CHAPTER XXXIII.
Strange Methods of the E.E.F. Staff.
It will be remembered that Lieutenant Jabotinsky was responsible for the idea of forming a Jewish Legion to help England in her great struggle for world freedom.
The British Government was impressed with the possibilities he placed before it, and eventually he was summoned to the War Office by Lord Derby, then Secretary of State for War, and to the War Cabinet by General Smuts, to expound his proposals. These high officials did not disdain to meet and confer with Jabotinsky on the Jewish Legion question, although at that time he was merely a private soldier, serving in the 20th Battalion of the London Regiment. They knew that he held a very high place in the Zionist movement, and was looked up to by the Jewish masses the world over as one of its most brilliant young leaders.
This fact was also known to the Staff of the E.E.F., but when, as an officer, in August, 1919, Lieutenant Jabotinsky sought an interview with the Commander-in-Chief, hoping that he might induce the local authorities to change their anti-Jewish policy in Palestine, he was not only refused a hearing, but methods were immediately employed to strike him down which I can only describe as despicable and un-English.
Jabotinsky was, of course, pro-British to the core. During his service in Palestine he had been for a time specially attached to the Zionist Commission with the sanction of the Commander-in-Chief. While he was employed in this capacity he brought about the acceptance of a programme by the Jewish Colonists, expressly calling for a British Mandate for Palestine.
All through his military service with the Battalion he, to my personal knowledge, did his utmost to allay the feelings of resentment felt by the Jewish soldiers at the bad treatment they received at the hands of the military authorities, treatment utterly undeserved and uncalled for, but apparently deliberately adopted to further what appeared to be the local policy of making the practical application of the Balfour Declaration an impossibility.
Hostility to all things Jewish was so open, that only those who wilfully shut their eyes could fail to see the game that was being played by certain interested parties. Jabotinsky saw that the line of action adopted must inevitably lead to outbreaks against the Jews, and naturally wanted to ward off such a calamity.