Balfour Declaration was “the greatest theft and falsification in human history,” declares PA daily
Excerpt of a column by Bassem Barhoum, regular columnist for the official PA daily
Headline: “104 years since the Balfour Promise – the thief has yet to be punished!”
“One hundred and four years ago the greatest theft and falsification in human history were committed. Palestine and the right to self-determination on its homeland were stolen from the Palestinian people. During World War I, and to be precise in the second half of 1917, the promise of theft (i.e., the Balfour Declaration) was drafted, which was given by British Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour to the Zionist movement on behalf of the government of the British kingdom. This promise gave it the right to establish ‘a national home for the Jewish people’ in Palestine…
The Balfour Promise was the most despicable global colonialist plan in history; Britain acted like the heir and owner of the Arab territories that had been controlled by the Ottoman Empire…
Today, after 104 years, the world is still incapable of correcting this historical mistake and this severe injustice by putting an end to the colonialist Zionist project…
After 104 years the conflict is still continuing, and it will not stop until this promise and its consequences are cancelled. The Palestinian people never was an enemy of the Jews as a religion, but it will not agree to the Zionist expansion project and will continue to fight it.”
The Balfour Declaration of Nov. 2, 1917 was a letter from British Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour to Baron Rothschild stating that "His Majesty's government views with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people." In 1922, the League of Nations adopted this and made the British Mandate "responsible for putting into effect the declaration," which led to the UN vote in favor of partitioning Mandatory Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state in 1947. In response, Britain ended its mandate on May 15, 1948, and the Palestinian Jews, who accepted the Partition Plan, declared the independent State of Israel. The Palestinian Arabs rejected the plan and together with 7 Arab states attacked Israel, in what is now known as Israel's War of Independence.