Were Jews, Arabs Destined To Hate Each Other? How British anti-Jewish policy kept a Jewish State from forming in the 1920-1930's That Would Have Saved Jewry From Hitler!
by Jonathan Levy
8-1-2002
Probably one of the most important books for both Jews and Arabs to read is
called The Rape of Palestine, by William Ziff first published in 1938 by Argus
Books in the US. The cover says nothing about who William Ziff is.
The book documents the difference between the overall pro-Jewish sentiments
of the British political elite who saw a strong Jewish presence in Palestine
as being good for the British empire, and the group of high level anti-Jewish
British officials who believed that the Jews would become so powerful (if Britain
let them) that they would no longer have to accede to British demands.
The latter group was entirely right. A strong Jewish presence in Palestine meant
Jewish national independence which wouldn't serve the British masters the way
the Arab puppets did. Arab tribal leaders were corruptible and this was the
only way those running Britain's colonial policies could control them. They
realized that controlling the Jews was not going to be so as easy. So they placed
obstacle after obstacle before any attempts to settle large numbers of Jews
in Palestine. The official reason for restricting Jewish immigration was that
the "economic capacity of the land" could not support more than a
million people. This was a lie, but few challenged the British when they proclaimed
it in their various "government commissions." The book also documents
how one-sided the British were in doling out public funds. As the Jews in Palestine
increased in number the economy boomed and in l935, the Yishuv, even though
only comprising one-third of the residents, were paying 75% of the taxes to
the British occupiers. Yet little of that money found its way back into roads
or schools serving Jewish towns. Ziff must have gone through nearly every British
government archive to document his claims that had the British left Palestine
in the late 20's or early 30's, the Jews would have had a state before l948
and which would possibly have been established around (and thriving) before
Hitler came to power thus saving the bulk of European Jewry. While no historian
has ever blamed the British for the destruction of European Jewry, Ziff's book
documents that claim.
Ziff's book (which was published first in l938 but probably took three or four
years of research to write) documents how the British "created" the
opposition to Zionism and that up until these so-called "radical Arab leaders"
came into the picture, most Arab residents of Palestine wanted nothing more
than to live in peace and prosperity with the Jews which they believed was their
good fortune.
"The Moslem religious leaders, the Mufti, was openly friendly. Throughout
Arabia, the chiefs were for the most part distinctly pro- Zionist: and in Palestine
the peasantry were delighted at every prospect of Jewish settlement near their
villages. Commercial intercourse between Arab and Jew was constant and steady."
pp.13
"The Arab National Movement was hated by the huge Levantine population
who continued to regard themselves simply as Ottoman subjects, looked to the
strong, influential Zionist Organization for sympathy and assistance."
"Hussein of the Hejaz looked to the Zionists for the financial and scientific
experience of which the projected Arab state would standly badly in need. In
May 1918, Dr. Chaim Weizmann and Hussein of the Hejaz met in Cairo where the
latter spoke of mutual cooperation between Jews and Arabs in Palestine. In early
l9l9 a Treaty of Friendship was signed to provide for "the closest possible
collaboration in the development of the Arab state and the coming Jewish Commonwealth
of Palestine. On March 3, l9l9, another Arab leader, Feisal, son of Sherif,
wrote: "We wish the Jews a most hearty welcome home."
If Ziff's words are accurate, there was no Arab opposition to Jewish immigration
to Palestine at least as far back as l919.
Ziff writes:
"With conscious design the Administration fostered hostility between Arab
and Jews. It directly advised the amazed Arabs of Palestine and Egypt to abstain
from any concessions to the Jews. It formed the Moslem-Christian Association
and used it as a weapon against the Zionists. It instructed astonished Arab
young-bloods to the technique and tents of modern nationalism, in order to resist
Jewish 'pretenses.' And in London it contacted reliable anti-Jewish elements
to form a liason which has endured to this day. The Arabs were not only instigated
and advised, but supplied with funds, and their arguments ghost-written by Englishmen
in high places. They proved a good investment."
"Matters came to a head in l920 when Feisal staged a revolt against the
French in Damascus, with money and ammunition supplied by the British General
Headquarters. He had been proclaimed King by a 'Syrian Congress' which included
Palestinians, and which asserted the principle that Palestine was a part of
Syria and couldn't be cut off from it. Almost simultaneously, in order to show
how impossible it was to implement the Balfour Declaration in the face of native
hostility, the Generals arranged a pogrom in Jerusalem."
Ziff believed that the stage was set charging that "the riots of April
l920 was perfectly timed." He reveals how Arab agitators ran through the
Moslem crowds gathered for the Nebi Moussa festival in Jerusalem, urging 'death
to the Jews' and that 'the government is with us.' Ziff discovered that all
Jewish policemen had been relieved from duty in the Old City.
He says that such planned riots occured again in April l921 in Jerusalem. Ziff
charges that the British Commandant of Police was "conveniently out of
the country. The few Jews on the police force had been mysteriously taken off
duty for the day. The Arab mob shouted: "Bolshevki! Bolseviki! The Zionists
are flooding the country with Bolsheviki!" pp. 20 While many students of
the Arab-Israeli conflict have heard the name "the Mufti of Jerusalem"
most don't know how the Mufti became "the Mufti." Ziff writes: "Implicated
in the disturbances was a political adventurer named Haj Amin al Husseini. Haj
Amin, was sentenced by a British court to fifteen years hard labor. Coveniently
allowed to escape by the police, he was a fugitive in Syria. Shortly after,
the British then allowed him to return to Palestine where, despite the opposition
of the Moslem High Council who regarded him as a hoodlum, Haj Amin was appointed
by the British High Commissioner as Grand Mufi of Jerusalem for life."
pp. 22
Regarding the Arab pogroms of l929, Alif Beh, a Syrian newspaper, he wrote:
"the uprising was the result of British intrigue...the English were looking
for an excuse to reject the demands of the Jewish Agency to participate in the
administration of the country, and encouraged the Arabs to teach the Jews a
lesson."
Regarding Arab views towards Jewish immigration, Ziff quotes Count Carlos Sforza
in his books, 'Europe and Europeans': "Syrians of all classes, who had
been watching Palestine's development with envious yes, were anxious to have
something of the same phenomena duplicated in their country." This desire
is written in the clamorous petition sent to the French in l935 by the inhabitants
of Lebanon, begging them to encourage Jewish immigration as that would bring
prosperity. Said the Damascus newspaper, "Iissan Alkhar": "We
ought to demand Jewish immigration, for through it our situation will be saved."
Sensing that some crude agenda was being played out with their collective destiny,
in May l930, the Jerusalem-based Arab newspaper Al Iqdam in wrote: "We
are led by a group of men who bargain us away, buying and selling us like cattle.
The Arab people have not yet said their last word on the Arab-Jewish question.
When this word has been said, it will not be one of hatred, but one of peace
and brotherhood, as is suitable for two people who live in one country."
During a seminar of leading Moslems and Christians of Nazareth in March l934,
as statement given to the press read: "On behalf of the majority of the
property-owners and consumers, we declare that we would welcome Jewish immigration
and trust that the enlightened Jews with their financial commercial associations
bring."
Ziff is suggesting that the opposition to Jewish immigration to Palestine by
Arabs was not nearly as widespread as conventional wisdom and standard history
books on the subject has led us to believe. By the time the Peel Commission
was in full swing in l937, Arab desires for rapprochment began appearing, there
had begun appearing in the press Arab desires for rapprochment with the Jews.
From the New York Times of August 5th, l937, we read: "For the first time
in the twenty years since the Balfour Declaration, the Arabs openly censured
the Palestine Government for never having attempted to bring the two peoples
together."
The Arab newspaper Falastin, claimed in an editorial that, "despite British
allegations of an unbreachable enmity between Jews and Arabs, we cannot recall
a single instance since the British occupation here when they made the slightest
effort to bring the Arabs and Jews together. Pre-war Jewish residents lived
here peacefully with Arabs for hundreds of years. To this day these Jews, in
addition to the Arabs, maintain that if it were not for British policy of divide
and rule the Arabs and Jews would again live in Palestine in peace and harmony."
On November 15th, l937 the Arab daily Ad-Difaa asserted that the British Government
had categorically rejected all proposals for a round-table discussion between
Jews, Arabs and British, through the Jews and Arabs alike were anxious for such
a meeting. After talking to all sections of the Arab population, the correspondent
for The New York Times reported on November 21st, that their unnaminous cry
was "we've suffered enough and we don't wish to have any more trouble.
May Allah curse them and cut off the lives of these intruders from the outside
who are disturbing our existence."
Pamphlets were distributed in Arab villages throughout Palestine violently attacking
Great Britain as being "the cause of their ruin. (pp.104)" Dr. Gustavo
Gutierrez, former President of Cuba's Chamber of Deputies, stated after his
visit to the Holy Land in late l936, that he saw "no evidence of friction
or disagreement between the Arab and Jewish people in Palestine," and that
"if Arabs and Jews were let to their own councils they could settle the
Palestine problem wisely and permanently." Contrary to what history books
tell us, there was Arab opposition to British rule- and a genuine desire to
live in peace with the Jews- even as late as l937.
Describing the Arab predictment, which has not changed in the six decades since
he wrote his book, in the epilogue Ziff states: "The Arabs are compelled
to free themselves from the present despotic and feudal regimes under which
all the Arab peoples suffer. In Arab countries, despite the paper constitutions,
which exist in several of them, there is little in the way of liberty. Poverty
and ignorance are endemic."
What is important about Ziff's book is that it was written close to when the
events were taking place. It is a version of history that few of us who believe
ourselves to be students of the "Arab-Israeli conflict" have ever
come across. It is the first revisionist historical account of the role the
British played in the modern Middle East in general, and in the Arab-Israeli
conflict in specific. Its main premise, that the Arab-Israeli conflict was created
and stoked by the British, and isn't the result of ethnic hatred of the participants,
is in a sense a revolutionary new perspective in Zionist history.
If nothing more, Ziff's book should encourage the Israeli government to establish
a body that aims to change all of the street names in the country that are named
after British Mandate personalities. The British government was the reason why
it took Israel until l948 to reach independence. Considering the state of the
Yishuv's economy in l937, independence then was possible. Had the British not
ruled Palestine, by l930 unrestricted Jewish immigration and the hard work and
creativity of the new Jewish immigrants would have created an economy twice
as large as it was at the time in 1930. The Arabs themselves acknowledge that
they would have participated fully in this unprecedented economic boom.
Instead, the British government created phony Arab "radicals" like
Haj Amin, to stoke the conflict. The British government was also to blame for
corrupting Arab leaders and conspiring to keep all Arabs poor and their economy
undeveloped.
Just as French collaborators and Nazis are still brought before tribunals and
charged with "crimes against humanity" so too should members of the
British colonial office who directed the overall policy in Mandated Palestine
to pit the Jews and the Arabs against each other. As this policy kept the Jews
from being able to help their brothers fleeing from Nazi Germany, the crime
is also of Genocide.