THE PROBLEM OF PALESTINE

Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21858, 11 August 1936, Page 8

THE PROBLEM OF PALESTINE

TO THE EDITOR OF THE PRESS. Sir, —A correspondent in the “Palestine Post” suggests a new word for our dictionaries. “Ishamaelism,” may be defined as the process whereby a vendor after selling his land at 10 times its value, and while enjoying the use of the money, and after the vendee has developed the land, seeks the return cf the land by shooting the vendee. Twenty-one years ago in 1914, before the war, the Turkish Government presented the. Huleh concession to two wealthy Effendis of Beirut. Huleh is situated in Upper Galilee. It is a valley extending northwards from Lake Merom. It presents a dismaying appearance of desolation and ruin. They undertook' to reclaim the area and to place 10,000 dunams at the disposal of the fellaheen, who occupied the territory. They failed to fulfil their obligation. In 1920 they applied to the British Government for a prolongation Of their concession, and the Government. agreed to their request, adding certain conditions, but again they neglected to fulfil their undertaking.

• In 1934, through the efforts of Dr. Chaim Weizmann and Dr. Chaim Arlo-oroff (who was shot by the Arabs at Tel Aviv), the concession was transferred to the Palestine Land Development Company at a price of nearly £200.000. The effort to transform swamp land into fertile fields IS one of the stories that fill the heart of all true Jews with pride. This is not an isolated case, the settlement of Nahalal was three times entirely wiped out by ma.aria under the Turkish rule, and yet iii spite of dreaded disease, the Jewish pioneers have turned this place into a wonderful settlement. Sir Andrew Wingate wrote some 15 years ago, when the riots took place in Jaffa, replying to a correspondent in the “Daily Telegraph.” “Is it true the Arabs belong to the race which occupied the country before the Jews arrived in it, and have been there since the Jews left? If the claimants describe themselves as Arabs, then true-Arabs, like the Jews, trace descent from Abraham and their common ancestor sent the Arab progenitors eastward, and gave Palestine to the Jews. The claimants wish to appear in court clothed with the glory and traditions of Arabia, and at the same time to represent themselves as remnants of Gaananites, or of the mixed nationalities introduced by various conquerors. The ancestors of the present cultivators may have owned their fields, though that is doubtful, but they never governed or owned Palestine.”. What have the Arab scratchers of the soil done for Palestine? Where are the roads, railways, -irrigation, commerce, harbours due to topir enterprise? On May 25. crcns wre fired and trees uprooted in Emek Jezreel and Sharon by the Arabs. On May 28. more trees - were uprooted in three Jewish settlements, and crops fired in two Jewish settlements, and three days later, crops were fired at Tel Adashim, and trees were destroyed al even Yehuda, near Tel Mond. _ On Thursday, June 4, 11,500 graoe vines were uproot'd at Shlcmo, 1700 fruit trees near Tel Mond, 2400 near Gaza, and 650 at Gedera. On the following Sunday, 3000 orange trees were destroyed near Mishka, and two days later 6000 trees were destroyed by fire in the Balfour Forest; and on the same day 9000 vines were uprooted hear Zichrbn Yaakov. During the ■ week following, crops were fired at Afuleh and Tel Joseph, and oh the Sunday, 10,300 trees were uprooted at Keriath Ariavim. The next day, 100 dunams of drange trees were damaged in a Jewsh grove near Ben Shemen, and 200 destroyed at Tel Mond, and 2000 citrus trees were destroyed at Kfar Yona, on the Tuesday, The loss of life so far has been small, but the destruction of property serious and exasperating. - A Jerusalem correspondent writes: “The Beduins, armed to the teeth, do not care a fig for the involved political problems of Palestine; they are more concerned with the fabulous wealth which, according to desert legend, has gilded the streets of Tel Aviv and brought to their neighbour west of Jordan a remarkable prosperity. The mere continuance of disturbed conditions in Palestine is a stimulus to the ,rapacious des-res of the Tranjordan tribwsmen, who have their eye focused upon the main chance, that of unlimited loot—if it can be had.

Jessie Sampter, writing in the “Palestine Review,” says: “If Jews were colonising as imperialists *do, the Arab fears of them migat be justified. But we are not colonising: we are settling. We are not conquerors; we have paid dearly lor every dunam of land we cultivate. We are not persons from an empire abroad who want to add this country to our own ior its glory or economic aggrandisement We do’not want to exploit the cheapness of Arab labour in order to build up the commerce and industry of some oth§r country. We want to build up the commerce, industry and agriculture of this country so that we may live in it as a tree people, lor the benefit of this country, that is, of its inhabitants, whoever they may be. Hence our determination that Jewish* labour shall be employed in Jewish enterprise. We do not want to create an exploiting class of Jewish employers getting rich through the use of cheap Arab labour. Jewish labour looks farther ahead, to the classless state, to self worked enterprise. Palestine is too small- and too centred in the world’s heart even to be ‘independent’; it must be part of larger un.ts, pait cf an Arab world its hinterland, of a European world, its ioreland; we Jews have suffered *so much in so many lands from the cruelties of nationalism that we ask only for good feLowship; we do not ask for that sovereign independence which is the cause of war. Among the Arabs, those who preach it are the rich and Seifish landlords, exploiters or their hirelings. The common folk have no intelligent part in these nationalist affairs; they are lied to, beaten, or bought (as in the present strike) to serve the purposes of shrewd leaders. Superstitious fears and slavish medieval loyalties hold the people in their thrall.”—Yours, etc., BEN EBEN. August 10, 1936.