On November 2, 1917, Arthur Balfour, Britain’s Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, addressed a letter to Lord Rothschild, one of the leaders of the British Jews:
I have much pleasure in conveying to you, on behalf of His Majesty’s Government, the following declaration of sympathy 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.
Thus, by a stroke of the imperial pen, the Promised Land became twice-promised. Even by the standards of Perfidious Albion, this was an extraordinary tale of double-dealing and betrayal, a tale that continued to haunt Britain throughout the thirty years of its rule in Palestine.
The statement was exceedingly brief, consisting of a mere sixty-seven words, but its consequences were both profound and pervasive, and its impact on the subsequent history of the Middle East was nothing less than revolutionary. It completely transformed the position of the fledgling Zionist movement vis-à-vis the Arabs of Palestine, and it provided a protective umbrella that enabled the Zionists to proceed steadily towards their ultimate goal of establishing an independent Jewish state in Palestine. Rarely in the annals of the British Empire has such a short document produced such far-reaching consequences.
Avi Shlaim, The Balfour Declaration And its Consequences in Wm. Roger Louis, ed., Yet More Adventures with Britannia: Personalities, Politics and Culture in Britain, London, I. B. Tauris, 2005,
Measured by British interests alone it is one of the greatest mistakes in our imperial history
Elizabeth Monroe, Britain’s Moment in the Middle East, 1914–71 (London, 1981), p. 43.
The British entered Palestine to defeat the Turks; they stayed there to keep it from the French; then they gave it to the Zionists because they loved "the Jews" even as they loathed them, at once admired and despised them, and above all feared them.... Weizmann's principal achievement was to create among British leaders the identity between the Zionist movement and "world Jewry" -- Lloyd George referred to "the Jewish race", "world Jewry" and "the Zionists" as if they were synonymous.
He also succeeded in persuading them that the British and Zionist interests were the same. Yet none of it was true... But Britain's belief in the mystical powers of "the Jews" overrode reality and it was on the basis of such spurious considerations that Britain took two momentous decisions: the establishment of a Jewish legion and the Balfour Declaration.
Tom Segev, One Palestine Complete, Abacus, 2001
In the United States, the President's [Woodrow Wilson] adviser, Louis D. Brandeis, a leading advocate of Zionism, had been inducted as Associate Justice of the Supreme Court on 5 June 1916. That Wilson was vulnerable [to persuasion to the Zionist cause] was evident, in that as early as 1911, he had made known his profound interest in the Zionist idea and in Jewry.
[He was described] as being "attached to Brandeis by ties of peculiar hardness," a cryptic reference to the story that Wilson had been blackmailed for $40,000 for some hot love letters he had written to his neighbor's wife when he was President of Princeton. He did not have the money, and the go-between, Samuel Untermeyer, of the law firm of Guggenheim, Untermeyer & Marshall, said he would provide it if Wilson would appoint to the next vacancy on the Supreme Court a nominee selected by Mr. Untermeyer. The money was paid, the letters returned, and Brandeis had been the nominee.
Robert John, Behind the Balfour Declaration, Institute for Historical Review
The only way (which proved so to be) to induce the American President to come into the war was to secure the cooperation of Zionist Jews by promising them Palestine, and thus enlist and mobilize the hitherto unsuspectedly powerful forces of Zionist Jews in America and elsewhere in favour of the Allies on a quid pro quo contract basis. Then one morning Baron Furness, one of England's unostentatious representatives, brought to 44 East 23rd Street, at that time headquarters of the Zionist Organization, the final draft ready for issue.
The language of the declaration accepted by the English Zionists based as it was on the theory of discontent was unacceptable to me. I informed Justice Brandeis of my views, called in Dr. Schmarya Levin and proceeded to change the text. Then with Dr. Wise, I hurried to Colonel House. By this time he had come to speak of Zionism as "our cause." Quietly he perused my proposed change, discussed its wisdom and promised to call President Wilson on his private wire and urge the change. He cabled to the British Cabinet. Next day he informed me that the President had approved. I had business that week-end in Boston and it was over the long distance wire that my secretary in New York read to me the final form as repeated by cable from London. It was the text as I had altered it.
Thus, as will be seen, the Zionists having carried out their part, and greatly helped to bring America in, the Balfour Declaration of 1917 was but the public confirmation of the necessarily secret "gentlemens' " agreement of 1916, made with the previous knowledge, acquiescence, and or approval of the Arabs, and of the British, and of the French and other Allied governments, and not merely a voluntary, altruistic and romantic gesture on the part of Great Britain as certain people either through pardonable ignorance assume or unpardonable ill-will would represent or rather misrepresent.
Samuel Landman, secretary to the Zionist leaders Weizmann and Sokolow, and later secretary of the World Zionist Organization, The New Palestine published by the Zionist Organization of America, 1927
There is no better proof of the value of the Balfour Declaration as a military move than the fact that Germany entered into negotiations with Turkey in an endeavour to provide an alternative scheme which would appeal to Zionists.
Another most cogent reason for the adoption by the Allies of the policy of the Declaration lay in the state of Russia herself. Russian Jews had been secretly active on behalf of the Central Powers from the first; they had become the chief agents of German pacifist propaganda in Russia; by 1917 they had done much in preparing for that general disintegration of Russian society, later recognised as the Revolution. It was believed that if Great Britain declared for the fulfilment of Zionist aspirations in Palestine under her own pledge, one effect would be to bring Russian Jewry to the cause of the Entente.
It was believed, also, that such a declaration would have a potent influence upon world Jewry outside Russia, and secure for the Entente the aid of Jewish financial interests. In America, their aid in this respect would have a special value when the Allies had almost exhausted the gold and marketable securities available for American purchases. Such were the chief considerations which, in 1917, impelled the British Government towards making a contract with Jewry.
Lloyd George Memoirs of the Peace Conference