Britannia, oil and Jews
Since World War I, pragmatism has ruled British Mid-East policy
The relationship between the UK and the Jewish people has been a series of peaks and troughs, with the latter sadly pre-eminent. Nearly every peak, though welcome, was inspired by selfish interests.
In 1066, when England had become an outpost of France, the Jews were brought in not to rescue them from persecution, but as accountants and financiers to run the country. In 1656 Cromwellmay have been partially motivated by religious zeal, but his acceptance of the Jewish exiles back into the country had everything to do with the expectation of a ready-made spying network against his continental enemies.
The only exception to this sorry situation was during the late 19th Century, when Britain opened its arms to help rescue the rejected and persecuted Jewish refugees from Russia and Eastern Europe, fleeing the pogroms. Their motivation mainly came from the philo-Semitism of prominent Christians such as Lord Shaftesbury, William Hechle rand Charles Spurgeon as well as the fact that, in contrast with France and Germany, anti-Semitism was taking a breather. England, after all, now had a Jewish Prime Minister (albeit a baptised one!) in Benjamin Disraeli, as well as a smattering of Jewish knights, barons, Mayors and Lords. In fact, Queen Victoria was quite positively inclined towards her Jewish subjects.
When she died, things began to change. The Aliens Act of 1905 was passed to limit Jewish immigration, the first sign that anti-Semitism was striving to gain a fresh foothold in the new Century. Then came the First World War, when fighting in the battle fields obscured the machinations that were taking place behind the scenes, in darkened rooms, desert tents and dusty palaces. With eyes looking forward to a post-war world, attention was firmly on the lands of the Middle East, currently held by the Turks. Trade routes had to be protected … and then there was oil.
Oil … the gamechanger!
On May 26, 1908 the first major oilfield in the Middle East had been discovered in Persia by a British company. This was the Anglo-Persian Oil company, now known as British Petroleum (BP). And so this particular story begins, the subtext for much of the strife that has enveloped that region ever since. Britain had a foothold, but how would it continue to be a player in this global game? It was going to have to win battles … and do deals.
It did a deal with the Arabs, in a series of letters from Sir Henry McMahon, British High Commissioner in Egypt, to the Sharif of Mecca, a powerful Arab leader in 1915. It promised Arab independence after the war was won, in return for help in the actual winning of the war. At the same time, British diplomat Mark Sykes was drawing up plans with the French and Russians to carve up the Middle East once the Turks were defeated. The third agreement regarding the same piece of land was made with the Jews, the Balfour Declaration in 1917.
Here we have some key political origins of the current conflict in the Middle East, the machinations of western politicians during the First World War, mainly from Britain. The cause of all this, as it always is with politicians, was national self-interest, for which every winner is at the expense of a loser (or losers). The winners were, at least for a few decades, these western politicians, as the flow of oil at a cheap price was ensured. But, as for the losers …
The meddling starts
After the war the land was carved up by the British and the French,breaking the agreement with the Arabs,forming the artificial states of Iraq and Syria. Then, three quarters of the land promised to the Jews was taken away from them, giving birth to another artificial state, Jordan (then called TransJordan),thus breaking the agreement with the Jews.
The good relationship developed between Britain and the Jews in Victorian times had been broken at the negotiators table and when push came to shove, political expediency dictated that the flow of oil was preferable to the dictates of natural justice, even when unsettling and sinister stories were coming out of Germany, now under a new regime!
Ever since the signing of the Balfour Declaration in 1917, the dealings of the British Government with the Jewish people had taken a downward trajectory. It is no secret that, for all the wars and skirmishes between Jews and Arabs since then, British actions have usually veered towards whoever served their best interests. Ever since Britain carved up the Middle East it has been cultivating relationships with the Arab ruling families, educating them at British colleges and Universities, such as Oxbridge and Sandhurst, leading to strong bonds with the upper classes and royal family. In the 1920s and leading up to the Second World War, Britain was given the mandate to rule the area of Palestine and its heavy-handed treatment of the Jews is well documented. Especially shameful was the Exodus incident 1 in 1947, when a ship packed with Holocaust survivors was refused embarkation in Palestine and the survivors sent back to Europe, many ending up in Germany of all places.
This attitude is despite the fact that Britain had imposed a 75,000 limit on Jewish immigration just before the war, a quota that was never fulfilled, despite clear indications as to what had been happening in Nazi Germany.2
And now?
What we need to know now is the current situation, as this will provide clues as to what the future holds. Surely Middle Eastern dynamics have shifted, with power – for good or bad – resting in the nations and people themselves? The rise of militant Islam is also a major factor. Is the British Government still holding to the old colonial ties or have most of them now been broken as a result of the upheavals of the Arab Spring and what followed?
Getting straight to the point, what is the current policy of the British Government towards the State of Israel? Even if members of the Foreign Office have stopped parading through Westminster corridors in full Arab regalia, as some did in the 1930s, is it still fundamentally arabist?
We must look at evidence; voting patterns, public (and private) declarations, always remembering that actions speak louder than words. On the positive side, Prime Minister Theresa May revealed in December 2016 that Britain will become one of the first countries to adopt a definition of anti-Semitism that had been worded by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance. She said:“It is unacceptable that there is anti-Semitism in this country. It is even worse that incidents are reportedly on the rise. As a government we are making a real difference and adopting this measure is a ground-breaking step. It means there will be one definition of anti-Semitism – in essence, language or behaviour that displays hatred towards Jews because they are Jews – and anyone guilty of that will be called out on it.” 3
On the other hand, two years earlier, in October 2014, the House of Commons did vote overwhelmingly to recognise the Palestinian state, a non-binding act, but highly symbolic in the context of their understanding of the Israel/Palestine issue. 4
The fact that only 12 MPs voted against the motion was a telling one. Equally telling was the fact that the UK voted against Israel in a UN resolution on Jerusalem that referred to Israel as the “occupying power” and that Israeli laws concerning Jerusalem were illegal and null and void. 5
Just stop and think about this. Regardless of opinions of politicians in other nations, Jerusalem is Israel’s chosen capital city, as it was 3,000 years ago, when London and every other major capital did not exist. Doesn’t a nation have a right to declare its capital city, even if the city in question had changed hands in the past, depending on who ruled the land at the time? What right does any other country have to decide on these matters?
What we learn from this is that the British government still continues to view the State of Israel through the lens of diplomacy and accepted consensus, even if this is not necessarily founded on objective truth, but rather influenced by the need to maintain good relations with nations that have the capacity to create serious bother or spoil the delicate equilibrium that maintains our World.
Truth … not propaganda
And what is the objective truth regarding Jerusalem? It is the eastern part of the city that is in dispute. Eastern Jerusalem was liberated (or conquered) by Israel in June 1967 in theSix-Day War. Before then it was held by Jordan, who controlled it as the spoils of the 1948-9 War of Independence and then annexed it in 1950 (an act condemned by all nations except Britain and Pakistan). Before then it was part of the British Mandate since 1923. Before that it was part of the Ottoman Empire. We can slip back through history and watch Jerusalem change hands again and again. The truth is that, regardless of the agenda-ridden proclamations of the United Nations and international community, East Jerusalem, as with every area of the Earth, belongs to the country that occupies it … Israel. Now there’s a loaded term. The reason why Israel ‘occupies’ it rather than ‘inhabits’ it is that, unlike any other conquering power, it chose not to drive out all those who were living there. And when the Old City of Jerusalem was liberated they chose to leave the mosques on the Temple mount intact, in contrast to the Jordanians who destroyed virtually every synagogue in Jerusalem when they were the occupying power.
These days we tend to peer at the World through a cloud of prejudice, political correctness and agenda, rather than insisting on a clear line of sight to the heart of the issue. It is fact we need to consider and not opinion. The fact is that the British Government, masters of diplomacy, choose the latter rather than the former, because that is the way the World runs. It would take a brave administration to buck this trend, but one never knows.
1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Exodus
2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Paper_of_1939
3 https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-leads-the-way-in-tackling-…
4 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/oct/14/israel-condemns-british-mp…
5 http://www.cufi.org.uk/news/uk-votes-againstisrael-at-un/
(This is an extract from Steve’s new book, Zionion, available at www.sppublishing.com)