A new campaign, known as Britain Owes Palestine is demanding the UK government acknowledge and apologise for their repressive actions committed in Palestine between 1917 and 1948, with backers of the petition stating that the repercussions are still felt by civilians today.
The campaign is led by petitioners, many of whom survived the persecution in Palestine during the period. The 400-page document demands that Britain takes responsibility for its violations of international law and addresses them.
The evidence in the petition has been gathered and analysed by leading historians, including Professors John Quigley and Avi Shlaim, Assistant Professor Dr. Victor Kattan, and barristers Ben Emmerson CBE KC and Danny Friedman KC.
The petition focuses on how Britain acquired control over Palestine, used repressive measures and paved the way for the creation of the State of Israel.
Dr Victor Kattan, a key voice behind the movement, told The New Arab that the Balfour Declaration was a turning point in history, and can be seen as the starting point for the occupation of Palestine.
He explains that when Jews were fleeing from persecution in eastern Europe, many people left for western Europe and the US, but there was significant debate at the time about how to stem migration, which is when Theodor Herzl, the founder of the Zionist Organisation, promoted the idea of establishing a Jewish homeland in a British colony.
"Various countries were looked at. The Egyptian Sinai, agricultural colonies in Argentina were a serious plan…but these didn’t get the kind of support from the Zionist Organisation because most Jews didn’t have a biblical or historical connection to that particular land," he said.
Despite widespread rejection of the idea in the UK and even controversy about it within the Jewish community, the UK pressed ahead.
The Britain Owes Palestine Campaign states that Britain then created a Mandate for itself with no legal authority, which saw it supress the Great Arab Rebellion and adopted a form of statutory martial law that subjected Palestinians to suffering and torture.
Kattan describes this as "the birth of the conflict," and while there were Jews in Palestine before the Balfour Declaration, new migrants had a different culture, language and national aspirations, which the Palestinian indigenous population rejected.
According to Kattan, the British armed forces carried out many brutal actions, including extrajudicial killings, house demolitions and torture in Palestine in the 1930s during the Arab Revolt.
"There was always an element of coercion involved in in British policy in Palestine," he added, saying that defence emergency regulations gave British authorities the powers to do essentially anything they thought was necessary to maintain law and order, which was abused.
One example, he says, was waterboarding.
"…Many associate this with the American war in Iraq and the War on Terror, but this tactic was used by the Brits in Palestine. As were collective punishments, the idea you punish the actions of the community or village for the actions of an individual".
He notes that the British further committed home demolitions, kept Palestinians in cages, and had a role in massacres, including the Al-Bussa bus massacre. There are also documented cases of the British denying Palestinians food and water until they confess to what they’ve been accused of, as well as the strapping of civilians to the front of armed vehicles – known today as human shields.
Leaders of the infamous Haganah, a fighting force, were trained by British soldiers and given weapons.
"British history in Palestine is a litany of unrest and violence. Now, that, of course, leaves a bitter legacy for the Palestinians," Kattan said, adding that the influx of Jewish migrants had caused a divided society, the consequences of which are still felt today.
The team behind Britain Owes Palestine say they are yet to receive a response from the British government, but they have acknowledged they have received and are studying it.
The team have also expressed that they would like to meet the foreign secretary and other British officials to discuss the contents of the documents and provoke a national conversation.
"We want, people in this country to know about the past…this is not a subject that's taught in schools, and perhaps it should be".