867N.01/1596
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Chief of the Division of Near Eastern Affairs (Murray)
Mr. Victor Mallet, Counselor of the British Embassy, called today and handed me the attached papers,49 which are extracts from the draft of the White Paper regarding Palestine which the British Government hopes to publish within the next few days. Mr. Mallet said that if and when the White Paper was published it was the intention of the British Government to make public at the same time the British “Declaration to the Seven”,50 a copy of the statement made by Mr. Hogarth to King Hussein in 1920 [1918],51 and a report of the Arab-British Committee52 which had been working on an interpretation of the McMahon-Hussein correspondence in 1915 and 1916.
Mr. Mallet went on to read from a telegraphic instruction received by the Embassy. He stated that although the Embassy had not been authorized to communicate this to the Department the Ambassador had decided to give us the information contained therein on a confidential basis. This instruction started out by stating that, although it was hoped to publish the White Paper on Palestine within the next few days and although it was expected that this White Paper would be substantially as indicated in the text which he had handed me, it was possible, in view of the existing situation, that the White Paper would be published in a different form, that it would be altered [Page 739] perhaps to a considerable extent or indeed that it might not be published at all. Here Mr. Mallet interpolated to say that he understood the foregoing to be a reference to the present European situation, which might prevent his Government from coming to a clear-cut decision on Palestine in the near future.
According to the above-mentioned instruction, the Arabs had objected to the final British proposals on the ground that no definite date was set for the establishment of an independent state in Palestine. It was pointed out that obviously no British Government could give a pledge as to a definite date on which such a state could be established, particularly in view of present world conditions and the impossibility of knowing what such conditions might be in the future. The Arabs also observed that under the British proposal no independent state could be set up without the consent of the Jews and that the Jews, by refusing to participate in the Government during the intermediate period, could effectively postpone and eventually prevent any state from being established. The British had assured the Arabs that if the Jews showed an inclination to decline to participate in the Government during the intervening period before independence, steps would be taken to induce them to take part in the Government.
The Arabs also had objected to the proposal for the admission of 75,000 immigrants into Palestine during the next five years. However the British Government did not consider this objection valid since such an increase would, at the end of the five-year period, bring the Jews up to only one-third of the population and there would still be in Palestine two Arabs for every Jew. The amount of 75,000 as the maximum number of Jewish immigrants into Palestine during the next five years, subject of course to the economic absorptive capacity of the country, had been suggested by Fuad Bey Hamza, the Saudi Arabian delegate. This number was somewhat smaller than the British had originally proposed but it was considered fair and just to all concerned. It was originally proposed, moreover, to limit immigration to the present number of approximately 1,000 a month but on the suggestion of the Arabs this had been reduced to the figure of 10,000 per year but, at the same time, a block of 25,000 immigrants, in addition, were to be admitted as Palestine’s contribution to the refugee problem.
The Embassy’s instructions went on to point out that most amicable relations had been established with the non-Palestinian Arabs, although it was disappointing that those Arabs had made a formal statement disapproving of the British Government’s final plan. There was reason to believe, however, that the non-Palestinian Arabs were not altogether dissatisfied with the arrangements which had been made.
- Not printed.↩
- British Cmd. 5964, Miscellaneous No. 4 (1939): Statements made on behalf of His Majesty’s Government during the year 1918 in regard to the Future Status of certain parts of the Ottoman Empire, p. 5.↩
- Ibid., p. 3.↩
- British Cmd. 5974: Report of a Committee set up to consider Certain Correspondence Between Sir Henry McMahon [His Majesty’s High Commissioner in Egypt] and the Sharif of Mecca in 1915 and 1916, March 16, 1939.↩