Britain’s Five-Year Plan

Greymouth Evening Star, 10 February 1947, Page 5

Britain’s Five-Year Plan

The British Government’s new proposals for Palestine were approved at a meeting of the Cabinet yesterday and have been handed to the Arab delegations attending the London; conference and to the Jewish Agency. The diplomatic correspondent of The Times says the Foreign Secre- [ tary, Mr Bevin, dislikes partition as' a solution, but his principal and most i immediate object is to prevent a complete breakdown in the present: discussions. The Governments pro-| posals may, therefore, represent some form of compromise in which tne ( Government hopes that, both the Arabs and the Jews can find enough common ground to.keep the existing negotiations alive; but that hope may. be slender unless, as Mr Bevin suggested at the last sitting of the conference, there is a willingness to put forward counter proposals instead of j flatly rejecting partially unacceptable proposals. , , Force Not Intended It remains the Government’s intention not to impose its new proposals by force. The best that is hoped for, the correspondent says, is that the proposals will enable something like a new start to be made,| but a less hopeful view is that they provide a last chance. ■Reuter’s diplomatic correspondent says it is believed the Cabinet approved the general outline ot IVII Bevin’s proposal, which is understood to suggest a kind of five-year plan within the framework of the mandate with local administration of semi-autonomous Arab and Jewish areas under a trusteeship. The position would be reviewed after live years. j The plan does not propose par- j tition.

The Government’s new plan had a bad reception by both the Jews and Arabs .according to most Sunday newspapers. i The Observer’s political correspondent predicts that the Jews, will reject the scheme which they dei scribe as an insult and says the Jew- ' ish Agency may even break off nego- ! tiations. The Arabs have reached a ' decision which practically amounts : to rejection. The correspondent says the scheme takes the form of a five-year British , trusteeshiup for Palestine over ' semi-autonomous Jewish and Arab ! areas with independence as the aim. 1 Afterwards Britain would give _ up ' the mandate to the United Nations if the Jews and Arabs were unable 1 to agree after five years, j Immigration Plans The newspapers differ on the details about immigration. The Observer’s political correspondent says the scheme would admit 96,000 Jews to Palestine in the next two years. The People gives a figure of 100,000 for the coming year, and the Sunday 1 Times mentions 100,000 in the next I 25 months. The People says the Arabs disapprove the scheme, but that the Jewish Agency is inclined to accept. This newspaper declares that the plan will, if necessary, be backed by force. The Cabinet is split on the Palestine issue, says the Sunday Dispatch. Some ministers are pressing for withdrawal from Palestine, particularly in view of the economic crisis in Britain and handing Palestine over to the United Nations. Mr Attlee, Mr Bevin, and Mr A. V. Alexander, the (Minister of Defence, however, favour | trying for an agreement before with- ’ drawing. <