Trudy Gold
Lloyd George and the Jews

Trudy Gold - Lloyd George and the Jews

- We’re back to England now, as you realised with William, and now I’m going to be looking at Lloyd George and the Jews. Lloyd George was an absolutely extraordinary character, because unlike the majority of the politicians of his day, he didn’t come from the Eton and Oxford background. Because if you actually look at the profile of the Tories and the Liberal Party, and you should know that the majority of Jews who became MPs this period, his dates are 1863 to 1945, by the way. And so the point is they were in the Liberal Party, but nevertheless, MPs were not paid until 1911, which made it very restrictive. And this is when the two great parties are the Tory Party and the Liberal Party. And what I’m going to look at today, obviously I can’t look at the career of such a huge individual in one session, I’m going to look specifically at his relationship towards the Jews because he is Prime Minister from 1916 to 1922, and that is very, very important, because it’s the period of the Balfour Declaration and the League of Nations’ granting of the mandates to Britain and writing into the terms of the mandate, the Balfour Declaration. So he’s a very important figure, and his attitudes are important. So let’s have a look at the man and where he was born and the world he came from. If we could see the first slide of him, there you see him. So he’s born in Manchester to Welsh parents. His father was a teacher both in London and in Liverpool. He also taught at a unitarian school. Now, it’s very important to remember the factors that are going to motivate Lloyd George. He is a Welshman.

He’s incredibly proud of his Welsh origins. In fact, the Welsh politician, Roy Jenkins said of him, Lloyd George was Welsh. His whole culture, his whole outlook, his language was Welsh. And he’s also a unitarian. He’s low church. And that branch of the church that was evangelical and had a very, very close relationship with the Hebrew Bible and the story of the Jews, he later said he knew the hills and valleys of Canaan, the names, before he knew the hills and valleys of Wales. Now, can we go on to the next slide, please? These are his heroes, the people we revere. Does it tell us a lot about our own lives and about our own personalities? Oliver Cromwell, of course, the, again, the religious man who destroyed the power of a king, Napoleon Bonaparte, the great conqueror, Abraham Lincoln, perhaps I’m going to stick my neck out here, and I know there’s a lot of Americans on the line, but perhaps the greatest of all American presidents, certainly up in the top three, so these are Lloyd George’s heroes. These are the people that he really, really respected. So whilst his father is teaching in this unitarian school, he met a man called James Martineau. Can we see James Martineau? James Martineau was a religious philosopher. By the way, he is an ancestor of the current Princess of Wales, Catherine Middleton. And he had a profound influence both on the father and on the son. He was very much low church, he believed in evangelical Christianity, and he’s going to have a huge mark on the young life of Lloyd George.

To what extent do the mentors we have on the way influence the way we think? I find it very, very important. I’ve spent a lot of time studying biography, and what interests me is what were the influences that shaped young people up until a certain age. Now, the father’s ill health compelled the family to return to Wales. He took up farming, but he died of pneumonia, the father, when Lloyd George was a very young boy. William’s widower, Elizabeth, sold the farm and moved with her four children to Caernarfonshire where she lived in a cottage with her brother, Richard Lloyd. Can we see Richard Lloyd, please? The next slide. Richard Lloyd, another incredibly important influence on the young Lloyd George. In fact, his double-barreled name is in honour of his uncle, because his father dies young. And Lloyd George, Lloyd is going to have an incredible influence on him as well. He was a shoemaker. Remember the family, although they’re not poverty stricken, although he did later claim that he was, his biographers have discounted this, but he was lower middle class. But he comes from an educated family, and he thinks that’s very important. And also a very, very religious family. His uncle was first with the Scottish Baptist and then the Church of Christ. Can we see the next slide, please? Those of you who come from America will know that it’s a movement that have begun in the states to reform the church. They sought the unification of all Christians in a single body, very much patterned after the teachings of the New Testament. When I say they’re low church, they want to break away from all the pomp or the ceremony. What they want is pious life, very much the life that Jesus would’ve lived, very much looking after the poor.

And the other thing about his uncle, not only is he determining his religious beliefs, he was also a very strong liberal. Because if you think of the world that we’re now in, the turn of the century, what was England like? We’ve had the great reform act, we’ve had the Chartists, England is the most important power in the world, but it is being run by an elite from basically Eton and Oxford and the aristocracy. And it’s the Liberal Party at this stage still under Gladstone. But it’s the Liberal Party that if there’s any hope of reform, it’s going to come from the Liberal Party. And he isn’t going to die until 1917, the uncle. And he’s going to have a profound influence on Lloyd George. It’s him who’s going to encourage him to enter politics. And the greatest honour Lloyd George could give him, he called his name Lloyd George. And he goes on with his education, with his mentor. He’s edited, he’s actually educated at the local school and later by tutors. Welsh was his first language. So he, now it’s interesting, because he remained at Chapel Hill all his life. He loved good preaching, but all the biographies argue that the evidence is that he did break away from strong religiosity. Did he become a deist? Did he become even an agnostic? Nevertheless, he fought passionately for Welsh non-conformity. He didn’t conform to the governance of the usage of a state church. He didn’t believe in a state church. He believed that people should have their right to determine how they believed.

Now, this very well-educated young man, oh, and I should also say he also broke away from the teachings of the church. One of the things we’re going to find out about him, he was a great womaniser. He had quite a career with women, but that’s another story not for today. Anyway, he’s well-educated. He qualifies as a solicitor. In those days, you could take articles, you didn’t have to go to university. And he establishes a practise in his uncle’s back parlour. And his aim is to help the people. The family were liberal, remember? And all his political activity is going to be towards the Liberal Party. And until the early 20th century, there’d been an alliance between free trade and the parliamentary reformers, and they’d had four governments under William Gladstone. Of course, Gladstone, who lived such a long life and was the major, taking you back into the 19th century, was the major protagonist of perhaps my favourite character, Benjamin Israeli. Now, he goes into local politics. He’s a man with a mission. And also, that was always the way to power. He became an alderman on Caernarfon County Council. He later became a justice of the peace and deputy lieutenant of the county. So he’s going through local politics. He’s very much in favour of rights of people. And his legal practise is, he doesn’t earn much money from it, but he’s taking the cases of the poor.

He married well. Can we see his wife, please? He married a woman called Margaret Owen. She was an interesting type. She was the daughter of a Welsh farmer who was a Methodist, you see, very much low church. But he was quite well off, her father. She was educated at a girls’ school, and in 1919 was one of the first of seven women to be appointed magistrates in the United Kingdom. So she’s very much part of the movement that is going to give rights to women. The couple went on to have five children. And in fact, her daughter Megan by Lloyd George was the first woman MP for a Welsh constituency. So he married a woman who very much shared his political views. She very, later on when he had this glittering career, she seldom came to London. And when she died in 1941, he married the woman who had been his secretary for 30 years. But it was a workable marriage. Anyway, in the 1890 elections, he becomes the MP for Caernarfon in Wales on the Liberal ticket. And he’s going to represent the constituency for 55 years. Can we have a look at the British Parliament in 1890? There you see a picture, that very famous picture, and of course all the horse-drawn carriages. There’s a lovely little story for you. In the 1890s, a traffic report was commissioned. People wanted to know what would be the worst traffic problem for England in the 1990s. And believe it or not, the commissioners reported after an awful lot of interviewing, et cetera, that it was going to be horse manure. Who would ever have envisaged in 1890 the incredible technical advances of the 20th century, just as I find it very difficult, along with many of my colleagues to really take on the technological advances of the 21st century.

So in politics, what did he stand for? He’s going to emerge as a brilliant orator. He also had a beautiful singing voice by the way, and you’re going to hear him speak later on. He was a brilliant, he emerges as a brilliant parliamentary speaker. And even though politically later on they’re going to be very different, he is going to become quite close to the young Winston Churchill. They were called the terrible twins. They came from different worlds, Lloyd George from a lower middle class, Welsh, low church, and of course Winston Churchill, the doyen of the British aristocracy, wealth, privileged, born up Blenheim Palace. And yet the two of them are going to have a lot in common. They’re both firebrands, they’re both brilliant, and ironically, and I’m going to introduce this to you now, they both believed in the British Empire. Now, another point about Lloyd George, his first speech in the Commons was in support of the temperance movement. He was well aware what too much alcohol was doing in the Welsh towns, the Welsh villages, and in England in terms of poverty. He also came out strongly against the Boer War. And he’s doing very well in the Liberal Party. And in 1905, he joins the cabinet as president of the Board of Trade. And this is under Herbert Asquith. And on Thursday I’m going to be talking about Asquith. And Edwin Montagu, his Jewish protege, and Venetia Stanley, the woman they both loved. And it’s going to have a huge impact on Jewish history.

Also he’s very, very concerned with the issues of social welfare. And he then is chancellor of the Exchequer under Asquith. In 1908, this brilliant parliamentarian with his huge belief in social justice, he becomes chancellor of the Exchequer. And he proposes, can we see the People’s Budget? He wants to introduce reforms. They want to cover the cost of old age pensions. The Liberal Party is now pioneering more help for the ordinary folk. Insurance, already from the middle really of the 19th century, there is this reforming movement in England. What he wants to do is to tax land and income to cover the cost of the old age pensions. “Death is the most convenient time to tax rich people,” he said. Now, even Rothschild, who was a member of the Liberal Party, he said, “Squeeze them all you can, because by taxing land rather than taxing income, it’s going to help the poor.” And this is where he has real ally in Churchill, who at this time was in the Liberal Party and president of the Board of Trade. The People’s Budget was a revolutionary concept for the redistribution of wealth. And it’s going to lead to the Parliament Act of 1911. There was huge opposition to the People’s Budget. And what it actually led to was the House of Lords, which had the power to throw out budgets, the House of Lords actually kept on throwing the budget out. And can we go on, let’s have a look at Winston Churchill as a young man. That’s what he looked like when he was a close friend of Lloyd George. Later on they were going to quarrel. Now, the House of Lords had the power to veto legislation.

And in the end, the new king, George V, Edward VII died in 1910. Let’s have a look at his successor, George V. The spitting image of his first cousin, of course, Nicholas, Tsar Nicholas II, because his wife, his mother, by the way, Alexandra, was sister to the mother of Nicholas II. And I’m just going to divert into a very interesting story, because after the Russian Revolution, the tsar and his family, there was talk that he would come to England. And in fact Lloyd George took the blame for them not coming. But in fact it was George V himself who didn’t want them to come because monarchies were falling. Think of what’s going to happen in the First World War. And he was not very popular. He had to change his name from Saxe-Coburg-Gotha to the House of Windsor. Don’t forget that the British royal family is far more German than it is English at this period. So it’s George V though, Asquith says to him, “We’ve got to do something.” So what George is forced to do, really, but he does give into it, he threatens to flood the Lords with liberal peers to stop this crazy legislation unless they assent to the bill. And in the end, you have the Parliament Act, which not only passes the People’s Budget, but also takes on board many of the dreams of the chartists and also pays MPs. Up until 1911, MPs were not paid. Oh, and something else I should mention, I really didn’t say enough how Lloyd George got his money. His lawyer’s practise flourished, by the way. He came to London.

He had a very good practise. And in fact his firm of solicitors were the firm that drafted the Uganda offer. You will know that in 1903, the British government offered the Jews a homeland in Uganda. And Lloyd George is firm, he was already acquainted then with the ideas of Zionism, because it was his firm that in fact drafted the Balfour, the Uganda offer, which ironically was turned down. There’d been a terrible pogrom in Kishinev, and Theodore Herzl, it’s 1903, the wonderful Theodore Herzl who was so desperate to do something about the plight of Jews in Eastern Europe. He thought, let’s take it as a stepping stone. It was the delegates from Kishinev and the Eastern European delegates said, “No, only in Palestine can we recreate our national home.” And that was a great puzzle to many of the English who were in government at the time. Why on earth didn’t the Jews take the Uganda offer? And ironically it was Lloyd George who was involved in that. Anyway, then we come of course to the First World War under Asquith’s government. And in the Asquith wartime coalition, Lloyd George, he was minister of munitions. Now, that should give you a clue. He’s also, can we go to the next slide please? Yeah, he’s minister of munitions. He’s very good at settling industrial disputes. And he meets regularly with another character, let’s have a look at him. Chaim Weizmann. Chaim Weizmann, the brilliant chemist. We keep on bumping into him in different presentations. The brilliant chemist who had come to Manchester University, who was close to Balfour, who was close to Weizmann, and he meets Lloyd George many times, and he had huge charisma.

This is what Lloyd George later said about Weizmann. This is what he wrote in his memoirs. “Weizmann was one of the greatest Hebrews of all time, applying his scientific skills and imagination to save Britain from a real disaster. He appealed to my reverence for the great men of his race who were the authors of the sublime literature on which I was brought up.” Let me re reread this to you, because this is really a clue to Lloyd George and what he’s going to do for the Jews. “Weizmann was one of the greatest Hebrews of all time, applying his scientific skills and imagination to save Britain from a real disaster. He appealed to my deep reverence for the great men of his race who were the authors of the sublime literature on which I was brought up.” On December the sixth, 19, after the death of Kitchener, he becomes minister of war. Now, there’s huge disenchantment with Asquith’s leadership, and he was one of those who brings him down and he succeeds him as prime minister in 1916 with Balfour as foreign minister. Let’s see him as Secretary of State for War, can we? There you see, that’s his war budget. He forms a coalition government. Asquith’s government had been seen responsible for a lot of the losses. The liberals who continued to support Asquith served in official opposition. So what he forms is a coalition government. And he’s going to be increasingly reliant on the Tories. However, against the backdrop of what he’s going to do wonderfully for Zionism, there’s also going to be quite a few financial scandals. So Lloyd George establishes a war cabinet, and it’s at this stage that CP Scott comes into the picture. Can we see CP Scott please? There he’s prime minister.

Can we see CP Scott? Yeah, CP Scott’s a fascinating character. He of course was the editor of The Manchester Guardian. His cousin had run the London office, and the paper needed a northern editor. He was offered the post. His uncle was in fact the founder of it and he took a very moderate liberal line, and he was the one who facilitated a very important meeting between Lloyd George and Weizmann at the time that he’s establishing a war cabinet. Now, on April the third of 1916, Lloyd George actually tells Weizmann and Scott that the British Army’s advance into Palestine is going to be a very interesting part of the war. And he also said this about being a politician. “A politician is a person whose politics you don’t agree with. If you agree with him, he’s a statesman.” I love that quote. Now, remember, he is now, let’s flip back to him as prime minister, yeah. Now, let me reiterate. He is prime minister at such an important time. He is going to guarantee that the Zionist case was on the agenda. And also after the Balfour Declaration was issued, he’s going to ensure that it gains international support with the Americans and also at Sanremo. So he said, “I was taught far more about the history of the Jews than about the history of my own people.” Now, remember, he’s already involved because of the Uganda offer. And also we know that back on August, 1914, he’d had a conversation with Herbert Samuel who was another important Liberal MP.

He said very key, and Herbert Samuel of course is later on going to become the first high commissioner in Palestine, a Jew and a Zionist. And he actually told him that he was actually quite keen on the idea of a Jewish state. So this is before he comes into contact with Weizmann. So know that it’s already there. Now, what was David Lloyd George view within the war? Now, let’s remember, everyone has mixed motives. Nobody thinks of an idea and sees it all the way through. This man walks the world. We know that he’s an idealist in some ways, he’s very anti-Turk, he’s horrified by the massacre of the Armenian Christians and the Greek Christians. Also, he’s pragmatic, because this Welsh, lower middle class man has become very infused by empire. Palestine is part of the empire. He, like many of the characters, and I’m going to be talking about this far more when I talk in the next couple of weeks about Milner and the whole in fact and the Cleveland set, because the whole notion of British Empire, remember the British Empire was at its height in the 1920s. And also that notion, and today we would find it quite unpalatable that the civilised British had the duty to civilise the world. This was very much a notion. They talked about the British race as a civilising force in the world. And just think of the extension of the British empire at this stage. And so when he’s going to support the Jews in Palestine, he also believed that Britain should control the holy places.

Never forget that. Even though his own faith is perhaps shaky, it’s so rooted in him that he wants to see the civilised British. Think of the extent of the empire. And it’s going to be of course in the war cabinet. So David Lloyd George’s war cabinet. So what does he want? He wants the expansion of the empire. He’s also becoming closer to Weizmann, who’s close to Balfour. And he’s very distressed about Jewish persecution. And another point to make, many of the characters in the war cabinets were influenced by Christian Zionism, which is something I’ve talked about before. Christian Zionism is a bit of a two-edged sword. On one level, they supported the idea of the Jewish return. On the other level, they did see something almost mystical in the Jewish people and also ascribed power to the Jewish people, which tragically I think the Shoah tells us never really existed. So who was in the cabinet with him? Well, of course Balfour, who we’ve talked about. He was a Scottish Presbyterian, an aristocrat, one of the wealthiest men in Britain. But he gave theological lectures at Cambridge. And when he was dying, he actually said, “Jewish restoration was possibly the most important thing I ever did.” In the covenant was Jan Smuts. He was a Boer general from South Africa. He was always pro-Jewish and restorationist. Edward Carson, he was an Ulster criminal lawyer, usually in opposition to anything Lloyd George did, but not about this. Andrew Bonar Law, who was a Canadian, later prime minister, raised by Presbyterians. Labour politician Arthur Henderson, who was an evangelical.

George Barnes, who was very philosemitic. So you had a cabinet, it so happened that you had a cabinet that was philosemitic. And Lord Milner, who believed above all in empire, but he saw the Jews as a civilising force. Now, there were a couple of dissenters. One was Lord Curzon who was the former Viceroy of India. And he had seen what happened when the Muslims became very upset. And he said, “You’ve got to beware about this. Don’t make promises.” And then the other Jew in the cabinet, Edwin Montagu, he’d originally left, he was a protege of Asquith. But by August, 1917, he’d been appointed Secretary of State to India. He wasn’t part of Lloyd George’s inner circle, but he was violently opposed to the Balfour Declaration because he thought the Jews were a religious group and it would harm us if our national home was at the end of the Eastern Mediterranean. But I’m going to talk a lot more about him on Thursday. But the point is, in the war cabinet, the majority of characters were in favour of it. So, and this is what Lloyd George wrote in his own memoirs. “I knew with the issue of the Balfour Declaration, I should please one group and displease another.” He’s talking about the assimilationist. “I had decided to please the Zionist because you stand for a great ideal.” And in his memoirs, when he talks about the Balfour Declaration in his memoirs, as to the meaning of the words national home, it was contemplated if the Jews had responded to the opportunity it afforded them and had become a definite majority of the inhabitants, then Palestine would become a Jewish commonwealth. The notion that Jewish immigration would have to be artificially restricted in order that the Jews should be a permanent minority never enter the heads of anyone engaged in the framing of the policy. And of course I’m going to be talking about that later on. Can we please see the Balfour Declaration.

• [Hannah] Foreign Office, November 2nd, 1917. Dear Lord Rothschild, I have much pleasure in conveying to you on behalf of His Majesty’s government the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the cabinet. His majesty’s government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object. It being clearly understood that nothing shall be done, which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country. I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.“

• Thank you very much, Hannah. And it was actually read out in the Royal Opera House to an audience of 2,000 people. And you can just imagine, it was seen at, and it’s important to remember at the time, and that’s why I read you Lloyd George’s, what he said about the Balfour Declaration. "As to the meaning of the words national home, it was contemplated if the Jews had responded to the opportunity afforded them and had become a definite majority, then Palestine would become a Jewish commonwealth.” So it’s important to remember, that was certainly what the British thought at the time. You are dealing with British imperialism. It’s partly that the British dreamt of an empire that stretched all the way to India, a land empire. And if they could help the Jews at the same time, particularly the Christian evangelists amongst them, it would be a Jewish commonwealth as part of the British Empire. And that’s what they thought would happen. And after the Samremo conference, this is what he said to Weizmann. “Now you’ve got your start. It all depends on you.” And of course he appointed Herbert Samuel as the first high commissioner. But by October the 19th, 1922, he is out of office, Britain’s last Liberal MP. And of course after he’s out of office, a lot is going to happen to what is going on, because, can we go onto the next slide, please? Things did not run too smoothly. We discussed it many times. The Balfour Declaration was issued, but promises were also made to the Arabs.

And the Arabs at the end of, I’m trying to do this very quickly because we have covered it in many, many sessions. And once the website is up, which I believe is going to happen next week, I believe, you can get all these back lectures because obviously I could spend hours talking about the events from 1920 to 1939 when basically the British did, they renege on the Balfour Declaration. Because what happens of course is the British get themselves in a terrible quandary, because what happens is the Arabs see that they have failed in their dreams. What the Arabs were promised by the British was an, what they believed was an independent state based on Damascus. Unfortunately, the British had done a deal with the French, and the French kick the Arabs out, and so the Arab leaders, the Emir Faisal is given a consolation prize by the British. He’s given Iraq. And his younger brother is given Transjordan, because the original Palestine mandate is then chopped off. And the British realise they are in there up to their necks and they’ve got a real problem. So the question is why did Britain get involved in the Middle East? And really I think there’s a good dose of evangelism. There’s also I think a huge sympathy for the Zionist, certainly on the part of Lloyd George, but also as a way of extending the British Empire and stopping the French. Got to remember that. Russia’s out of the story. And the other point of course is that the Arabs become more and more vocal because Herbert Samuel makes Hajj Amin al-Husseini the mufti of Jerusalem, and he is a fanatic.

And gradually the situation exacerbates so much so that in 1929, there is a terrible incident at the Western Wall. The excuses that a mechitza was erected at the Western Wall, and also the revisionist Zionists had become much more militant. It led to the mufti, probably egged on by anti-Semitic British officers, I’ve already lectured on this, to call the people to jihad. There were massacres in Jerusalem and in Hebron. Jabotinsky was banned from ever reentering Palestine. And then the British have a white paper. Sidney Webb, the great Fabian, his wife Beatrice Webb, he is now Lord Passfield, it’s the Passfield White Paper. And Lloyd George was very much going to speak against it. And let me now go to, because all the time he’s out of office now, but he’s in parliament, great orator, and he’s going to speak against it. So can we go on, please? This is the Savoy Hotel in the 1930s. Why am I showing you that? Now, this is, before we come to that, he’s going to attend a Zionist Federation dinner, and you’re going to hear him speak in 1927, to a Jewish audience, “There we were confronted by your people in every country in the world. You may say you have been oppressed and persecuted, but that has been your power. You have been hammered with fine steel, and therefore we wanted your help. We thought it would be very useful.” What is interesting, also, as I said to you before, he also believed that the Jews were a power group. This is one of the reasons the Balfour Declaration was issued. And that’s something else he said. As I said, it’s evangelical, it’s helping Weizmann, but it’s also very pragmatic, helping the British Empire.

And believe it or not, the Foreign Office believed that a pro-Zionist declaration would help bring America into the war and keep Russia in the war, because so many of the Bolsheviks were Jews. They didn’t get it. But take it as read, I know it’s illogical. The great historian Yehuda Bauer, he puts it this way. He said at that particular period, remember the protocols, it’s the height of the protocols. The majority of people, whether they were benign or not, believed in the almost occult power of world Jewry. He argued against the white paper, he spoke against it. And this is in the Savoy Hotel. And before I’m going to show you a clip of him, I’m going to read other things that he said. “Words can hardly express the gratitude I feel to you for the enduring hand you have conferred on attaching my name to a colony in the veil of Jezreel.” Because he’d been such a friend to the Zionist, they named a colony for him. “The name of these valleys and hills are as sacred to the Gentile as to the Jew. I heard of Jezreel, of Carmel and Zion before I knew of the existence in my land of the valley of Glamorgan. I was prime minister at the time of the Balfour Declaration and secured for it the sanction of the allies. I was principal delegate of the British Empire at Sanremo where the mandate received its final shape. Mandatory power must discharge its functions with fidelity and resolution. Whatever doubts were raised by the egregious white paper,” he’s talking about the Passfield White Paper, have been laid to rest. Mandate must be carried out in letter and spirit. The Jews have a special claim to Canaan.

They are the only people who’ve made a success of it during the past 3,000 years, and as a race have no other home. Because what happens, the Passfield White Paper says that basically, although the Arabs caused the riots, it was really because of fear of Jewish immigration. So the Passfield White, and don’t forget the Wall Street crash, there was huge economic recession. And what they said, if there’s one unemployed Arab, no more Jews can come into Palestine. There was such an outcry in parliament and also in Britain that consequently they altered the terms of the white paper and said, as long as there’s no unemployed Jews. So they go back on it. And now I want to show you something that he says in a speech at the Savoy. But before that, I’m going to read you another speech. He often attended Zionist meetings. He was an honoured guest. There has never been such an experiment, he’s talking about Palestine. “In this attempt in the history of the world, here is a race which made a greater contribution to the spiritual elevation of humanity than any that ever dwelt on this earth. The people from which sprung Moses and Jesus of Nazareth and Isaiah. The same people that were scoured by the oppressor from their native land, for they have acquired experience that no other race can ever claim, driven into exile 19 years ago, scattered over the face of the globe, mingling with every nation, yet preserving their own strong individuality, absorbing the best of every civilization, yet retaining their own ideals. They have an impulse to rebuild their national home, their old home. We are entitled to expect great things for such an experiment, not just from Palestine alone, not only for the children of Israel, but for all the children of men. Now can we please see him speaking? If you don’t mind. this is at the Zionist dinner in 1931.

• On the western shores of the Mediterranean, three of the greatest powers on earth representing between them one third of the total inhabitants of the globe. They issued a decree, as to the future government and development of a small but a famous country on the eastern shores of the Mediterranean. And under that decree, that development was to be under the protection and control of the nations of the world. A Jew at Tel Aviv, he’s as entitled to protection as a matter of right as a Muhammad in the concourse. The honouring of the British flags demand that both should be protected against outrage and violence, The rights of all the ancient dwellers in the soil, whatever their faith, whatever their creed, whatever their race must be respected.

• I think we better stop it. Thank you, thank you very much. And there are many occasions when he speaks at Zionist dinners. Now, the controversy of Lloyd George. In 1936, he goes to visit Adolf Hitler, and he is welcomed by him. And also he sums up his meeting with Hitler in an article in the Express. Can we see the next slide, please? Yeah. And it wasn’t completely negative. He says, "There can be no doubt,” and now obviously I’ve summed it up. “There can be no doubt that he’s achieved a marvellous transformation and the spirit of the people and their attitude towards each other and their social and economic outlook. His movement has made a new Germany a general sense of security. The people are more cheerful. It’s a happier Germany. One man has accomplished this miracle. He’s a born leader of men, a magnificent and dynamic leader. The fact that Hitler has rescued his country from the fear of despair, penury, and humiliation has given him an unchallenged authority in modern Germany. The old trust him, the young idolise him. It is the worship of a national hero who has saved his country from utter despondency and degradation.” I never met a happier people than the Germans, and Hitler is one of their greatest men. But he did also said the Germans have definitely made up their minds never to quarrel with us again. However, he is later on, you’ve got to remember appeasement is later on going to become such a dirty word.

And as I said, I’m going to talk far more about that when I talk about Cleveland set. The World War 1 was so appalling that many people did dream of trying to make peace with the monster. Nevertheless, he does change his mind and he is the one, he’s one of those who pressed Chamberlain to resign in 1940. But do remember he visited Hitler after he’d flouted the Treaty of Versailles, after the Nuremberg Laws, and he had a social visit with him in Berchtesgaden. We can see that they’re joking, they’d pause for photographs. He met Hess in Munich. He also met Ribbentrop. And he did say to Ribbentrop that Churchill didn’t have any judgement , because at this stage, by now, Churchill and Lloyd George are completely parted company. And remember it’s Churchill who’s screaming out against the dangers of Hitler. But he did stress in an article in The News Chronicle that he deplored the attitude to the Jewish people. But then another rather strange article in Strand Magazine, what have the Jews done, quoting, “The most remarkable race that ever dwelt on this earth. But the most unaccountable mystery in the history of the Jews is the persistence, the source, and the intensity of their persecution through the ages. They refuse to be good mixers, and their insistence on maintaining their own rights and customs have been at the bottom of many pogroms.

But a Jew fairly treated is a loyal citizen of all lands. Now we come to a very problematic issue. Now, having unfortunately studied anti-Semitism and the Shoah most of my working life, I take the view of historians like Robert Wistrich and Chaim Maccabee that the major plank that led to the Shoah, because there are at least 10 things that made it happen, was in fact Christian anti-Judaism, the notion of the deicide. Now, let’s be very careful here. I do not believe the majority of Christians have that at the forefront of their minds. On the contrary. But it’s there. And that’s why I think you get this notion of Jews in power. Because even though those, even though these ideas go into abeyance, it’s in the culture of people. I don’t have to tell you that when there’s economic, social, and political disruption, the Jews do become a major target of hostility. And also to quote Elias Canetti, "There are no people more difficult to understand the Jews.” That’s the problem, isn’t it? Are we a race? Are we a religion? Whatever the word race means, which I discount. Are we a people? What are we? Are we a religious entity? I’m sure every one of you have got your own views on that, so I don’t want to go down that path. But the point is that even Lloyd George who was sympathetic and of course was pragmatic as well, he had his own reasons for Balfour Declaration. Nevertheless, on balance, he was pretty much of a friend to the Jews, yet he, and Churchill did the same thing.

Never forget in 1922, Churchill writes a very, very long essay in the Illustrated Sunday Herald, where he basically says, “We must stop the Jews becoming communists.” Communism was the bete noire. And the problem was they all knew the visible captains of industry who were Jewish, but now the communists, and this all plays into the conspiracy theories. Now, the next issue that he gets involved in is the Peel Commission. Move on a bit. Can we see the Peel Commission? Thank you. By 1936, the situation in Palestine was almost impenetrable. And the British sent in another commission under Lloyd George to investigate the partition of that one third of Palestine that was left into a Jewish state, into a Jewish homeland and an Arab homeland. And they questioned nearly a hundred people, including Lloyd George. Now, in 2017, it was released, some of Lloyd George’s comments were released. And this is what he had to say. I should like to remind of the war position at the time of the Balfour Declaration. We were now looking at the war through dazzling glow of a triumphant end. But in 1917, still very much in doubt, public opinion in America and Russia was crucial. And we had every reason to believe at the time that in both countries, the friendship or hostility of the Jewish race might make a considerable difference. He also suggested by the way, that they were worried that the kaiser was about to make a pro-Zionist declaration. And also he reminds them immediately following the declaration, millions of leaflets were dropped in every town and area throughout the world with Jewish communities, talking about Eastern Europe. I can point out substantial, and in one case, decisive advantages derived from this propaganda amongst the Jews. We had good reason to believe that Jewish propaganda.

Russia had a great deal to do with the difficulties created for the Germans in South Russia. The Jews in their subtle way managed to place obstacles in the way of the Germans. So he believes in Jewish power, but this is also what he has to say. The Arabs have done well out of allied victories. He’s talking Peel Commission ‘36, remember. Owing chiefly to British and allied sacrifices, the Arabs now have four independent states, Iraq, Syria, Transjordan, and Saudi Arabia. Although most of the Arab races fought throughout the war for their Turkish oppressors, the Palestinian Arabs fought for Turkish rule. In fact, it must be said that 2,000 Palestinian Arabs actually joined the Emir Hussein and Lawrence. So he’s not being, I’m giving you his views. The Arab leaders at the time, again, did not offer objections as long as the rights of Arabs were respected. And it was contemplated by Lord Balfour then the course of a political evolution, the Jews would have a majority. President Wilson, who had given his assent to the declaration, made similar comments about a future Jewish commonwealth. And when in the end the Peel Commission, they decide to divide the mandate, he said, “This is surrender. The British Empire seems to be losing its nerve. I do not like it.” Now, of course, in the end, even that didn’t happen. And I should mention that characters like Jabotinsky gave evidence, heartbreaking evidence. Weizmann, he said there are six million Jews at risk, at least save the young, the two million who have a right to work. It’s heartbreaking.

But it’s interesting because if anything illustrates the powerlessness of the Jew, it’s this, yet nevertheless, it all persists. And he did also say there are two people I would not quarrel with if I was running a state. They are both international forces. One of it’s the Jews, the other’s the Catholic Church. The Jews are a very subtle race. They have means of communicating throughout the world, which nobody seems to know about. He did write in the Sunday Express on the Peel report, “A deplorable ending to one of the most imaginative and promising experiments which the Great War made possible. The national home is to be mutilated and left to shamble along, a disfigured and shapeless cripple. The Jews have not only fulfilled their end of the bargain, but trouble has arisen entirely from the magnitude of their success. They have built Tel Aviv, a modern city of 150,000 inhabitants, which will rival any town of its size on the shores of the great inland sea. And which with 16 and a half million Jews dispersed over the globe, think, a mutilated concern without Zion, Bethlehem, and Judea, a Jewish home without Judea, Zionism without Zion.

They will return to the Promised Land to find the promise broken by those who gave it.” That’s an extraordinary phrase. “They will return to the Promised Land to find the promise broken by those who gave it.” And then he says, and this is heartbreaking, he says this to the Peel Commission. Suppose Jewish Palestine grew by another 200,000 to 600,000. You cannot kill 600,000 people. Even Hitler cannot get rid of the Jews. Again, his problem with Bolshevism. I do not say that Trotsky was a Zionist, but he was a Jew. Kamenev was a Jew. Born Rosenfeld. He was Trotsky’s brother-in-law and a member of the first Politburo. They were pretty well all Jews, but very powerful in those days. And probably non-Zionist. But a Jew is still a Jew. So this is what Tom Sege said about it all. The men who signed the Balfour Declaration were Christian Zionists and in many cases anti-Semites. They still believe the Jews controlled the world. So it’s complicated. And on balance, I think we have to see him as a man of his time. But on balance, I think he was in the end, as far as Zionism concerned, an ally. But like many, he did believe in Jewish power. I want to finish off actually with his funeral. Can we see it, please? Thank you.

• [Narrator] In a simple house in Manchester, was born in 1863, David Lloyd George. In a cottage in Cricieth, he grew up in a community Welsh in speech and tradition. The house in which he lived and died will be remembered as the home of perhaps the greatest Welshman who ever lived. But his spiritual home must surely have been the Welsh Hills he loved. The crystal River Dwyfor gave him much more than the title for his earldom. On its banks, he chose the place for his rest. Farmhands were his pallbearers and a farm cart his hearse. Along the narrow country lane he so often walked, men and women who knew and loved him paid their tribute. Among those who escorted the coffin of the man who won the last war were his four grandsons, all under 22 and all serving in this war. Earl Lloyd George chose to be bedded in accordance with the ancient Welsh custom in land over which cattle may graze. As the cortege passed the riverside, John Roberts, who had known Lloyd George from boyhood, looked on. History will number Lloyd George with Chatham, Pitt, and Churchill as one of Britain’s Supreme War ministers, and a man who was for years the most vivid personality in British politics. But in his death he was completely Welsh, and Welsh voices sang beside his grave. In the land of his father’s, the memory of David Lloyd George will live forever.

• Thank you very much. And can we just see the last slide, which shows you the two, there are streets in both Tel Aviv and in Jerusalem named for him. All right, should we see about questions now?

Q&A and Comments:

Q: How could Napoleon be one of his heroes less than a hundred years after Waterloo?

A: There are many Brits who admire Napoleon, you know? He’s the first great European, and I think what Lloyd George remember, he wants to concentrate on creating that huge British Empire. Isn’t it fascinating? He came from a completely different background to the aristos, but he was still a man of the empire.

Hannah, I don’t know why Welsh people have good singing voices, but they do. This is from Michael. My mother’s family grew up in South Wales in the early years of the 20th century. My mother and her brothers told me as I grew up in Canada about the local Welsh people in their hometown. Many Welsh people saw the Jews in South Wales as the beginning of the second coming of Jesus. Yes, it’s fascinating, isn’t it? To Lloyd George, calling someone a Hebrew like Weizmann has a different meaning to referring to someone who is Jew. I think he’s just emphasising. He was so steeped in the story of the Hebrews that he’s seeing Chaim Weizmann of one of the prophets. Thank you. I’ve also seen this term used in American 20th century census reports.

Yes, it’s not necessarily pejorative, you know? Asquith in his memoirs claimed that LG did not care a damn for the Jews or for their past or their future. Yes, yes, but then Asquith and Lloyd George hated each other in the end. And I’ll be talking about Asquith. He’s very complicated himself about the Jews. What happened in the 20 years from the Balfour Declaration to the white paper. Shelly, I gave about three lectures on that, and Hannah and I, am I not correct, they would be able to get them all soon?

• [Hannah] Yes, absolutely, that’s forthcoming. Yeah. Ann MacMillan, a former CBC reporter who is often stationed in London, her sister Margaret, who is an author, are the granddaughters of Lloyd George.

Oh, thank you, Rhode, likes my hair. Thank you. Rhode, Thank you for this.

Ann MacMillan, a great journalist. They’re great-granddaughters. Other than possible safety and farming, which Jews have been escaping forever possible, Uganda landlord country had nothing to offer Jews. Many European Jews were looking for liberal education, urbane culture, music. Ah, okay. What had happened was there’d been, Russia under the last tsar, it was absolutely appalling for the Jews. There were pogroms after pogroms after pogroms. What Hertzl thought it could be would be a stepping stone. He wanted to get them out of Russia. That was the point. Nobody thought that, and he wasn’t thinking necessarily about German, French, or English Jews at this time. He’s thinking about the Jews of Eastern Europe.

Riva says, when I was a youngster many years ago, we sang a ditty. My father knew Lloyd George. When I met my husband, and he heard it, he commented that his father really did. His dad was one of the founders of the Labour Party, and he worked closely with Lloyd George. Oh, I do love these stories.

Selena, the Vatican finally apologised for blaming the Jews for deicide. Do you think this has finally absolved centuries of unfair blame the Catholic, Selena, what do you think? What do you really think? And don’t forget, they only said, they only blamed future, they said future generations are not to blame. They still said the Jews at the time were responsible. Be careful. You know what I think about this, but then I have very strong views on this one. My tutor was Robert Wistrich, who by the way was in the Vatican looking at the archives for over three years. And when he couldn’t get what he wanted, he wrote a really scathing story.

Monty, about Zionism, on YouTube, there’s a talk by Susannah Heschel, the intertwining of Zionism and Judaism, worth listening to. She’s a daughter of the late Abraham Joshua Heschel. Oh, thank you for that, Monty.

Thank you, Rita gives it to us. Is he still buried on the river, ask Janet.

Monty’s saying singing voices. Thank you. Okay, thank you, Courtney.

All right. I think we’ll stop it there because don’t forget, at seven o'clock we have Danny Finkelstein talking about his extraordinary good book and being interviewed by Tanya. So I hope you’ll come back for that. And I will see you on Thursday to talk more about Asquith, Venetia Stanley, and Edwin Montagu, who was in the cabinet and was violently anti-Zionist. So I’m going to look at why certain Anglo-Jews were so against Zionism. Take care, all of you. And Hannah, thank you very much.