Description

The 1945-1952 British Government’s Opposition to Zionism and the Emergent State of Israel tells the story of a longstanding campaign conducted by senior members of a British government against Zionism, a fledgling nationalist movement, immediately after World War II. The book argues that although the British Labour Party had once been firm supporters of Zionism and the creation of a Jewish homeland, once in office, and particularly under the influence of the anti-Zionist Foreign Office, their position changed. The two senior Cabinet ministers, Prime Minister Clement Atlee and Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin, had very little knowledge about or interest in Zionism at the time that they took office. And so various internal and external bodies were able to persuade them to adopt their own firmly held position when they had no position of their own. Despite the horrors of the Holocaust and displacement of large numbers of Jews, ultimately the British Government were not willing to risk alienating Middle East Arabs in support of a Jewish homeland. The book examines the motivations and roles of the two men and their fascinating relationship with the Zionist movement of the mid-twentieth century, culminating in the triumphant establishment of the state of Israel against all odds.