Uganda Scheme

With the aim of exploiting the commercial potential of the interior regions, the British built the Uganda Railway, which ended up costing taxpayers a total of £5,244,000.

[1][7][9] Nevertheless, he agreed to discuss the El Arish plan with Lord Lansdowne, the Foreign Secretary, believing it could gain the support of world Jewry for Britain.

[7] Additionally, during a journey on the Uganda Railway through what was described as "the white man country" in East Africa (modern Kenya), Chamberlain's opinion on the suitability of the tropical climate for Europeans changed.

[1][6][7][8][9] Leopold Greenberg acted as Herzl's main representative in the negotiations, and together they hoped to gain de facto diplomatic recognition from Great Britain, making the proposal's political value immense.

[6][7][12] Greenberg successfully obtained a letter from the Foreign Office expressing the British government's willingness to establish a Jewish colony with considerable land, local autonomy, and religious and domestic freedom under its general control.

[1][8][9] The discord threatened to divide the organization, with some Eastern European delegates dramatically walking out of the meeting and others expressing their loss of trust in Herzl and the steering committee.

[7] However, some members, such as Reverend Dr. Moses Gaster and Lucien Wolf, strongly opposed the plan, believing it went against the principles of Zionism and was an unwise experiment with Jewish self-government.

[6][7] The white British settlers were openly hostile toward the offer and formed the "Anti-Zionist Immigration Committee," which rejected the proposal through the African Standard.

Furthermore, there were worries about granting a special territory to an alien community after the troubles in Canada with the Doukhobors, and doubts about Jews' ability to engage in profitable farming.

[7][8] Although there were disparities in their final reports, with the climate used to argue for and against the Jewish settlement, the main reason for the rejection of the Plan in 1905 was partly due to the opposition by the former high commissioner of East Africa and the white settlers in the area.