​This is the original translation of the Balfour Declaration written by the Zionist thinker and writer Ahad Ha’am. Ahad Ha’am translated the Balfour Declaration into Hebrew so that the wider population of Palestine could understand the words.

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Ahad Ha'am - Ahad Ha’am, or Asher Zvi Hirsch Ginsberg, was known as the central figure of cultural Zionism. Born in Russia, he began participating in the early Zionist movement, Hibat Zion, in Odessa in 1884. He travelled frequently to Palestine and wrote much about life in the Yishuv, the aims of Zionism, and the importance of Hebrew and Jewish culture. In 1922 he made Aliyah and settled in Tel Aviv, where he served until 1926 as a member of the Executive Committee of the city council.

The debate between Herzl and Ahad Ha’am was the highlight of the early Zionist Congresses. Herzl was the original prototype of a political Zionist, who believed that the solution to the Jewish problem, namely, anti-Semitism, was to create a nation state of Jews regardless of its geographical location, and he was even in favour of the Uganda Proposal. Ahad Ha’am, on the other hand, was vehemently opposed to the Ugandan Proposal, seeing it as a rejection of Jewish nationality. While he did not believe in the need for Jewish political sovereignty, Ahad Ha’am was vocal in his support for a centre of Jewish culture which could, he believed, only be situated in the Land of Israel. 

Living in London from 1907, Ahad Ha’am was actively involved in the Zionist movement and played an important part in the lead up to the Balfour Declaration as a close confidant of Chaim Weizmann.