COLD SHOULDER TO PALESTINE INQUIRY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 4, 6 January 1938, Page 7

COLD SHOULDER TO PALESTINE INQUIRY.

LOCAL REACTION.

Arabs Fear Only Further

Entanglements.

INDIFFERENCE SHOWN.

United Press Association. —Copyright. (Received 1.30 p.m.) LONDON, January 5. "The Times" Jerusalem correspondent says the White Paper, announcing a further Commission of Inquiry into the partition problem, was coldly received in Palestine.

Although Jewish circles, which feared abandonment of the partition project, were most relieved to find the principle still maintained, Arabs profess indifference to the technical commission's visit.

They contend that the time occupied in the inquiries will only result in further entanglement of the Palestine position.

The "Daily Telegraph" political correspondent points out that the phraseology of the White Paper is sufficiently wide to allow the Government to put almost an entirely new plan before the Mandates Comitaission of the League if the new Palestine Commission thinks it advisable.

This writer adds that the Government is most anxious to expedite the inquiry, and the commissioners will doubtless be at work in Palestine before the end of March.

TO FIND FACTS.

NEW PALESTINE INQUIRY. (Received 12 noon.) RUGBY, January 5. Newspapers, commenting on the new Palestine Commission, point out that this will be a fact-finding body, and attention is drawn to the terms of reference which empower it to suggest modifications of the previous Royal Commission's plan, including variation of areas recommended for retention under the British mandate. BUSES FIRED ON. SEVERAL JEWS WOUNDED. (Received 2 p.m.) JERUSALEM, January 5. A Jewish quarryman was fatally shot on the outskirts of the city and a Jewish police escort seriously wounded when 25 shots were fired at a bus on the Jerusalem-Jaffa highway. Three Jews were wounded when shots were fired at another bus.