Arab Committee Questions U.N. Right to Divide Palestine
LAKE SUCCESS, Nov. 19 (AP). An eight-nation Arab sub-commitee on Palestine today formally challenged the authority of the United Nations in any attempt to partition the Holy Land into separate Arab and Jewish countries.
The challenge was contained in the report of a sub-group appointed to present the Arab viewpoint to the 57-nation Palestine committee of the General Assembly. All of this sub-group's membership is Arab or Moslem or both.
The report was submitted as a nine-nation sub-committee put the finishing touches on a complete plan to partition Palestine. Both reports were expected to be ready for debate by tonight. The Arab group recommended that the Assembly postpone action on the Palestine question until the International Court of Justice could clear up legal points raised by the Arab countries. This would mean an indefinite delay on a final Palestine solution.
The Arab report recommended specifically that the Palestine problem be dropped from the current Assembly's agenda.
Four major legal points were raised: The legality of Britain's League of Nations mandate, the validity of the Balfour Declaration of 1917, the competence of the United Nations to partition Palestine and the legality of any plan to enforce partition.
The Boston Globe,
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Angry Arabs Walk Out, Voice Hint of Holy War
Split Wins, 33-13; Assembly Ends Until September
UNITED NATIONS, HALL, Flushing, N. Y. — (UP) — The United Nations general assembly voted yesterday to partition Palestine into Arab and Jewish states, and Arab delegates angrily walked off the assembly floor hinting at holy war.
The decision to split Palestine, the most important UN ever made, ended the assembly's work for this year. The assembly adjourned at 5:58 p.m. (CST) until next September.
One by one, Arab delegates, some wearing ceremonial robes and swords, strode to the rostrum to brand the verdict a violation of the UN charter that could not be ob served. White-haired Faris El Khoury of Syria said that. All the Arabs in the Moslem world will obstruct carrying out of partition.
Then, as if at a signal, delegates of all the Arab states moved for the exits. But later they emphasized that it was just a boycott of Palestine proceedings and not a walk-out from UN itself — not at present, anyway.
Independence By Oct. 1
The epochal move to partition Palestine was intended to give Jews the home which they have sought for more than 2000 years. The plan, engineered by the United. States and Russia, called for Great Britain to leave Palestine by Aug. 1, letting a five-nation UN commission divide the territory into Arab and Jewish states that will receive independence by Oct. 1.
Great Britain has ruled Palestine under an old League of Nations mandate since the first world war ended. Britain, economically sick at home and harassed by increasingly-violent warfare from the Jewish underground, asked UN last spring to take over the Holy Land.
The British repeatedly have refused to use their troops to enforce partition, and many of the delegates who voted for the split yesterday feared that a fanatical Jewish-Arab religious war would bathe the Holy Land in blood before the issue is settled. The partition plan does not provide troops to put down a full-scale war.
Verdict Greeted Silently
The crowded galleries, although strongly in favor of partition, greeted the verdict silently. One disturbance during the roll-call vote was gaveled down by Assembly President Oswaldo Aranha of Brazil.
Great Britain's Sir Alexander Cadogan immediately took the rostrum to express hope that a UN committee to supervise the partition will arrive in Palestine promptly.
Prince Faisal Saud of Saudi Arabia, dressed in a flowing brown robe with white headdress, angrily denounced the decision as a violation of the UN charter, and warned that Saudi Arabia does not feel bound by this verdict.
The partition plan, as written by the United States and Russia, provided for:
1. Ending the British mandate over Palestine by Aug. 1.
2. Withdrawal of all British troops from Palestine by Aug. 1.
3. Creation of a five-nation UN commission to take over British responsibilities in the Holy Land. Splitting the territory into Arab and Jewish states and guiding them to independence by Oct. 4.
4. Placing the holy city of Jerusalem and its environs under permanent international control through the UN trusteeship council.
Gradual Withdrawal
British troops would withdraw from Palestine gradually, handing over each evacuated area to the UN commission. The commission then would appoint provisional governments in each of the new states and start the formation of militia to keep order.
The commission would see that the provisional governments set up democratic elections-with all men and women over 18 years of age allowed to vote-to select permanent governments.
Partition in the final show-down, polled a surprisingly heavy ballot. Up until the last hour, delegates were under tremendous pressure from Arabs and Jews to switch their votes, but the partitionists clearly had a lead.
Those For Partition
The nations voting for partition were: Australia, Belgium, Bolivia, Bra zil, Byelorussia, Canada, Costa Rica, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, France, Guatemala, Haiti, Iceland, Liberia, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Philip pines, Poland, Sweden, Ukraine, South Africa, Uruguay, United States, Venezuela. USSR,
Voting against partition were Afghanistan, Cuba, Egypt, Greece, India, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey, Yemen.
Abstaining were Argentina, Chile China, Colombia, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Honduras, Mexico, United Kingdom, Yugoslavia.
Siam was absent.
Speaking for Iraq and Iran fell into the line of Arab states by promising to ignore UN's decision. Ardel Arslan of Iran cried: The UN charter is dead — it has been murdered.
But like any man condemned to hang, we are allowed to say a few words. We will not recognize this decision.
Commission Named
The assembly selected members of a five-nation commission to ad minister Palestine's partition. Countries elected to the commission were Bolivia, Czechoslovakia, Den mark, Phillippines and Panama.
The final vote came after a last minute Arab caucus developed a compromise plan for a federated Jewish-Arab country and over State governments for Jewish and Arab areas. Aranha, however, ruled that this was no proposal at all, because it was too vague. The Arabs made another attempt to stall when they asked that the whole Pales tine problem go back to a commit tee for further study until Jan. 15.
The Jewish agency issued a for mal statement promising that the Jewish people will forever be grateful to the nations which contributed to this decision (to partition Palestine).
We pray for the peace of Palestine, the Jewish agency statement said. We extend a hand of genuine friendship to the New Arab state which is to be established in Palestine.
The Arab walkout on the election of the UN commission members probably was the first in a long series of such boycotts that will come. Apparently, they will have nothing to do with the proposed government in the Arab state that would be set up in part of Palestine.
If the Arabs refuse to cooperate in setting up a government in the Arab state, the UN commission would be authorized to refer the matter to the UN security council for further action.
Even the most ardent supporters of partition do not claim that the plan is perfect. Palestine, a territory about the size of Vermont would be divided almost equally, 5,600 square miles going to the Jewish state and 4,711 square miles going to the Arabs.
Jewish State Richer
Delegates working on the partition scheme conceded that the proposed Jewish state would be richer than the Arab state. To meet this problem, the two states would op erate under a joint economic board that would supervise a common monetary and tax system. It also would manage transportation, communications and water facilities then for benefit of both states.
In the areas proposed for the Arab state, there are now 10,000 Jews and 805,000 Arabs. In the areas proposed for the Jewish state, there are 498,000 Jews and 327,000 Arabs.
This near-equality of population groups in the Jewish area soon would be made overwhelmingly Jewish by large-scale Jewish immigration. Great Britain, in preparing for its withdrawal, is requested to leave a major seaport and enough land by Feb. 1 to permit substantial Jewish immigration to start.
The Tenneseean
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Palestine Partitioning Likened to Crazy Quilt
NEW YORK — (AP) — Palestine is to be cut up like a crazy quilt under the partition, plan approved last night by the United Nations a general assembly.
Part will become a Jewish coun try, part an Arab country. Near the center, a tiny portion, roughly circular and taking in Jerusalem and Bethlehem, will become an in ternational zone.
The Holy Land is a little larger than Vermont. On the map it looks like a scimitar blade with the edge facing eastward.
The southern third or so of this, bordering Egypt, takes in the dry Negeb and Beersheba sections. In land, the Jews get the bigger chunk of this third. On the coast the Arabs get a little strip with an arm cutting down at right angles along the border.
The middle part of Palestine lies between the Dead sea and the Jor dan river on the east and the Mediterranean on the west. The Jews get a narrow strip on the coast, including some citrus coun try, all-Jewish Tel Aviv and the port of Haifa. The Arabs get the rest of this part of the Holy Land and also the port of Jaffa, a tiny circle of Arab rule surrounded by the Jewish coastland.
In northern Palestine, the Jews are given a narrow strip on the east running around the sea of Tiberias, usually called Galilee in the New Testament, and on up to the Lebanese frontier. The Arabs get the rest of the northern end of Palestine, including Acre on the coast and Nazareth and Safad inland.
In all, there are three Jewish areas and three Arab areas. At two points they cross-about half way between Jaffa and Gaga and just south of Nazareth.
The Tenneseean
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Claim All of Israel, Jewish Underground Urges
TEL AVIV, Palestine — (AP) — Members of the Irgun Zvai Leumi, Jewish underground organization, took over the public address system of a newspaper here early yesterday and urged Jews to claim all of Israel.
Witnesses said they were carry ing guns when they entered the building of the newspaper Haboker and interrupted an early morning rebroadcast of the United Nations vote on partitioning of Palestine.
They were overpowered and evicted after a technician had jammed the loudspeaker system.