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You are here: Home / Archives for Balfour

November 2, 2017 By Olivier Melnick Leave a Comment

The Balfour Declaration – A Thorn in the Flesh of Political Correctness!

Little did Lord Arthur Balfour (1848-1930) know when he penned his declaration, that much of the world would be in an uproar about it, 1oo years later. His short letter to Lord Rothschild on behalf of the Jewish people became a pillar in the foundation of the modern state of Israel. The 1917 Balfour Declaration established that because of the “historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine,” The Jewish people were entitled to return to the area. The statement was unequivocal: “His Majesty’s Government views with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object.” 

The Balfour Declaration is a document that should have been foundational in the world’s recognition of Israel’s right for self-determination within the boundaries of her own historical and biblical land of Eretz Yisrael. It was followed by another equally important but lesser known agreement including the original Balfour text, known as the San Remo Resolution, where the Mandate for Palestine was drawn together (land boundaries were decided four years later.) As a result of the San Remo Resolution being drafted, Great Britain ended-up being responsible for the drawing of the Mandate and land boundaries for Palestine. This became later known as the “British Mandate for Palestine,” and led to the 1947 United Nations vote in favor of Resolution 181 and the partitioning of Palestine between Jews and Arabs. It must be noted that the term “Palestine” as used in the Balfour Declaration and San Remo Resolution, is merely the name of a Middle East geographical boundary known as the Land of Israel today. The word then was not as politically charged as it is today. On May 14, 1948, under the leadership of David Ben Gurion, one day before the end of the British Mandate, Israel became a modern nation. Within hours five neighboring Arab countries declared war on the newborn Jewish state, and Israel has been in a state of war ever since.

I cannot help but think of the different outcome we would have witnessed if Israel had been reborn out of the San Remo Conference of 1920 instead of 1948, but it was not part of God’s plan. Israel’s right to self-determination was agreed upon 97 years ago and shouldn’t be put in question. God remains sovereign over all. Much water has gone under that bridge since and history appears different today. But the reason why it seems changed is that the agenda for Israel’s destruction has been pushed harder since the mid-60s. Palestine is no longer just the name of a geographical area to be restituted to the Jewish people, but it has been made into a country with displaced people painted as the sole victims of the Middle East conflict.

We are now in November 2017, precisely 100 years after the Balfour Declaration was penned. As it is so well described in the Bob Dylan song, Israel is now overwhelmingly seen by the world as “The Neighborhood Bully.” the tiny Jewish state is the constant target of various governments, organizations, celebrities and church denominations because they believe that Israel is the problem in the Middle East. And so, the Balfour Declaration–and by proxy Israel–is under attack!

• In 2016, Mahmoud Abbas decided to sue Britain over the Balfour Declaration and has asked many Arab nations to join his endeavor.
• Britain’s leader of the opposition Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn–who is also a blatant antisemite– decided not to attend the country’s 100 year Balfour declaration Celebration.
• Columbia University professor of Modern Arab Studies, Rashid Khalidi held a lecture titled ““The Balfour Declaration from the Perspective of its Victims.”

Israel’s foes are looking at the Balfour Declaration as a declaration of war against Palestinians. We are told that “Palestinian victims” mourn the loss of their “native” land. The narrative goes on, and the world goes along for the ride. In reality, since 1917, Israel had repeatedly agreed to split the land into two states. Even in 2000, at Camp David, when it could have been a political and existential disaster when Ehud Barak agreed to give away more than 95% of the West Bank and all of the Gaza Strip, Arafat said NO! Every single time, the Palestinian leaders delivered an emphatic NO to the two-state solution, and that is because it is not an option for them. The only viable option as they see it is a Palestinian State with no Jews at all. And as frustrating as it might be, it is becoming the majority opinion globally, because today when it comes to Israel and the Jewish people, fact-finding is the last thing that people are interested in! Not to mention the many prophecies that were fulfilled in 1948 when Israel was reborn. Here are some of these prophecies from the Tanach:

1. Jacob’s descendants would regain control of Israel – Amos 9:14-15
2. Israel would be brought back to life – Ezekiel 37:10-14
3. Isaiah spoke of an Israel being reborn in one day – Isaiah 66:7-8
4. Israel would be re-established as a united nation – Ezekiel 37:21-22
5. The second Israel would be more impressive than the first –  Jeremiah 16:14-15
6. Ezekiel predicted when Israel would be re-established – Ezekiel 4:3-6
7. The people of Israel would return to “their land” – Ezekiel 34:13
8. God would watch over the people of Israel – Jeremiah 31:10
9. Israel’s army would be disproportionately powerful – Leviticus 26:3, 7-8
10.The fortunes of the people of Israel would be restored – Deuteronomy 30:3-5

The Balfour Declaration has become a thorn in the flesh of our politically correct western societies. They want it gone as one more step towards the collapsing of Israel. I would suggest that in and of itself, that Declaration makes a strong case for the self-determination of Israel based on its biblical pre-existence. Compounded with the San Remo Resolution of 1920, it picks up a lot of momentum that is also reinforced by a plethora of Bible passages. In other words, the Declaration only validated from a human perspective what the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had vindicated long ago from within His divine decree. David Ben Gurion expressed it well when he appeared before the Peel Commission in 1937 :

“I say on behalf of the Jews that the Bible is our Mandate, the Bible which was written by us, in our own language, in Hebrew in this very country. That is our Mandate. It is only recognition of this right which was expressed in the Balfour Declaration – David Ben Gurion

 

 

 

Filed Under: Antisemitism, End-Times, Featured-Post-1, God, Israel, Jewish, Middle East, Palestinians, Political Correctness, United Nations Tagged With: Abbas, Balfour, Ben Gurion

July 26, 2016 By Olivier Melnick 4 Comments

For Once Its Not the Jews’ Fault!

Balfour99 years ago, a very important document was written in the United-Kingdom by foreign Secretary Lord Arthur James Balfour to the leader of the Jewish community Baron Walter Rothschild. It has become known in history as the “Balfour Declaration.” The text of that letter reads as follows “I have much pleasure in conveying to you, on behalf of His Majesty’s Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet. “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.” I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.”

The Balfour Declaration is a document that has been foundational in the world’s recognition of Israel’s right for self-determination within the boundaries of her own historical and biblical land of Eretz Yisrael. It was followed by another important agreement including the original Balfour Declaration, known as the San Remo Resolution, where the Mandate for Palestine was drawn together (land boundaries were decided four years later.) As a result of the San Remo Resolution being drafted, Great Britain ended-up being responsible for the drawing of the Mandate and land boundaries for Palestine. This became latter known as the “British Mandate for Palestine.” Fast forward to 1947 and the United Nations voted in favor of Resolution 181 and the partitioning of Palestine between Jews and Arabs. On May 14, 1948, under the leadership of David Ben Gurion, one day before the end of the British Mandate, Israel became a modern nation. Within hours five neighboring Arab countries declared war on the newborn Jewish state. One way or another, this war has been going on for seventy-seven years.

Just days ago, in a move that we could see as being both creative and ludicrous, Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas decided to sue Great Britain for the Balfour Declaration.  Abbas asked his foreign minister, Riyad al-Malki to help with the lawsuit. According to the Palestinians, it is the Balfour Declaration that set in motion all the bloodshed seen in the Middle East in the last eight decades. In fact, Abbas insists that the Balfour Declaration paved the way to the rebirth of Israel, and thus Great Britain is to be held responsible for ALL ISRAELI CRIMES committed against Palestinians since.

This would be a very bold move to make, even if we were dealing with to people groups fighting for territory. Britain might have been involved in initiating the agreement, but whatever took place after the United Nations voted for the partitioning of the region, even if it was connected to the Balfour Declaration, remains the responsibility of Israel and her Arab neighbors. Dan Margalit of Israel Hayom says “But the Balfour Declaration didn’t exist in a vacuum. The world supported it. Even King Faisal of Iraq, whose family originated in Saudi Arabia, reached an agreement with Weizmann on the terms. The declaration was approved in 1920 by an international conference that met in San Remo after World War I. The approval of the mandate by the Council of the League of Nations in 1922 gave the Balfour Declaration international validity, almost like the 1947 U.N. resolution to establish a Jewish state in part of the land of Israel. 

But here is a bigger problem; Palestinians didn’t exist in 1917 (Balfour), 1920 (San Remo), 1924 (San Remo Land boundaries), 1947 (UN partition vote) and 1948 (Israel’s Declaration of Independence.) As a matter of fact, Palestinians didn’t come onto the scene as a “people” until the mid 1960s. So in essence, Abbas is retroactively inserting the Palestinians into history to justify the injustice he is claiming took place in 1917 and subsequent years. It is akin to quoting Abraham Lincoln saying: “Don’t believe everything you read on the Internet”, except that the latter statement is funny because it was made tongue-in-cheek. Abbas is dead serious about the Palestinians going way back in history.

The original Palestinian was invented, forcibly placed in Israel as a “displaced refugee” and further coerced into staying through several generations, born within the refugee camps and/or territories. Palestine went from a geographical area to a political agenda aimed at the complete destruction of Israel and the Jewish people. It took about fifty years to get where we are today. The current acceptance of the Palestinian narrative has become the new normal and is used as the foundation to historically justify a lawsuit against Britain for the Balfour Declaration. That justification doesn’t rest on factual history but this will not stop the PA from proceeding with the suit.

So what is next, a law suit against Italy for the San Remo Resolution of 1920? What about suing the United Nations for allowing Israel to become a modern nation in 1947/48? I suppose the Palestinians could even go as far as suing themselves for signing the Oslo Accords in 1993! Taken to an extreme, they could sue God Himself for giving the Land of Canaan to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and their descendants (Genesis 12:7, 13:15, 15:18-21, 35:9.) After all, it looks like God started it all! Ironically, for once the Jews are not being blamed and I’ll take that as a small victory.

Filed Under: Antisemitism, God, Israel, Jewish, Middle East, Palestinians, United Nations, Zionism Tagged With: Abbas, Balfour, League of Nations, Oslo Accords, Palestine, San Remo, United Nations

August 4, 2015 By Olivier Melnick 3 Comments

As a Jew, I can support Palestine!

Jordanians wave their national flag and shout slogans during a protest near the Israeli embassy in Amman on September 15, 2011 to demand that the government expel the Jewish state's envoy and scrap the joint 1994 peace treaty. AFP PHOTO/KHALIL MAZRAAWI (Photo credit should read KHALIL MAZRAAWI/AFP/Getty Images)
(KHALIL MAZRAAWI/AFP/Getty Images)

Depending on which side of the Middle East fence you are on, Palestine and the Palestinians can be defined in very different ways. Of course, your understanding and supporting of the Arab/Israeli conflict will vary greatly based on which definition you adhere to.

One of the major reasons why there is so much strife in the region is because of the lack of clarity in these definitions as well as the amount of historical inaccuracy supporting them. Modern day Palestinians and their supporters often speak of “historic Palestine” in an attempt at validating its existence prior to that of the Jewish people. But was there such a thing as a historic Palestine and if there was, how could it be defined?

Let us start with what we know from history and define a geographical Palestine. At this point, my use of the word Palestine will only be to describe geographical boundaries in the Middle East. It is therefore critical to differentiate between the “Land of Palestine” as a geographical area and the “State of Palestine” as a political entity. Palestine is a piece of land in Eastern Asia between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, squeezed in a very strategic region between Syria, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon and Iraq.

The word “Palestine” has been etymologically altered over the last 50 years. Until then, it was simply the name of a region. Biblically, it was actually NEVER called Palestine but “The Land of Canaan”. It was God’s choice to give the Land of Canaan to Abraham and his descendants as we read in Genesis 17:8: “I will give to you and to your descendants after you, the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession; and I will be their God.”

Nevertheless, the first use of the word itself might go back to the 5th century BCE out of Greece.  It came from Herodotus who penned The Histories, considered a foundational work on history in Western literature. In Book III of The Histories, he calls it Palaestine. Many authors and historians such as Aristotle, Plutarch and Josephus followed Herodotus in the use of the name which always described a geographical area.

Fast forward to the last Jewish revolt against the Romans known as the Bar Kochba Revolt (132-135 CE) and you now have the official renaming of that area as Palaestina to further humiliate the remaining Jewish people after their defeat. Additionally, Jerusalem was renamed Aelia Capitolina by emperor Hadrian. There is no archeological or historical evidence for the survival of the people known as the Canaanites–from whom many believe the Palestinians come from. On the other hand, we can trace the first Hebrews in the Land of Canaan back to 1,300 BCE.

The name Palestine continued to be used for that area of the world through the centuries, and Jewish presence was never put into question. In the early 1880s, Diaspora Jews who had been spread out all over the world since the destruction of the 2nd Temple in 70 CE, had started to return to Palestine in a series of Aliyot due to intense persecution. In 1916, the region was divided under the Sykes-Picot Agreement between France and Grand Britain. Lebanon and Syria were assigned to France and Palestine was assigned or “mandated” to Great Britain. The 1917 Balfour Declaration established that because of the “historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine“, The Jewish people were entitled to return to the area. The statement was very clear: “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.”

While there might have been some tension as to who really belonged in the land and its exact boundaries, Palestine remained a descriptive for a geographical area and not a political movement or people group. It is then accurate to say that historically we can support geographical Palestine.

The area known as Palestine under the British Mandate actually included what was then known as Trans-Jordan (East of Jewish Palestine). One is to wonder why Trans-Jordan or “Eastern Palestine” is never mentioned and never included in the modern quest for the Palestinian State? That area known today as Jordan, represented 85% of the Entire British Mandate, yet it apparently wasn’t enough! Incidentally, the Palestinian flag is almost identical to the Jordanian flag.

The tide began to turn in 1929 during the Hebron Massacres and the Arab revolt of 1936-39. Around that time, it was still appropriate to speak of ” Palestinian Jews” and “Palestinian Arabs”. In 1948, Palestinian Jews became known as Israelis and Palestinian Arabs started to be called Palestinians as the narrative switched from geographical Palestine to “historic” Palestine. Yet many arabs from neighboring countries continued to call themselves Arabs and not Palestinians for a while longer.

Yassir Arafat (born in Egypt) came on the scene and the pressure was increased on the modern state of Israel. The terms Palestine and Palestinian continued to be deconstructed and re-defined. Today Egyptians and Jordanians of the past are calling themselves Palestinians and claiming right to the Land of Palestine in the name of “self-determination.” Arab victims of the War of Independence (1948), the Six-Day War (1967) and the Kippur War (1973) have been made into political refugees, forcing Israel to become the “occupier.”

Historical revisionism will work for two reasons. On one hand, the lies propagated by its supporters are constantly placated on the news, in books, interviews and the internet. On the other hand they are for the most part never challenged. A repeated lie that is never challenged eventually will become the new accepted truth.

This new truth of a displaced people [the Palestinians] and an occupier [the Israelis] is what currently punctuates the news. Unfortunately, it also dictates the world’s response to the Middle East crisis. But it is based on revisionism and not on historical facts. Any serious student of history, while not blindly exonerating Israel of all guilt over the last 67 years, will recognize Israel’s right to exist and be in the land. Israel’s right to the land can be proven biblically, historically, geographically and archeologically.

You can choose to call that land the Holy Land, Eretz Yisrael, Jewish Palestine or even Western Palestine as we could agree that all these term are inter-changeable, as long as the name refers to a geographical area. From that angle, I support Palestine. The moment that Palestine becomes a political entity with a fictitious displaced people is the moment that I draw the line.

Geographical Palestine exists while historic Palestine never did. More than the Israelis, the real victims are the Jordanians, Egyptians and other Arab neighbors of Israel who were made into something they are not. Of course, their children and grand-children, innocently born as “refugees” only exacerbates the problem. We might not be able to come-up with a viable solution any time soon, but this shouldn’t give us the liberty to ignore the problem and its root cause.

 

Filed Under: Antisemitism, Bible, Israel, Middle East, Muslims, Palestinians, Zionism Tagged With: Balfour, historic, Israel, Jewish, Jews, Palestine, Palestinians

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