THE BALFOUR DECLARATION IN PALESTINIAN POETRY

Abstract

The First World War has catastrophic impact on the Palestinian people; as soon as the war ended, Palestine fell under the British occupation which has committed a crime promising to give Palestine to be a national homeland for the Jewish people. This promise has devastated the Palestinian people life aspects which reflected deeply on the Palestinian literature in general and poetry in particular.

Most of those who studied the Palestinian poetry in the first half of the 20th century have pointed to its echo of the declaration in some poet’s works but only 3 pages contained repeated poetic patterns including the comments made on it.

The writer has spent months searching the Palestinian poetry in the British mandate period which resulted in finding some poems to be studied using the historic, descriptive, and analytical approaches.

The writer has studied Belfour Declaration in some Palestinian poets at four levels: condemning the declaration, defaming Belfour and ridiculing him, portraying the declaration catastrophic effect s on the Palestinian people, instigating the Palestinian to resist it by performing Jihad to undermine it and to fail the British schemes to establish a Jewish homeland on Palestine.

The writer came to the following conclusion: that some poets have done their duty revealing the declaration to the people showing the means the British mandate uses to implement the declaration. In addition, the poets have portrayed the catastrophic effects on the Palestinian people. They emphasized the fact that only by resistance they can fail it to protect the Palestine. The writer recommends exploring it academically as no serious works are found on it.