Fighting By Arabs Thought Unlikely

Greymouth Evening Star, 13 October 1947, Page 6

Fighting By Arabs Thought Unlikely

LONDON, October 11.

Any suggestion that armed, conflict was likely in Palestine was mischievous. Such a situation had not arisen and was unlikely to arise, said a Foreign Office spokesman today. He added that no confirmation had been received in London of any Arab troop movements. In the event of an imminent threat of conflict Britain might consider appealing to the Security Council, but no such threat had developed. “The seriousness of the Arab League Council’s open and somewhat belligerent pronouncements about the military measures it is taking to resist the formation of a Jewish state in Palestine cannot be overlooked, and most observers accept the earnestness of its intentions,” says a special correspondent of The Times in Beirut. “But there is a big gap between making warlike plans and executing them. “Some troops may appear on the borders of Palestine as a demonstration, and varied military preparations may be instituted behind them; but few persons visualise Arab armies marching openly into Palestine, either now or later. “Guerrilla infiltration still seems more likely as the basis of action if, as the Arabs appear to think, their cause is lost at Lake Success.” An Associated Press correspondent at Jerusalem, who made a flight of 300'miles on each side of the Syrian, Lebanon, and Transjordan frontiers, said that there were not 1000 troops within 20 .miles of the Palestine border from the Mediterranean to the Dead Sea. A British United Press correspondent, after a tour of 185 miles, said that he saw about 6000 Syrian troops manouevring on the Palestine border, but otherwise there were no big Arab troop concentrations. Certain Lebanese frontier posts had been reinforced.