December 15, 1917 India, Muslims, and Oil Gilbert Clayton, Britain’s chief representative to Mark Sykes in Cairo: “We have to consider whether the situation demands out-and-out support of Zionism at the risk of alienating the Arabs. By pushing them as hard as we appear to be doing, we are risking the possibility of Arab unity becoming something like an accomplished fact and being ranged against us.” Source: The Wall Street Journal February 27, 2001