Balfour Declaration — public statement written by Arthur Balfour issued by the British government in 1917 in support of a "national home for the Jewish people" in Palestine then an Ottoman region
The first major power endorsement of Zionist aims in Palestine, it shaped the British Mandate and is a principal cause of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict.
Key Facts
- Date of letter
- 2 November 1917
- Author
- Arthur Balfour, British Foreign Secretary
- Recipient
- Lord Rothschild, leader of British Jewish community
- Published in press
- 9 November 1917
- Territory concerned
- Palestine, then under Ottoman rule
- Incorporated into
- British Mandate for Palestine (founding document)
Location
Cause → Event → Consequence
After Britain declared war on the Ottoman Empire in November 1914, it began deliberating over Palestine's future. Zionist advocates, including Herbert Samuel, lobbied the War Cabinet to align British policy with Zionist ambitions, arguing Jewish support would benefit the Allied war effort. By late 1917, Britain sought to influence Jewish opinion in neutral and revolutionary states, particularly the United States and Russia, both not fully engaged in the conflict.
On 2 November 1917, Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour sent a letter to Lord Rothschild declaring British government support for the establishment of a 'national home for the Jewish people' in Palestine, while stipulating that nothing should prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities there. The text was deliberately vague on boundaries and the question of statehood, reflecting compromises between Zionist advocates and internal opponents.
The declaration boosted Zionism globally and was embedded in the British Mandate for Palestine, the legal framework governing the territory after World War I. It indirectly contributed to the founding of the State of Israel in 1948. The British government later acknowledged in 1939 that Palestinian Arab interests should have been considered, and in 2017 recognised the declaration's failure to protect Palestinian political rights, underscoring its role in the ongoing Israeli–Palestinian conflict.
Work
Balfour Declaration
The declaration became the foundational political document of the Zionist movement's international legitimacy, shaped the British Mandate for Palestine, and set in motion events leading to the creation of Israel and the prolonged Israeli–Palestinian conflict.