BRITISH POLICY ATTACKED

Greymouth Evening Star, 30 July 1946, Page 8

BRITISH POLICY ATTACKED

REJOINDER BY PALESTINE

JEWS authenticity of telegrams • LONDON, July 29. Mr. David ben Gurion, chairman of the Jewish Agency, at a conference, attacked the authemi-i. j of the telegrams mentioned in we White Paper on Palestine. He said that British policy was directed towards destroying the newish community in Palestine, ana ne indicated that the Jewish Agency would issue a “Black Paper, nor to refute the British document, but to list what he said had been ac.s of. British terrorism. Mr. ben Gurion claimed that - ,n iy one ot the eight telegrams contained the names of the sender and addressee, He asked if Britain know the identities of the persons connected with the others. He asserted that he had’never received such a telegram as the eighth, in which he himself was named. He added that the telegram said that Moshe Snertok, head of the political bureau of Hie Jewish Agency, had instructed that the text of the broadcast tor “Voice of Israel” should be handed to ben Gurion. Shertok was with him in London at that time, and there would be no need for the telegram. , “I will not go so far as to say that the telegrams are forgeries, but they are very queer,” he added. Mr. ben Gurion charged that British policy in the Middle East was shaped by “Fascist reactionary feudalist groups centred in the British Embassy in Cairo and the Middle East Army Command. These groups, he said, found that the progress of the Jews menaced British policy. The groups were antiFrench, anti-Russian. anti-American, just as they were anti-Jewish. He claimed that Britain was using the following formula to destroy the Jewish community in Palestine: “First, they are to be disarmed, and then the Grand Mufti’s people will be turned loose on them. Few will

survive and, at the last moment, the British Army will be given the humanitarian role of protecting them.” Rabbi Rosenberg, of Tel. . Aviv, speaking in London, said that the Jews had to fight against a Government that would sell them for other economic interests, but they also had to fight Jewish terrorists. BOMB OUTRAGE DESCRIBED AS TREASON (Rec. 12.30 p.m.) SYDNEY, July 30. The recent bomb outrage in Palestine was a treason against the Jewish people, said Dr. Maurice Perlzweig, an executive member of the World Jewish Congress, when addressing a meeting last night. The Jews would deal with those responsible for the outrage who had given anti-Semi-tics an opportunity ’to blame the Jews for crimes they had not committed.

The Jews, he added, needed Britain in Palestine and Britain needed the Jews, who, if allowed to settle, would serve the interests of the British Dominions and. democracy.

AMERICANS DENY BREACH OF SECRECY LONDON, July 28. “High American circles deny the British, report that Mr. Byrnes released the details of the so-called partition plan for Palestine in violation of a secrecy agreement between himself and Mr. Bevin,” says Reuter's correspondent in Paris. “American sources say that Mr. Bevin requested Mr. Byrnes to keep silent, not the other way round, as the British report, suggested. They add that Mr. Byrnes had not seen the plan. He told a correspondent at a press conference before leaving America’ for Paris that he believed that the plan had been accepted by the British Government as ‘basis for negotiation.’ ” ANTI-SEMITISM ALLEGED IN AUSTRALIA SYDNEY, July 29. Bitter criticism of what they described as the recent outburst of anti-Semitism in Australia was made by two Jewish rabbis during the week-end.

‘•The last few weeks have seen the .most virulent and unbridled antiJewisb campaign ever let loose in Australia,“ said Rabbi M. Schenk at a meeting in the suburb of Chatswood last night. “The loyalty of the Jews to Jhe British Empire is questioned, but where have any people shown such unswerving loyalty as the Jews of Palestine?

Rabbi Schenk said the official platform of international Zionism looked forward to the establishment of a Jewish State within the framework of the British Commonwealth of Nations. He criticised the policy of the Colonial Office and the administration in Palestine as unjust and aggressive. Speaking in the synagogue. Rabbi E. Falk said that while no Jew could condone the terrible outrage which had' occurred in Jerusalem. Jews bitterly resented the way some journals had whipped up the passions of the people against them. The Jewish people still believed in the justice of the British people, and that they would adhere to the promise to make Palestine a national home for the Jews.