16 THE QUESTION OK PALESTINE wishes o f the native majority resident in that territory, and (d) it took the form o f a promise about this same territory to another foreign group, so that this foreign group might, quite literally, make this territory a national home for the Jewish people. There is not much use today in lam entingsuch a statement as the Balfour D eclaration. It seems more valuable to see it as part o f a history, o f a style and set o f characteristics centrally constituting the question o f Palestine as it can be discussed even today. B alfour’s statements in the declaration take for granted the higher right o f a colonial power to dispose o f a territory as it saw fit. A s Balfour himself averred, this was especially true when dealing with such a significant territory as Palestine and with such a momentous idea as the Zionist idea, which saw itself as doing no less than reclaiming a territory promised originally by G od to the Jewish people, at the same time as it foresaw an end to the Jewish problem. Balfour himself was quite clear about these matters. N ote in the follow ing extract from a memorandum he wrote in August 1919, how as a member o f the Cabinet he was well aware o f the various contradictory promises made to parties in the Middle East theater, and how what finally counted was not any violation o f promises, but his (that is, his as a privileged m ember o f a superior political, cultural, and even racial caste) sense o f the important priorities: The contradiction between the letter of the Covenant [the Anglo-Frcnch Declaration of [918 promising the Arabs of former Ottoman colonies that as a reward for supporting the Allies they could have their independence] is even more flagrant in the case of the independent nation of Palestine than in that of the independent nation of Syria. For in Palestine we do not propose even to go through the form o f consulting the wishes o f the present inhabitants of the country, though the American Commission has been going through the forms of asking what they are. The four great powers are committed to Zionism and Zionism, be it right or wrong, good or bad, is rooted in age-long tradition, in present needs, in future hopes, o f far profounder import than the desire and prejudices of the