Israel is "perfecting" crimes committed by Britain

Britain has been supporting the Zionist colonization of Palestine for more than a century. (Martin Pope / ZUMA Press)

Committing a genocide is clearly not enough for a large bloc within Israel’s ruling coalition.

The far-right ministers in the government – backed by some members of Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party – are intensifying their push for recolonizing Gaza.

Their goal of building new settlements in a territory subjected to wholesale destruction is equally despicable and logical.

It is in keeping with the logic of the Balfour Declaration, the November 1917 document which kickstarted the process whereby a Jewish state would be established in Palestine.

The anniversary of the declaration – which falls this weekend – is an occasion to reflect on the thinking behind it, as well as its consequences.

Arthur James Balfour, Britain’s foreign secretary at the time, was under no illusions about what he was doing in issuing that pledge of support for the Zionist movement.

His declaration did not specify the contours of the state being envisaged, which was euphemistically described as a “national home.” Yet it did prove vital in creating “facts on the ground,” to use more recent Zionist parlance.

That is precisely what Balfour intended.

In 1919 Balfour wrote a letter to David Lloyd George, then prime minister, after an Anglican bishop in Jerusalem had queried British policy towards Zionism.

Balfour admitted that there was a “weak point” in Britain’s position as it “deliberately and rightly” declined to accept the principle of self-determination for Palestine. That would mean asking Palestine’s indigenous people – whom Balfour called its “present inhabitants” – for their views.

“If the present inhabitants were consulted they would unquestionably give an anti-Jewish verdict,” Balfour wrote, adding that “we conceive the Jews to have an historic claim to a home in their ancient land, provided that home can be given them without either dispossessing or oppressing the present inhabitants.”

It is important to parse Balfour’s choice of words.

Before the Balfour Declaration, Muslims, Christians and Jews lived in Palestine without major hostility and frequently on friendly and harmonious terms.

The “anti-Jewish verdict” that Balfour wished to avoid would not be directed at Jews because of their ethnicity or religion. It would rather be a verdict against a colonization project which would deny basic rights to Palestinians despite how Britain contended otherwise.

“Strike hard”

The Balfour Declaration was later enshrined in the League of Nations Mandate under which Britain would rule Palestine following World War I.

Winston Churchill – revered today as a heroic leader – championed the declaration repeatedly.

Churchill stated in 1921 that the declaration must be “regarded as one of the facts definitely established by the triumphant conclusion of the Great War.”

Churchill was an avid supporter of Zionism. Blake Alcott’s The Rape of Palestine demonstrates just how avid a supporter Churchill was.

In one 1937 discussion on the Balfour Declaration, Churchill spoke about “the good faith of England to the Jews,” adding, “We are bound by honor, and I think upon the merits, to push this thing as far as we can.”

Pushing “this thing” – the colonization of Palestine – “as far as we can” required crushing resistance to the Zionist project.

During the same 1937 discussion, Churchill sought to justify Britain’s approach by saying, “We have every right to strike hard in support of our authority.”

Churchill personally authorized brutal repression.

As colonial secretary in 1921, he was instrumental in sending a specialized police force to Palestine.

It was comprised of men who had previously served in Ireland – with the British forces known as the Black and Tans and the Auxiliaries.

To this day, the Black and Tans are synonymous with immense cruelty during Ireland’s War of Independence.

The Black and Tans set fire to entire neighborhoods of Cork city and Balbriggan, my hometown in north county Dublin.

As Caroline Elkins writes in her book Legacy of Violence, Palestine came to replace Ireland as the “official and unofficial training ground for colonial police indoctrination.” By 1943, five out of Palestine’s eight district police commissioners had previously served with the Black and Tans in Ireland.

Just this week David Lammy, Britain’s foreign secretary, suggested that the seriousness of the term “genocide” is undermined if it is applied to Israel’s current war against Gaza.

It is understandable that a senior British politician would try to excuse or downplay Israel’s crimes. Israel is, after all, seeking to “perfect” crimes which it learned from Britain.

When Britain ran Palestine, it set up a concentration camp and resorted to home demolitions, collective punishment and imprisonment without charge or trial.

Douglas Duff, one of the former Black and Tan members who went on to become a police chief in Palestine, wrote about the torture techniques which he used and possibly pioneered. His memoirs indicate that he introduced the practice now called waterboarding to Palestine.

Israel has kept up the tradition he established. Palestinians arrested by Israeli troops now occupying Gaza have undergone waterboarding, testimony gathered by the United Nations Human Rights Office has found.

Arthur James Balfour once expressed a desire to see the “strengthening and consolidation” of the British Empire.

The Balfour Declaration reflected such thinking. It was hoped that the Zionists would form “for England a ‘little loyal Jewish Ulster’ in a sea of potentially hostile Arabism,” according to Ronald Storrs, a Jerusalem-based military administrator.

The irony is that Britain’s sponsorship of Zionism helped to weaken the empire.

As the Zionist movement felt that colonization was not advancing with sufficient speed, it fell out with Britain in the 1940s. Some elements in the movement even conducted bombing and assassination campaigns against the British.

Concluding that Palestine was unmanageable, the British eventually had to leave that land with their tails between their legs. The British departed Palestine as Zionist forces they had trained were implementing the Nakba, the mass expulsion of Palestinians from their homes.

Although the empire has shrunk, many figures in the British establishment still have an imperial mindset.

As Israel is a product of Britain’s imperial machinations, those British politicians who enable its crimes are following a historical pattern. It is a pattern soaked with the blood of Palestinians.