WORLD AFFAIRS.

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 4324, 27 July 1937, Page 3

WORLD AFFAIRS.

NOTES AND COMMENTS ON THINGS THAT MATTER. SUB-DIVIDING PALESTINE. The hostile reception from, both Arabs and Jews which has greeted the report of the Royal Oomlmission on Palestine and the suggestion to divide that troubled country _ into three parts, indicates that its future may be even more 1 troublous. Intermittent rioting and clashes between the two races have disturbed the Peace of Palestine for many years. Unfortunately it was not only a conflict of Arab and Jew, but a golden opportunity for an adventurer about whom little has hitherto been made public, to stir up trouble to his own advantage. The troublemaker was the Arab terrorist com-mander-in-chief Faiz Kaukaji, who has been plotting_ against French and British rule in the Near East since 1925.

A STRIKING FIGURE. In appearance, he might Rave stepped out of a Hollywood “Foreign Legion” film. Young, handsome beyond criticism, and wearing a severely plain uniform of European cut, with Ms left breast ablaze of medals and decorations (including the Iron Cross), Kaukaji is indeed a striking figure. Partly of Turkish descent, he was trained at the Officers School at Constantinople and served in the Turkish army in the Great War. After the Armistice he joined the French forces in Syria— and joined too in the revolt of the Druses, in 1925. A massacre of 70 Armenians at Damascus railway station caused the Druse leader to send him away. His band of terrorists was later dispersed by the French. TWICE SENTENCED TO DEATH.

Sentenced to death by the French, Kaukaji took refuge in Saudi Arable, and later took part in a revolt against Ibn Saud in 1932. Ibn Saud sentenced him to death, but later commuted the penalty to banishment. His next move was to obtain a commission in the Iraq army. After resigning tMs he was _ reported lighting against Ibn Saud in the Yemen, and later against the Italians in Abyssinia. In 1934 adventurer Kaukaji came to Jerusalem, and Laid before a number of Arab notables a plan for ridding Syria and Palestine of the French and British mandates. There was a second conference in Jerusalem in April last year. OPPORTUNITY IN PALESTINE.

It was agreed to start in Syria, where the strike early La-t year gave tire first opportunity of carrying out the Jerusalem plan. But the strike petered out. Meanwhile tension between Arabs and Jews resulted in the development of a promising situation in Palestine. Kaukaji collected the band he had organised in Iraq, Syria, Transjordania, and crossed the border into Palestine. There, he modestly admits, “I led the revolution and played my part most cleverly and successfully.” 1 A GRIM WARNING.

Last November he was proud of having escaped from Palestine by fording the Jordan at night. He was actually allowed to slip over by British authorities who were glad to get him out of the country, but did not want to make a martyr of him in the eyes of his Arab supporter®. Befewi he went Kaukaji issued _ a communique to his followers, praised them for their resistance to the British forces, and told them to keep their arms as they might need them again. He finished: “Unless there is a satisfactory permanent settlement of the grievances of the Palestine Arabs, there will be another outbreak within 18 months, far more serious than the last.” ‘ v AN EMIR'S AMBITIONS.

The Arab rulers in the Near East have been appealed to by the Arab Higher Committee in Palestine to use their influence to prevent the partition. , 'No one could be more

pleased to intervene, if he could, than the Emir Abdallah who raids Trans jor dania, Palestine’s , nearest Arab neighbour. After helping Lawrence to defeat the Turks he hoped for the throne of Syria, but had to be content with the smaller reward of Trans jordania. Now, rumours have it, “The East’s most disappointed man’ (as an English paper calls him) aims to become the ruler of the Arab section of Palestine as well.