867N.01/11–2246
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Acting Secretary of State
Lord Inverchapel called at his request. He said that he had been spending some time in New York, chiefly talking with Mr. Bevin about Palestine. He had urged Mr. Bevin to see some of the Jews interested in this subject. Mr. Bevin had had two interviews with Rabbi Silver. Lord Inverchapel was hoping that he would see Ben-Gurion.94 Mr. Bevin has already also had talks with Goldmann in London. The first interview with Rabbi Silver was not very successful. The second one resulted in much freer conversation between the two men. Lord Inverchapel was present at both interviews. Without attempting to differentiate between the interviews, Lord Inverchapel gave me the following summary of the conversations:
Mr. Bevin led off by stating that he was most anxious to work out a permanent settlement in Palestine. He said that if his effort in this direction should fail, he would give up the Mandate. In doing so, he would first ask the United States Government to take over the Mandate. If that Government was not willing to do so, he would inform the United Nations that the British Government was giving it up and was placing the entire matter before the United Nations for its action.
Rabbi Silver was much agitated at this statement, which Lord Inverchapel said both he and Rabbi Silver were convinced was entirely sincere and was not a bargaining statement. Rabbi Silver stated that this would be a disaster; that the British could not give up the Mandate; and that to do so would produce chaos. Mr. Bevin insisted upon this point and said that he had discussed it with both Mr. Attlee and Mr. Churchill,95 who agreed.
[Page 724]Rabbi Silver then came out for a partition. He stated that he personally did not believe in partition, but that he was willing to sink his personal views in favor of it on the ground that it gave up “territory for status.”
Mr. Bevin replied that in his view there was nothing in the Mandate which permitted the Mandatory to agree to partition, and that therefore such a proposal must be laid before the United Nations, the successor of the League of Nations for its approval. If this were done, he expected that there would be strong opposition and that the necessary vote of approval could not be obtained. Mr. Bevin said that he was not opposed to partition in principle except for the legal reasons given above.
Rabbi Silver said that in his opinion the opposition could not be effective if both the United States and the United Kingdom agreed to the proposal. Rabbi Silver strongly urged that prior to the meeting in Basle Mr. Bevin should “give him the word,” which meant that Mr. Bevin would agree to the principle of partition. Rabbi Silver stated that if this could be done before the convention in Basle, he would obtain the support of the Zionist Organization for such a settlement. Rabbi Silver repeated the assertions previously made by Mr. Goldmann that representatives of the Jewish Agency had received from Sidki Pasha96 and Azzam Pasha intimations that, if the United States and the United Kingdom agreed upon partition as a settlement, the Arab opposition would not be over-serious. Mr. Bevin said that he had heard these statements made before, but nothing which had come to the attention of the Foreign Office justified the belief that the Arabs mentioned held this view.
So far as my notes go, this appears to be the end of Lord Inverchapel’s summary of the interviews between Mr. Bevin and Rabbi Silver.
Lord Inverchapel went on to say that Mr. Bevin is moving rapidly toward acceptance of partition as the solution. His difficulty is that he believes that he cannot espouse it unless he knows with definiteness the attitude of the United States. He wants to know how far, if at all, the United States will support his proposing and putting through such a solution. Lord Inverchapel said that on one or more occasions during the interview Rabbi Silver had stated that the United States Government was committed to the solution of partition. Under cross examination he somewhat changed his statement and said that the United States Government would support partition. Lord Inverchapel asked me whether he would be justified in encouraging Mr. Bevin to believe that the United States Government would support partition.
I asked why Mr. Bevin did not talk this out with Secretary Byrnes and get a statement of our position which would not be in the vague field of encouragement but would have the authority of the President and the Secretary. He said that Mr. Bevin intended to do this on [Page 725] Tuesday or more probably Wednesday of next week, at which time he would have word from London of the Cabinet position on the paper which had been referred to the Cabinet. In the meantime Lord Inverchapel asked for my judgment as to the attitude of this Government.
I told him that so far as I was able to help him my statements would be rooted in the President’s public statement of October 4. I pointed out that in that statement, referring to the Morrison–Grady proposals, the President had said:
“However, opposition to this plan developed among members of the major political parties in the United States—both in the Congress and throughout the country. In accordance with the principle which I have consistently tried to follow, of having a maximum degree of unity within the country and between the parties on major elements of American foreign policy, I could not give my support to this plan.”
The Statement then went on, referring to the Jewish Agency proposal for partition, as follows:
“Meanwhile, the Jewish Agency proposed a solution of the Palestine problem by means of the creation of a viable Jewish state in control of its own immigration and economic policies in an adequate area of Palestine instead of in the whole of Palestine. It proposed furthermore the immediate issuance of certificates for 100,000 Jewish immigrants. This proposal received widespread attention in the United States, both in the press and in public forums. From the discussion which has ensued it is my belief that a solution along these lines would command the support of public opinion in the United States. I cannot believe that the gap between the proposals which have been put forward is too great to be bridged by men of reason and goodwill. To such a solution our Government could give its support.”
Finally the President, in his conclusions, stated:
“Furthermore, should a workable solution for Palestine be devised, I would be willing to recommend to the Congress a plan for economic assistance for the development of that country.”
I said that it seemed to me both from the words of the statement and from my recollection of the discussion at the time it was issued that the President was stating, not that he put forward the solution of partition, but that it would command the support of public opinion in the United States; that he did not believe the gap between that proposal and the Morrison proposal was too great to be bridged; and that to such a solution (that is, one which was worked out to bridge this gap) the Government of the United States both could give its support and the President himself would be willing to recommend to the Congress the necessary action.
Lord Inverchapel then asked me what the judgment of the Department was as to the degree of opposition of the Arabs to a plan of partition. [Page 726] I told him that I did not have enough knowledge myself to make my opinion of any value, but that I would talk to the officers of our Near Eastern office and would give Lord Inverchapel a summary of our views sometime tomorrow.97
He then said that he had done some computing on a proposal to approve partition. Cadogan98 had stated that if everyone voted, it would take 19 votes to defeat such approval. He did not believe that there would be more than 12 such votes, including the U.S.S.R., the satellites, the Arab states, France and India among the number. Since, however, there would undoubtedly be abstentions, it could not be stated that the vote in the Assembly would be in favor of approval. I did not gather from any of Lord Inverchapel’s remarks that Mr. Bevin was contemplating action at the present session of the Assembly. In fact, he told me that everyone wished to postpone the resumption of the London talks on Palestine until sometime in January—the Arab states because they had nothing to gain by resumption, the Jews because they wished to complete the Basle Conference which began [begins] on December 9 before the talks resumed, and the British because they were so burdened with international meetings that they wished further time to prepare.
- David Ben-Gurion, Zionist leader.↩
- Winston S. Churchill, former British Prime Minister and Leader of the opposition Conservative Party.↩
- Ismail Sidki Pasha, Egyptian Prime Minister.↩
- The following day, Mr. Acheson notified Lord Inverchapel of the Department’s best estimate of the situation as follows: All Arab countries would oppose partition, but with varying degrees of sincerity and intensity; we did not anticipate military action although some terrorist acts might endanger British and American representatives; anti-Jewish riots might take place in Baghdad and possibly in Cairo and Alexandria; demonstrations before the Legations would take place; the Arabs might threaten to leave the United Nations but would probably not do so. Mr. Acheson noted further: “An important factor will be the degree of determination with which such a solution is put forward and carried through and the degree of solidity of front between the British and ourselves. If British representatives in that area undertake to place the responsibility for partition upon the United States or if United States businessmen or governmental representatives take a secretly critical attitude toward the British, this will be the crack into which the opposition will insert its wedge and will give encouragement to violence, demonstrations, and delays.” Lord Inverchapel stated that the views expressed by Mr. Acheson accorded entirely with his own. (867N.01/11–2346)↩
- Sir Alexander Cadogan, British Representative at the United Nations.↩