UN Palestine Commission – Offer of cooperation by the Hebrew Cttee of National Liberation

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UNITED NATIONS PALESTINE COMMISSION

Communication to the Chairman from the Hebrew Committee

of National Liberation

The following letter has been received by the Chairman on 18 February 1948 from Mr. Bergson, Chairman of the Hebrew Committee of National Liberation.

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HEBREW COMMITTEE OF NATIONAL LIBERATION

February 16, 1948

Dear Dr. Lisicky:

The progressive deterioration in the Palestine situation since the General Assembly adopted its Palestine plan on November 29, 1947, has created a grave national emergency far the Hebrew people.

The Hebrew Committee of National Liberation, therefore, feels duty-bound in the light of this new emergency facing our nation, to came into direct contact with the United Nations Commission on Palestine and to offer its cooperation in a program designed to avert the impending disaster.

In taking this decision, the Hebrew Committee has been prompted not alone by the situation in Palestine itself, but by the knowledge that the fate of nearly a million Jewish residents of the Moslem countries and the fate of hundreds of thousands of Hebrew displaced persons in Europe are inextricably bound up with the immediate future of Palestine.

In a series of communications to the appropriate United Nations organs, the Hebrew Committee has made clear its opposition to any plan for partitioning Palestine and has submitted several memoranda offering an alternative solution. In its last communication, dated December 1, 1947, to Secretary-General Lie, the Committee declared that the Hebrew people could never accept as final this further partitioning of our country. In this same communication, nevertheless, the Committee stated:

“The gruesome tragedy that overcame our nation during the war and the humane consideration for the undue suffering sustained by the surviving relatives of the six million of our sacred dead, as well as the appeal of the General Assembly of the United Nations for peace in Palestine, have prompted the Hebrew patriots to cooperate with the United Nations Commission in its legitimate efforts toward the preservation of peace in our country.”

Events that have site then occurred have unfortunately substantiated our gravest fears, and have therefore, compelled the Committee, despite its continuing opposition to partition, to address this communication to you.

The Hebrew Committee is a Palestinian body in exile which since its creation in 1944 has led the political struggle for the salvation of the Hebrew people and the liberation of Palestine from British oppression.

The Hebrew Committee maintains that the Jewish Agency for Palestine, being a voluntary body of citizens of many lands, cannot and does not represent the Hebrew people. Furthermore, the Jewish Agency has constantly collaborated with the British regime of occupation and has actively sought to crush the Hebrew resistance in Palestine, whose struggle for freedom finally resulted in United Nations consideration of Palestine.

Hon. Karol Lisicky, Chairman,

United Nations Special Commission

on Palestine

Lake Success New York

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The fact that the Government or the United Kingdom opposes the establishment of a “Jewish militia” should not prevent the manifold preparations that can be undertaken outside of Palestine.

The United Nations Commission should request the Government of the United States and other members of the United Nations to sell and lease the military equipment necessary for the Palestine Army. The assembling of this equipment, including air and seacraft, and its shipment to Palestine should commence so that it may be available on May 1st, which appears at present to be the earliest data the British will allow the Commission to enter Palestine.

3. That the United Nations Commission should request all member governments of the United Nations to give maximum assistance in the organization of large-scale repatriation of Hebrew displaced persons to Palestine which under the United Nations decision should have commenced on February 1st.

The Government of the United States, which at present shoulders the burden for the maintenance of more then 200,000 Hebrew displaced persons and which has organized the repatriation of some 7,000,000 European displaced persons, should be requested to lend facilities and assistance in the carrying out of this task.

In this connection we want to stress the inalienable right of Hebrew nationals to enter Palestine, which le their national territory. Under the Resolution of the General Assembly which recognized Hebrew sovereignty in Palestine, all member states of the United Nations should feel duty-bound to assist the long suffering Hebrews in Europe to be repatriated to their own country.

4. That the United nations Commission should request the Security Council to undertake immediately all steps provided by the Charter to restrain the Governments of Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Iraq, and the Yemen from continuing their acts of aggression against Palestine.

Quite apart from ant prior to the dispatching of an international force to Palestine, a force which the Security Council does not yet possess, there are numerous concrete acts which the Security Council can carry out immediately, ouch as the creation of a Palestine Border Commission,  the imposition of economic sanctions and the suspension of members from the United Nations. It is our view that if such steps are taken there will probably be no necessity for United Nations armed intervention.

We beg to submit that the task of the United Nations Commission is to establish sovereignty in Palestine and not to guarantee the security of the newly recognized states or state. This latter respectability will fall under the jurisdiction of the Security Council once the state has come into being. We, therefore, respectfully suggest that the Commission can proceed with the formal establishment of the Hebrew Republic of Palestine regardless of the already existing threats to the security and integrity of that State.

We have made the above proposals in accordance with the resolution of the General Assembly, which provides for the creation of a Provisional Council of Government prior to April 1, 1948. Only after a Palestinian sovereignty is thus established will it be possible to overcome the obstacles to implementation deliberately created by the Government of the United Kingdom which are otherwise insurmountable.

In conclusion, we beg. to express to you, Mr. Chairman, and to your colleagues on the Commission, our confident hope that the Governments which you represent, having been entrusted by the United Nations with a problem the solution of which might well determine the very existence of the United Nations organization, will face, that task with determination and foresight.

Please accept assurances of my highest esteem and consideration.

Faithfully yours,

(Signed)

Peter. M. Bergson,

Chairman