Palestine question – Ad Hoc Cttee General debate: Peru, Haiti, Syria, Yugoslavia, Canada – Press release

At this afternoon’s meeting the Committee continued general discussion of the Palestine Question.

Dr. Alberto Uloa (Peru) stated that the Jewish problem should be solved in accordance with the principles of human rights. He gave his support to the partition proposal of the UNSCOP Majority Report but indicated that he would prefer Jerusalem to remain under the jurisdiction of Christianity.

The second speaker, Mr. Antonio Vieux (Haiti), also supported the Majority Report of UNSCOP but explained that his acceptance was based on Haiti’s belief that sovereignty over Palestine was held by the United Nations, as the rightful successor to the League which had received Palestine from their Ottoman Empire after World War I.

The Jewish claims to Palestine, he said, were not legally valid, since neither misfortune nor economic contributions to a country could be accepted as a vested interest in that country.

Referring to the Displaced Jews of Europe Mr. Vieux declared that his country, already densely populated, could not accept any plan which included enforced Jewish immigration on the nations of the world.

Dr. Farid Zein Eddine ( Syria) said that the Palestine problem had been created by Zionism and that the Arabs should not be called upon to bear the brunt of it.

He considered that the Balfour Declaration contemplated a Jewish National Home and not a Jewish State. He also criticized the proposal to set up an international volunteer force to carry out the decisions of the General Assembly.

Mr. Vladimir Simic (Yugoslavia) declared that an analysis of historical facts lead to the conclusion that both Arabs and Jews had an historical association with Palestine. He stated that the economic security of Palestine was in the intent of both people and urged that the future government of Palestine Jews and Arabs should enjoy equal rights.

He asked that the Mandate be terminated, foreign administration withdrawn and Palestine proclaimed independent.

Mr. Simic criticized the carrying out of the Mandate by the United Kingdom, and outlined the advantages of the federal plan for Palestine.

He also proposed that the Jews detained in the Cyprus camps be immediately admitted into Palestine.

Mr. J.L. Ilsley (Canada) recorded his country’s acceptance of the 11 unanimous recommendations of UNSCOP and of the 12th. Partition, be declared, seemed the best solution for the present.

Mr. Ilsley said of the United States suggestion that a volunteer constabulary be recruited by the United Nations, that it should first be established that the United Nations would have authority over such a force.

Mr. Ilsley also proposed that a sub-committee- including the five permanent members of the Security Council – be appointed to consider methods of implementation.

(For a chronological and more detailed account of this meeting, see Takes #1 – 8 following this summary.)

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AD HOC COMMITTEE ON PALESTINE (PM) TAKE #1

The Chairman, Dr. H. V. Evatt (Australia) called the meeting to order at 3:20 p.m. and gave the floor to Dr. Alberto-Ulloa, (Peru),

Dr. Alberto Ulloa began by saying that Dr. Garcia Salazar, who was his country’s delegate on the Special Committee on Palestine and who signed the majority report, was, from the personal standpoint, one of the most highly qualified members of the Peruvian diplomatic service, as regards both ability and conscientiousness. Accordingly, his study of the problem and his opinion on it merited the confidence of the Peruvian Government with respect to their impartiality, and predisposed it to a favorable view of his Judgment.

Dr. Ulloa then declared that there was no Jewish problem in Peru. In Peru, he said, there were not sufficient reasons for the Jewish problem to cause anxiety, either from the international or from the national point of view. Not from the first, because Peru had no economic or political interests in the Near East, the Mohammedan countries or the Mediterranean; and not from the second, because the participation in or influence on the life of Peru through combined action of the real Jews residing in Peru was relatively small.

Continuing, Dr. Ulloa said that a matter involving the consideration of the Jewish question in its relation to past, present and future, should be mainly decided in accordance with the growing insistence on human rights as a basis of international law. When, he explained, the affirmation of human rights were applied to the future, it meant the transformation of national groups that were homogeneous and clearly defined into autonomous States. For this reason, he added, the delegation of Peru supported the majority report of the Special Committee on Palestine.

The British Mandate over Palestine, he said, ought to be terminated and any provisional regime set up to serve as a bridge for the transmission of authority, ought to be of short duration.

(END OF (PM) TAKE #1)

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AD HOC COMMITTEE ON PALESTINE (PM) TAKE #2

Dr. Uloa then gave his view on the Balfour Declaration. At the time of the Balfour Declaration, he said, Great Britain, which officially issued it, was not a State acting individually or apart from the international community. She was a leading member of an association of States, united Allies in the First World War, which not only sought military victory over their enemies but also asserted a moral and political philosophy and promised humanity the solution of its great problems of co-existence in a democratic spirit of justice which would afford guarantees for a better way of life. This circumstance, he said, together with the fact that after the Balfour Declaration practically all the powers of the world conferred the mandate for Palestine on Great Britain gave what, in the judgment of some people, might have been regarded as a unilateral undertaking, the character of an international agreement by tacit consent.

With regard to the threats to which consideration by the United Nations had given rise, Dr. Uloa stated that a few days ago the Political Committee expressed its distress and surprise at the attitude of States which, though Members of the United Nations, appeared to be announcing in advance their refusal to comply with the resolutions or recommendations of the United Nations.

Concluding, Dr. Uloa declared that Peru would prefer that Jerusalem be retained wholly under the moral authority and legal jurisdiction of Christianity.

(END OF TAKE #2)

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AD HOC COMMITTEE ON PALESTINE (PM) TAKE #3

The second speaker was Mr. Antonio Vieux (Haiti) who announced that Haiti supported in principle the partition of Palestine as recommended in the Majority Report of UNSCOP.

He said, however, that Haiti did not believe that the Jews were entitled to claim Palestine in whole or in part as a fatherland. Misfortune, he said, could not he used as a rightful claim to territory occupied by others for thousands of years. Nor could the contributions of Jews to Palestine be considered as a vested interest of their’s in that country. He did not consider that the question of assent or self-determination was involved. The question, he argued, was rather one of transference of sovereignty. In this case, the sovereignty of Palestine, he said, lay with the United Nations as successor to the League to which Turkey had ceded her sovereignty after World War I.

In view of this fact, he said, Haiti would support the UNSCOP report though, in order to allay Arab fears of partition, it might be possible to negotiate an extension of Arab territory.

Mr. Vieux called attention to what he considered the “lack of wisdom” of any plan imposing Jewish immigration on other countries. Haiti, he said, had already too dense a population to respond to any request that she admit such immigrants.

(END OF TAKE #3)

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AD HOC COMMITTEE ON PALESTINE (PM) TAKE #4

Dr. Farid Zein Eddini (Syria) warned the Committee against a decision on Palestine which, he said, would be unjust.

One of the facts which should be taken into consideration, he said, was that the Palestinian problem had been created by Zionism. Zionism was alien to the Arabs, he said, and they should not therefore be called upon to solve the problem at their own expense. Another fact, Mr. Zein Eddini went on, was that Zionism, which after the first world war, had been content with a National Home for the Jews in Palestine, now claimed a Jewish State in that land. This, said Mr. Zein Eddini, went beyond the Balfour Declaration, and would result in the Arabs being driven out of this Jewish State.

Further violence, said Mr. Zein Eddini, would be used by the Zionists in pursuance of their plans.

Mr. Zein Eddini then proceeded to criticize the proposal for the setting up of an international volunteer force to carry out the eventual decisions of the General Assembly. He also criticized the tendency to consider Jewish colonization in Palestine as an accomplished fact without consideration of historical and legal arguments of the Arab States.

He drew a parallel between Zionism and Nazism, declaring that both presented certain similarities.

(End of Take #4)

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AD HOC COMMITTEE ON PALESTINE (PM) – # 5.

Concluding, Mr. Zein Eddine, declared that the right of self-determination was not taken into consideration with regard to Palestine at the end of the first World War. Neither, he added had the allied Powers of that time legally acquired the right to dispose of Palestine.

The proposal to partition this country, said Mr. Zein Eddine, ran counter to the Charter of the United Nations because it would lead to violence whereas the Charter’s aim was to preserve peace.

Mr. Zeid Eddins was also critical of the economic clauses of the partition plan which by placing economic coordination in the hands of a board comprising the Arabs, the Jews and the foreign appointees which latter would hold the balance, deprived Palestine of economic independence.

(END OF TAKE #5.)

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AD HOC COMMITTEE ON PALESTINE (PM) TAKE #6

Mr. Vladimir Simic (Yugoslavia) recalled that his country had been represented in the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine, and that Yugoslavia’s views were met forth in the minority proposal (federation).

Mr. Simic stated that the best solution would have been one reached by common consent of the Arabs and Jews. This, however, did not seem possible in view of the existing state of tension.

Mr. Simic declared that an analysis of historical and. legal facts led to conclusion that both Arabs and Jews had an historical association with Palestine, and that the right of both peoples to independence was a result of the national awareness of both. He added that the maintenance of economic unity in Palestine would serve the interests of both Arabs and Jews.

Mr. Simic declared that equal civil, political and religious rights for all the inhabitants of Palestine was the basic prerequisite if a democratic state were to be set up.

He made it clear that, is his opinion, a solution of the Palestine problem did not at the same time constitute a solution of the Jewish problem in general.

Mr. Simic then asked that the British Mandate over Palestine be terminated, the foreign administration withdrawn and the country proclaimed independent.

(END OF TAKE #6)

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AD HOC COMMITTEE ON PALESTINE – (PM) TAKE #7

Mr. Simic argued that the Mandatory Power had failed in its task in Palestine, and had thereby tended to make the solution of the Palestine problem more difficult. The country, he explained had not been prepared for independence by the Mandatory Power, which had not fostered the development of appropriate institutions.

He also criticized the increase in military expenditure in comparison with the limited credits for education and health.

Mr. Simic said that if the Mandatory Power had developed self-governing institutions in Palestine, Arabs and Jews would have been better prepared to cooperate.

He then outlined the proposals of the minority (federal) plan and explained its advantages. He argued that the proposed transition period of three years was too long.

With regard to Jewish immigration, Mr. Simic declared that there was a certain interdependence between the survival of the European Jewish refugees and the solution of the question of Palestine. Both, he said, were international questions. He went on to explain the proposals on this matter put forward by the minority report. He also submitted a resolution calling upon the Mandatory Power immediately to admit into Palestine the Jewish deportees now living in the Cyprus camps.

(END OF (PM) TAKE #7)

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AD HOC COMMITTEE ON PALESTINE (PM) TAKE #8

The last speaker, Mr. J. L. Ilsley (Canada) said his Delegation had reached the following conclusions.

It approved of the 11 unanimous recommendations of UNSCOP and the 12th as well which has been adopted by a very large majority.

Canada’s own experience with its 80 year-old Federal State lent hope, he said, to the idea that in the future Arabs and Jews in Palestine might some day find in federation a means of solving their problems. However, he said, the Canadian decision was based on agreement on the two groups. Since this was not the case now, he said, partition seemed the best solution at present.

Referring to the US proposal for the establishment of special constabulary recruited on a voluntary basis by the United Nations, he said the authority of the UN over such a force should be established beyond doubt.

He added that to establish that authority it might be necessary to explore the possible application of Chapter 12 of the Charter during the period of transition.

Mr. Ilsley also suggested such a force should have for its basis of recruitment one which would not further inflame either Community in Palestine.

The problems, he said, raised by the questions of administration after the withdrawal of the Mandatory Power and the implementation of whatever plan was adopted, should be the subject of special study by a second subcommittee, in which the five permanent members of the Security Council should be included.

(END OF TAKE #8 and of

PRESS RELEASE GA/PAL/15)

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