Lords of the Desert Quotes

“When the British Empire sank beneath the waves of history,’ the high commissioner told him, ‘it would leave behind only two monuments: one was the game of Association Football, the other was the expression, “Fuck off”.’12”
― James Barr, Lords of the Desert: Britain's Struggle with America to Dominate the Middle East

“Our period of occupation did the country little permanent good, for all the selfless work of many devoted Englishmen and so many good intentions.”
― James Barr, Lords of the Desert: Britain's Struggle with America to Dominate the Middle East

“Only the appointment of yet another prime minister, who declared that he would not pursue membership of the pact, bought an uneasy calm.”
― James Barr, Lords of the Desert: Britain's Struggle with America to Dominate the Middle East

“The problem of Palestine’, one British general decided, was ‘the same as the problem of Ireland, namely, two peoples living in a small country hating each other like hell.”
― James Barr, Lords of the Desert: Britain's Struggle with America to Dominate the Middle East

“By then tensions were rising in Palestine. Almost exactly twenty-five years earlier, in the hope of creating what it called ‘a buffer Jewish state’ to guard the eastern approaches to the Suez Canal and keep the French at bay, the British government of the day had issued the Balfour Declaration, named after the then foreign secretary, Arthur Balfour. This pledged support for a Jewish national home in Palestine so long as it did not impinge on the civil and religious rights of the existing non-Jewish communities there. It helped Britain secure the mandate to rule Palestine in 1920.”
― James Barr, Lords of the Desert: Britain's Struggle with America to Dominate the Middle East