The Balfour Declaration was actually a 67-word statement contained within a brief letter attributed to Lord Arthur Balfour, the British foreign secretary, dated Nov. 2, 1917. The declaration recognized the establishment of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. It statement read as follows:
His Majesty's Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.Balfour addressed the letter to Lionel Walter Rothschild, 2nd Baron Rothschild, a British banker, zoologist and Zionist activist who, along with Zionists Chaim Weizmann and Nahum Sokolow, helped draft the declaration much as lobbyists today draft bills for legislators to submit. As such, the declaration was in line with European Zionist leaders' hopes and designs for a homeland in Palestine, Rothschild and others believed would be realized through intense immigration of Jews around the world to Palestine.
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