George Adam Smith, Atlas of the Historical Geography of the Holy Land 1917

George Adam Smith, Atlas of the Historical Geography of  the Holy Land

David Lloyd George was the British  Prime Minister from  December 7, 1916-October 22.

It was during Lloyd George's time in office that the British conquered Palestine, the Balfour Declaration was adopted, and the Peace conferences that concluded with the Mandate for Palestine being accepted by the British all took place.

Lloyd George had often cited the works of a Scottish Biblical scholar named George Adam Smith as the authority on the ancient Holy Land. It was Smith's maps that were to be used in determining the borders of Jewish Palestine. The two maps below are maps that detail Jewish rule during the times of the Jewish Monarchs and the Second Temple Period.

For more information about George Adam Smith and his maps being used to determine the borders of the Jewish National Home, see the article below the maps.

Smith's maps are available as a PDF online

From The Legal Foundation  and Borders of Israel under International Law, by Howard Grief, (Mazo Publishers, 2008) pp.31-33

The San Remo Conference

On the question of boundaries, (French diplomat) Philippe Berthelot outlined the French position for the northern, eastern and southern frontiers of Syria. As regards Palestine, he said her frontiers would conform to the definition advocated by (British Prime Minister) Lloyd George, who favoured the ancient boundaries of Dan and Beersheba, as previously discussed at the first London Conference of February 1920. This Biblical formula was based on the historical connection of the Jewish People with the entire Land of Israel and was not to be construed literally from Dan to Beersheba, but rather referred in effect to those areas of the Promise Land that had been conquered, settled and ruled by the Twelve Tribes of Israel and their descendants, in both the First and Second Temple periods.1.

…In his remarks, Lloyd George recalled that former French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau, when he was in London on December 1, 1918, had agreed to his suggestion that the limits of Palestine should be fixed by the ancient towns of Dan and Beersheba…Lloyd George relied on a book written by the Scottish Biblical scholar Rev. George Adam Smith, which he regarded as the ablest book on Palestine ever written..2.

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1. The minutes of the San Remo Peace Conference drawn up at the session held on April 25, 1920 make it clear that this is what Lloyd George actually meant when he defined Palestine according to the biblical formula "Dan to Beersheba,  as appears from his documented reliance on George Adam Smith’s scholarly works to determine the exact territorial extent of ancient Israelite habitation and rule. He included in Palestine all the land historically settled or occupied by Jews in the First and Second Temple Periods. This is confirmed by the third recital in the Preamble of the Mandate, which refers to the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and is further evidenced by Colonel Richard  Meinertzhagen who recalled, in his book, the statement made by Lloyd George in Paris in 1919 regarding the true meaning  of "Palestine": "The area occupied by the twelve tribes of Israel, from Dan to Beersheba.  Middle east Diary, Thomas Yoseloff, Publisher, New York, p.355

2. George Adam Smith was an ordained Scottish minister and scholar of the Bible, as well as the principal of the University of Aberdeen  (1909-35). He wrote a book about the topography, economics and history of Jerusalem from the earliest times to 70 A.D. (CE) and several commentaries on books of the Bible.  His main works which the British consulted for determining Palestine’s borders and which won high praise from Lloyd George were  The Historical Geography of the Holy Land which appeared in 25 editions beginning in 1894, followed by the publication of the Atlas of the Historical Geography of the Holy Land in 1915. These books were the outcome of detailed observation and investigation made in Palestine.  They also proved invaluable to General Edwin Allenby in the Palestine campaign in World War I …

The Balfour Declaration
(November 2, 1917)
The Balfour Declaration was a British statement of foreign policy. It originally had no legal force, and the British had merely committed to "use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object (i.e.: the reconstitution of the Jewish Commonwealth in Palestine)."

At the San Remo Peace Conference, April 25, 1920, the British accepted the role as Mandatory, the administrators, of the Mandate for Palestine. The San Remo Declaration transformed the Balfour declaration from  a British commitment to use their "best endeavours" to a legal obligation to "put into effect" the creation of a Jewish country called Palestine.

Foreign Office
November 2nd, 1917

Dear Lord Rothschild,

I have much pleasure in conveying to you, on behalf of His Majesty's Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet.

"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."

I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.

Yours sincerely,
Arthur James Balfour

The Balfour Declaration, Nov. 2, 1917 is often called the Magna Carta of the Jewish National Home. It must be made clear, that though the Balfour Declaration listed rights that the British Government recognized in Palestine for Jews and non-Jewish residents, the declaration, in itself, is not a legally binding document. However, the Balfour Declaration was adopted into the Mandate for Palestine. At that point, the declaration was transformed from a policy of the British using "their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement...the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people" to becoming a legal obligation.

The San Remo Resolution (April 25, 1920) and the Mandate for Palestine (July 24, 1922), transformed the Balfour Declaration into Law.

On December 3, 1924, the United States and Great Britain signed a treaty that incorporated the text of the Mandate for Palestine. The 1924 Anglo-American Treaty not only protected the rights of Americans living in Palestine under the Mandate, but it also made the rights and provisions part of United States treaty law. Furthermore, those rights are protected under constitutional law, as the Constitution calls a treaty the "Supreme Law of the Land." The treaty also obligated the British to consult with the United States before making any policy changes to the Mandate. It should be noted that the Mandate was authorized by the Supreme Council of the Principal Allied Powers and neither the British nor the Americans had any legal right to make any changes that alter the rights granted through the Mandate.

The U.S. Senate advised ratification of the treaty on February 20, 1925. It was then ratified by President Calvin Coolidge on March 2, 1925 and ratified by Great Britain on March 18, 1925. Ratifications were exchanged in London on December 3, 1925.

The treaty is also known as the Anglo-American convention, the American-British Palestine Mandate Convention, the Convention Between the United Kingdom and the United States of America Respecting the Rights of the Governments of the Two Countries and their Respective Nationals, and the Palestine Convention. [Howard Grief, The Legal Foundation and Borders of Israel under International Law (Jerusalem, Israel: Mazo Publishers, 2008), 195-199.]


Excerpts from Deliberations from Congress Supporting the Mandate for Palestine

CONGRESSIONAL RECORD, 1922 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

NATIONAL HOME FOR THE JEWISH PEOPLE

June 30, 1922 HOUSE RESOLUTION 360
(Rept. NO. 1172)


Representative Walter M. Chandler from New York - I want to make at this time, Mr. Speaker and gentlemen of the House, my attitude and views upon the Arab question in Palestine very clear and emphatic. I am in favor of carrying out one of the three following policies, to be preferred in the order in which they are named:

(1) That the Arabs shall be permitted to remain in Palestine under Jewish government and domination, and with their civil and religious rights guaranteed to them through the British mandate and under terms of the Balfour declaration.

(2) That if they will not consent to Jewish government and domination, they shall be required to sell their lands at a just valuation and retire into the Arab territory which has been assigned to them by the League of Nations in the general reconstruction of the countries of the east.

(3) That if they will not consent to Jewish government and domination, under conditions of right and justice, or to sell their lands at a just valuation and to retire into their own countries, they shall be driven from Palestine by force.

"Mr. Speaker, I wish to discuss briefly each of these alternatives in order. And first let me read the now celebrated Balfour declaration of date of November 2, 1917, during the progress of the Great War, and afterwards incorporated in the preamble of the British mandate authorized by the League of Nations.
"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."

"If this is not a condensed and at the same time a complete bill of rights both for the Arabs of Palestine and for the Jews who intend to remain in their present homelands outside of Palestine, I have never read or seen one. It is conceded by the Arabs themselves that the present government of the country under the British mandate and through the Zionist organization as an administrative agency is infinitely better than the government of the Turks who were chased out of the country by Allenby, the British general. It is probably better than any that the Arabs could create and maintain for themselves.

"I respectfully submit that the Arabs in Palestine should be and would be happy and content under the present government of that country if it were not for Turkish and Arab agitators, who travel around over the land stirring up trouble by making false representations concerning the true character of the Zionist movement, and by preaching a kind of holy war against the immigrant Jews who arrive from day to day.
The Arabs are well represented in the personnel of the present Palestine administration, which has recognized their language as one of the official languages of the country, and has given official standing to the Moslem religion.

"In the second place, if the Arabs do not wish to remain in Palestine under Jewish government and domination there is plenty of room outside in purely Arab surroundings. The British Government and her allies made overtures and gave pledges to the Arab people to furnish them lands and protect their freedom in consideration of Arab alliance with the Allies during the World War. That pledge has been kept. The Hedjaz kingdom was established in ancient Arabia, and Hussein, Grand Sheriff of Mecca, was made king and freed from all Turkish influence.

The son of King Hussein, Prince Feisal, is now the head of the kingdom of Mesopotamia [Iraq], and Arab predominance in that country has been assured by the Allies to the Arab people.

"Mesopotamia is alone capable of absorbing 30,000,000 people, according to a report submitted to the British Government by the Great English engineer, Sir William Wilcocks. Arab rights are also fully recognized and protected by the French mandate over Syria. There are also several flourishing Arabic cultural and political colonies in Egypt. In short, the Arab-speaking populations of Asia and Africa number about 38,000,000 souls and occupy approximately 2,375,000 square miles, many times larger than the territory of Great Britain.

In other words under the reconstruction of the map of the east, the Arabs have been given practical control of Greater Arabia, Mesopotamia, Syria, and parts of Egypt, which gives them an average of 38 acres per person. If the Arabs are compelled to leave Palestine and turn it over entirely to the Jews, it is admitted that the Arab race would still be one of the wealthiest landowning races on the earth. Therefore, I contend that if they will not consent to live peaceably with the Jews, they should be made to sell their lands and retire to places reserved for them somewhere in Arabia [Saudi], Syria, Mesopotamia, or Egypt, that suit them best, and where they can worship Allah, Mahomet [Muhammad], and the Koran to their heart's content.

After all is said, the fact remains that the Arabs have more lands than they need, and the Jews have none. I am in favor of a readjustment under the Balfour declaration, without too great regard to nice distinctions in the matter of the question of self-determination.

This thought brings me to my third proposal heretofore mentioned, that the Arabs should be driven out of Palestine by the British and Jews, or by somebody else, if they will not listen to the voice of reason and of justice.

"I shall probably be told that, regardless of the question of land and property rights, the Arabs have an interest in the holy places around Jerusalem. Admitting  that their claims in this regard are just, there should be no trouble along this line. There is no reason to believe that Jews and Christians would deny them access to the holy places in the pilgrimages that they might desire to make from their Arab countries.

But if the rights of the Jews to their ancient homeland are to be made dependent, as a final question, upon Muslim interests in the holy places around  Jerusalem, I am willing and prepared to repudiate these rights entirely and to shut the Arabs out altogether."