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The McMahon-Hussein Correspondence and the Question of Palestine

The controversy over this question is half a century old. Today it has no more than an academic interest, but in the past the keenest brains in Middle East politics were pitted against each other to prove their respective cases, only to demonstrate the gulf that separated them. Despite statements made by the high-ranking British officers directly involved in negotiations with the Arab leaders, passions did not subside. To those who could see only duplicity in the conduct of the British government of the time, the slogan of the 'twice promised land' became almost an article of faith. It infected some well-meaning and sincere, albeit misguided, British intellectuals. Publication of the relevant records could have dispelled much of the misunderstanding but, though this was urged in both Houses of Parliament since I921, successive British governments objected on the ground that publication would be 'detrimental to the public interest'.1 The refusal to allow publication was due not to the weakness of the British government's case, as its critics suspected, but to considerations entirely unconnected with Palestine. The chief reason for official secrecy, as we are now able to learn, was that the correspondence contained encouragement to the Sherif of Mecca (given both by Lord Kitchener and his successor as High Commissioner in Egypt, Sir Henry McMahon) to rebel against the Sultan-Caliph in Constantinople and seek the Caliphate for himself with British assistance. Publication of this fact, it was feared, would have precipitated a storm of indignation in the Moslem world, particularly in India, with most embarrassing consequences.