T. E. LAWRENCE

Stratford Evening Post, Volume IV, Issue 159, 17 June 1936, Page 6

T. E. LAWRENCE

NAME THROWN U?. ARABIAN TROUBLE. Alleged' Wrong Translation Of Treaty. DREAM OF EMPIRE. Press Association —Copyright. London.' june 16. ' Propaganda in the Arab - Jewish struggle has thrown up the name of | Lawrence of Arabia, who allegedly mistranslated for ' King Feisui the ArabJewish Treaty signed ai London in ii)l9, which was recently publ'istved', says the Jerusalem correspondent of the News Chronicle. Dr. Weizmann, a Jewish professor at the Jerusalem University produced a copy of the treaty as proof that King Feisul strongly sympathised with the project of a Jewish national home in Palestine but Arabs declare the docu.ndrit is a Jewish forgery. This is improbable, but it is suggested on photostatic copies of the treaty that Lawrence mistranslated the treaty because he realised that unless King Feisui could be forced into giving the Jews their demands he could not fulfil his dream of a great Arab Empire. King Feisui was un v able to read English. He added a protective footnote which Lawrence translated on Dr. Weizmann's copy and King Feisul signed thus: "If the Arabs are established, aa 1 asked' in the manifesto addressed to the British Foreign Secretary, I will carry out this agreement." A photostatic copy of King Feisui's Arabic shows tie wrote: "Should the Arabs obtain their independence, as I asked in the manifesto addressed to the British Secretary," I will carry out this agreement."

; It is said that Lawrence as a faultless Arabic scholar could not have made the faulty translation. Accordingly it is suggested that if he mellowed King FeTsul's footnote he almost certainly toned down the Zionist aspirations presented to King Feisul.. The Moslem council supports' this view, declaring that when it was hlnt6d the treaty existed King Feisul telegraphed denying his signature. This telegram is now in the possession of Hade Bey,' a signatory to' the treaty, at present interned' in connection with the" disorders.