It came down to pragmatism. The Zionist project was a colonialist project. The 1917 Balfour declaration and the subsequent immigration into Palestine had as its explicit aim to create an alien entity in Palestine at the expense of the indigenous population. In principle it was wrong for Palestinians to go along with it in any way, shape or form. In practice it might have avoided the Nakba [cataclysm] that Palestinians are still suffering from today. - Bitter Lemons