Balfour Declaration

Lord Warner Excerpts

Monday 3rd April 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Tonge]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to commemorate the centenary of the Balfour Declaration.

[Lord Warner (CB)]

My Lords, on behalf of the noble Baroness, Lady Tonge, and at her request, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in her name on the Order Paper.

[The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Anelay of St Johns) (Con)]

My Lords, we will mark the centenary of Balfour with pride. The Prime Minister has extended a guest of Government invitation to Prime Minister Netanyahu to visit the UK on the centenary. We are proud of our role in the creation of Israel. However, we recognise that the declaration should have called for the protection of political rights of non-Jewish communities in Palestine, particularly their right to self-determination. This is why we support a two-state solution.

[Lord Warner]

First, I am sure that the whole House wishes the noble Baroness, Lady Tonge, a speedy recovery, and recognises the huge contribution she has made on Palestinian matters. I thank the Minister for her reply. She recognises, I think, that there was a conditionality on granting in the terms of the Balfour Declaration the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people. That conditionality was very clear, as the declaration states,

“it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine”.

Does the Minister agree that successive British Governments, both under the British mandate and subsequently, have failed to deliver that declaration protection to the Palestinian people? Furthermore, should we not mark the centenary with a gracious apology from the British Government and Parliament for the suffering that that failure has caused and try to make amends—

[Noble Lords]

Too long.

[Lord Warner]

We have waited a long time, my Lords—with a clear commitment to recognition of a viable independent Palestinian state?