A History of Zionism (97 page)

Various peace-makers volunteered their services to mediate between Arabs and Jews. Among the well-meaning individuals who took a hand in the search for a solution were A.A. Ayamson, the former head of the immigration department of the mandatory government; Colonel Newcombe, a well-known advocate of the Arab cause; Dr Magnes, chancellor of the Hebrew university; and Nuri Said, the Iraqi foreign minister. Some of the blueprints produced were based on the cantonisation scheme, others on the concept of one sovereign Palestinian state in which the maximum Jewish population should be less than half — thus providing a Jewish national home but not a state. But these schemes aroused no interest among either Jews or Arabs: the Zionists had been unhappy about Lord Peel’s state and they rejected
a fortiori
the idea of permanent minority status. The Arabs, on the other hand, rejected not only partition but also a bi-national state based on parity. Nor were they willing to consider further Jewish immigration.

The London Round Table Conference opened on 7 February 1939 with a speech by the prime minister, Neville Chamberlain. The feeling among the Jews was one of unrelieved gloom. The previous October Hitler had invaded Czechoslovakia and on the very day that parliament was debating the Woodhead Report, the big pogrom in Germany (the
Kristallnacht
) took place. Hitler and Mussolini openly supported the Arabs: fascist Italy had always regarded a Jewish Palestine as a danger to the Italian empire because it was bound to become a British imperial base, another Malta or Gibraltar. Zionism could expect no help from France or the United States. In so far as they were at all interested in Middle Eastern politics, the Soviet Union, and the Communist parties following its line, supported the Arab rebellion.

Zionism was thus totally isolated, completely dependent on British goodwill. Moving appeals reached London from German Jewry: ‘It is a question of life and death, it is inconceivable that Britain will sacrifice the German Jews.’
*
But the fear, grief and agony of a persecuted people counted for little in world politics. As Namier wrote at the time: ‘All the sacrifices were demanded from us, and all the gains were offered to the Arabs.’
†

There years earlier Namier had vainly tried to persuade the British that their interests and those of the Jews were inseparable, that the Jews, while numerous enough to be an irritant, were not at the moment sufficiently strong to serve as a defensive shield, that in a coming world conflict the Arabs would be against Britain anyway, and that it was therefore in the British interest to get the Jews to the other shore as quickly as possible. This was not how the British policy-makers saw it, and even after the appeasement policy in Europe was seen to have failed, the attitude towards Zionism did not change. The Arabs were many and the Jews were few. Precisely in view of the coming war, Arab goodwill had to be won.

The question whether British policy was effective as
Realpolitik
will no doubt be debated for a long time to come. It has been argued that if the pro-Axis elements in the Arab world failed in their bid for power in 1941, as in Rashid Ali’s revolt in Iraq, if Egypt was quiet even when Rommel reached El Alamein, this was the result of the far-reaching concessions made by London to the Palestinian Arabs. It seems, however, more probable that the revolt in Iraq would have been suppressed anyway, and that (like General Franco) the Arab rulers, whatever their sentiments
vis-à-vis
Britain, were not willing to come out openly for the Axis until Hitler and Mussolini were sure of victory.

In his opening statement at the London conference Weizmann reiterated world Jewry’s belief in British good faith. Cooperation with the British government had always been the cornerstone of Zionist policy, and the movement was approaching its present task in the same spirit. The Jewish delegation was the most representative which had ever taken part in an international conference. All leading Zionists were present as well as some of the best known non-Zionist Jewish leaders. The Palestinian Arab delegation included Jamal Hussaini, its acting chairman, but not the mufti. Among the delegates from other Arab countries there were leading figures like Ali Maher, Nuri Said, the Jordanian prime minister, and Emir Faisal, Ibn Saud’s son. The Arabs refused to sit at one table with the Jews and arrangements were made for them to reach the conference hall in St James’s Palace by a different entrance. There were, in fact, two separate conferences. Only on two occasions did informal meetings take place between Jewish leaders and the representatives of Egypt, Iraq and Saudi Arabia. The Palestinian Arabs refusing any contact with the Jews.

The Zionists had gone to the conference with great misgivings. At the Inner Zionist Council meeting in December 1938 eleven members had voted in favour of participation and eleven against. It had been decided to leave the final decision to the executive, which agreed on participation because, as Ben Gurion wrote, they had been assured by Malcolm MacDonald, the colonial secretary, that the British were still bound by the Balfour Declaration and the mandate, that they rejected the idea of an Arab state, and that Jewish immigration would not be stopped.
*
Both Weizmann and Ben Gurion believed that London would not wash its hands entirely of the Jewish cause. They wanted, moreover, to use the opportunity to have direct talks with Arab leaders. Ben Gurion is reported to have said on one occasion that from the Arabs he would be willing to accept less favourable terms than from the British. He predicted at the time two historically inevitable processes: one making for an Arab federation, the other for a Jewish state. If the Arabs were willing to accept the Jewish right to immigration there would be room for fruitful negotiation, perhaps agreement on a Jewish state within an Arab federation.
*

The meetings soon showed that Zionist hopes, modest as they were, had been exaggerated. The British had more or less accepted the Arab demand to terminate the mandate and to establish a Palestinian state allied to Britain. Under this plan the British would continue to administer the country for several years and the special rights of the Jews as a minority in an Arab state would be discussed during this transition period. The Egyptians, Iraqis and Jordanians showed a more conciliatory attitude than the Palestinian Arabs. They were willing to tolerate the existence of a Jewish community of four hundred thousand. But, like the Palestinian Arabs, they emphasised that they regarded Palestine as an Arab country with which the Jews had no special connection. What Weizmann said about the principle of non-domination was of no interest to them, since they stood for Arab rule, not for a bi-national state, however constructed.

The meetings between the Jewish delegation and the colonial secretary took place in a tense and unfriendly atmosphere. Much of the discussion concerned the situation likely to arise in the event of war. The Zionists stressed repeatedly that they constituted a military element that could not be ignored, whereas the British could not count on Arab help in a war against Hitler. But the British representatives were not impressed: the danger of an Arab revolt loomed much larger in their calculations than any benefit they could derive from Jewish support. Occasional veiled threats that there would be trouble if illegal immigrants were turned away did not impress the British: what alternative did the Jews have to support for Britain? As MacDonald told them, if they would not cooperate, it was a fair certainty that His Majesty’s government would leave them to their fate, and the results of that could easily be foreseen.
†
To the Arabs this attitude was most welcome. They had told MacDonald that the Jews would not present a problem if Britain were to withdraw. But the British had no intention of doing so on the eve of a world war in which Palestine would be an important strategic base. They had accepted the Arab demand that the Jews should be reduced to permanent minority status, but insisted on their being given certain rights and on the continuation of limited immigration. At one meeting Weizmann announced that he was willing to accept restrictions on immigration if this would help to bring nearer an agreement with the Arabs. The other Zionist leaders were not happy about this concession but nothing came of it, since the Arabs did not take it up. MacDonald stressed time and again that the Jews would have to obtain Arab consent to immigration, which provoked Weizmann’s observation that the British, too, were not in Palestine by Arab consent.
*

The Jewish delegates were most unhappy about the total repudiation of the Balfour Declaration. They felt that the British attitude worsened almost daily: at first parity had been suggested and the negotiations proceeded on the basis of the mandate. Later it was said that the number of Jews should eventually reach 40 per cent at most, a figure subsequently reduced to 35 per cent and then to 33 1/3 per cent. The renunciation of the mandate was also proposed at a later stage of the conference. In their counter-proposals in early March, Weizmann and Ben Gurion mentioned various possibilities: the establishment of a Jewish state in part of Palestine, or the establishment of a federal Arab-Jewish administration on the basis of parity, with the proviso that immigration would not be stopped. As a last resort they suggested a freezing of the situation: the immigration quota was to be fixed for the next five years, during which time all other outstanding problems were to be discussed.

MacDonald was dissatisfied with the Zionist reaction. Originally he had, he said, been opposed to the idea of an Arab veto on immigration but the intransigent attitude of some members of the Jewish delegation had made him realise that so long as the Jews had the British government behind them, they would never meet the Arabs halfway.
†
The final British suggestions, made on 15 March, envisaged the establishment of a Palestinian state after a transitional period of about ten years, during which time self-governing institutions would gradually be established, a national assembly convened, and a constitution drafted. There would be guarantees for the Jewish minority and possibly even a federal structure of Arab and Jewish cantons. During the coming five years a maximum of 75,000 Jews were to be permitted to enter Palestine, so that the Jewish population would be one-third of the total.

The scheme was turned down by the Jewish delegation, and the Arabs, too, found it unacceptable. They had hoped for independence in the immediate future, were opposed to another ten years of British rule, and, above all, insisted on the total cessation of Jewish immigration. There was nothing more to discuss, and on 17 March the conference came to an end. Two months later, on 17 May, the British government, as it had intimated previously, announced that in view of the inability of the two sides to reach any agreement it would impose its own plan. It seems that London had all along assumed that the conference would end in failure but went through the motions of a full-scale conference in order to gain time to work out its plan.

The Zionist leaders without exception regarded this turn in British policy as an unmitigated disaster, a ‘death sentence’, as Weizmann, the most moderate among them, called it. Even the confirmed pessimists among them had believed that British behaviour was part of the general pattern of appeasement. Since it had been demonstrated beyond any shadow of doubt that appeasement did not work in Europe, was there not a chance that with a turn in the policies of the western democracies the British attitude towards Zionism too, would improve? This optimism, as events were soon to show, was misplaced, for Zionism had become a liability to Britain irrespective of events in Europe.

Various last minute attempts were made by the Zionist leaders to prevent the publication of the White Paper. Weizmann asked for an interview with Neville Chamberlain, but accomplished nothing: ‘The prime minister of England sat before me like a marble statue, his expressionless eyes were fixed on me, but he never said a word … I got no response.’
*
Weizmann went to Cairo and met the Egyptian prime minister without, of course, expecting any immediate outcome. A Jewish delegation met President Roosevelt in early April and was warmly received. The British were in a terrible state, Roosevelt said. The Balfour Declaration and the yishuv were to be sacrificed on the altar of appeasement.
†
He promised to press for the postponement of the White Paper. In fact he did nothing of the sort.

The White Paper

The White Paper, published on 17 May 1939, consisted of a preface and three main sections dealing with constitutional issues, immigration and land respectively.
*
It repeated that it was the objective of H.H. government that an independent state should come into being within the next ten years. Some 75,000 immigrants were to be admitted over the next five years. After that, from 1 March 1944, immigration was to be permitted only with the consent of the Arabs. Moreover, Jewish settlement was to be prohibited altogether in certain parts of Palestine and to be restricted in others. In all essential points the White Paper thus followed the British plan communicated to the Zionist leaders during the St James conference. Reacting immediately, the Jewish Agency said that the White Paper was a denial of the right of the Jewish people to rebuild their national home in their ancestral country, a breach of faith, a surrender to Arab nationalism. But this blow, coming at the darkest hour of Jewish history, would not subdue the Jewish people: they would never accept the closing to them of the gates of Palestine, nor let their national home be converted into a ghetto. Weizmann, in a letter to the high commissioner, and Ben Gurion, in an analysis of the White Paper, were no less forceful.
†
Weizmann registered the ‘strongest possible protest’ against the repudiation of the mandate. Ben Gurion wrote that ‘the greatest betrayal perpetrated by the government of a civilised people in our generation has been formulated and explained with the artistry of experts at the game of trickery and pretended righteousness.’