Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast/Palestine Action
Pro-Palestinian protesters spray-painted and tore down a portrait of Lord Balfour at Cambridge University on Friday, an act intended to call attention to the U.K.’s role in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. “Arthur Balfour, then UK Foreign secretary, issued a declaration which promised to build ‘a national home for the Jewish people’ in Palestine, where the majority of the indigenous population were not Jewish. He gave away the Palestinians homeland—a land that wasn’t his to give away,” the protest group Palestine Action said in their statement taking credit for the event. A protester sprayed the portrait with red paint to symbolize “the bloodshed of the Palestinian people” since 1917, when the declaration was issued. The current conflict in Gaza has left more than 30,000 dead and nearly 2 million displaced since October, according to U.N. estimates, and rights groups warn of imminent famine as Israel blocks aid from reaching the besieged.
