-three months later, by which time Britain had de facto obtained the mandate.
   Meanwhile, bolstered by Wilson's mid-October approval of the proposed declaration, Lloyd George put his War Cabinet's own approval of it on the agenda of its next meeting, October 31, 1917. Curzon, chairman of the cabinet committee on Middle East acquisitions, again objected that Palestine was already inhabited by some half million Arabs who "will not be content either to be expropriated for Jewish immigrants or to act merely as hewers of wood and drawers of water for the latter."  Balfour, however, stressed three points:
   1. Germany might make its own declaration in support of a Jew-ish national home in Palestine, and thus beat Britain to the punch and win Jewish support throughout the world, including America. According to Israeli historian Michael J. Cohen, "The British became convinced (thanks to an assiduous Jewish lobby that supplied the government with press clippings) that if they did not issue a pro-Zionist declaration, the Germans would preempt them."  Actually Balfour probably had no valid evidence that this would happen. He should have seriously doubted that it would happen. Although Germany had interceded with Turkey on behalf of Jews in Palestine, it was not apt to make a declaration offensive to its Ottoman ally.
   2. Lord Balfour stressed that the British declaration would increase Russian Jews' support for the Allied war effort. This point, part of his argument that the statement would be good wartime propaganda, was already questionable. Russia's ability to fight had been seriously undermined for several months by its increasing political turmoil, which had already resulted in the October Revolution. The triumphant Bolsheviks, including Jewish Bolsheviks, wanted Russia to leave the war completely. British courting of Russian Jews' favor would have little hope of returning Russia to the war as an effective fighting force. (Within two months Russia signed an armistice with Germany.)
   3. Lord Balfour asserted that a British declaration favoring a Jewish national home in Palestine would increase U.S. Jews' support of the Allied war effort. According to O'Brien: "The point about America had great substance, and on that, Wilson's approval was decisive. Curzon did not press his objection, and the War Cabinet approved the Balfour Declaration."
   In saying that "Wilson's approval was decisive," O'Brien im-plies that Britain probably would not have adopted the statement without it. Wilson, as O'Brien notes above, would not have ap-proved it if he had not been pressured by U.S. Zionists. Laqueur favors a similar conclusion. He states that Zionists considered Wil-son's initial refusal to approve the declaration a disaster. But when he reversed himself within two weeks and approved it, Laqueur comments, the "Zionists had surmounted yet another major hurdle owing to the help received from American Jewry."  One can only speculate whether Britain would have adopted the declaration without the stated approval of America's president. The fact is that he did approve it. This approval probably aided its adoption by Britain. Wilson was undoubtedly a party to its adoption.

   British papers soon printed the declaration. Britain had no sovereignty over Palestine when it was adopted and so it had no legal standing other than its being a commitment by Britain. Because it was a commitment, Arab leaders strongly objected. However, Sherif Hussein's son, Feisal, hoping Britain would make him King of Syria, allegedly signed two pledges to support a Jewish national home in Palestine. When the French took over Syria they expelled Feisal, who claimed the signatures on the pledges were forgeries.  Within a few months after Britain adopted Balfour, France, Italy, China, Japan, Greece and Siam at least implicitly endorsed it. Although Wilson had already approved a draft of Balfour, his government could not formally endorse it because it was at peace with Turkey. With Wilson approving Balfour and the War Cabinet passing it, both the British government and at least the White House in effect approved of Zionism itself. Many Jews concluded that Gentiles would no longer question their loyalty even if they were Zionists. Only then did many, but not all, British and U.S. Jews drop their anti-Zionism.

V. Moral Issues Surrounding the Balfour Declaration.

   The declaration did not adequately safeguard the rights of Palestinian Arabs. It refers only to their "civil and religious rights," not to their political rights.  If Britain intended that "civil rights" include political rights, the document would have been stronger on Arab rights than it appears. This apparently was not the case, however; for Britain, in order to implement the declaration, violated Palestinian Arabs' moral right to the political freedom due to them. Specifically, if the establishment of the Jewish national home were to have been put to a popular vote in Palestine before Zionists became a majority there, it would have lost. Therefore this part of the declaration required that Britain forcibly withhold political freedom from Palestine's inhabitants.
   Did Britain, by violating the Palestinian Arabs' right to political freedom, commit an injustice? It can be argued that if Britain had not developed the Balfour Declaration and the accompanying man-date, Palestinians still would probably not have experienced de-mocracy but rather a monarchy. (Palestinians here means not only Arabs but all inhabitants of Palestine.) Most of the other Arab countries which were formed from the Ottoman Empire, and which achieved independence, became monarchies - either emir-ates, kingdoms or dictatorships. Therefore, one might argue, Brit-ain did not take away Palestinians' rights because they would not have had them anyway. This argument presumes that if the Pales-tinians would not have had a democracy (which was not proven), they would have elected to live under a British mandate rather than under an Arab monarch. (The evidence indicates that king-desig-nate Feisal would probably have been preferred.) The argument also presumes that because an Arab monarch might have violated Palestinians' political rights, Britain automatically had the moral right to violate those rights. The argument does not undo the fact that Palestinians' rights were violated by Britain. This must be construed as an injustice. To conclude otherwise would require that the moral rights of the British and Zionists outweighed the moral rights of Palestinians. That, of course, is a key moral issue regarding this crucial period in the Zionist-Palestinian conflict.
   Both Britain, and Wilson in supporting Britain, seemingly were working out of a colonialist moral framework in which right was judged by might. During the preceding century England had conquered vast colonies around the world, and America had pushed its own frontier from eastern Illinois to Alaska. Numerous Native Americans, Puerto Ricans, Hawaiians, Filipinos and other Pacific islanders had come under the U.S. flag without being asked whether or not they wanted to. In 1917 Palestinians were being victimized by this colonialist moral framework.
   In addition to the issue of violating Palestinians' right to political freedom the Balfour Declaration raises a second moral issue: Did it violate the moral rights of Palestine's indigenous people by making it possible for so many non-Palestinians to immigrate there that they would inevitably upset "the common good rightly understood?"  Would such a large influx of immigrants almost certainly unduly disrupt the lives of the indigenous people? The declaration (fully quoted at the top of the previous section) indicated that it would not let this happen: "...it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine." However, the declaration made no provision for these non-Jewish communities to be a judge of what might "prejudice" their "civil and religious rights." The policing of this clause would be under British, not Palestinian, control. The success or failure of the clause would depend partly on the number of immigrants that Britain would allow. In the following years Britain allowed so many non-Palestinians to immigrate that they did in fact upset "the common good rightly understood." The way in which the clause, "nothing shall be done...," would be implemented would also depend on how Britain would interpret the phrase, "the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people." Britain would allow so many Zionists to immigrate that they would eventually be able to help force the establishment not only of a home but of a state.
   Balfour had told the War Cabinet that the term, "'national home'....did not necessarily involve the early establishment of an independent Jewish state, which was a matter of gradual development in accordance with the ordinary laws of political evolution."  Thus Balfour himself foresaw the possibility of an eventual establishment of a Jewish state. However, the Balfour Declaration did not clarify when or perhaps even whether the homeland for Jews in Palestine should be an independent state. Nor did it set forth how this homeland could be established in such a way that, as it stated, "nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine." This ambiguity would be a factor exacerbating the extremely muddled diplomacy that would develop during the thirty-one years between the adoption of the declaration and the establishment of the state of Israel.
   Therefore a third issue regarding the morality of the Balfour Declaration is this: Did the proviso for this national home violate the rights of the indigenous people? The phrase, "national home," is so deliberately vague that it could mean a large or small part of Palestine; it could mean a fully independent state or some entity with less independence. By crafting a deliberately vague declaration Britain gave its future governments a blank check regarding its enactment. The only restriction regarding Palestine was the proviso not to prejudice the civil and religious rights of non-Jews. However, as noted, interpreting this was a British prerogative. Eventually Britain technically answered to the League of Nations, but Britain dominated the League. The declaration was bound to cause dissention because it was virtually self-contradictory: If the clause about "the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people" were to be fulfilled on a scale satisfactory to Zionists, this would "prejudice the civil and religious rights of the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine." If, however, Britain made sure that "nothing shall be done which may prejudice" these rights, then the clause about the "national home" would be met on a scale unsatisfactory to Zionists. Reconciling these two poles may have been theoretically possible, but it would have required a much higher degree of sensitivity, cooperation, justice, and love for one's neighbor than is usually attained in stressful inter-ethnic relationships. The Balfour Declaration did nothing to create the just and compassionate atmosphere necessary for its own success.
   Within a few months of its passage, some Zionists in Palestine were openly discussing the clash with their Arab neighbors that they thought would be inevitable. In 1918, Y. A. Wilkansky alluded to the moral reservations that some Jews were experiencing with regard to Jewish plans for Palestine. He told the Conference of the Yishuv (the Jews living in Palestine) that Jews who want a Palestinian national home but do not want to displace the Arabs are like people who oppose cruelty to animals and yet eat meat. He disparaged such Jews for maintaining that:
 it was impossible to evict the fellahin (the Arabs), even if we wanted to....Nevertheless, if it were possible, I would commit an injustice towards the Arabs....There are those among us who are opposed to this from the point of view of supreme righteousness and morality. Gentlemen,...if one wants to be a 'preventer of cruelty to animals,' one must be an extremist in the matter. When you enter into the midst of the Arab nation and do not allow it to unite, here too you are taking its life. The Arabs are not salt-fish; they have blood, they live, and they feel pain with the entry of a 'foreign body' into their midst. Why don't our moralists dwell on this point? We must be either complete vegetarians or meat-eaters: not one-half, one-third, or one-quarter vegetarians.
   Apparently Wilkansky and Zionists who thought like him did not agree with the Balfour Declaration proviso that "nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine." Either that, or these Zionists did not consider displacing Arabs something that would "prejudice their civil...rights."
   A fourth issue concerns the morality of American involvement in the declaration because of Wilson's approval of it.
   1. As a party to Britain's adoption of the declaration, Wilson must have known that Britain intended to have some type of postwar control over Palestine in order to implement the document. Otherwise it would have little meaning. Therefore America, through its president, was seemingly a party to the violation of Palestinians' moral right to political self-determination, to political independence.
   2. America, through Wilson, was also a party to giving Britain a blank check with regard to both the number of immigrants and the size and nature of the national home. In doing this it would seem that America also violated the moral right of the Palestinians to determine these issues themselves.
   If it was moral for America and Britain to take the actions they did regarding Palestinians' rights then it would be moral for a group of other nations to take similar actions regarding basic rights of the British and Americans. To argue otherwise requires that moral rights of people in Britain and America are more sacred than the moral rights of people in Palestine.
   One may argue that America was not morally responsible for Wilson's acts, especially because the Senate did not ratify these. Most Americans, either then or since, were not even aware of Wilson's endorsement. How could they be morally responsible for what he did? They may not have been responsible but they can still be accountable and therefore morally responsible for correcting the violation in so far as they can. As will be noted in Chapter Six, Wilson's approval was seconded by the next two presidents, Harding and Coolidge, and by both the Senate and House during Harding's Administration and by the Senate in Coolidge's. Thus the approval was not an isolated action of one president acting alone but the work of a wide spectrum of the government. More-over, the approval was expressed on several occasions. All of this increased America's involvement and therefore, it would seem, its corporate moral responsibility.