In the further article in the same issue the Government adoption of the Zionist policy was further commented upon:—
“With singular timeliness, for it coincides with the victories of Gaza and Tekrit, Mr. Balfour has written a letter to Lord Rothschild announcing the adhesion of the British Government to Zionism. With the reservation of the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, and without prejudice to the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country, Palestine, when it has been conquered, is to become a national home for the Jewish people. With numerically small exceptions this decision—on which we comment more fully elsewhere—will be accepted with joy by all the Jews of the Dispersion throughout the world. It will have an immediate political effect in America and in Russia, no less than in Poland and Hungary. It will tell to the advantage of the Allies even in Bagdad. In the Levant generally it should unite the Jews with the Arabs, Greeks, and Italians in revolt against the Turks. But its great ultimate influence, as all will pray, will be to affect for the better in many subtle ways the relations of Christian and Jew throughout the world. If that should happen one of the most insidious diseases from which civilization has suffered will have been cured.”
According to The Aberdeen Free Press:—
“This is the first time that any Government has definitely put itself in touch with Zionist ideals, and the new departure is as important as it is timely.”
“... In many ways the moment appears to be a peculiarly favourable one for preparing to launch the scheme for providing ‘a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine’ in the sphere of the practical. The Zionist idea has passed through many changes, and may pass through many more.... Never until now have time and place and opportunity been in accord with the dream of returning and building up Zion. Mr. Balfour’s letter, read in the light of General Allenby’s march upon Hebron, may well sound like the long-postponed answer to the prayer of the exiled and persecuted race, ‘Next year, O Lord, in Jerusalem!’” (Scotsman.)
The Dundee Advertiser also put itself in line with its contemporaries which commented on the Government’s pronouncement:—
“Palestine will, therefore, be a suitable field for immigration, and by tradition and inclination the Jews are the people to occupy it. Already before the war a number of colony settlements had been established, chiefly by Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe, and without exception these settlements were thriving. One and all they were agricultural, and contradicted the prevailing belief that the Jew is bound to become a trader or an artisan, and will never undertake the tillage of the soil. The Jewish colonies were models of up-to-date agricultural enterprise, in which the best scientific knowledge of irrigation and dry-farming was applied. A very pleasing prospect is therefore opening up.... In the fulness of time a new page in the history of the Holy Land is being opened by Allenby’s army.”
The Irish Times expressed its views in the following passage:—
“These fortunate circumstances invest with especial significance the important declaration of British policy in Palestine which we printed yesterday.... In this endorsement of Zionist aspirations at a moment when Jerusalem can hear the distant thunder of British guns the Government has declared a policy of great and far-reaching importance. It is at last an attainable policy, and it is from every point of view a desirable policy. From the British point of view the defence of the Suez Canal can best be secured by the establishment in Palestine of a people attached to us, and the restoration of the Jews under British auspices can alone secure it in this way. From the European point of view it would be a great gain that the Jews should become, in the words of The Jewish Chronicle, ‘a nation, and not a hyphenation.’”
A leading article in The Western Daily Press ran in part as follows:—