The Maccabaean

in private he has fought against a Jewish Palestine, and his has been the glorious privilege of invoking Islam and Indian nationalism against Judaism and the Jewish nation. He has had some other Jewish allies who have mostly worked secretly. Some day this little chapter of Jewish history will be written. It will not make exhilarating reading, but it will be exceedingly interesting.

If these various obstacles have been overcome, it has been due to the general sympathy among the Allies for the Jewish national claim. It needs no emphasizing that the British Government has pressed it. The Italian Government could always be counted upon. America has been in a somewhat different position from the other Powers inasmuch as she was not technically at war with Turkey, and has maintained in public a certain reserve, although in private Zionist leaders have always been able to reckon upon American support. But the skill of the Zionist leaders has also played its part in a situation that has not been always too easy.

Economics the Key to a Jewish Palestine

The economic demands put forward by the Zionist leaders have both a negative and a positive side. Negatively to prevent Palestine being exploited by the foreign concession hunter and financier. Positively, to secure for the Jewish people the power to develop the land and the power to develop industry in Palestine. To translate these general ideas into concrete proposals has given Zionist leaders an infinity of trouble. They have had to be just to a Jewish Palestine without being unjust to the non-Jewish elements in Palestine. I think I am safe in saying that they have succeeded in convincing the British delegation of the necessity

and the justice of the Jewish economic claims in Palestine. To win the approval of the British Government is to guarantee embodiment in the mandate for a Jewish Palestine. I need hardly say that to get the Jewish economic claims sanctified by the mandate will be an enormous gain. Itis by and through the economic instrumentalities that we shall be able to have a Jewish majority in Palestine constitute a vital and many colored Jewish society, and make in the fullest sense of the word a Jewish Palestine. The more one dwells upon the problem of a Jewish Palestine, the more one is convinced that the key to it is in economics. I trust that nobody will imagine that this is a materialistic view. For us Jews it is not the physical presence or the economic prosperity of a large body of Jews in Palestine which is significant. It is the creation of a Hebrew society in which the Jewish spirit can once again manifest itself in the full amplitude of liberty. But such a society must rest upon a material foundation, and to secure that material foundation we must have the economic rights for which the Zionist leaders have asked.

I have given some slight idea of the problems and the difficulties of our leaders. Much more will one day be told for which the present is not the suitable moment. But no candid mind can doubt that the task has been very heavy, and that the Zionist leaders have been equal to their responsibility. But do not imagine that in this great enterprise the Jewish masses have not counted. They have reacted from time to time on their leaders, and the will of the Jewish people has always been their most potent argument and instrument at Paris. The final victory will be a victory of the Jewish democracy. That is as it should be and must be.

I said: "How fearful is the sunWith brilliance that I cannot face!Therefore I know that God is great."But in my heart there burned a lightMore dazzling than the sun.

I said: "How many are the starsWith flickering flames that crowd the skies!Therefore I know that God is great."But in my heart there twinkled lightsMore numerous that the stars.