Sir Herbert Samuel, the first British High Commissioner in Mandatory Palestine (1920 - 25) has been generally regarded as an impartial administrator. Sahar Huneidi argues that most of the measures Samuel took during his time in Palestine were designed to prepare the ground not simply for the "Jewish national home" promised in both the Balfour Declaration and the mandate for Palestine, but also for a Jewish state. Using a wide range of sources Huneidi charts Samuel's career in Palestine against the complex background of British policy, the Zionist movement at its inception and the emergent Palestinian Arab nationalist movement.