Murderous Chaos was Predicted 100 Years Ago — It Remains So
Ted Schmidt, Toronto
Volume 40 Issue 7, 8, & 9 | Posted: October 22, 2025
It is fascinating to see the clear eyed vision many in the British House of Lords saw about Lord Balfour’s catastrophic Declaration of 1917. Today it is regarded by historians as the worst decision the British government made in the 20th century. This is Lord Sydenham in the House of Lords December 21, 1922.
I sympathize entirely with the wishes of the Jews to have a National Home, but I say that this National Home must not be given if it cannot be given without entailing gross injustice upon other people. Palestine is not the original home of the Jews. It was acquired by them after a ruthless conquest, and they never occupied the whole of it, which they now openly demand. They have no more valid claim to Palestine than the descendants of the ancient Romans have to this country.
The Romans occupied Britain as long, or nearly as long, as the Israelites occupied Palestine, and they left behind them in this country far more valuable and useful work. If we are going to admit claims based on conquest thousands of years ago, the whole world will have to be turned upside down. The only real claim to Palestine surely is that of its present inhabitants, some of whom descend from the pre-Jewish conquest population, and others from Israelites converted to Islam.
Five years later Balfour died, but his legacy lived on and it was Lord Curzon’s final remarks on that celebratory evening of December 2, 1917 that seemed both ambiguous and eerily prescient. Those sentiments were lustily cheered: “I don’t like to prophesy what ultimate results that great event may have, but for myself I believe it will have a far-reaching influence on the history of the world and consequences which none can foresee on the future history of the human race.”
Given the chaos and bloodshed which have eventuated, a genocide foretold as Chris Hedges wrote, the comments of Jonathan Schneer the author of one of the finer books on the Balfour Declaration, are less ambiguous: “The lead up to the Balfour Declaration sowed dragon’s teeth and produced a murderous harvest, and we go on harvesting today
The Iraqi-Israeli historian Avi Shlaim’s conclusion is an apt summary: “In Arabic there is a saying that something that starts crooked, remains crooked. The Balfour Declaration was not just crooked; it was a contradiction in terms. The national home it promised to the Jews was never clearly defined and there was no precedent for it in international law. On the other hand, it was arrogant, dismissive, and even racist, to refer to 90 per cent of the population as ‘the non-Jewish communities in Palestine.’ And it was the worst kind of imperial double standard, implying that there was one law for the Jews, and one law for everybody else.”
And here we are over 100 years later.
Ted Schmidt, Toronto