How many of you have heard of the Balfour Declaration of 1917? (Britain granted the right for Zionist Jews to have a national home in Palestine.) The back story Ive never heard before though is of considerable interest. A leading Zionist at the time in England - Chaim Weizmann was a Jew of Russian extraction, who became a British subject in 1910. During the First World War he became the Director of the British Admiralty Laboratories and he achieved recognition from the British government when he developed a synthetic acetone, intended to be used in the manufacture of cordite, which was the explosive used to propel shells and bullets vital to the allied war effort. The problem, at the time, was that most of the sources of acetone were to be found only in German-occupied Africa and a synthetic acetone was at least as valuable at the time as gold bullion. The British government asked Weizmann what he wanted in return of virtually winning the war for them. He told them that he wanted nothing for himself but that he wanted a home in Palestine for the Jewish people. The result of this was the Balfour Declaration. Another interesting detail affecting the US in all of this - At the time, the Ottoman Empire still had most of the area of Palestine under its control, and the borders of what would become Palestine had been outlined as part of the 16 May 1916 Sykes-Picot Agreement between Britain and France. In exchange for the commitment , the Jewish community would seek to encourage the United States to join World War I. Yikes - And now we know the rest of the story... adespicabletruce.org.uk/page68.html
Posted on: Mon, 24 Mar 2014 14:06:30 +0000
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