H-Empire
BLOG: 100 Years After the Balfour Declaration – Revisiting
Sir Herbert Samuel’s Legacy [Imperial & Global Forum]
Discussion published by Marc-William Palen on Thursday, February 2, 2017
Sir Herbert Samuel
inaugurating the Jaffa-Jerusalem railway, 5 Oct 1920 (Prints and photographs division of the Library
of Congress, Washington, D.C.)
Charlotte Kelsted
University of Exeter
Speaking before the UN General Assembly last year, Palestinian
President Mahmoud Abbas requested that the British government
offer an apology for its 1917 Balfour Declaration supporting a Jewish
homeland in Palestine. ‘We ask Great Britain, as we approach 100
years since this infamous declaration, to draw the necessary lessons
and to bear its historic, legal, political, material and moral
responsibility for the consequences of this declaration, including an
apology to the Palestinian people for the catastrophes, misery and
injustice this declaration created and to act to rectify these
disasters and remedy its consequences, including by the recognition
of the state of Palestine,’ Abbas said. ‘This is the least Great Britain
can do.’
Citation: Marc-William Palen. BLOG: 100 Years After the Balfour Declaration – Revisiting Sir Herbert Samuel’s Legacy [Imperial &
Global Forum]. H-Empire. 02-02-2017. https://networks.h-net.org/node/5293/discussions/164786/blog-100-years-after-bafour-declaration-%E2%80%93-revisiting-sir-herbert
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
1
H-Empire
Abbas’s demand for an apology is far from the only one. Just last
November, for example, Liberal Democrat peer Baroness Jenny
Tonge hosted the launch of the Palestinian Return Centre
initiative to get the UK government to recognize its role in ‘almost a
century of Palestinian suffering.’ 100 years on, the Balfour
Declaration’s legacy remains a controversial part of the present day
– so, too, is the legacy of the first High Commissioner to the
Palestine Mandate, Herbert Samuel. [continue reading at the
Imperial & Global Forum]
Citation: Marc-William Palen. BLOG: 100 Years After the Balfour Declaration – Revisiting Sir Herbert Samuel’s Legacy [Imperial &
Global Forum]. H-Empire. 02-02-2017. https://networks.h-net.org/node/5293/discussions/164786/blog-100-years-after-bafour-declaration-%E2%80%93-revisiting-sir-herbert
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
2