ARABS DROP CLAIM

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22319, 2 May 1947, Page 5

ARABS DROP CLAIM

IMMEDIATE VOTE INDEPENDENCE ISSUE EGYPT'S LONE BATTLE (10 a.m.) NEW YORK, May 1. The Arab States last night dropped their demand that the United Nations General Assembly consider now the independence of Palestine. Mahmoud Hassan Pasha, Egypt, acting as spokesman for the five Arab States, said the decision had been made in view of the appeals that had been made and the sympathy shown for the Arab cause. By a vote of eight to one, with five abstentions, the general committee rejected the original Arab demand that the General Assembly consider the independence of Palestine immediately. Egypt fought a lone battle in the general committee to avert a vote, and then cast the only vote for the original Arab proposal. France. China, Canada, Ecuador, the United States, Britain, Sweden and Honduras voted against the proposal. Czechoslovakia, Brazil, Russia, Poland and India abstained. The other Arab States are not members of the general committee. Migration Must Stop Faris el Khoury, Syria, addressed the committee in a more conciliatory tone after he had conferred privately with the other Arab delegates during the luncheon recess. ■ Fie said the Arabs would be willing to postpone the debate on Palestine’s independence if all immigration to Palestine were stopped immediately. The Arabs were not insisting on the termination of the British mandate by any specific date. They simply wanted the Assembly to recommend that Britain should be prepared to give Palestine its freedom. If immigration were stopped, the Arabs did not object to waiting. The Polish spokesman told reporters that Poland would move a formal resolution that the Jewish Agency for Palestine be recognised as the official Jewish representative and given a voice at the Assembly’s debate. Both Mr. Hershel Johnson, United States, and Sir Alexander Cadogan, Britain, told the steering committee that the Arab proposal would mean a debate without a decision and would be a poor compromise. India supported the Jewish plea for a direct voice in the debate on Palestine.