The shameful record of Great Britain when it was the holder of the Palestine Mandate needs to be remembered, as we consider how that country treats Israel – and its claim to Jerusalem — today.
The first significant act of Great Britain, after it had been assigned the role of Mandatary, was to cease to apply the Mandate’s provisions to all of the territory originally meant to be included in the Mandate. The British announced that the provisions of the Mandate having to do with “facilitating Jewish immigration” and “encouraging close settlement by Jews on the land” would not apply to any of the Mandate’s territory east of the Jordan River. That territory, which constituted 78% of the area that was intended to be part of a future Jewish National Home, was henceforth closed off to Jewish immigration. Instead, that territory became the Emirate of Transjordan, created by the British to satisfy the territorial ambitions of the Hashemite Emir Abdullah. Like his brother Feisal, whom the British had put on the throne of Iraq, Abdullah wanted a place to rule; the British obliged him with what was then called “Transjordan,” by depriving the Zionists of land that they had been led to believe would be included in the Mandate for Palestine.
The second act of betrayal by the British in Palestine was to do little, and sometimes nothing, to protect the Jewish pioneers when Arabs began to systematically attack them. In April 1920, when the Jewish quarter in Jerusalem was attacked by local Arabs, the Zionist leader Vladimir Jabotinsky organized Jewish self-defense units. But the British, instead of arresting Arabs, arrested Jabotinsky, who was interned in Acre Prison, accused of illegally training and arming Jews and using British military forces – these were former members of the Jewish Legion, who had fought as part of the British army against the Ottoman forces – without permission. These men had long since ceased to be part of the British army, and were free to help defend other Jews; the British charge was unjust. For daring to help Jews defend themselves, Jabotinsky was given a long sentence, but an international outcry led to his release after three months. The incident was telling: the British in Palestine clearly had little sympathy for the Jews. They did nothing, either, to protect the Jews who were being massacred in Hebron in 1929, save to evacuate a handful. During the Arab Revolt (1936-1939), the British again did little to help the Jews defend themselves. One British officer, Captain Orde Wingate, a fervent Christian Zionist, took it upon himself to teach the Jews to take the fight to the Arabs; he organized “Night Squads” that soon had the Arabs on the run. Wingate was forced to leave Palestine in 1938; his Zionism had made him unpopular with many of the British officers. In 1939, in another act of British betrayal of the Jews, a White Paper was passed in London that limited Jewish immigration to Palestine to 15,000 for each of the next five years, after which any Jewish immigration would be subject to an Arab veto. At the moment of maximum peril for Europe’s threatened Jews, the British, instead of “facilitating immigration” as they were obligated to do according to the Mandate’s provisions, chose to curry favor with the Arabs by this cruel limitation on Jewish immigrants.
The British thus prevented desperate Jewish refugees from reaching Palestine, at a time when hundreds of thousands of European Jews might still have been saved. Even after World War II, the British continued to prevent ships full of Jewish refugees, who had survived the camps, from landing in Palestine.
And those disturbing details serve as the backdrop to the latest display of British want of sympathy for the Jews now ingathered in their ancient homeland. It has to do with the competing claims of Israelis and Palestinians to Jerusalem. It is reported on here: “The UK must end its double standard over Jerusalem,” by Alastair Kirk, JNS, June 24, 2022:
Earlier this month, the United Kingdom celebrated the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, marking Her Majesty’s 70th year on the throne. To mark the occasion, the United Kingdom hosted parties for the Queen around the world, including in Israel. However, there seemed to be a disparity between how Israelis and Palestinians were able to mark the occasion.
Israelis, including former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, were invited to celebrate the Queen’s Jubilee in Tel Aviv, Israel’s largest city. Meanwhile, in Jerusalem, Israel’s capital, the United Kingdom hosted its Jubilee party for Palestinians, and no Israelis were invited.
The reason for this disparity is because the United Kingdom refuses to acknowledge Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and instead places its embassy to Israel in Tel Aviv. Meanwhile, the British consulate to the Palestinians is not in Ramallah, the main Palestinian city; instead, it is in Jerusalem. In other words, the United Kingdom treats Israel unfairly compared to the Palestinians. It operates a double standard when it comes to Jerusalem.
Why does Britain deny Israel’s legal right to Jerusalem while supporting a Palestinian claim?
It bases its Jerusalem policy on UN Security Council Resolution 242 and claims that the status of Jerusalem “should be determined in a negotiated settlement between the Israelis and the Palestinians.” It then immediately adds that “the final determination of Jerusalem must ensure that the holy city is a shared capital of Israel and a Palestinian state.”
UNSC Resolution 242 makes no mention of Jerusalem. As its author, the British ambassador to the U.N., Lord Caradon, explained, Resolution 242 allows Israel to retain any territory won in the Six-Day War that it deems necessary for it to have “secure [i.e. defensible] and recognized boundaries.” Whether east Jerusalem, and the Old City, qualify is not spelled out; that is one of the things that is supposed to be decided in negotiations between the parties. Access to the Old City, and the Temple Mount, which is the holiest site in Judaism, was denied Jews between 1949 and 1967. It might be argued that any loss at this point of east Jerusalem and the Old City would fatally vitiate Jewish morale, and hence undermine the ability of the Jews to defend themselves.
These statements seem to contradict each other. On one hand, the British position is that Jerusalem’s status should be determined by the two parties through negotiations. On the other hand, Britain is giving its “final determination” that Jerusalem “must” be shared between the two, effectively ignoring its own advice by pre-determining the outcome of negotiations.
So which is it to be for the British? Will Jerusalem’s status be determined by negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians? Or will the British claim that Jerusalem “must” be shared prevail, which means that the most important part of the negotiations over Jerusalem are already predetermined? The British should have simply stuck with the first position: the status of Jerusalem should be determined by negotiations between the parties.
So far, the Palestinians have refused to acknowledge the Jewish connection to Jerusalem, let alone recognize it as Israel’s capital. Meanwhile, the UK Foreign Office continues to reward the intransigence of the Palestinian leadership while penalizing Israel. It is unfathomable for the Jewish connection to Jerusalem to even be called into question. The British government may genuinely believe that the status of Jerusalem should be determined through negotiation, but no one knows the finalized borders should there be a future Palestinian state. A British consulate in Jerusalem might be in the wrong place for a future Palestinian state. Likewise, if Jerusalem “must” be shared in the United Kingdom’s opinion, then why does Britain not just recognize west Jerusalem as Israel’s capital today?
All of West Jerusalem has been part of Israel since 1948. It will always be part of Israel. There is no reason why the U.K. should not recognize that part of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. The seat of Israel’s government, including the Prime Minister’s office, the President’s office, the Knesset, and the Supreme Court, are all in west Jerusalem. Why should the British continue to pretend that Tel Aviv, founded in 1909, is Israel’s capital, instead of Jerusalem, that has been the capital of the Jewish people for 3000 years? By recognizing west Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, the British government need not worry; it is not committing itself to supporting the Israeli claim to all of Jerusalem.
And why is the British “embassy” to the Palestinians now located in Jerusalem? The seat of the PA’s government, the place where President Mahmoud Abbas has his offices, where the Palestinian parliament meets, where all government offices are to be found is Ramallah. It makes no sense to have British diplomats make the trek from Jerusalem to Ramallah every time they want to meet with PA officials.
There are two ways the United Kingdom can correct this hypocrisy.
The first is to recognize the historic and legal fact that Jerusalem is Israel’s capital and move the British embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. The second option is to move the British consulate to the Palestinians from Jerusalem to Ramallah. Either of these actions would correct the double standard the government is currently deploying.
Better still, both options should be chosen. The British should follow the United States, end the insulting farce of Tel-Aviv-is-the-capital-of-Israel, and move their embassy to west Jerusalem. That would right a historic wrong, and encourage other countries to go and do likewise. At the same time, the British consulate to the Palestinians should be moved from Jerusalem to the true capital of the PA, Ramallah. The Palestinians will complain, but if the British stick to their guns, they will eventually acquiesce. Diplomatic relations with the U.K, are simply too important for the PA to cut them off in a fit of pique. After all, it needs the money the U.K. supplies to both the PA and to UNRWA.
London refuses to locate its embassy in Jerusalem, despite the fact that Israel’s parliament and government are located in Jerusalem, the usual criteria for British embassies, more than 80 of which are in capital cities around the world. No other sovereign nation would accept being told where it should designate its capital.…
Here’s the “double standard” applied to Israel: everywhere else in the world, the British embassy is placed where the receiving nation’s seat of government is located. Only in the case of Israel is this otherwise universal practice ignored. Not only is Israel’s seat of government in Jerusalem, but Jerusalem has been the political, religious, and cultural capital of the Jewish people since at least 1000 B.C. What would the British think if another country – say, a Muslim country — were to decide to place its embassy to the U.K. in heavily Muslim Birmingham rather than in London? We know what they would think. And that embassy would never open.
The embassy can be moved to west Jerusalem without any British commitment on the ultimate disposition of east Jerusalem. But we all know what that ultimate disposition will be. There is not a chance in hell that Israel will ever give up east Jerusalem, where the Western Wall and the Temple Mount are located. The British should start to adjust to that non-negotiable position, by moving their embassy to west Jerusalem. When Trump moved the American Embassy to Jerusalem, people predicted that all hell would break loose in the Arab countries. Nothing happened. And nothing will happen if Great Britain now follows suit.
mortimer says
Another scholarly and accurate assessment of betrayal of Israel by the Colonial and Foreign Office! Indeed, if they had allowed high levels of Jewish immigration from Europe, then the severe problems we see today would not exist. The Jewish state would have a population of 10 million consisting mainly of Jews and the Holocaust might not have occurred. Adolf Eichmann considered emigration to Israel as the best solution to expelling Jews from Nazi-occupied Europe, but it was not available because of British betrayal.
The names of those British civil servants and politicians who betrayed the mandate to build the Jewish homeland will live in infamy. Israel and its neighbors now live with the ongoing instability that they tried to create.
bill says
As they say that was then this is now. The USA has also done a lot of bad things in it short history why bring up things from a century ago
gravenimage says
Mortimer, it is also true that modern Israel would not exist today. I certainly do not agree with all of Britain’s actions at the time–to put it mildly–but this core truth still has to be remembered.
mortimer says
Obviously, the policy of the United Kingdom is intended to avoid offending oil sheikhs. That explains it. BP wouldn’t want to lose any contracts.
Wellington says
Solid summation of a “problem,” i.e., Britain’s timidity and, very possibly as well, a low-key form of anti-Semitism.
Kenneth J Johnson says
Not so low key. This attitude Towards appeasement of the Arabs is reflelclteld in the Muslemn invasion and the shortsighted British lkeaders cznnotg see thjisl. Britain has gonr a long way down, and if they don’t change soon, very soon,, Britain wiol become an Izlamic country, note the failkuare in Rothnggra,. someof tghe highest officialsikn bov ernment are musxlem, and muslem pñlkeasing decisiio0ns are being made daily.
Fiorst England, thenm France. KEN
Wellington says
Well, I was thinking of Russian pogroms, the Dreyfus Affair in France and even Nazi Germany when I characterized Britain’s stance as “low-key,” which by comparison I think is accurate.
I do agree with you about the British government stance on Islam and Muslim immigration. It represents a slow national suicide.
gravenimage says
+1
Kenneth J Johnson says
Nort so low key. This attitude of appeasement of the Arabs is reflecteld in the Muslem invasion and the shortsighted British leaders cannot see this. Britain has goned a long way down and if they don’t change soon BBritain will become an Isamic country. Note the failure in Rothergram. Sokme of the highest officials in the goverfnment are Muslem and Muslem lplesing decisions are being made daily,. This article could apply to France for the last 10o0 years as well. First England, then France. KEN
Infidel says
The Israelis should have simply denied any Palis the right to attend the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee celebrations in Jerusalem. And in protest, they should have canceled the function in Tel Aviv and sent the British embassy packing, telling them “Either move the embassy to Jerusalem like the US did, or get out of here”. Tel Aviv is not the capital, and having foreign embassies (as opposed to consulates) there is like another country having its US embassy in New York, while pretending that DC is a part of another country
Wellington says
I wish DC was part of another country. It would be a good start.
gravenimage says
The U.K. and Its Policy On Jerusalem
………………………………
Grimly accurate analysis, Mr. Fitzgerald.
Jerry says
British duplicity is actually worse.
The British created, clothed, equipped, armed, yraind and to a large extent led the Jordanian Muslim Military in the period leading to snd during the 1948 war.
With British complicity the Jordanian Army, the so called Arab Legion invaded and illegally occupied Jewish East Jerusalem and Jewish Lands and settlements.
The British then acquiesced with the continued Muslim occupation of Jewish Lands, yet, 19 years later, after those lands were liberated by the Israelis in 1967, thr British then treated the Jewish rightful owners as though they were the illegal occupiers.