New study shows WWI-era Jewish spy network played key role in advancing the Balfour Declaration

ed note–NOW REMEMBER, the notion that Jews operate with a hive mentality, are engaged in 5th column/state-within-a-state machinations in every country in which they reside is an ‘anti-Semitic canard’ that has no basis in reality, and not even when it is Jewish sources themselves saying it.

Israel National News

Aaron Aaronsohn and his friends at the NILI underground played a crucial role in the formation of the Balfour Declaration, former Mossad Chief Efraim Halevy claimed in a new study.

The Balfour Declaration is a diplomatic document signed in 1917, which paved the way for the establishment of the State of Israel.

The new study was published in the British-Jewish magazine Fathom, which is printed by the BICOM organization. The magazine’s current issue is dedicated to commemorating the 100 year anniversary of the Balfour Declaration.

Until today the Balfour Declaration was credited mainly to then-Jewish Federation of England President Dr. Haim Weizmann, who later became Israel’s first president. Aaronsohn’s Jewish underground was a controversial issue among the Jews at the time, and continued to remain so for decades after it ceased to exist.

Halevy quotes a number of references based on documents from the era, as well as statements from senior British officials of the period. These statements show that the Jewish underground’s assistance was crucial both in ensuring Jewish statehood and in aiding British efforts to conquer the Ottomans.

In an official publication by the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) and reviewing the intelligence activity of Britain in the years 1909-1949, the writer quotes documents from the First World War.

According to the documents, NILI spies collected “abundant military information through Palestine and South Syria” in an effort to recruit Britain to the cause of establishing a Jewish homeland in what was then known as “Palestine.”

Halevy further notes that in May 2017, a British Intelligence officer stationed in Paris wrote to the director of the Eastern Mediterranean Special Intelligence Bureau (EMSIB): “You certainly seem to be getting good stuff through Mack.”

“Mack” was the British intelligence’s code name for Aaron Aaronsohn.

Captain Sir George Mansfield Smith-Cumming (the legendary founder and first Director of the SIS from 1909-1923) provided additional testimony of Aaronsohn’s role when he noted that “they consider him (Aaronsohn) very valuable in Cairo.”

Twenty years later, Colonel Walter Gibbon, who was in charge of Near East intelligence in the War Office at the time, suggested that it was “largely owing to the information provided by the Aaronsohn network that General Allenby was able to conduct his campaign in Palestine so successfully.”

In light of this, Halevy notes that Cumming likely viewed the handling of NILI in a category that exceeded the bounds of an intelligence-gathering operation. It must have been at his behest, Halevy concludes, that Samuel Aaronsohn – Aaron’s brother – received a draft copy of the Balfour Declaration.

This draft was to be smuggled into Palestine to encourage NILI operatives on the ground to double their effort to gather more information.

Jeffrey rather cryptically tells us that “Cumming, too, liaised with the Zionist leader Haim Weizmann, meeting him several times in 1917 and 1918 to discuss Jewish affairs.”

Halevy also notes that the most prominent evidence of Aaronsohn and his men’s contribution is the fact he was one of only two Zionists (Weizmann was the other) invited to the British government session on October 31, 1917. According to Halevy, when the meeting hall’s door was opened, Sir Sykes announced “It is a boy” and the two were invited to shake hands and sit with British Prime Minister David Lloyd George, Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour and other ministers.

“The matter was first breached by Sir Mark Sykes in 1916 speaking to [the Chief Rabbi of the Spanish and Portuguese Jewish Community in Great Britain] Dr Gaster, and [Jewish Cabinet minister and later the first British High Commissioner for Palestine] Sir Herbert Samuel. Dr Weizmann was then unknown. Sykes was furthered [i.e. influenced] by General Macdunagh DMI (Director of Military Intelligence) as all the most useful and helpful intelligence from Palestine (then still occupied by Turkey) was got through and given with zeal by Zionist Jews who were from the first pro British,” noted Omsby Gore in 1922, when he was asked to prepare a document for incoming Secretary for the Colonies Winston Churchill.

‘As we approach the hundred year anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, we should also highlight those who helped bring it about,” Levy concluded, adding that NILI “proved how a handful of determined people can transcend their immediate condition, and through the power of their convictions, win over powerful international figures to support their cause.’