The Maccabaean

WHAT a revived Hebrew nation in Palestine may mean to humanity in the future may conveniently be considered under two heads first, the direct influence on the world's history of the development of Hebrew national life in Palestine itself; secondly, the indirect influence which the Hebrew national centre will exert through the Jewish communities in other parts of the world. For, however rapidly and successfully the Jewish settlement in Palestine may grow under more favourable conditions than have prevailed hitherto, for many generations, at least, if not for all time, the numerical majority of the Jewish people will remain outside Palestine, and the Jewries of the Dispersion cannot be left out of account in any forecast of the part which the Jewish people may play in centuries to come. Such a forecast must naturally be speculative; but if certainty is unattainable in a matter of this kind, some developments may be regarded at least as probable. We are reprinti important article o

Jewish effort in the past generation has already reclaimed parts of Palestine which had been swamp or desert for centuries. With increasing Jewish immigration and improved facilities, this work of reclamation should proceed apace, until at last the potentialities of the country are realised to the full. What those potentialities are is still a matter of some doubt: in particular, it is doubtful whether Palestine has the natural resources that are necessary for the building up of industries on a large scale. But there is no doubt whatever that the agricultural productivity of the country can be vastly increased; and it is equally certain that with proper harbours and railways it can become as of old a great highway of communication between the Mediterranean and the East. Palestine has, then, an economic future; and in making the most of its economic possibilities the Jews will not merely lay a secure foundation for their own national life, but will enrich the world by the addition of one more to the number of productive territories.

This economic development will be fruitful of benefit to the Arab inhabitants of Palestine and the neighbouring lands. The Palestinian Arabs have already gained considerably as a result of Jewish colonisation work, with its modern intensive methods of agriculture, its scientific appliances, its western ideas of hygiene and business methods. There is every reason to hope that future Jewish development in Palestine will react favourably on the economic condition and the culture not only of the

We are reprinting here part of the important article on "Palestine and Jewish Nationalism" which appeared in the March number of the "Round Table." English authorities regard this as one of the best statements on the Zionist cause from the point of view of Jewish needs and Jewish developments. The "Round Table" is a quarterly review of British Imperial Politics which, under the directorship of Viscount Bryce, exerts a profound influence on the most intelligent groups of English society. The article was contributed by a distinguished Jew, well known for his philosophical background, who has attained note as a disciple of Ahad Ha-Am.

Arabs in Palestine, but of the Arab kingdom of the Hedjaz. The Arabs are apt to be regarded as a backward race, constitutionally incapable of joining in the onward march of modern civilisation. It is difficult to believe that charge of a nation with such an illustrious record of civilising work in the past. But for centuries the Arab has not had a chance. The rule of the Turk, though sympathetic to him from the religious point of view, is politically oppressive, and makes for stagnation rather than for progress. With the European he has too little kinship of ideas and temperament to be capable of learning from him what the West ought to teach the East. But there is a very real kinship between Jew and Arab—a kinship not merely of blood, not merely of language, not merely of religion (for Islam owes more to Judaism than even Christianity), but of joint work in the diffusion of knowledge. It was the Arab and the Jew who brought scholarship and medicine into Europe at the beginning of the Middle Ages. Jewish philosophers and scientists got their knowledge of Greek thought from the Arabs, and brought that knowledge with them into Europe. The Jews thus owe the Arabs a debt which they should be eager and able to repay when their genius has free scope in a national life of their own and the Arabs are their closest neighbours. Coming to the Arabs not as strangers from an entirely different world, but as kinsman who have gained a rich experience during ages of separation, they will help the Arabs by their influence and example to adapt themselves to modern conditions, and, side by side, the two races will realise their national possibilities.

In its co-operation with the Arabs the Hebrew nation of the future will be fulfilling a part, but only a part, of the function which should properly fall to it of acting as mediator between East and West. For Palestine will not merely become a highway of commerce in the material sense: it will be a meeting-place of ideas and civilisations. Politically it may have to be a kind of buffer-State; spiritually it will be the converse. Instead of serving as a barrier, which is the function of the buffer-State, it will hold open the door between East and West, and will help each to a better understanding of the other. Nor will it simply act as a transmitter of ideas: it will make its own positive contribution to the problem of harmonising the divergent conceptions of East and West. For centuries the Jews have been intermediaries in the sphere of ideas as in that of