u/BuzzYrGirlfriendWoof

Chaim Weizmann, a Jewish chemist, developed a fermentation process during World War I that enabled Britain to produce large quantities of acetone, a crucial ingredient in the manufacture of cordite for artillery shells. His contribution made him valuable to senior British officials, including David Lloyd George and Arthur Balfour, and gave him unusual access to Britain's political establishment. Weizmann used that influence to advocate for a Jewish national home in Palestine, at a time when Britain was considering the future of the Ottoman Empire's Middle Eastern territories.

In 1917, Britain issued the Balfour Declaration, expressing support for a “national home for the Jewish people” in Palestine while also promising not to prejudice the civil and religious rights of the territory's existing non-Jewish population.

The popular story that Britain effectively rewarded Weizmann with Palestine for his acetone discovery is too simplistic and is disputed by historians: British support for Israel had numerous strategic, political, religious, and ideological motivations.

Nevertheless, Weizmann's wartime scientific contribution helped elevate his influence at a crucial moment, and the Balfour Declaration became an important part of the chain of events that eventually produced the competing Jewish and Palestinian national claims underlying the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

And the UN bungled it from there, taking over for Britain in 1948.

Acetone. Britain. The UN. Those are the botch agents right there