I don’t accept Asa Winstanley’s reply to my review of his book. I shall be very brief in this response as I intend to write something else about the book in more detail at a later date.

Winstanley claims that, “Abd al-Wahid writes as if he made up his mind about my book before reading it and then refused to let the actual text alter his foregone conclusions.” I would like to assure Winstanley this wasn’t the case. I read the book chronologically from front to back and I noted that Winstanley didn’t first mention the “Balfour Declaration” until almost two thirds into the book on pg.196 – I found this peculiar. Thereafter the defining document which laid the foundations for the ethnic cleansing of Palestine is only mentioned a handful of times if that. Specifically, as he says, on pg.236 where he very briefly explains what the document is.  

The focus of Winstanley’s reply is mainly based around what he wrote between pages 49 and 53. In these pages Winstanley mentions Britain’s historical support for Zionism but within the context of Labour’s Party relationship with the Poale Zion group not within the context of the Balfour Declaration issued by the British government in 1917. So when he claims in these pages that Britain “began reneging on its pledge to hand Palestine over to the Zionist movement…” What exactly is the “pledge”? Keep in mind I’m reading the book in the aforementioned chronological order. Those of us who are au fait with some of the history should immediately recognise what this “pledge” is, but many more, probably the majority, simply do not. Continue reading →

Inevitably, British imperialism, their Zionist-colonial protégés and their followers are waging war not only against the Palestinian present but also against memory. The notion there was a Palestine that stretched from the ‘River to the Sea’ clearly pains them immensely to the point that they now want to consider it a form of “hate speech”.

This essay published on al-Mayadeen English refutes this historical ignorance.