Mr. Gilbert did not resign from the Conjoint Committee, of which he was not a member. He resigned his membership of the Board of Deputies in order that the prospective president, Sir Stuart Samuel, might be elected in his place.
The Chief Rabbi, Dr. J. H. Hertz, wrote to The Times, expressing the following opinion:—
“I do not propose to advance any arguments contesting the extraordinary statement on Zionism and Palestine which you published on Thursday last, signed by Mr. D. L. Alexander, K.C., and Mr. Claude G. Montefiore. But, as Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the British Empire, I cannot allow your readers to remain under the misconception that the said statement represents in the least the views held either by Anglo-Jewry as a whole or by the Jewries of the Oversea Dominions. Moreover, neither the Board of Deputies nor the Anglo-Jewish Association—on whose behalf their presidents signed the document in question—authorized its publication or had an opportunity of considering its contents.
“It is, indeed, grievously painful to me to write this in your influential columns. But I am impelled to do so in the interests of truth, and in justice to the communities of which I have the honour and privilege of being the spiritual head.”
Dr. M. Gaster, the Haham of the Spanish and Portuguese Jews’ congregations in England, declared:—
“A settlement of the Jewish problem will, no doubt, form part of the general settlement which is to secure to the world a permanent peace resting on ‘national liberty and international amity,’ as Lord Robert Cecil only yesterday declared in the House of Commons. The Jew also wants a permanent peace resting on the same foundations, and he can only find it by the realization of the Zionist programme, a national autonomous life in the Holy Land, publicly recognized and legally secured. It embraces, of course, the religious as well as political and economic life, indissolubly united in the Jewish national consciousness.”
Lord Rothschild replied to several of the objections to Zionism advanced by the two Presidents in a letter which stated:—
“In your issue of the 24th inst. appears a long letter signed on behalf of the Conjoint Committee by Messrs. Alexander and Montefiore and entitled ‘The Future of the Jews.’ As a sincere believer both in the justice and benefits likely to accrue from the Zionist cause and aspirations, I trust you will allow me to reply to this letter. I consider it most unfortunate that this controversy should be raised at the present time, and the members of the Zionist organization are the last people desirous of raising it. Our opponents, although a mere fraction of the Jewish opinion of the world, seek to interfere in the wishes and aspirations of by far the larger mass of the Jewish people. We Zionists cannot see how the establishment of an autonomous Jewish State under the ægis and protection of one of the Allied Powers can be considered for a moment to be in any way subversive to the position or loyalty of the very large part of the Jewish people who have identified themselves thoroughly with the citizenship of the countries in which they live. Our idea from the beginning has been to establish an autonomous centre, both spiritual and ethical, for all those members of the Jewish faith who felt drawn irresistibly to the ancient home of their faith and nationality in Palestine.
“In the letter you have published, the question also is raised of a chartered company. We Zionists have always felt that if Palestine is to be colonized by the Jews some machinery must be set up to receive the immigrants, settle them on the land, and to develop the land, and to be generally a directing agency. I can only again emphasize that we Zionists have no wish for privileges at the expense of other nationalities, but only desire to be allowed to work out our destinies side by side with other nationalities in an autonomous State under the suzerainty of one of the Allied Powers.”
Dr. Weizmann replied to two statements made by the anti-Zionists in a further letter which appeared in The Times:—