Manawatu Evening Standard. SATURDAY, JUNE 25, 1938. PALESTINE TERRORISTS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVIII, Issue 176, 25 June 1938, Page 10

Manawatu Evening Standard. SATURDAY, JUNE 25, 1938. PALESTINE TERRORISTS.

While the British Government’s Technical Commission is at work in Palestine studying the proposed boundaries for the Jewish and Arab provinces and the British mandatory area, as well as other technical matters, terrorism persists in keeping the country in a state of-unrest. The latest incident is typical of the tactics of Arab leaders in trying to prevent an amicable solution of the problem. Three hundred Lebanese terrorists, who attacked a village and murdered three of its occupants, wex’e pursued by British troops but fled across the frontier. The following day they apparently returned and were engaged by Jewish' supernumerary police who killed two of the terrorists and wound-' ed two others. Damage apart from the raid was caused to the barbed wire fence on the northern border known as “Tegart’s Wall.” The organisation of these bands of terrorists is ascribed to the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, who fled when deprived of his office, and the Arab Higher Committee was proscribed for the murder of British officers. An implacable adversary of the British mandate, of Zionism, and of partition, in his seclusion near Beirut he has directed his murderous operations against the British forces trying to restore order in Palestine. He holds the thread of a powerful and scarcely secret organisation ..which recruits terrorists who are by no means always Arabs, and expends large sums on anti-British propaganda, says a commentator. It has collected large sums of money in Palestine and in other Arab countries, and it is said to have received some financial help from Europe. The terrorists responsible for the latest outrage caine from the Lebanon, and it is lcno'wn that during one week in March nearly one hundred men entered Galilee from this area. Unfortunately, certain responsible authorities have done nothing to check these activities, and disappointing results have followed the British Government's representations. That British people will be pleased to see the Palestine problem settled is well-known. In the House of Commons the Colonial Secretary made it quite clear that no delay will occur in reaching a decision on the Commission’s report, but it is impossible as yet to say when the Commission will conclude its labours. However much the terrorism of the implacable Arabs—there are many Arabs who are now shewing opposition to the bands operating in Palestine —is

employed against tlie British authorities, the Commission will not be frustrated in performing its duties. An important function is to decide the military issues involved in the creation of frontiers, so that when drawn there' will be • no temptation to provoke strife imposing fresh responsibilities on the British garrison. Partition would fail if it meant in the future a substantial force to keep the peace between Arabs and Jews because of ill-defined frontiers. The British Government, having adopted the plan of partition, is determined to find the best means of making it equitable to all interests. The Commission’s task is not without its difficulties, and in its application to the work before it there will be a good deal of opposition. But though partition may not be the ideal solution of Palestine’s problem of two races seeking to make it their national home, nothing better has been suggested by its critics, and the British Government as the mandatory Power must proceed in the hope that what is contemplated will prove satisfactory in the end.