EGYPT GENERAL MISSION

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXX, 15 June 1936, Page 2

EGYPT GENERAL MISSION

MISS REEVES PALMER’S VISIT CONDITIONS IN THE EAST A visitor to Nelson is Miss Reeves Palmer, of the Egypt General Mission, which works among the Moslems of Egypt. The missionary is touring New Zealand, and in the course of her stay in Nelson will describe the Mission’s work in several addresses. Miss Palmer visited the Colleges this afternoon and to-night speaks in the Presbyterian schoolroom on the “Gospel Work in the land of the Pharaohs.” Miss Palmer, who is staying in Nelson till Friday, is to give further addresses in the country later in the week. The missionary when interviewed spoke of the troubled conditions in the East, with particular reference to Palestine. “In Palestine matters are very serious,” said Miss Palmer. “The Arabs are jealous because the Jews are getting the land they thought was no good. The Jews have drained and planted malarial, swampy land from Jaffa to Haifa and in spite of disastrous floods they have grown wonderful citrus fruit. “The Arabs were very angry about the ‘Balfour Declaration’ which says that the Jews may look upon the country as their national land. Curiously enough I don’t think the old Jews are unpopular in Palestine. It is the new ones who are disliked.” Asked about the notorious evils in Cairo, Miss Reeves Palmer spoke of the magnificent work being done by Russell Pasha in regard to clearing up drug and white slave traffic. “People who visited Cairo during the war would not know it now,” she said. Russell Pasha is a distinguished figure in modern life—Thomas Wentworth Russell, C.M.G., 0.8. E. He became Commandant of the Cairo City police in 1918 and is now Director of the Egyptian Central Narcotics Intelligence Bureau.