[News] Pro-Palestine protesters slash Lord Balfour’s painting at University of Cambridge

[Anti-Imperialist News]

middleeastmonitor.com
<https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20240308-pro-palestine-protesters-slash-lord-balfours-painting-at-university-of-cambridge/>
Pro-Palestine protesters slash Lord Balfour’s painting at University of
Cambridge
Middle East Monitor
March 8, 2024
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*VIDEO IS HERE
<https://www.instagram.com/p/C4QvqYPvsau/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=embed_video_watch_again>*

A pro-Palestinian activist slashed a painting of the early 20th-century
British Foreign Minister, Arthur Balfour, at Cambridge University on
Friday, saying his 1917 declaration was the reason the Palestinians had
lost their homeland to Israel, *Reuters *reports.

A video posted on social media by the Palestine Action protest group showed
a woman spraying red paint over the life-size portrait before cutting it
repeatedly with a knife – the latest in a flurry of protests prompted by
the Israel-Palestine war.

Balfour’s declaration, made as Ottoman rule was crumbling in the Middle
East and Britain a global power, said London would “view with favour the
establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people” and
work toward it – albeit, without prejudicing “the civil and religious
rights of existing non-Jewish communities”.

It was the first time a major power had publicly expressed support for a
Jewish homeland, gave a boost to the growing worldwide Zionist movement –
and shaped what was to become interim British “mandate” rule of Palestine
from 1918 onward.

*READ: Nakba Day is when Palestinians remember the catastrophe of their
land being stolen
<https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20220511-nakba-day-is-when-palestinians-remember-the-catastrophe-of-their-land-being-stolen/>*

Palestinians have long demanded that Britain apologise for the 67 word
document.

British oversight of Palestine ended traumatically in 1947-48 with war
between Jews and Arabs, the declaration of the State of Israel and the
exodus of some 750,000 Palestinians who were forced out or fled.

“Balfour’s declaration began the ethnic cleansing of Palestine by promising
the land away — which the British never had the right to do,” Palestine
Action said in a caption accompanying the clip.

Last week, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak called for tougher policing of
protests in light of an increase in hate speech.

His government has particularly alleged threatening behaviour by some of
those attending a wave of protests against the thousands of civilian deaths
and the humanitarian crisis caused by Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip.

Sunak said people had the right to protest, but could not use support for
Gaza’s Palestinians to justify backing Hamas, the armed movement that rules
Gaza, which Britain considers a terrorist group.

More than 30,000 have been killed by Israel’s military since 7 October,
when members of  the Palestinian Hamas group killed 1,200 people in
southern Israel and abducted 253, by Israeli counts.

However, since then, it has been revealed by *Haaretz *
<https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20231211-another-israel-witness-confirms-israeli-tanks-killed-own-citizens-on-7-october/>that
helicopters
and tanks of the Israeli army had, in fact, killed many of the 1,139
soldiers and civilians claimed by Israel to have been killed by the
Palestinian Resistance.

Cambridge’s Trinity College said it regretted the damage, and that support
was available for college members.

*READ: Explained: The Balfour Declaration
<https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20161102-explained-the-balfour-declaration/>*
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