ABSTRACT
After World War One, many right-wing British politicians, as well as the right-wing press, protested that the Declaration did not oblige the British to take on the mandate for Palestine. The level of the opposition's anti-Zionist rhetoric in Parliament prompted Leo Amery MP to refer to the existence of an 'anti-Semitic' party in the House of Commons. The role played in Palestine by Zionist-generated capital was demonstrated, when the government published a tender for a concession to exploit the minerals of the Dead Sea. The new policy marked a 'crossroads' in the history of the mandate. The recession made Britain even more dependent on the import of Jewish capital to finance its administration in Palestine, and the Treasury refused to invest the huge sums required to reform the Arab agricultural sector. On the morrow of the UN Partition Resolution the Palestinians made their first attacks against the Yishuv, thereby igniting the first Arab-Israeli war.
