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At Large
A Lost Opportunity of Historic Proportions
Why the British Mandate failed and helped produce an Arab war on Zionism instead.
(Page 2 of 2)
The putative National Home became an armed camp, with Jewish dissident groups and waging guerrilla war on the British administration, leading to reprisals and counter-reprisals. It remained for the new United Nations to ponder the problem afresh and recommend partition, which was accepted by Jews but again rejected by Arabs. The British announced their intention to depart Palestine, after which the contest between Arabs and Jews was put to the test of the sword.
On May 14, 1948, the last High Commissioner, General Sir Alan Cunningham, left Government House in Jerusalem for the last time and proceeded under heavily armed escort in an armored car for Haifa port where he boarded HMS Euryalus, bringing to an end three decades of British rule in Palestine. The next day, at a meeting convened in Tel Aviv’s Museum of Modern Art, the head of the Jewish community in Palestine, David Ben Gurion, announced the formation of the new state of Israel, to which American and Soviet recognition was forthcoming within hours. Later that day, Arabs armies invaded, Tel Aviv was bombed from the air, and Ben Gurion’s first prime ministerial address to the nation was delivered from an air raid shelter.
The Jews prevailed, Arabs fled the war zone in large numbers and refugee camps housing their burgeoning communities became a permanent fixture in neighboring countries. Arabs have since plumbed every resource of counter-offensive, military, diplomatic, and psychological, to demoralize and destroy the country which has grown despite searing adversity into a powerhouse of innovation and development. The Jewish National Home has been a state for 64 years, but its existence remains contested to this very day.
British governments and officials at times acted to honor the Mandate’s terms, secured the national home in the 1920s at a time when Britain was militarily and financially stretched, introduced Hebrew as an official language, established, at first, a liberal Jewish immigration policy and developed the country’s infrastructure. But in the end, they entrenched a conflict that might have been deflected onto less bloody paths and ensured that Israel, when it did emerge, did so under fire, which has rarely subsided since, fueled by a refugee problem the international community has connived in keeping alive. It need not have been the outcome. A strong and lawfully established Jewish state had been an option, a firm British ally would thereby have emerged and Britain might even have maintained the military and naval facilities it had so fretted about losing during much of the Mandate. Certainly, such an alliance is likely to have endured longer and stronger than the gerry-built British treaties with Egyptian and Iraqi autocracies that imploded into blood-letting and overthrow within a matter of a few years. Instead, attempting to appease implacable Arab opposition to Zionism invigorated conflict and ensured an ignominious British departure. The British Mandate was a missed opportunity.
About the Author
Daniel Mandel is a Fellow in History at Melbourne University and author of H. V. Evatt and the Establishment of Israel: The Undercover Zionist (Routledge, London, 2004). His blog can be found on the History News Network.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (57) | Leave a comment
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Jack in Wi| 8.15.12 @ 6:27AM
There should have never been a British Mandate. The British promised the Arabs their independence if they fought the Turks. The British and the French forgot all their promises and divided the region between them. That my friends, is why we have a mess in the Middle East today. Before the British stuck their noses in Palistine, it had been a peaceful backwater where the largely agricultural population had lived in relative peace and harmony for hundreds of years. The population was about 1/3 Christian, with the rest mostly Muslim. There also was a Druze and small Jewish community.
The area that became Lebanon had a majority Christian population. Syria, Iraq and Egypt had large Christian minorities. Muslims were divided mostly Sunni and Shia. The British and Frence ruled their empires by the divide and conquor principle. After WW2 these empires became untenable and the colonial powers left. The USA has tried to take over and made a worse messs then the British and French did. It is long since time to get out of this region and a lot of other ones and let these people figure it out for themselves.
Jack in Wi| 8.15.12 @ 6:38AM
There were fairly large and generally properous Jewish populations in Iraq, Syria, and Egypt. They got along with their Christian and Muslim neighbors. Since the end of WW2 The Christian populations of Iraq and Palistine have been reduced to a small number. The Christians of Egypt and Syria are under severe stress. The whole policy of the USA in this region makes enemies everyday. It is incompetently run and makes no sense.
The Arabs need to sell their oil to live. Until we got really heavily involved in the area the price of oil was peanuts. The Arabs have been punishing us for our interference in the area by keeping the prices sky high. It is time to get the hell out and develop our own vast energy sources. Let the Middle East be the worry of the Europeans, Chinese, Indians, and Japanese who really need the oil. None of them seem to think it is necessary to hang around the area like we do.
Nick| 8.15.12 @ 10:06AM
You forgot to praise your hero, Herr Hitler, for not starting the "Final Solution" until 1942, Jackboot the Nazi.
Were you related to the Oak Creek killer?
Jack in Wi| 8.15.12 @ 10:15AM
Hi George Neumyr- Nick. No the Oak Creek killer fell for your crackpot propaganda that people with brown skins and headress' on are his enemies. His was too stupid to realize that a Sikh is different from a Muslim. The hatred spread by you crackpot Zionists is responsible for causing a tremendous amount of hatred both here and around the world. You have a lot to answer for when you meet your Judge, Jesus.
Nick| 8.15.12 @ 10:44AM
Why do you keep calling me "George Neumyr [sic]" you illiterate Nazi?
I'm Nick from Detroit. I've been commenting here for close to 4 years, Jackboot the Nazi.
How many of your relatives were in the Gestapo and SS?
Jack in Wi| 8.15.12 @ 10:57AM
Nick: You sure sound like George, another Neocon who pretends to be a Catholic. Real Catholics don't spread hate and crackpot Zionist war propaganda.
RCV| 8.15.12 @ 11:17AM
You're right, Jack. Real Catholics don't spread hate. They aren't antisemites like you. As my parish priest at St. Boniface in New York used to say to little thugs like you, "Christ was a Jew, you idiot."
Nick| 8.15.12 @ 12:50PM
And you sound like the lefty priest, Fr. Coughlin, who was deluded into believing that Jewish bankers ran the world.
Fortunately, Archbishop Edward Mooney silenced the good Padre. Too bad I can't get your bishop to silence you, Jackboot the Nazi.
RCV| 8.15.12 @ 9:38PM
Jack has expressed his admiration for that crackpot many times.
CJW| 8.15.12 @ 1:43PM
Jack/Adolph, in the other article you said about Israel:
"As far as I am concerned that little cancerous pimple on the face of the world should have been blown off the earth because of it. The world would be a far more peaceful place."
You are not a Catholic or American in any definition accepted by civilized people.
You are a Nazi scumbag.
2Anglico| 8.15.12 @ 9:41AM
There should have never been a Jack in Wi ...
John786| 8.15.12 @ 7:10AM
A few friends got together and sold my house to another one of their friends. Apparently this other friend of theirs had ancestral connection to my house going back two thousand years ago (: apparently it's all documented in their holy book). The first I heard about it was when they evicted me. As you can imagine I'm not very happy. I'm now living in a neighbour's yard. Please help. They are trashing all my family heirlooms passed down through the generations. They are all heavily armed and have now started to kill my family. Please help.
Nick| 8.15.12 @ 10:10AM
"Please help."
Umm.....NO!
Tell your friends & relatives to stop blowing up innocent civilians and launching rockets into residential neighborhoods.
Jack in Wi| 8.15.12 @ 10:24AM
George-Nick. Quit pushing crackpot Zionist lies that Muslims are not full human beings deserving of respectful treatment. The Pope talks to the Iranians. Why can't we? The answer in Palistine is full integration with full civil, human and political rights for all the peoples who live in the borders of old Palistine. That means the 5 million Muslims, Druze and Christians and the 4 and one half million Jews.
The answer in Iran is for us to send an ambassador to Tehren, open full diplomatic relations, end immoral sanctions, just like the Pope wants, and get the hell out of the region and let these people run their own lives. The price of oil would plumett.
Nick| 8.15.12 @ 10:51AM
Oh, wait a minute. Maybe you aren't an illiterate Nazi.
It must be very hard to type while wearing your white sheet and hood, huh?
If this is the case, it explains much, Jackboot the Nazi.
Please, tell us more of how your hero, Hitler, was a friend of the Jews because he wanted to ship them to Madagascar. And, how Hitler was nice enough not to start the "Final Solution" until 1942. Anti-Semitic schweinhund.
Jack in Wi| 8.15.12 @ 11:10AM
I never ever said Hitler was a friend of the Jews you lying piece of dung. I said he was a Zionist in that he wanted them out of Germany and in their own country. He made a pact with the Zionists early in his regime to help them move to Palistine. It was called The Transfer Agreement. Most Jews wanted nothing to do with Palistine.But if you wanted to get any hard money out of German, you had to go therey. The Zionists were the only peeole would negotiate with. They both wanted the Jews out of Germany and in another country.
Later Hitler got flack from all the Arabs who wanted this policy stopped, so he settled on Madagascar the place to send the Jews. This was after he conquered France. The Holocaust only was planned in early 1942 after the USA came into the war. Those are the facts. There is nothing to argue about. If you want to read the ADL approved version read the book the Transfer Agreement by Edmund Black. For a far darker version read the webbsites of the Anti-Zionist Jews. Even Black's is bad enough.
Jack in Wi| 8.15.12 @ 11:20AM
I want to correct one mistake above. The proper sentence should read. The only Jewish group Hitler would negotiate with were the Zionists. Their newpapers were the only ones allowed to be printed of the Jewish press in Germany. Hitler kept his agreements with them faithfully right up to the war. George- Nick do a little homework before you try to take me on again.
Doctor Right| 8.15.12 @ 12:12PM
I'll take you on, you Nazi gas-bag.
You're a sick, stupid man.
You're also a coward hiding behind your keyboard, safely tucked away in Nowhere, Wisconsin.
You don't have the balls to ever admit any of the crap you believe in public, you slimy little weasel.
Quartermaster| 8.15.12 @ 12:59PM
Doc, you didn't take one on. All you did was show you are everything you accuse him of being. It would be nice if you libtards masquerading as Conservatives would simply own up to what you are and crawl back under your rock.
That said, show what was wrong among what clint said. Do a bit of actual research instead of relying on that publik skool indoctrination you keep showing off.
CJW| 8.15.12 @ 1:45PM
Q
Why do you always refer to Jack as clint?
Doctor Right| 8.15.12 @ 3:06PM
Look...
One idiot (Jack) on this board is enough.
You think I'm a Lib??? THAT'S funny!!!! I guess you don't read much, or very well.
CJW| 8.15.12 @ 1:48PM
Adolph,
You said:
"The Holocaust only was planned in early 1942 after the USA came into the war."
So the USA caused your fellow Nazis to plan the Holocaust? If it wasn't for the USA entering the war after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, then the Jews would have been safe?
Nick| 8.15.12 @ 1:58PM
W,
Your appeals to logic & common sense are wasted on Jackboot the Nazi, I'm afraid.
It's like trying to have a rational conversation with Louie Farrakhan, as you well know.
Doctor Right| 8.15.12 @ 3:08PM
Jack,
You're deluded.
The Holocaust was planned well before the Wannsee Conference; that was about logistics.
Nick| 8.15.12 @ 11:44AM
Yes, yes, Jackboot the Nazi. You are so right.
There should be a statue of your hero, Hitler, at Yad Vashem, and a picture of him at every Holocaust museum in the world. Because he was so reasonable when it came to what to do with those pesky Jews.
Let me guess? You believe Polish troops really attacked that German radio station on August 31st, 1939? You Jew-hating Nazi, Jackboot.
Jack in Wi| 8.15.12 @ 11:57AM
Well Nick if it wasn't for Hitler and the Transfer Agreement there never would have been an Israel. Hitler and the Zionists were both nasty racists. Thats probably why they got along so well.
Nick| 8.15.12 @ 1:20PM
Oh, now Israelis can thank Hitler for their state!?!??? You really are insane.
Let me guess? Your grandpa wrote The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, eh, Jackboot the Nazi?
Anti-Semetic putz.
Jack in Wi| 8.15.12 @ 2:19PM
It's been a long time since I read Edmund Black's book. But I believe his conclusion was that Israel would not exist without the Transfer Agreement. Read it yourself you ignorant clod. Usually I don't waste my time with people like you Nick-George. This is my last post of the day on this subject. I have a lot better things to do.
CJW| 8.15.12 @ 2:23PM
Jack
You do know that the song "Springtime for Hitler" from the Producers is satire?
Occam's Tool| 8.16.12 @ 1:32AM
When you stop raping 9 year old girls and beheading infants, I'll think about it, vermin.
My goodness, "the gnurrs come from ze voodwork out,"to quote a title of a story I read long ago.
johntyd| 8.16.12 @ 2:49AM
Everybody else's property is sacred except the thieves that deal in it. Jewish ownership of Judea relies on more than what's written in a book.
So imperial squattery is to have currency of ownership? If conquest justifies ownership, which is how Arabs acquired their holdings, what are you complaining about? Ohhhhh its only because Jews succeeded - THAT is your problem? So Gentiles own land by historical habitation and by conquest but none of these methods are available to Jews? Now what do we call that again?
If you want to get rid of competing claims to property you have to get rid of all the potential claimants - what? you already tried that? Doesn't leave you much left other than to get your gun and try that way. Oh, you only do that to unarmed Jews. Well all's left then is to write this trite drivel of yours then.
Doctor Right| 8.15.12 @ 8:02AM
In retrospect, perhaps FDR should have gone ahead with his plan to set-aside a portion of the Alaska Territory as a permanent home for the world's displaced Jews.
Look it up; it's true. The 1940 Slattery Report recommended using Sitka, Alaska as a resettlement home for European Jews being persecuted by the Nazis. Estimates are that as many as 2million could have been saved. However, the effort was stopped by US Territorial Representative Anthony Dimond, who used procedural rules to kill the vote in the House of Representatives.
Just think of it, Jack...you could have been a full-fledged member of the "Alaska Liberation Organization," planting bombs all throughout Alaska!
But alas, it was not to be...
Jack in Wi| 8.15.12 @ 10:28AM
The Jews of Europe may have had a claim for East Prussia or Pomerania after WW2 . They never had a right to any part of Palistine, that they didn't pay for. Israel could have been a religious state like the Vatican only in Palistine, with a few hundred acres that nobody would have minded.
Doctor Right| 8.15.12 @ 12:06PM
You are a mentally deranged jackass.
Seriously, Jack...you need help. REAL psychiatric help.
Occam's Tool| 8.16.12 @ 1:34AM
Dr R: First the lightbulb has got to want to be changed---or the criteria for involuntary treatyment must be reached. jack meets neither. He is a worthless supporter of pederasty and child murder is all he is.
johntyd| 8.16.12 @ 2:58AM
Such an expert over what the Jews have rights to. 'Never had a right to Palestine' . No they don't have a right according to you NOW that they have succeeded in that enterprise. They always had that right as long as it was kept as a theoretical prospect. The Jews have more right to Judea that you have to whoever's land you are squatting on. 'East Prussia', another idiot disciple of Lord Moyne? Happily, you and your ilk no longer decide what the rights of Jews are. That is your complaint.
Peter von Kowatscheff| 8.16.12 @ 9:28PM
Your ignorance is as profound as your inability to write coherently in your mother tongue, Jack. Jews have lived coninuously in "Palestine," bought huge tracts of land from Ottoman and Arab landowners and were granted a homeland which includes the "West Bank," and all of Jordan under the still-valid San Remo Conference agreement. That agreement, which also guarantees the rights of other nations formerly in the Ottoman empire is still international law. In fact it is the only real, unchallenged and fully legitimate international law pertaining to the Jews' right to a homeland.
But we all know that you couldn't give two figs for "Palestinians" or Shmalestinians, since you are clearly indifferent to their suffering right now in neighbouring Arab countries. You are merely trying to find socially acceptable ways to express your malignant Jew-hatred. You are not only evil, which is bad enough, but you are beyond contempt, as you can't scrape together something that would resemble honour even in your own society of psychopaths.
There, hopefully that's my first and last post to you. I think I need a shower and a scrub-down now.
Jack in Wi| 8.17.12 @ 6:25PM
When Israel was formed they owned about 6% of Palistine. I said they had a right to that and not anther inch more. If you didn't like the neighbors. why did you steal the neighborhood? The answer has always been peace, integration, reconciliation, and restitution, from the zionists, for all the theft, murder, and discrimination of the last 65 years. Shalom
johntyd| 8.18.12 @ 2:10AM
Theft, murder, discrimination. Yes these are the Arab and European specialities that you champion.
Just where do you think the name of 'Palestine' comes from? The Roman insult to Jewish insurrection in 2nd century CE. There is not even a 'P' sound in Arabic. They call the place falastin.
You think that after the Arabs were given 99.99% of Ottoman possessions and the Jews 0.01% that this is a basis of legitimate complaint?
Jewish title over Judea has never lapsed. It will never lapse. Not all the Nazis like yourself in the whole world can make a whit of difference to this fact.
Arab imperialism, terror and squattery will not prevail. The Egyptians in Gaza and the Jordanians in Samaria will be expunged. There is nothing you and your ilk will be able to do about it.
RCV| 8.15.12 @ 11:19AM
Dr. R: Have you read Michael Chabon's "The Yiddish Policeman's Union"? It's a murder mystery set in a mythical Alaska-Jewish homeland. Wonderful book. Highly recommended.
Doctor Right| 8.15.12 @ 12:06PM
Yup.
It's an awesome read!
CJW| 8.15.12 @ 1:50PM
Good read. Did you read Chabon's "Mysteries of Pittsburgh?" He attended college in Pgh.
Bob K| 8.15.12 @ 9:34AM
John Lukacs in his historical essay "Democracy and Populism--Fear and Hatred;" Yale Univ. Press, 2005, noted that "What came after 1870 was the emergence and the powerful attraction of two new enormous movements, nationalism and socialism, that turned out to rule most of the history of the twentieth century--indeed, most of the world even now. ..... and of these two nationalism proved to be the most powerful and enduring." p.31.
He does not address the nationalist movements in the near east during this time but they can't be ignored here in the light of the 1917 Balfour Declaration which in effect put fuel on the fires of nationalism in the near east.
These fires are still burning and much diplomacy, time, money and worse have been used up in trying to contain them.
Nick| 8.15.12 @ 10:36AM
It should be noted, also, that P.M. Chamberlain was so eager to accept "Peace in Our Time," in September, 1938, because of the fact that he wanted to free-up British troops to fight in Palestine.
The British had been fighting for 2 years against the Grand Mufti and other Arabs (as mentioned in Mr. Mandel's fine essay,) and, they were losing. Chamberlain was so desperate to get the German threat off the table (so he could deal with the Arab uprising) that he was willing to sell Czechoslovakia down the river. This freed-up enough troops to end the Arab revolt.
Appeasement emboldened Hitler and led to him think that Britain would also sell-out Poland. This little known factor in the start of WWII is something that I only recently learned about.
RCV| 8.15.12 @ 11:27AM
Fascinating tidbit, Nick. Where did you read that?
Nick| 8.15.12 @ 12:15PM
I saw it in the multi-part documentary Nazi Collaborators that recently aired on The Military Channel. I didn't catch all of the episodes, but those I did see were quite good, RCV.
http://www.amazon.com/Nazi-Col.....B008I34ZMA
Someone had the Grand Mufti episode on YouTube, if you're interested.
Jack in Wi| 8.15.12 @ 11:59AM
That is all a pile of nonsense Nick. But I am with my grandchildren and have no time to demolish it.
Nick| 8.15.12 @ 12:17PM
Have to go teach them how to goose-step, eh, Jackboot the Nazi?
Or, is today the day your family bleaches their sheets?
Quartermaster| 8.15.12 @ 1:02PM
Nick, you are acting like an idiot. You also seem to be a Libtard, or at the very least, acting like one.
Nick| 8.15.12 @ 1:23PM
Are you defend the rantings and ravings of Jackboot the Nazi, Quartermaster?
Yeah, I'm a liberal. Better look the word up, you obviously don't know its meaning.
CJW| 8.15.12 @ 1:53PM
Nick
Q once wrote here that he opposed bombing of churches EVEN if they are Catholic.
Doctor Right| 8.15.12 @ 3:09PM
Thanks for the advice, Clint...
I'm sure Nick is very grateful.
Occam's Tool| 8.16.12 @ 1:35AM
QM: up yours, dumbass. I was a rampaging Conservative when you were crapping your diapers, punk.
Marie| 8.15.12 @ 1:21PM
What it has come down to is that the Western world has forgotten how to say, "We Won, You Lost and you Losers Behave Yourself." We have to get back that mindset if we are going to bring back relative peace in the world, because the middle east surely has never had the mindset to bring peace.
Occam's Tool| 8.16.12 @ 1:37AM
Indeed, Marie. What we need to do is beat the Islamic world severely enough so that they will admit defeat.
Simple enough to do---calculate the amount of force necessary to slam Japan and Germany down, multiply it by 2 or 3, and the trick should be done.
We have that amount of power available.
Michele San Pietro| 8.15.12 @ 3:53PM
British colonizers were brutal everywhere and made an endless number of mistakes. As for the Middle East, it's clear to me there will be no peace as long as the Arabs don't really accept the existence of Israel.
Mistral| 8.18.12 @ 11:23AM
Looks like the freemasons had a big hand in this one. No wonder it went through with US, UK and USSR approval. The worst feature of Zionism is that many Chrisitian groups support it. Even the liberal modernist new Catholic Church supports it shamefully enough. Post-conciliar popes have popped in and out of synagogues telling rabbis that they are still "saved" by their Old Covenant and we have prominent Jews becoming papal knights.
I recall Deng Xiao Ping who once stated that the British Lion had left his tail behind him in every place he had ventured as an imperial power. Israel is a classic illustration.
Based on the same principle perhaps we ought to restore those of other ancient cultural identities to the lands they once inhabited - not sure where we begin with that one!