PALESTINE REPORT

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVII, Issue 197, 21 July 1937, Page 9

PALESTINE REPORT

UPPER HOUSE DEBATE. “INTOLERABLE SITUATION.” LABOUR CRITICISMS. 9 (United Press Association—By Electric / Telegraph.—Copyright.) (British Official Wireless.) Received July 21, 11.55 a.m. RUGBY, July 20. The House of Commons debate tomorrow on the motion approving the Government’s adoption of the recommendations of the Royal Commission on Palestine was preceded by a debate in the House of Lords arising from questions addressed by the Opposition leader, Lord Snell, who said he still believed the mandate to be workable, but for errors of commission and omission—chielly omission—by all the parties, the mandatory, the Jews, and the Arabs. He considered that the proposals for a partition were undesirable and regarded what he said was, in effect, the return of the mandate to the League as a national humiliation.

Lord Peel, chairman of the Royal Commission, said that the Commission had started on its task opposed to the idea of partition, but liad come reluctantly to adopt it. He paid a tribute to the Palestine Government’s administration of two peoples so utterly different, and contended th»t if the experiment had failed it was not due to the mandatory but to the intractable character and material with which it had to deal.

The Marquess of Dufferin and Ava, replying for the Government, said it was not weakness but strength to end a situation which had become intolerable for the mandatory and a menace to those whose interest it had to protect. The application of armed force would never provide the solution. Having decided to accept the report, the Government would not tolerate action by either side in Palestine which would again inflame tlio fires of controversy. The Government was not prepared to entertain any large or substantial variation in the scheme of partition unless the Jews and the Arabs, in a joint agreement, put forward alternatives commending themselves to the Government. The Government would support proposals by independent Arab or Jewish States for admission to the League. There would be military conventions regarding the naval, military and air forces, for the security of ports, roads and railways, the protection of pipe lines and other matters, as well as the effective security of Palestine as a whole. ATTENDANCE AT MEETING. (British Official .Wireless.) RUGBY, July 19. The Colonial Secretary, announced in the House of Commons at question time that he proposed to attend the session of the League’s Mandates Commission which is to consider tne 1 aiestine report. . , T . , „ He said representation of Jewish, or Arab opinion before the Mandates Commission was a matter for the Commission itself.