JEWS IN PALESTINE

Greymouth Evening Star, 5 October 1945, Page 5

JEWS IN PALESTINE

ARAB REPLY TO TRUMAN

(Rec. 11.50 a.m.) JERUSALEM, October 4. Large parties of British mobile police, with armoured cars, surrounded blocks in the centre of the city, and have begun intensive searches. The Government Commission for Immigration invited men and women who entered Palestine illegally, but who joined the forces voluntarily, to register for legislation rights. The Government, however, at present has no plans to legalise the status of nearly 20,000 illegal immigrants, who entered Palestine during the last five years, and this number. will be subtracted from the quota of 75,000 approved under the Palestine White Paper. In London, the Secretary of the Arab League (Azzam Bey), in a statement in reply to Mr Truman’s letter to Mr Attlee, said: “I would remind the President that the Arabs were officially given to understand, both by him and Mr Roosevelt, that the American policy towards Palestine was based on consultation with the Arabs; also the determination not to use force for a settlement. The Americans, are in the best position to understand a clash of racial interests in Palestine, especially if they realise that the driving power behind immigration is the racial political will to dominate The Arabs are opposed to this idea of domination, backed by European Imperialism. The Arabs are willing to take an equal share in solving the Jewish problem.” “The Times” in a leader says: While many will share Mr. Truman’s anxiety to relieve Jewish suffering, his suggestion that Britain should assume responsibility for altering at a stroke the population ratio of Palestine to the disadvantage of the Arabs will find little support. The decision to refer the matter to the Council of the United Nations was right, not only because the Palestine problem has important implications affecting international security, but also for the reason that the undoubted, debt owed to persecuted Jewry is owed by western civilisation as a whole, and cannot be discharged by vicarious action. It cannot be shifted to the shoulder of the economically backward Arab world which has done nothing to incur it.