Foreign News: Smouhaha

When Queen Victoria ruled the waves, Lord Palmerston sent the fleet to blockade the port of Athens simply to collect damages for a Gibraltar-born Jewish Briton whose house had been destroyed by a Greek mob. "A British subject in whatever land he may be," proclaimed the Queen's Foreign Secretary, "shall feel that the strong arm of England will protect him against injustice and wrong."

Last week, a century later, the Anglo-Egyptian agreement to let Suez bygones be bygones was being held up largely because of the claims of one Iraqi-born Jewish British subject to property in Egypt. This time, far from boasting...

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