MUCH has been said about this week's 50th anniversary of the Six-Day War that reshaped the geo-political contours of the present-day Middle East. Yes, it is certainly appropriate to recall the events of June 5, 1967 when Israel launched pre-emptive attacks on several of its neighbours and won a decisive victory with the capture of the Sinai Peninsula and the Gaza Strip from Egypt, the West Bank and the Old City of Jerusalem from Jordan and the Golan Heights from Syria.

But there has been relatively little attention paid to the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict which has its roots in the World War I carve-up of the Ottoman Empire between the British and the French. In fact, this year marks the 100th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration which set in motion the events that eventually led to the Six-Day War 50 years later.

This is arguably the more important anniversary, although it lacks the high drama of the 1967 war. In 1916, the British persuaded the Arab populations of the region to rise up against their Turkish rulers as a stratagem against the Axis powers. When it became obvious that they were winning, the British and the French drew up the Skyes-Picot map to split the Ottoman possessions between themselves. And with that came the famous (or infamous, depending on your point of view) declaration by Britain's foreign secretary Arthur James Balfour. London "would favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object . . .", in the words of the declaration. Of course, the resettlement of European Jews in Palestine really took off after World War II following Nazi Germany's attempt at genocide.