There was already sympathy for the aims of Zionism in the British government, including the Prime Minister Lloyd George.God, Guns and Israel, Jill Hamilton, UK 2004, Especially chapter 14. Over 14,000 Jews were expelled by the Ottoman military commander from the Jaffa area in 1914–1915, due to suspicions they were subjects of Russia, an enemy, or Zionists wishing to detach Palestine from the Ottoman Empire,Jonathan Marc Gribetz, Defining Neighbors: Religion, Race, and the Early Zionist-Arab Encounter, Princeton University Press, 2014 p.131. and when the entire population, including Muslims, of both Jaffa and Tel Aviv was subject to an expulsion order in April 1917, the affected Jews could not return until the British conquest ended in 1918, which drove the Turks out of Southern Syria.God, Guns and Israel, Jill Hamilton, UK 2004, Especially chapter 15 A year prior, in 1917, the British foreign minister, Arthur Balfour, sent a public letter to the British Lord Rothschild, a leading member of his party and leader of the Jewish community. The letter subsequently became known as the Balfour Declaration. It stated that the British Government "view[ed] with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people". The declaration provided the British government with a pretext for claiming and governing the country.A Line in the Sand: Britain, France and the Struggle That Shaped the Middle East by James Barr, Simon & Schuster 2011, pages 375–376. New Middle Eastern boundaries were decided by an agreement between British and French bureaucrats.
There was already sympathy for the aims of Zionism in the British government, including the Prime Minister Lloyd George.God, Guns and Israel, Jill Hamilton, UK 2004, Especially chapter 14. Over 14,000 Jews were expelled by the Ottoman military commander from the Jaffa area in 1914–1915, due to suspicions they were subjects of Russia, an enemy, or Zionists wishing to detach Palestine from the Ottoman Empire,Jonathan Marc Gribetz, Defining Neighbors: Religion, Race, and the Early Zionist-Arab Encounter, Princeton University Press, 2014 p131. and when the entire population, including Muslims, of both Jaffa and Tel Aviv was subject to an expulsion order in April 1917, the affected Jews could not return until the British conquest ended in 1918, which drove the Turks out of Southern Syria.God, Guns and Israel, Jill Hamilton, UK 2004, Especially chapter 15 A year prior, in 1917, the British foreign minister, Arthur Balfour, sent a public letter to the British Lord Rothschild, a leading member of his party and leader of the Jewish community. The letter subsequently became known as the Balfour Declaration. It stated that the British Government "view[ed] with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people" The declaration provided the British government with a pretext for claiming and governing the country.A Line in the Sand: Britain, France and the Struggle That Shaped the Middle East by James Barr, Simon & Schuster 2011, pages 375–376. New Middle Eastern boundaries were decided by an agreement between British and French bureaucrats.