On 15 May 1947, the General Assembly of the United Nations approved
the establishment of a committee of eleven to investigate the
Palestine question, to make proposals for a settlement, and to
report back by September. None of the big powers was represented on
this committee, which entered history under the name of UNSCOP. It
consisted of delegates from Australia, Canada, Czechoslovakia,
Guatemala, India, The Netherlands, Persia, Uruguay and Yugoslavia.
Its chairman was Judge Sandstrom, a Swede, with Ralph Bunche
representing the U.N.
UNSCOP heard witnesses for three and a half months in America,
Europe and Palestine, and toured DP (displaced persons) camps and
Arab and Jewish cities and rural settlements. Among the Zionist
representatives the most effective was again Chaim Weizmann,
appearing for once in an unofficial capacity. The committee was
given a brief lecture on the nature of anti-Semitism: what are
Poles? What are Frenchmen? The answer is obvious, Weizmann said,
but if one asks who is a Jew, lengthy explanations are necessary,
and these are always suspect. Why did the Jews insist so stubbornly
on Palestine rather than some other country? It was no doubt the
responsibility of Moses who had taken them to Palestine. Instead of
the Jordan, they might have had the Mississippi: "But he chose to
stop here. We are an ancient people with a long history and you
cannot deny your history and begin afresh."
When asked about the prospects of binationalism, Moshe Shertok made
the point that willingness to work together was the prerequisite
for the existence of a binational state, but unfortunately it did
not exist. A Jewish state was needed because Palestinian Jewry had
come of age, to save the remnant of European Jewry, and to ensure
the future of the Jewish people. Questioned by Sandstrom,
Ben-Gurion said that he foresaw the settlement of the first million
Jews in a Jewish state in the shortest possible time - three to
four years. In the period of transition he envisaged a régime
of diarchy with the mandatory power, as in India. Ben-Gurion
rejected the idea of parity, which would result in permanent
deadlock on all vital issues such as immigration. Instead of an
Arab-Jewish federation, he proposed a confederation of
states.
As the members of UNSCOP came to grasp the complexity of the
situation, two opposed views emerged: India, Iran and Yugoslavia
favored federation, not altogether dissimilar to the Morrison-Grady
plan. There was to be common citizenship, and a federal authority
controlling foreign policy, national defense, immigration and most
economic activities. During the transitional period, which was to
last for three years, the administration was to be conducted by an
authority appointed by the United Nations.
The UNSCOP majority came out in favor of partition, but recommended
at the same time economic union, without which they believed the
proposed Arab state would not be viable. All members of the
commission agreed that the transitional period should be as short
as possible. There was also a consensus on keeping the Holy Places
accessible to all, and there was an appeal to Arabs and Jews to
refrain from acts of violence. But on matters of political
substance, no common denominator could be found to reconcile the
majority and minority views, and consequently there were two
separate reports.
The UNSCOP findings were published on 31 August 1947. Both the
majority and the minority reports had been drawn up by the same man
- Dr. Ralph Bunche. The majority plan envisaged a Jewish state and
an Arab state (both of which were to come into being by September
1949), with the city of Jerusalem remaining under international
trusteeship. The Jewish state was to consist of three sections:
upper Galilee and the Jordan and Beisan valleys; the coastal plain
from a point south of Acre to a point north of Isdud, including the
city of Jaffa and most of the Valley of Esdraelon; and lastly, most
of the Negev. The Arab state was to include western Galilee, most
of the West Bank down to and including Lydda, and the Gaza Strip,
from the Egyptian border to a point some twenty miles south of Tel
Aviv.
The Zionist leaders had fought very hard throughout the UNSCOP
hearings for the inclusion of western Galilee and the Negev in the
Jewish state, so as to have at their disposal sparsely populated
areas for future development. They failed as far as western Galilee
was concerned, and the fate of the Negev was uncertain, for when
the UNSCOP majority plan came to the vote later that year, the
American delegation wanted the Negev to be assigned to the Arabs to
make the scheme more palatable to them. Weizmann went to see a most
reluctant President Truman to prevent any change in the proposed
borders.
The minority report was rejected without further ado by the
Zionists. On the majority report counsels were divided. While
abstaining from the vote on partition in Paris a year earlier,
Ben-Gurion had clearly retreated from Biltmore. In a letter to
Weizmann of October 1946 he had said that "we should be ready for
an enlightened compromise even if it gives us less in practice than
we have right to in theory, but only as long as what is granted to
us is really in our hands." Rabbi Silver said that the boundaries
as drawn by UNSCOP were a great blow and had to be fought. But
after this initial negative reaction Silver, too, retreated, having
realized that the majority report was the maximum the Zionists
could possibly hope for. He understood that the commandment of the
hour was not to press for more, which was unrealistic, but to work
for acceptance of the report by the United Nations.
The prospects were by no means rosy: Britain was clearly opposed to
partition, so were the Arab countries and most of the Asian
nations. As the views of the rest were not at all clear, the
American position was likely to be a factor of paramount
importance. In Washington the State Department (General Marshall,
Dean Acheson, Robert Lovett, Loy Henderson) was clearly against a
Jewish state, as was Forrestal, the secretary of defense. Truman
wrote in his diary that the nation's military leaders were
primarily concerned about Middle East oil and, in long-range terms,
about the danger that the Arabs, antagonized by western action in
Palestine, would make common cause with Russia.
These were weighty arguments and were pressed home with immense
concern by Forrestal and others. Forrestal argued that the failure
to go along with the Zionists might lose the Democrats the states
of New York and California. But was it not high time to consider
whether giving in to Jewish pressure "might not lose the United
States"? Since the Soviet Union was a cosponsor of partition, and
since Forrestal could not have foreseen the switch in the Soviet
position, his anxiety was exaggerated. Since the West was the only
major market for Arab oil, there was no reason to fear that the
Arabs would try to boycott their best customers.
Subsequent developments seem to have partly justified Forrestal's
warnings, for Palestine was no doubt one of the main issues as the
radical Arab countries moved to a position hostile to the United
States. However, the evidence is by no means conclusive. Similar
processes took place all over the Third World, with the exception
of a few countries directly threatened by the Soviet Union. King
Farouk may have lasted a few more years but for the emergence of a
Jewish state, but there is little doubt that political and social
change sprang from indigenous conditions in the Nile Valley. On the
other hand, it could be argued that but for the existence of
Israel, serving as a lightning conductor, the "moderates" would
have been overthrown by the "radicals" everywhere, or that in the
absence of a common enemy the Arab world would have fallen into a
state of anarchy. All this, of course, is highly speculative; no
one can say what might have happened but for the emergence of the
State of Israel.
A hesitating President Truman gave his assent to the partition
scheme on 9 October 1947. He faced considerable opposition within
his administration, and the strident tone of American Zionist
propaganda and the pressure constantly brought on him had
antagonized him. Nevertheless, he seems to have given instructions
in November to give assistance to the Zionist representatives in
New York who were trying hard to gain the necessary majority for
the UNSCOP report. There were delays and it was not certain up to
the last moment whether the motion would succeed. The vote was
taken on Saturday, 29 November, and the motion carried by
thirty-three to thirteen. Among those against were the Arab and
some Asian states as well as Greece and Cuba. Among those who
abstained were Argentina, Chile, China, Ethiopia, Britain,
Yugoslavia and several South American republics.
There were celebrations that day in New York, in Palestine, and
wherever Jews lived. Traffic stopped in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem as
people danced in the streets until the early hours of the morning.
The decision imposed heavy responsibility on the Yishuv (Jewish
community) and the entire Jewish people, Ben-Gurion said in an
interview. "After a darkness of two thousand years the dawn of
redemption has broken," declared Isaac Herzog, the chief rabbi. "It
looks like trouble," said Dr. Magnes who for many years had fought
valiantly and vainly for a binational state.
The next morning the Palestinian Arabs called a three-day protest
strike, and Jews in all parts of the country were attacked. On that
first day of rioting seven were killed and more injured; the
fighting continued to the end of the mandate. The next months, as
chaos engulfed Palestine, were a time of crisis for the Jewish
community. Britain announced that it would leave the country by 16
May 1948, but the administration made no preparations to transfer
power to Jews and Arabs, nor indeed to the Committee of Five which
had been appointed by the U.N. to administer Jerusalem. The most
pressing task facing the Jewish population was to strengthen its
defenses, since the Arab countries had already announced that their
armies would enter the country as soon as the British left. Syria
was not willing to wait that long: an "Arab Liberation Army" inside
Palestine was established in February with the help of Syrian
officers as well as irregulars.
Hagana was by no means as well equipped and trained a fighting
detachment as was commonly believed. Its forces and equipment were
sufficient to cope with a civil war, but they seemed inadequate to
defend the Yishuv against regular armies. While Britain continued
to supply arms to the neighboring Arab countries, and America had
declared a general arms embargo, the Jewish forces had great
difficulty in obtaining supplies. By February the Arab forces were
on the offensive throughout the country. While they did not succeed
in capturing Jewish settlements, they all but paralyzed the traffic
among them, and even Jerusalem was about to become a besieged city.
The Jewish relief forces sent to the help of the Etzion settlements
had been wiped out to the last man, a terrible loss by the
standards of those days.
At the U.N. The Palestine Commission reported despairingly that
nothing could be done before the end of the mandate. They could not
demarcate the frontiers or set up a provisional government in the
Arab state, and this would prevent economic union, and jeopardize
the Jewish state and the international régime for Jerusalem.
The British announced that they could not support the U.N.
resolution because it committed the Security Council to carrying
out the partition scheme or giving guidance to the Palestine
Commission. Palestine sterling holdings in London were blocked and
the country expelled from the sterling bloc. It seemed as if London
was determined to wreck whatever chances remained for an orderly
and peaceful handover. Perhaps it wanted to demonstrate that the
Palestinian problem was intractable and that, where Britain had
failed, no one else could succeed.
As events in Palestine took a turn for the worse, as far as Jewish
interests were concerned, the resolve of the United States to
support partition, never very strong, was further weakened. Senator
Austin, telling the Security Council on 24 February that his
country was not really bound by the recommendation of the General
Assembly, prepared the way for retreat. On 18 March he formally
declared that since the partition plan could not be put into effect
peacefully, the attempt to implement it should be discontinued and
a temporary trusteeship established by the U.N. Only a day before
this announcement, Truman had assured Weizmann that the United
States was in favor of partition and would stick to this
policy.
The shift in the American position was not apparently the result of
a carefully thought out political line; it simply reflected the
drift, the lack of resolution and coordination in the American
capital and the conflicting views within the administration. The
trusteeship proposals were unrealistic, for if the U.N. had no
authority to send a police force to supervise partition, who was
going to enforce trusteeship? But events in Palestine had their
momentum, and the country was moving towards partition. In April
Truman informed Weizmann that there would be no change in the
long-term policy of the United States. If partition was not
reversed in the General Assembly, and if after 15 May a Jewish
state came into being, Washington would recognize it.
During March and April the military situation in Palestine suddenly
improved for the Jews. It was still doubtful whether Hagana would
be able to withstand the attack of Arab regular armies, but the
main Arab guerrilla forces near Jerusalem and Haifa were routed.
Fighting became more intense and savage, as acts of reprisal
followed one another. On 8 April, most of the inhabitants of the
Arab village of Deir Yassin on the outskirts of Jerusalem, 254 in
number, were killed by a combined IZL-Sternist force. Three days
later, a Jewish medical convoy on its way to the Hadassa[h]
hospital on Mount Scopus was ambushed in the streets of Jerusalem
with the loss of seventy-nine doctors, nurses and students. A
British force stationed two hundred yards away did not
intervene.
As the armed struggle became more bitter, the Jews were fighting
with their backs to the wall, whereas the Arabs could take refuge
in neighboring countries. By the end of April, about 15,000 Arabs
had left Palestine. What impelled them to do so has been debated
ever since. The Arabs claim that the Jews, by massacres and threats
of massacre, forced them out and that this was part of a systematic
policy. The Jews asserted that the Palestinian Arabs followed the
call of their leaders, believing they would soon return in the wake
of victorious Arab armies.
As the end of the mandate drew nearer, the Jewish organizations
prepared for the establishment of the state. Manpower was
mobilized, emergency loans floated; the name of the new state, its
constitution, flag, emblem, the seat of government were discussed,
and there were hundreds of other questions to be decided. In reply
to Washington's trusteeship proposal, the Jewish Agency executive
resolved on 23 March 1948 that immediately after the end of the
mandate a Jewish government would take over. The Jewish Agency (at
its meeting of 30 March) and the Zionist Council (on 6-12 April)
decided on the establishment of a provisional government to be
called Minhelet Ha'am (National Administration) and a provisional
parliament, Moezet Ha'am (National Council). On 20 April, these
terms were first used in the Palestinian press. The new government
was to consist of thirteen members and the council of thirty-seven;
they were to be located for the time being in the Tel Aviv area.
Thus the era of Zionist institutions in the history of Palestine
came to an end.
The mandate was due to end at midnight, 14 May, but the new Jewish
administration began to function several weeks earlier. The blue
and white flag was hoisted on public buildings in Tel Aviv, new
stamps were issued, the taxation services reorganized. (One of the
main problems facing the new administration was to find a
sufficient number of Hebrew typewriters.) Meanwhile in New York and
Washington the Americans and the U.N. went through the motions of
establishing a caretaker commission as zero hour approached. But a
report from the Consular Truce Commission in Jerusalem announced
that partition in the capital was already a fact. Officials in
Washington thought that the chances that the Jewish state, if
proclaimed, would survive, were not very good. Moshe Shertok was
warned by General Marshall, the secretary of state, that if the
Jewish state was attacked it should not count on American military
help. There were suggestions by Dean Rusk and others that the
proclamation of the state should be postponed for ten days, perhaps
longer, and that meanwhile the truce should be restored.
Shertok arrived in Tel Aviv on 12 May, just in time for the session
of the provisional government which was to decide on the
proclamation of the state. He supported the proposal that a truce
should be declared and that, while a government should be appointed
at the end of the British mandate, the proclamation of the state
should be delayed. But Ben-Gurion was not willing to budge. The
motion was defeated by a vote of six to four, as, with a small
minority, was the suggestion that the proclamation of the state
should mention its borders as defined by the United Nations.
The State of Israel came into being at a meeting of the National
Council at 4 p.m. on Friday, 15 May 1948 (Iyar 5, 5708), at the Tel
Aviv Museum, Rothschild Boulevard. The Hatiqva was sung first, and
then David Ben-Gurion read out the declaration of independence: "By
virtue of the natural and historical right of the Jewish people and
of the resolution of the General Assembly of the United Nations we
hereby proclaim the establishment of the Jewish state in Palestine
to be called Israel." This took little more than fifteen minutes,
after which the members of the council signed the document in
alphabetical order. Rabbi Fishman pronounced Shehekheyanu, the
traditional benediction (...that we lived to see this day...). The
first decree adopted by the National Council as the supreme
legislative authority was the retroactive annulment of the White
Paper. The ceremony was over well before the Sabbath set in.
Ben-Gurion said to one of his aides: "I feel no gaiety in me, only
deep anxiety as on 29 November, when I was like a mourner at the
feast." Half an hour after midnight the last British high
commissioner left Haifa, and the following Sunday Dr. Weizmann was
elected president of the new state.
The first country to recognize the new state was the United States.
President Truman made a brief statement to that effect on Friday,
shortly after 6 p.m. Washington time. Within the next few days the
Soviet Union, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Guatemala, Uruguay and other
countries followed. A cable was received by the chairman of the
Security Council from the Egyptian foreign minister: the Egyptian
army was crossing the borders of Palestine with the object of
putting an end to the massacres raging there, and upholding the law
and the principles recognized among the United Nations; military
operations were directed not against the Palestinian Jew but only
against the terrorist Zionist gangs. During Friday night, the
invasion of Palestine began. On Saturday morning Tel Aviv's power
station and Aqir airport were attacked from the air. It was the
beginning of a series of wars which was not to end for many years.