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-Britain officially assumes control -Transjordanian independence -Israel independence Currency Today part of 29 September 1923 25 May 1946 14 May 1948 Palestine pound Israel Jordan Palestinian territories Saudi Arabia Iraq
This article deals with the Mandate instrument passed by the League of Nations granting Britain a mandate over the area presently occupied by Israel, the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Jordan. For a history of the period, see Mandate Palestine. The British Mandate for Palestine, also known as the Palestine Mandate and The British Mandate of Palestine, was a legal commission for the administration of Palestine, the draft of which was formally confirmed by the Council of the League of Nations on 24 July 1922 and which came into effect on 26 September 1923.[1] The document was based on the principles contained in Article 22 of the draft Covenant of the League of Nations and the San Remo Resolution of 25 April 1920 by the principal Allied and associated powers after the First World War.[1] The mandate formalised British rule in the southern part of Ottoman Syria from 19231948. With the League of Nations' consent on 16 September 1922, the UK divided the Mandate territory into two administrative areas, Palestine, under direct British rule, and autonomous Transjordan, under the rule of the Hashemite family from the Kingdom of Hejaz in present-day Saudi Arabia, in accordance with the McMahon Correspondence of 1915.[1] Following the 1922 Transjordan memorandum, the area east of the Jordan river became exempt from the Mandate provisions concerning the Jewish National Home.[1] [2] The preamble of the mandate declared: Whereas the Principal Allied Powers have also agreed that the Mandatory should be responsible for putting into effect the declaration originally made on November2nd, 1917, by the Government of His Britannic Majesty, and adopted by the said Powers, in favour of the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing should be done which might prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.[3] The formal objective of the League of Nations Mandate system was to administer parts of the defunct Ottoman Empire, which had been in control of the Middle East since the 16th century, "until such time as they are able to stand alone."[4]
Background
Strategy against the Ottoman Empire
When the Ottoman Empire joined the Central Powers in the First World War in April 1915, it threatened Britain's communications with India via the Suez Canal, besides other strategic interests of the allies. The conquest of Palestine was thus part of an articulated strategy by Britain's military and political leadership aimed at establishing a land bridge between the Mediterranean and the Persian Gulf. This would enable rapid deployment of troops to the Gulf, then the forward line of defense for British interests in India, and protect against invasion from the north by Russia. A land bridge was also an alternative to the Suez Canal.[5] In response to French initiatives, the United Kingdom established the De Bunsen Committee in 1915 to consider the nature of British objectives in Turkey and Asia in the event of a successful conclusion of the war. The committee considered various scenarios and provided guidelines for negotiations with France, Italy, and Russia regarding the partitioning of the Ottoman Empire. The Committee recommended in favour of the creation of a decentralised and federal Ottoman state in Asia.[6]
Zones of French and British influence and control proposed in the Sykes-Picot Agreement
At the same time, the British and French also opened overseas fronts with the Gallipoli (1915) and Mesopotamian campaigns. In Gallipoli, the Turks successfully repelled the British, French and Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZACs). In 1916, Britain and France concluded the SykesPicot Agreement, which proposed to divide the Middle East between them into spheres of influence, with "Palestine" as an international enclave. (Papp 1994, p.3) The British made two potentially conflicting promises regarding the territory it was expecting to acquire.[7] Britain had promised Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca, through T. E. Lawrence, independence for an Arab country covering most of the Arab Middle East in exchange for his support, while also promising to create and foster a Jewish national home in Palestine in the Balfour Declaration of 1917, in return for Jewish support.
General Allenby's final attacks of the Palestine Campaign gave Britain control of the area
The surrender of Jerusalem by the Ottomans to the British on 9 December 1917 following the Battle of Jerusalem
At the Paris Peace Conference, Prime Minister Lloyd George told Georges Clemenceau and the other allies that the McMahon-Hussein correspondence were a treaty obligation. He explained that the agreement with Hussein had actually been the basis for the Sykes-Picot Agreement, and that the French could not use the proposed League Of
British Mandate for Palestine Nations Mandate system to break the terms of the agreement. He pointed out that the French had agreed not to occupy the area of the independent Arab state, or confederation of states, with their military forces, including the areas of Damascus, Homs, Hama, and Aleppo. Arthur Balfour (later Lord Balfour, British Foreign Secretary at the time) and President Woodrow Wilson were present at the meeting.[14] The open negotiations began at the Paris Peace Conference, continued at the Conference of London and took definite shape only after the San Remo conference in April 1920. There the Allied Supreme Council granted the mandates for Palestine and Mesopotamia to Britain,[15] and those for Syria and Lebanon to France. In August 1920, this was officially acknowledged in the Treaty of Svres. Both Zionist and Arab representatives attended the conference, where they met and signed an agreement[16] to cooperate. The agreement was never implemented.
The Mandate
Practical and legal basis
The Official Journal of the League of Nations, dated June 1922, contained an interview with Lord Balfour in which he opined that the League's authority was strictly limited. According to Balfour [the] Mandates were not the creation of the League, and they could not in substance be altered by the League. The League's duties were confined to seeing that the specific and detailed terms of the mandates were in accordance with the decisions taken by the Allied and Associated Powers, and that in carrying out these mandates the Mandatory Powers should be under the supervisionnot under the controlof the League. A mandate was a self-imposed limitation by the conquerors on the sovereignty which they exercised over the conquered territory.[17]
Emir Faisal's delegation at Versailles, during the Paris Peace Conference of 1919. Left to right: Rustum Haidar, Nuri as-Said, Prince Faisal, Captain Pisani (behind Faisal), T. E. Lawrence, Captain Hassan Khadri
Each of the principal Allied powers had a hand in drafting the proposed mandate[18] although some, including the United States, had not declared war on the Ottoman Empire and did not become members of the League of Nations. The Sykes-Picot Agreement did not call for Arab sovereignty, but for the "suzerainty of an Arab chief" and "an international administration, the form of which is to be decided upon after consultation with Russia, and subsequently in consultation with the other allies, and the representatives of the Sherif of Mecca."[19] Under the terms of that agreement, the Zionist Organization needed to secure an agreement along the lines of the Faisal-Weizmann Agreement with the Sherif of Mecca. At the Peace Conference in 1919, Emir Faisal, speaking on behalf of Emir Feisal I (right) and Chaim Weizmann (also King Hussein, asked for Arab independence, or at minimum the right wearing Arab garment as a sign of friendship) in to pick the mandatory.[20] In the end, he recommended an Arab state Syria, 1918 under a British mandate.[21] The World Zionist Organization also asked for a British mandate, and asserted the 'historic title of the Jewish people to Palestine'.[22] A confidential appendix to the report of the King-Crane Commission observed that "The Jews are distinctly for Britain as mandatory power, because of the Balfour declaration' and that the French 'resent the payment by the
British Mandate for Palestine English to the Emir Feisal of a large monthly subsidy, which they claim covers a multitude of bribes, and enables the British to stand off and show clean hands while Arab agents do dirty work in their interest."[23] The Faisal-Weizmann Agreement called for British mediation of any disputes. It also called for the establishment of borders, after the Versailles peace conference, by a commission to be formed for the purpose. The World Zionist Organization later submitted to the peace conference a proposed map of the territory that did not include the area east of the Hedjaz Railway, including most of Transjordan. In the Sanremo Conference (24 April 1920) the Mandate for Palestine was allocated to Great Britain. France required the continuation of its religious protectorate in Palestine but Italy and Great Britain opposed it. France lost the religious protectorate but thanks to the Holy See continued to enjoy liturgical honours in Mandatory Palestine until 1924 when the honours were abolished (see: Protectorate of the Holy See).[24] The mandate was a legal and administrative instrument, not a geographical territory.[25] The territorial jurisdiction of the mandate was subject to change by treaty, capitulation, grant, usage, sufferance or other lawful means. To many observers it seemed as though the boundary of Britain's mandate for Palestine was to extend eastward to the western boundary of its mandate for Mesopotamia.[26] However, the area east of a line from Damascus, Homs, Hamma, and Aleppo including most of Transjordan had been pledged in 1915 as part of an undertaking between the UK and the Sharif Hussein of Mecca. The area east of the Jordan River 'was included in the areas as to which Great Britain [sic] pledged itself that they should be Arab and independent in the future'. At the 1919 Peace Conference, the Zionist Organization's claims did not include any territory east of the Hedjaz Railway. The Faisal-Weizmann Agreement provided that the boundaries between the Arab state and Palestine should be determined by a commission after the Paris Peace Conference. The proposed Arab state and Jewish national home called for separate boundaries and administrative regimes in the sub-districts of historical Cisjordan (west of the Jordan River) and Transjordan (east of the Jordan River). The Palestine Order in Council provided that: The High Commissioner may, with the approval of a Secretary of State, by Proclamation divide Palestine into administrative divisions or districts in such manner and with such subdivisions as may be convenient for purposes of administration describing the boundaries thereof and assigning names thereto.[27]
British Mandate for Palestine Aaron Klieman said that the French formed a new Damascus state after the battle of Maysalun. As a result, Curzon instructed Vansittart (Paris) to leave the eastern boundary of Palestine undefined. On 21 March 1921, the Foreign and Colonial office legal advisers decided to introduce Article 25 into the Palestine Mandate. It was approved by Curzon on 31 March 1921, and the revised final draft of the mandate (including Transjordan) was forwarded to the League of Nations on 22 July 1922.[30] Article 25 of the mandate recognised the McMahon-Hussein correspondence. It permitted the mandatory to "postpone or withhold application of such provisions of the mandate as he may consider inapplicable to the existing local conditions" in that region. The future Transjordan had been part of the Syrian administrative unit under the Ottomans. It was part of the captured territory placed under the Allied Occupied Enemy Territory Administration (OETA).[31] [32] At the Battle of Maysalun on 23 July 1920, the French removed the newly-proclaimed nationalist government of Hashim al-Atassi and expelled King Faisal from Syria. British Foreign Secretary Earl Curzon wrote to the High Commissioner, Herbert Samuel, in August 1920, stating, "I suggest that you should let it be known forthwith that in the area south of the Sykes-Picot line, we will not admit French authority and that our policy for this area to be independent but in closest relations with Palestine."[33] Samuel replied to Curzon, "After the fall of Damascus a fortnight ago...Sheiks and tribes east of Jordan utterly dissatisfied with Shareefian Government most unlikely would accept revival"[34] and subsequently announced that Transjordan was under British Mandate.[35] Without authority from London, Samuel then visited Transjordan and at a meeting with 600 leaders in Salt, announced the independence of the area from Damascus and its absorption into the mandate, quadrupling the area under his control by tacit capitulation. Samuel assured his audience that Transjordan would not be merged with Palestine.[35] The foreign secretary, Lord Curzon, repudiated Samuel's action.[36] The Cairo Conference was convened by Winston Churchill, then Britain's Colonial Secretary, to resolve the problem. With the mandates of Palestine and Iraq awarded to Britain, Churchill wished to consult with Middle East experts. At his request, Gertrude Bell, Sir Percy Cox, T. E. Lawrence, Sir Kinahan Cornwallis, Sir Arnold T. Wilson, Iraqi minister of war Jafar alAskari, Iraqi minister of finance Sasun Effendi (Sasson Heskayl), and others gathered in Cairo, Egypt, in March 1921. The outstanding question was the policy to be adopted in Transjordan to prevent anti-French military actions from being launched within the allied British zone of influence. The Hashemites were Associated Powers during the war, and a peaceful solution was urgently needed. The two most significant decisions of the conference were to offer the throne of Iraq to Emir Faisal ibn Hussein (who became Faisal I of Iraq) and an emirate of Transjordan (now Jordan) to his brother Abdullah ibn Hussein (who became Abdullah I of Jordan). Transjordan was to be constituted as an Arab province of Palestine. The conference provided the political blueprint for British administration in both Iraq and Transjordan, and in offering these two regions to the sons of Sharif Hussein ibn Ali of the Hedjaz, Churchill believed that the spirit, if not the letter, of Britain's wartime promises to the Arabs might be fulfilled. After further discussions between Churchill and Abdullah in Jerusalem, it was mutually agreed that Transjordan was accepted into the mandatory area with the proviso that it would be, initially for six months, under the nominal rule of the Emir Abdullah and would not form part of the Jewish national home to be established west of the River Jordan.[37] [38] That agreement was formalised before the mandate officially went into effect. An article was included in the Mandate for Palestine which allowed the UK to postpone or withhold unspecified provisions from the lands which lay to the east of the Jordan River.[39] On 16 September 1922, the League of Nations approved a British memorandum detailing its intended implementation of that clause, namely to exclude Transjordan from the articles related to Jewish settlement.[40] [41] From that point onwards, Britain administered the 23% west of the Jordan as "Palestine", and the 77% east of the Jordan as "Transjordan." The subsequent two mandates were administrated under one single British Foreign Office High Commissioner which does not prejudice or vacate the international principle whereof official League of
British Mandate for Palestine Nations documents referred to them as if they were two separate mandates. Transfer of authority to an Arab government took place gradually in Transjordan, starting with the recognition of a local administration in 1923 and transfer of most administrative functions in 1928. The status of the mandate was not altered by the agreement between the United Kingdom and the Emirate concluded on 20 February 1928.[42] [43] It recognised the existence of an independent government in Transjordan and defined and limited its powers. The ratifications were exchanged on 31 October 1929."[44] Britain retained mandatory authority over the region until it became independent as the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan in 1946. The juridical status of the mandate under the Palestine Mandate Convention remained unchanged pending a decision on the Palestine question by the United Nations or Transjordan's admission to the United Nations as an independent state. See Termination of the Mandate.
Demarcation of borders
During and after World War I, Britain made conflicting and shifting commitments regarding the future division and governance of the region, including those announced in the Balfour Declaration of 1917, the Sykes-Picot Agreement, the Hussein-McMahon correspondence, and the Churchill White Paper of 1922. At the San Remo conference, the boundaries of the mandated territories were not precisely defined.[15] [45] The boundary between the British and French mandates was defined in broad terms by the Franco-British Boundary Agreement of December 1920.[46] That agreement placed the bulk of the Golan Heights in the French sphere. The treaty also established a joint commission to settle the precise border and mark it on the ground.[46] The commission submitted its final report on 3 February 1922, and it was approved with some caveats by the British and French governments on 7 March 1923, several months before Britain and France assumed their Mandatory responsibilities on 29 September 1923.[47] [48] Under the treaty, Syrian and Lebanese residents would have the same fishing and navigation rights on Lake Hula, Lake Tiberias, and the Jordan River as citizens of the Palestine Mandate, but the government of Palestine would be responsible for policing of the lakes. The Zionist movement pressured the French and British to include as much water sources as possible to Palestine during the demarcating negotiations. These constant demands influenced the negotiators and finally led to the inclusion of the whole Sea of Galilee, both sides of the Jordan river, Lake Hula, Dan spring, and part of the Yarmouk. The High Commissioner of Palestine, Herbert Samuel, had demanded full control of the Sea of Galilee.[49] The new border followed a 10-meter wide strip along the northeastern shore.[50]
Map showing boundaries (in red) of the proposed Jewish state, as suggested by the Zionist representatives at the 1919 Paris Peace Conference, superimposed on modern boundaries.
Following the settlement of the border issue, the British and French governments signed on 2 February 1926 an Agreement of good neighbourly Relations between the mandated territories of Palestine, Syria and Lebanon.[51]
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The object of Zionism is to establish for the Jewish people a home in Palestine secured by public law." ... ...It has been said and is still being obstinately repeated by anti-Zionists again and again, that Zionism aims at the creation of an independent "Jewish State" But this is fallacious. The "Jewish State" was never part of the Zionist programme. The Jewish State was the title of Herzl's first pamphlet, which had the supreme merit of forcing people to think. This pamphlet was followed by the first Zionist Congress, which accepted the Basle programme the only programme in existence.
The United Nations Special Committee on Palestine said the Jewish National Home, which derived from the formulation of Zionist aspirations in the 1897 Basle program has provoked many discussions concerning its meaning, scope and legal character, especially since it had no known legal connotation and there are no precedents in international law for its interpretation. It was used in the Balfour Declaration and in the Mandate, both of which promised the establishment of a "Jewish National Home" without, however, defining its meaning. A statement on "British Policy in Palestine," issued on 3 June 1922 by the Colonial Office, placed a restrictive construction upon the Balfour Declaration. The statement included "the disappearance or subordination of the Arabic population, language or customs in Palestine" or "the imposition of Jewish nationality upon the inhabitants of Palestine as a whole", and made it clear that in the eyes of the mandatory Power, the Jewish National Home was to be founded in Palestine and not that Palestine as a whole was to be converted into a Jewish National Home. The Committee noted that the construction, which restricted considerably the scope of the National Home, was made prior to the confirmation of the Mandate by the Council of the League of Nations and was formally accepted at the time by the Executive of the Zionist Organization.[59] The League of Nations Permanent Mandates Commission took the position that the Mandate contained a dual obligation. In 1932 the Mandates Commission questioned the representative of the Mandatory on the demands made by the Arab population regarding the establishment of self-governing institutions, in accordance with various articles of the mandate, and in particular Article 2. The Chairman noted that "under the terms of the same article, the mandatory Power had long since set up the Jewish National Home."[60] In March 1930 Lord Passfield, the Secretary of State for the Colonies, had written a Cabinet Paper[61] which said: In the Balfour Declaration there is no suggestion that the Jews should be accorded a special or favoured position in Palestine as compared with the Arab inhabitants of the country, or that the claims of Palestinians to enjoy self-government (subject to the rendering of administrative advice and assistance by a Mandatory as foreshadowed in Article XXII of the Covenant) should be curtailed in order to facilitate the establishment in Palestine of a National Home for the Jewish people." ... Zionist leaders have not concealed and do not conceal their opposition to the grant of any measure of self-government to the people of Palestine either now or for many years to come. Some of them even go so far as to claim that that provision of Article 2 of the Mandate constitutes a bar to compliance with the demand of the Arabs for any measure of self-government. In view of the provisions of Article XXII of the Covenant and of the promises made to the Arabs on several occasions that claim is inadmissible. In 1937 a British Royal Commission headed by Lord Peel proposed solving the Arab-Jewish conflict by partitioning Palestine into two states. The Jewish leadership rejected the plan and developed an alternate proposal.[62] The US Consul General at Jerusalem told the State Department that the Mufti had refused the principle of partition and declined to consider it. The Consul said that the Emir Abdullah urged acceptance on the ground that realities must be faced, but wanted modification of the proposed boundaries and Arab administrations in the neutral enclave. The Consul also noted that Nashashibi side-stepped the principle, but was willing to negotiate for favourable modifications.[63]
British Mandate for Palestine A collection of private correspondence published by David Ben Gurion contained a letter written in 1937 which explained that he was in favour of partition because he didn't envision a partial Jewish state as the end of the process. Ben Gurion wrote "What we want is not that the country be united and whole, but that the united and whole country be Jewish." He explained that a first-class Jewish army would permit Zionists to settle in the rest of the country with or without the consent of the Arabs.[64] Benny Morris said that both Chaim Weizmann and David Ben Gurion saw partition as a stepping stone to further expansion and the eventual takeover of the whole of Palestine.[65] Former Israeli Foreign Minister and historian Schlomo Ben Ami writes that 1937 was the same year that the "Field Battalions" under Yitzhak Sadeh wrote the "Avner Plan", which anticipated and laid the groundwork for what would become in 1948, Plan D. It envisioned going far beyond any boundaries contained in the existing partition proposals and planned the conquest of the Galilee, the West Bank, and Jerusalem.[66] In 1942 the Biltmore Program was adopted as the platform of the World Zionist Organization. It demanded "that Palestine be established as a Jewish Commonwealth." In 1946 an Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry, also known as the Grady-Morrison Committee, noted that the demand for a Jewish State went beyond the obligations of either the Balfour Declaration or the Mandate and had been expressly disowned by the Chairman of the Jewish Agency as recently as 1932.[67] The Jewish Agency subsequently refused to accept the Grady Morrison Plan as the basis for discussion. A spokesman for the agency, Eliahu Epstein, told the US State Department that the Agency could not attend the London conference if the Grady-Morrison proposal was on the agenda. He stated that the Agency was unwilling to be placed in a position where it might have to compromise between the Grady-Morrison proposals on the one hand and its own partition plan on the other. He stated that the Agency had accepted partition as the solution for Palestine which it favoured.[68]
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The arrival of Sir Herbert Samuel. From left to right: Col. T. E. Lawrence, Emir Abdullah, Air Marshal Sir Geoffrey Salmond, and Sir Wyndham Deedes and others
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British Mandate for Palestine British, appealing to the terms of the mandate, which they had designed themselves, rejected the principle of majority rule or any other measure that would give an Arab majority control over the government of Palestine.[81] The terms of the mandate required the establishment of self-governing institutions in both Palestine and Transjordan. In 1947 Foreign Secretary Bevin admitted that during the previous twenty-five years the British had done, their best to further the legitimate aspirations of the Jewish communities without prejudicing the interests of the Arabs, but had failed to "secure the development of self-governing institutions" in accordance with the terms of the Mandate.[82]
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British Mandate for Palestine 30th, Egypt 33rd and Turkey 35th.[89] The Jews in Palestine were mainly urban, 76.2% in 1942, while the Arabs were mainly rural, 68.3% in 1942.[90] Overall, Khalidi concludes that Palestinian Arab society, while overmatched by the Yishuv, was as advanced as any other Arab society in the region and considerably more than several.[91] Under the British Mandate, the country developed economically and culturally. In 1919 the Jewish community founded a centralised Hebrew school system, and the following year "Bevingrad" in Jerusalem, Russian Compound behind barbed wire established the Assembly of Representatives, the Jewish National Council and the Histadrut labour federation. The Technion university was founded in 1924, and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 1925.[92]
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British Mandate for Palestine The Jewish Agency, which was the Jewish state-in-formation, accepted the plan, and nearly all the Jews in Palestine rejoiced at the news. Israeli history books mention 29 November as the most important date in the creation of Israel as it refers to UNGA 181 of 1947 Partition of the Mandate of Palestine into two states and whereof Israel's Proclamation of Independence refers to UNGA 181 as its source of sovereignty in Ph's 9 & 15. The partition plan was rejected out of hand by Palestinian Arab leaders and by most of the Arab population. Meeting in Cairo in November and December 1947, the Arab League then adopted a series of resolutions aimed at a military solution to the conflict. Britain announced that it would accept the partition plan, but refused to enforce it, arguing it was not acceptable to both sides. Britain also refused to share the administration of Palestine with the UN Palestine Commission during the transitional period. In September 1947, the British government announced that the Mandate for Palestine would end at midnight on 14 May 1948.[103] [104] [105] Some Jewish organizations also opposed the proposal. Irgun leader Menachem Begin announced: "The partition of the homeland is illegal. It will never be recognised. The signature by institutions and individuals of the partition agreement is invalid. It will not bind the Jewish people. Jerusalem was and will for ever be our capital. The Land of Israel will be restored to the people of Israel. All of it. And for ever." These views were publicly rejected by the majority of the nascent Jewish state.
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British Mandate for Palestine detailed legal argument from Rabbis Wise and Silver objecting to the independence of Transjordan.[113] In 1946 Transjordan applied for membership in the United Nations. The President of the Security Council, speaking in his capacity as the representative of Poland, said that Transjordan was part of a joint Mandate. He denied that the Mandate had been legally terminated and asserted the rights and obligations of the United Nations. He mentioned that US Secretary of State Byrnes had spoken out against premature recognition of Transjordan, and he added that the application should not be considered until the question of Palestine as a whole was addressed.[114] Transjordan's application for UN membership was not approved. At the 1947 Pentagon Conference, the USA advised the UK it was withholding recognition of Transjordan pending a decision on the Palestine question by the United Nations.[115] During the General Assembly deliberations on Palestine, there were suggestions that it would be desirable to incorporate part of Transjordan's territory into the proposed Jewish state. A few days before 29 November 1947 decision on partition, U.S. Secretary of State Marshall noted frequent references had been made by the Ad Hoc Committee regarding the desirability of the Jewish State having both the Negev and an "outlet to the Red Sea and the Port of Aqaba."[116] According to John Snetsinger, Chaim Weizmann visited President Truman on 19 November 1947 and said it was imperative that the Negev and Port of Aqaba be under Jewish control and that they be included in the Jewish state.[117] Truman telephoned the US delegation to the UN and told them he supported Weizmann's position.[118] The British had notified the U.N. of their intent to terminate the mandate not later than 1 August 1948,[119] However, early in 1948, the United Kingdom announced its firm intention to end its mandate in Palestine on May 14. In response, President Harry S. Truman made a statement on March 25 proposing UN trusteeship rather than partition, stating that "unfortunately, it has become clear that the partition plan cannot be carried out at this time by peaceful means... unless emergency action is taken, there will be no public authority in Palestine on that date capable of preserving law and order. Violence and bloodshed will descend upon the Holy Land. Large-scale fighting among the people of that country will be the inevitable result."[120] The Jewish Leadership led by future Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, declared independence on the afternoon of Friday, May 14, 1948 (5 Iyar 5708 (Hebrew calendar date), with the declaration to become effective from the end of the Mandate at midnight of that day.[121] [122] The State of Israel declared itself as an independent nation, and was quickly recognised by the Soviet Union, the United States, and many other countries, but not by the surrounding Arab states. Over the next few days, approximately 700 Lebanese, 1,876 Syrian, 4,000 Iraqi, 2,800 Egyptian troops invaded Palestine.[123] Around 4,500 Transjordanian troops, commanded by 38 British officers who had resigned their commissions in the British army only weeks earlier (commanded by General Glubb), invaded the Corpus separatum region encompassing Jerusalem and its environs (in response to the Haganah's Operation Kilshon[124] ), as well as areas designated as part of the Arab state by the UN partition plan. On the date of British withdrawal, the Jewish provisional government declared the formation of the State of Israel. The partition plan required that the proposed states grant full civil rights to all people within their borders, regardless of race, religion or gender. Although Israel acknowledged that obligation, legal scholars, including Prof. James Crawford and Prof. William Thomas Mallison, have noted that Israel did not comply with the prescribed conditions for protection of minorities.[125] [126]
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References
[1] Palestine Royal Commission Report Presented by the Secretary of State for the Colonies to Parliament by Command of His Majesty, July 1937, Cmd. 5479 (http:/ / unispal. un. org/ UNISPAL. NSF/ 0/ 88A6BF6F1BD82405852574CD006C457F). His Majestys Stationery Office., London, 1937. 404 pages + maps. [2] Marjorie M. Whiteman, Digest of International Law, vol. 1, US State Department (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1963) pp 650652 [3] The Palestine Mandate, The Avalon Project (http:/ / avalon. law. yale. edu/ 20th_century/ palmanda. asp) [4] Article 22, The Covenant of the League of Nations (http:/ / www. yale. edu/ lawweb/ avalon/ leagcov. htm#art22) and "Mandate for Palestine," Encyclopedia Judaica, Vol. 11, p. 862, Keter Publishing House, Jerusalem, 1972 [5] Tom Segev's New Mandate, [[Yehoshua Porath (http:/ / www. jewishagency. org/ JewishAgency/ English/ Jewish+ Education/ Educational+ Resources/ More+ Educational+ Resources/ Azure/ 9/ 9-porat. html. htm)]] [6] The Middle East and North Africa in World Politics: A Documentary Record, by J. C. Hurewitz, 1979, Yale University Press; 2nd edition, ISBN 0-300-02203-4, page 26, BRITISH WAR AIMS IN OTTOMAN ASIA: REPORT OF THE DE BUNSEN COMMITTEE 30 June 1915 [7] See the detailed discussions set out in Balfour Declaration of 1917 and Hussein-McMahon correspondence, as well as that in the Churchill White Paper. It is difficult to determine how much of the conflict was due to British duplicity or to the exigencies of raison d'etat, and how much simply to infelicitous language used by McMahon in his correspondence of 24 October 1915, particularly in the meaning of his rather unfortunate phrase "portions of Syria lying to the west of...". In any event, without trying to assess the good faith of the British government, it is clear (as it was to the observers and participants, both within and outside of the government, at the time) that serious misunderstandings had been engendered by the statements of the British government, whatever may have been their underlying intent. [8] (Biger 2004, pp.55, 164) [9] The others included Occupied Enemy Territories North (Lebanon) under the command of French Colonel De Piape and Occupied Enemy Territory East (Syria and Transjordan) under the command of Faisal's chief of staff, General Ali Riza el-Riqqabi. [10] See also "The Armistice in the Middle East," in (http:/ / www. encyclopedia. com/ doc/ 1G1-142205397. html) [11] Report of a Committee Set up to Consider Certain Correspondence Between [[Sir Henry McMahon (http:/ / domino. un. org/ unispal. nsf/ 3d14c9e5cdaa296d85256cbf005aa3eb/ 4c4f7515dc39195185256cf7006f878c!OpenDocument)] and the Sharif of Mecca in 1915 and 1916], UNISPAL, Annex H. [12] Allenby and British Strategy in the Middle East, 19171919, Matthew Hughes, Taylor & Francis, 1999, ISBN 0-7146-4473-0, page 122 (http:/ / books. google. com/ books?id=vbJWx89nJSIC& pg=PA123& dq=& client=#PPA122,M1) [13] Papp 1994, pp.35. Papp suggests that the French concessions were made to guarantee British support for French aims at the post-war peace conference concerning Germany and Europe. [14] see pages 110 of the minutes of the meeting of the Council of Four starting here: (http:/ / digicoll. library. wisc. edu/ cgi-bin/ FRUS/ FRUS-idx?type=goto& id=FRUS. FRUS1919Parisv05& isize=M& submit=Go+ to+ page& page=1) [15] (Biger 2004, p.173) [16] http:/ / www. mideastweb. org/ feisweiz. htm [17] Excerpts from League of Nations Official Journal dated June 1922, pp. 546549 (http:/ / unispal. un. org/ unispal. nsf/ 9a798adbf322aff38525617b006d88d7/ b08168048e277b5a052565f70058cef3?OpenDocument) [18] Palestine Papers, 19171922, Doreen Ingrams, 1973, George Brazziller Edition, Chapter 9, Drafting the Mandate [19] The Sykes-Picot Agreement: 1916, Avalon Project (http:/ / www. yale. edu/ lawweb/ avalon/ mideast/ sykes. htm) [20] Foreign Relations of the United States, Statement of Emir Faisal to the Council of Ten (http:/ / digicoll. library. wisc. edu/ cgi-bin/ FRUS/ FRUS-idx?type=turn& entity=FRUS. FRUS1919Parisv03. p0899& q1=Feisal& q2=Clemenceau) [21] DESIRES OF HEDJAZ STIR PARIS CRITICS; Arab Kingdom's Aspirations Clash With French Aims in Asia Minor (http:/ / query. nytimes. com/ mem/ archive-free/ pdf?_r=1& res=9805EED61039E13ABC4053DFB4668382609EDE& oref=slogin) [22] Statement of the Zionist Organization regarding Palestine, 3 February 1919 (http:/ / domino. un. org/ UNISPAL. NSF/ 9a798adbf322aff38525617b006d88d7/ 2d1c045fbc3f12688525704b006f29cc!OpenDocument) [23] The King-Crane Commission Report, 28 August 1919 Confidential Appendix (http:/ / www. hri. org/ docs/ king-crane/ appendix. html) [24] The Vatican and Zionism: Conflict in the Holy Land, 18951925, Sergio I. Minerbi, Oxford University Press, USA, 1990, ISBN 0-19-505892-5 [25] 'Date on which the question of the Draft Mandate for Palestine should be placed on the Agenda of the Council' (http:/ / domino. un. org/ unispal. nsf/ 2ee9468747556b2d85256cf60060d2a6/ b08168048e277b5a052565f70058cef3!OpenDocument). [26] Douglas J. Feith et al. (1994). Israel's Legitimacy in Law and History. Center for Near East Policy. pp.56 & 102. ISBN0964014505. "There was never any question that Britain's two mandatesfor Palestine and Mesopotamiawere to be geographically contiguous. The UK had not decided by 1920 where in the desert east of the Jordan River the boundary line between eastern Palestine and Mesopotamia should be drawn." [27] The Palestine Order in Council, 10 August 1922, article 11. (http:/ / unispal. un. org/ UNISPAL. NSF/ 0/ C7AAE196F41AA055052565F50054E656) [28] Palestine and International Law, Essays on Politics and Economics, ed. Sanford R. Silverburg, McFarland, 2002, ISBN 0-7864-1191-0, page 14, footnote 37
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Bibliography
Papp, Ilan (15 August 1994). "Introduction" (http://books.google.com/books?id=zAJZCKAwtPMC& pg=PR5&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=0_1#PPA1,M1). The Making of the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 19471951 (http://books.google.com/books?id=zAJZCKAwtPMC). I.B.Tauris. ISBN9781850438199. Retrieved 2 May 2009. Khalidi, Rashid (2006). The Iron Cage: The Story of the Palestinian Struggle for Statehood (http://books. google.com/books?id=xp3MQavDxjIC). Beacon Press. ISBN0-8070-0308-5. Retrieved 2 May 2009. Khalidi, Rashid (2007) [1st ed. 2001]. "The Palestinians and 1948: the underlying causes of failure" (http:// books.google.com/books?id=h3EOJGiBBpQC&pg=PR5&source=gbs_selected_pages& cad=0_1#PPA12,M1). In Eugene L. Rogan & Avi Shlaim. The War for Palestine: Rewriting the History of 1948 (http://books.google.com/books?id=h3EOJGiBBpQC) (2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press. ISBN9780521699341. Retrieved 2 May 2009. Khalidi, Walid (1987) [Original in 1971]. From Haven to Conquest: Readings in Zionism and the Palestine Problem Until 1948 (http://books.google.com/books?id=qSpIAAAAMAAJ). Institute for Palestine Studies. ISBN0887281559. Retrieved 2 May 2009. Morris, Benny (2001) [Original in 1999]. Righteous Victims: A History of the Zionist-Arab Conflict, 18811999 (http://books.google.com/books?id=ZawVAQAACAAJ). New York: Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN978-0-679-74475-7. Retrieved 2 May 2009. Aruri, Naseer Hasan (1972). Jordan: A Study in Political Development 19231965 (http://books.google.com/ books?id=GVaG4WGKj9MC). The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers. ISBN9789024712175. Retrieved 2 May 2009. Biger, Gideon (2004). The Boundaries of Modern Palestine, 18401947 (http://books.google.com/ books?id=jC9MbKNh8GUC). London: Routledge. ISBN9780714656540. Retrieved 2 May 2009. Louis, Wm. Roger (1969). The United Kingdom and the Beginning of the Mandates System, 19191922. International Organization, 23(1), pp.7396. Segev, Tom (2001) [Original in 2000]. "Nebi Musa, 1920" (http://books.google.com/ books?id=XvT8CWv2DakC&pg=PA127). One Palestine, Complete: Jews and Arabs Under the British Mandate (http://books.google.com/books?id=XvT8CWv2DakC). Trans. Haim Watzman. London: Henry Holt and Company. ISBN9780805065879. Retrieved 2 May 2009. Stein, Kenneth W. (1987) [Original in 1984]. The Land Question in Palestine, 19171939 (http://books.google. com/books?id=hpvnNILnO3kC). University of North Carolina Press. ISBN9780807841785. Retrieved 2 May 2009. Gilbert, Martin (1998). Israel: a history (http://books.google.com/books?id=Wn6gAAAAMAAJ). Doubleday. ISBN9780385404013. Retrieved 2 May 2009. Shapira, Anita (1992). Land and Power: The Zionist Resort to Force, 18811948 (http://books.google.com/ books?id=h4K06WBjCrAC). trans. William Templer. Oxford University Press. ISBN0-19-506104-7. Retrieved 2 May 2009. Black, Ian (1991). Israel's Secret Wars: A History of Israel's Intelligence Services. Morris, Benny. Grove Press. ISBN0-8021-1159-9. Avneri, Aryeh L. (1984). The claim of dispossession: Jewish land-settlement and the Arabs, 18781948 (http:// books.google.com/books?id=8Teb4dKHQcoC). Transaction Publishers. ISBN9780878559640. Retrieved 2 May 2009. Khalaf, Issa (1991). Politics in Palestine: Arab factionalism and social disintegration, 19391948 (http://books. google.com/books?id=nrc3EUh9cyUC). State University of New York Press. ISBN9780791407080. Retrieved 6 May 2009.
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Further reading
Bayliss, Thomas (1999). How Israel Was Won: A Concise History of the Arab-Israeli Conflict. Lexington Books. ISBN 9780739100646 Bethell, Nicholas The Palestine Triangle: the Struggle Between the British, the Jews and the Arabs, 193548, London: Deutsch, 1979 ISBN 0-233-97069-X. El-Eini, Roza I.M. (2006). Mandated landscape: British imperial rule in Palestine, 19291948 (http://books. google.com/books?id=ekQOAAAAQAAJ). London: Routledge. ISBN9780714654263. Retrieved 5 May 2009. Katz, Shmuel (1973). Battleground: Fact and Fantasy in Palestine (http://books.google.com/ books?id=xp3MQavDxjIC). Bantam Books. ISBN0-929093-13-5. Retrieved 2 May 2009. Paris, Timothy J. (2003). Britain, the Hashemites and Arab Rule, 19201925: The Sherifian Solution. London: Routledge. ISBN 0-7146-5451-5 Sherman, A J (1998).Mandate Days: British Lives in Palestine, 19181948, Thames & Hudson. ISBN 0-8018-6620-0
External links
Resources > Modern Period > 20th Cent. > History of Israel > Building a State > British Mandate (19171948) (http://www.dinur.org/resources/resourceCategoryDisplay.aspx?categoryid=777&rsid=478) The Jewish History Resource Center, Project of the Dinur Center for Research in Jewish History, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem Coins and Banknotes of Palestine under the British Mandate (http://www.drberlin.com/palestine) Stamps of Palestine under the British Mandate (http://www.zobbel.de/stamp/pal_poste.htm) A history of Palestine, Israel and the Arab-Israeli conflict (http://www.mideastweb.org/briefhistory.htm) An Introduction to the Israel-Palestine Conflict (http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/article.php?pg=4&ar=10) by Norman Finkelstein Map of Population Distribution by Ethnicity 1946 (http://www.passia.org/images/pal_facts_MAPS/ dist_of_pop_jews_and_palestinians_1946.gif) Population of Palestine before 1948 (http://www.mideastweb.org/palpop.htm) Map of Land Ownership in Palestine 1945 (http://domino.un.org/maps/m0094.jpg) British Servicemen and Police who died 19451948 Database (http://www.roll-of-honour.com/Databases/ Palestine/index.html) The Jewish Community under the Mandate (http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/ jews_mandate.html) at Jewish Virtual Library.org "Mandate Unscrambled." (http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,882742,00.html). Time Magazine. 9 July 1937. Retrieved 14 October 2009. British Mandate of Palestine Coins (http://www.chiefacoins.com/Database/Countries/Palestine.htm) British Mandate of Palestine (http://histclo.com/essay/war/ip/man/pal-man.html)
Primary sources
Yale Law School, Avalon Project, archive copy of the Palestine Mandate (http://avalon.law.yale.edu/ 20th_century/palmanda.asp) Map of 1947 UN division (http://domino.un.org/maps/m0103_1b.gif)
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License
License
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported http:/ / creativecommons. org/ licenses/ by-sa/ 3. 0/
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