Who sowed the seeds of Palestinian tragedy
To right a historic wrong, Britain must apologise to the Palestinian people for helping create Israel, and end all its defence deals with the rogue state
By Nizamuddin Siddiqui
THE WORLDVIEW
October 5, 2025
ALL of us are sick and tired of the atrocities that have become routine in the Occupied Gaza Strip — bombed hospitals, displaced families, and streets strewn with rubble where children once played. What the world witnesses today in Gaza is not an isolated tragedy; it is the continuation of a century-old injustice that refuses to heal.
The worsening situation has prompted an overwhelming global response: out of the 193 United Nations member states, a staggering 157 have publicly called for the establishment of an independent Palestinian state. That number alone defies claims that this is merely a ‘Muslim issue’.
Some fifty countries across the globe are recognised as Muslim-majority states. The remainder — Christian, secular, or otherwise — are united by conscience, not creed. Their shared stance reveals a moral awakening: the recognition that the Palestinians have endured one of the most prolonged and grievous episodes of statelessness in modern history.
Yet few pause to ask a disquieting question: who bears the greatest responsibility for this calamity? It is convenient to lay all blame at Israel’s door, or that of the United States. But behind the walls of partition and decades of occupation stands another architect: the United Kingdom.
Once the superpower that carved up empires and drew borders with a ruler’s edge, Britain played a decisive hand in transforming Palestine from a multi-faith homeland to contested ground.
How Britain gave birth to Israel
History’s trail begins in 1917, amid the turmoil of the First World War. That November, the British government issued the now-infamous Balfour Declaration, pledging support for the creation of a “national home for the Jewish people” in Palestine. At the time, some 700,000 Arab Muslims and Christians already lived there — cultivating its soil, trading in its markets, and calling it their ancestral home.
A month later, British troops defeated the Ottoman Empire’s forces and occupied Palestine. From then until 1948, a full three decades, the land remained under British rule. In that period, Britain not only administered Palestine but actively facilitated Jewish immigration from across Europe and beyond. What began as a trickle became a steady flow, encouraged by official policy, administrative leniency, and the machinery of empire.
The figures speak with chilling clarity. At the time of the 1922 census, Jews made up only 11 per cent of Palestine’s population. By 1945, the figure had climbed to 31 per cent — an extraordinary demographic transformation under a single colonial mandate. The British rationalised this as fulfilling a humanitarian promise to a persecuted people. But to the Palestinians, it was dispossession by decree.
Then came the final blow. Britain sought the intervention of the newly created United Nations to ease tensions between the Arabs and Jews living in Palestine. In other words, the Western countries, led particularly by the UK, asked the UN to help solve what was then being termed the “Palestinian problem”.
Under the umbrella of the UN, the Western nations then played a cynical game, carving up Palestine in such a manner that the Jews received the major share of the land in question. The UN committee tasked with formulating the partition plan did exactly what was expected of it.
To the horror of peace-loving and fair-minded peoples of the world, the UN committee allotted 55 per cent of the land to the Jews (although they comprised only 31 per cent of the population). The Arabs, who accounted for approximately 69 per cent of the population, were granted only 45 per cent. As anticipated, the Arabs rejected the UN’s partition plan.
As if that were not enough, when Britain’s mandate ended in May 1948 and the last Union Jack was lowered, on that very day, Israel proclaimed its independence. The timing was symbolic, almost theatrical: Britain’s exit dovetailed precisely with Israel’s birth.
Weapons, infrastructure, and institutions were already in place; the foundation had been laid meticulously by the departing power. And though Britain formally withdrew, its involvement did not end there.
To this day, it maintains numerous agreements with Israel — ranging from defence cooperation to trade and technology partnerships — quietly nourishing a relationship rooted in its own imperial creation.
Meanwhile, generations of Palestinians have lived without statehood, their lives suspended between refugee camps and hostile borders. Yet, when British leaders now stand at global forums and grandly advocate for a ‘two-state solution’, they do so with a striking absence of memory. Their rhetoric of fairness sounds hollow when juxtaposed with their century-long complicity.
If Britain truly wishes to reclaim moral authority in world affairs, it must confront its own record with honesty and humility. Words of sympathy are no longer sufficient. The British government should:
Apologise publicly to the Palestinian people for its decisive role in creating a Jewish homeland at their expense.
Scrap all military and defence agreements with Israel that enable ongoing occupation and aggression.
Match the financial and development aid given to Israel with equal support for a future Palestinian state.
Pledge even-handed diplomacy — no favouring one side if conflict erupts again between Israel and Palestine.
Only through such measures can Britain begin to erase its colonial stain and win back the trust of a world that now sees through the veneer of its moral posturing. The ghosts of the Balfour Declaration still hover over Gaza’s ruins. Until they are exorcised by truth and contrition, peace in the Holy Land will remain a fragile illusion — written not in treaties, but in tragedy.