THE BACKGROUND OF ARAB-ISRAEL CONFLICT
P.
KODANDA RAO
The
support which India gave to the Arab cause in the recent
conflict between the Arab States and Israel has been criticised pretty
extensively and severely in India and elsewhere as anti-democratic, as against
national interests of India, as a violation of non-alignment, and, above all,
as painfully immoral. As the recent outburst is but the latest of a series, it
is essential to recall the background to understand it. In expressing in the
Indian Parliament India’s sympathy for the Arab cause, Mr. M. C. Chagla, the
Minister for External Affairs, summarised it as the creation of Jewish State
of Israel in Arab Palestine. Britain, by her Balfour Declaration in 1917,
was primarily responsible for the creation of the Jewish Home in Palestine, and
America was primarily responsible for the creation of the Jewish State of
Israel in 1948, against the consistent and persistent protests of the
Arabs.
It
is a most lamentable fact of history that in most Christian countries and
during many centuries, most Jewish people have en despised, insulted and
confined to ghettoes, like untouchables India, Their persecution reached
an incredible climax in Hitler’s rule in Germany. The people of India, who
suffered under British imperialism, had all along felt sympathy, deep and
burning, for the persecuted Jews and welcomed their emancipation. There is a
general consensus of opinion that the establishment of a Jewish Home, and later
a Jewish State, and the methods adopted to achieve them were far from just to
the Arabs, particularly to Arabs displaced from Palestine by force. These
events have been a running sore between the Arabs and Jews, and an intractable
problem for the United Nations.
During
the First World War, when the fortunes of the Allies had touched a low, Britain
sought the help of both Arabs and Jews by making secret promises to both, which
were mutually in-compatible. In 1916, it seduced the Arabs under the Sheriff of
Mecca from his loyalty to the Sultan of Turkey by a secret promise that, in the
event of Allied victory, it would support the independence of Arab lands,
practically from the Mediterranean to the Euphrates. Almost simultaneously, it
made a pact with France by the secret Sykes-Picot agreement to partition the
Arab lands, and let France take over Syria and itself take over Palestine. This
agreement amounted to a violation of the promise of independence to the Arabs
who helped it to win the war. The famous Englishman, Laurence of Arabia, said
in his Seven Pillars of Wisdom:
“If
we won the war, the promises to the Arabs were dead paper. Yet, the Arab
inspiration was our main tool in winning the Eastern War. So, I assured
them that England kept her word in letter and spirit. On this comfort, they
performed their fine things, but, of course, instead of being proud of what we
did together, I am continually and bitterly ashamed.”
When
the Allies won the war, France took over Syria and Britain took over Palestine
as Mandates from the League of Nations. The Arabs were cheated and felt bitter,
particularly against Britain.
As
long ago as 1894, Theodore Herzl conceived the idea of a National Home for Jews
in Palestine to escape persecution in Christian countries. Not much notice was
for long taken of it either by Britain or America. Indeed, the persecution of
Jews was dismissed a “domestic” problem of each nation, outside the scope of
international concern! But when, in 1917 Britain’s fortunes in the First World
War were low, she looked for financial help from international Jewry and
received scientific help from Cham Weisemann and, in return, made the famous
Balfour Declaration promising the establishment of a National Home for Jews in
Palestine. Speaking in the British House of Commons on June 19, 1936, Prime
Minister David Lloyd George said:
“Let me recall the circumstances to the House. At the time the French army had mutinied, the Italian army was on the eve of collapse, and America had hardly started preparing in earnest. There was nothing left but Britain, confronting the most powerful combination the world has ever seen. It was important for us to seek every legitimate help we could get. We came to the conclusion, from information received from every part of the world, that it was vital we should have the sympathies of the Jewish community. In these circumstances and on the advice which we received, we decided it was desirable to secure the sympathy and co-operation of that most remarkable community, the Jews, throughout the world. They were helpful in America and in Russia....
“In
these conditions we proposed this (National Home for Jews in Palestine) to our
Allies….All the nations which constituted the League of Nations accepted it.
And the Jews–I am here to bear testimony to the fact–with all the influence
they possessed responded nobly to the appeal which was made. I do not know
whether the House realises how much we owe to Dr. Weisemann with his marvellous
scientific brain. He absolutely saved the British army at a critical moment
when a particular ingredient, which was essential we should have for our great
guns, was completely exhausted. His great chemical genius enabled us to solve
the problem. But he is, only one out of many who rendered great services to the
Allies. It is an obligation of honour which we undertook, to which the Jews
responded. We cannot get out of it without dishonour.”
Mr.
Leopold S. Amery said in the House of Commons on March 24, 1936:
“In
these days, when defence problems are uppermost in our minds, we cannot forget
the immense importance of Palestine as the effective air centre of the British
imperial system…Palestine offers the very outlet to the Mediterranean for oil
supplies under British control. Who knows whether we shall have access to
American supplies in future?….If we had in Palestine a prospering and
developing community, bound to this country by ties of gratitude, influenced by
the fact that we have made an ancient dream come true, the effect would surely
be well worth keeping in mind.”
It
is obvious that the Balfour Declaration, promising a National Home for Jews in
Palestine, was not inspired even remotely by humanitarian sympathy for Jews who
were being treated as lepers and outcastes, but as a war-bargain, to serve
British imperial interests!
The Balfour Declaration, which was issued on
November 2, 1917, while it promised a National Home for Jews, took care to
insist that “nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious
rights of non-Jewish communities.” But the militant international
Jewry would have none of it. Dr. Eder, Chairman of the Zionist Commission in
Palestine, said:
“There
can be only one National Home in Palestine, and that a Jewish National Home,
and no equality and partnership between Jews and Arabs, but Jewish pre-dominance
as soon as the members of the race are sufficiently increased.” (Servant of
India, July 23, 1936)
About
1936, Britain proposed to establish a Legislative Council, consisting of some
nominated and some elected members, with fourteen Moslems, seven Jews and three
Christians, as at the time the Moslems numbered 725,000, Jews 320,000 and
Christians 100,000, The Jews would have none of it. Lord Melchet, who had the
reputation of being a moderate, said in the House of Lords on February
26, 1936:
“We
take the view that we cannot put ourselves in a minority in a National Home. A
minority status of the Jewish people is neither novel nor singular. It has,
lasted for centuries and is world-wide. But if “National Home” is to have a
real meaning, we cannot of our own volition and free will accept a minority
status.” (Servant of India, July 23, 1936)
With
a view to becoming a majority, the Jews promoted immigration, both legal and
illegal, and with the help of finance furnished by international Jewry, began
to buy up lands in Palestine from the Arabs.
Britain,
which had promised to create a Jewish National Home in Palestine and had it
incorporated in the Mandate, proceeded to encourage immigration of Jews and the
purchase of land by them from resident Arabs by the enactment of land laws
which promoted it. When the protests of the Arabs became strident and even
violent, Britain decided to prohibit further alienation of Arab lands to
immigrant Jews and to limit further Jewish immigration. The Jews revolted
against Britain. Faced with violence, which it could not control, Britain
surrendered the Mandate in 1948, and handed over the problem to the United
Nations. In 1949 it issued a White Paper that it had contemplated only a Jewish
Home in Palestine and not a Jewish State. Before Britain renounced
the Mandate and the United Nations could take over the administration, the Jews
proclaimed the emergence of the independent State of Israel! Within minutes
of it, America surprised the whole world, and even its delegates in the United
Nations, by rushing de facto recognition of the new State.
Subsequently,
Israel conferred Israeli citizenship on all the Jews in the world, even those
who had no intention to come to Israel, and declared that the State of Israel
would be extended from Egypt to Persia, and reduced the status of resident
Arabs to a second-class citizenship and denied them the right of habeas
corpus, and otherwise lorded over them.
The
Palestine Arabs resented even more the methods adopted, with the connivance of
Britain and America, by Jews to gate-crash into Arab Palestine. Prof. Arnold
Toynbee of Britain said:
“If
the heinousness of sin is to be measured by the degree to which the sinner is
sinning against the light that is vouchsafed to him, the Jews had even less
excuse in 1948 A.D. for evicting Palestinian Arabs from their homes than
Nebuchadnaezzar and Titus and Hadrian and the Spanish and Portuguese
inquisition had for uprooting, persecuting and exterminating Jews in Palestine
and elsewhere at diverse times in the past. In A. D. 1948 the Jews knew, from
personal experience, what they were doing; it was their supreme tragedy that
the lesson learnt by them from the encounter with Nazi German Gentiles should
have been, not to eschew but to imitate, some of the evils that the Nazis had
committed against the Jews.
“The
Arabs in Palestine...became in their turn the vicarious victims of the European
Jews, indignation over the ‘genocide’ committed upon them by their Gentile
fellow-Westerners in A. D. 1933-45.”
Prof. Hocking of
Harvard University in America, said:
“The
documented facts leave no doubt that Israel was the aggressor….Before the
British Mandate ended on May 14, 1948, and two months before the State of
Israel could legally be proclaimed….the Zionist-Israel armies had already
illegally occupied much of the territory reserved for the Arab State...During
the six months period of hostilities 300,000 Arabs were driven out of their
homes by terrorist tactics and became refugees–contrary to every human decency.
The impact of these sufferings extended in deep waves to the entire Arab world.
Sympathy and an outraged sense of justice became a determined antipathy to
Israel.
The
United Nations made several attempts to bring about some peaceful settlement
between the Jews and the Arabs. Among them was the partition of Palestine into
an Arab and Jewish State. It also suggested that the displaced Arabs should be
given the choice of repatriation to their former lands and homes from which
they were driven out by force by Jews, or the Jews should give adequate
compensation for the displaced Arabs. The Jews refused to give option to them
to return, and Arab States declined to absorb them to oblige the Jews, and the
displaced Arabs became refugees from their own homes and lands and have been
looked after by the United Nations for nearly two decades.
The
unfortunate and pitiable plight of the Palestine refugees has been universally
recognised, but few acceptable solutions have been suggested, except that justice
should be done. Recently, Prof. Arnold Toynbee said that the ideal solution
was repatriation of all the Palestine refugees, as desired by them. He,
however, doubted if many of them would return to live under Jewish rule in the
present atmosphere. He, therefore, suggested that some of those who would not
wish to return should be invited to settle in Syria, Canada, Australia,
Venezula, and above all, United States of America.
The
choice to return to Palestine is likely to be acceptable to them if Israel
becomes a secular state, like America, and gave equal status to all its
citizens, irrespective of race and religion, in conformity with the Charter of
the United Nations and modern secular trend in polity, which should be
encouraged by all progressive forces. Jews have equal rights in the United
States and even exercise significant influence on its government, without
insisting that it should be a Jewish State.
It
seems very odd, to say the least, that recent Jewish immigrants, mostly from
Europe, should be allowed to gate-crash into Palestine against the wishes of
the local Moslems, in order to gratify their sentiment that many centuries ago
their forefathers lived there and to dismiss callously the sentiment of Arab
Moslems who, and whose ancestors for centuries, have been living in the same
land! The immigrant Jews have only their sentiment, but the displaced Arab
Moslems, have not only an equally strong sentiment, but also economic interests
in lands and homes and self-government. If justice be the criterion, the
recent Jewish immigrants should emigrate from Israel, as they are more likely
to find admission into, and assimilation in, countries like America, than the
Arab refugees.
Another
solution is to place Israel under United Nations Mandate, unless some voluntary
agreement can be reached between Israel, the Palestine refugees and the
Arab States, and consent replaced coercion.
It
has been said in favour of Israel that the United Nations approved of the State
of Israel and admitted it to its membership. But it is the consent of the Arab
States, amongst which Israel has been planted, that is more relevant. And they
have so far refused to recognise even the existence of Israel!
In
the United Nations the Arab States opposed the partition of Palestine and
proposed a unitary state. The partition proposal was carried on Nov. 29, 1947,
by 33 to 13 votes and 10 abstensions in the General Assembly. While America and
Russia voted for, all the Muslim countries–Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq,
Lebanon, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey and Yemen–voted against, India
voted against, Britain abstained, and declined to enforce partition.
Israel’s application for membership of the United Nations was carried in the
Security Council by 9 votes to 1. Egypt opposed and Britain abstained.
Israel
defied the United Nations on several occasions and was censured. Egypt agreed
to the stationing of the UN peace-keeping force on its side of the boundary
between itself and Israel, but Israel refused to let it be stationed on its
side also. If it had permitted the recent hostilities could have been
prevented, even if Egypt had asked the UN force to quit from its soil.
India’s
sympathies have all along been with the Arabs in the conflict between them and
the Jews. As stated earlier, it voted against the partition of Palestine, along
with all Muslim countries. Mahatma Gandhi said on Nov. 12, 1938:
“I
have all my sympathies with the Jews. But sympathy does not blind me to the
requirements of justice. The cry for a national home for Jews does not make
much appeal to me. Palestine belongs to the Arabs in the same sense that
England belongs to the English or France to the French. It is wrong to impose
the Jews on the Arabs. If the Jews have no home but Palestine, will they relish
the idea of being forced to leave the other parts of the world in which they
are settled? Or, do they want a double home where they can remain at will?”
He
returned to the subject on Nov. 26, 1938:
“The
Palestine of Biblical conception is not the geographical tract. It is in their
hearts. But if Jews must look to Palestine of geography as their national home,
it is wrong to enter it under the shadow of British guns.”
He
returned to it again on August 1947:
“The
Jews have erred grievously in seeking to impose themselves on Palestine, with
the aid of America and Britain and now with the aid of naked terrorism. Why
should they depend on American money or British arms for forcing themselves on
an unwelcome land?”
And
yet again in 1948:
“It
should be clearly understood that the basic problem of Palestine is between the
Arabs of Palestine and the Jews who want to come from abroad to settle there.
Unless the Jews are able to convince the local Arabs of their bonafides, no
basis could ever exist for the Jewish entry into Palestine.”
Pandit
Jawaharlal Nehru said in 1937:
“Balfour
Declaration is a great betrayal of Arabs by Britain.”
The
Indian National Congress said in 1928:
“Indian
National Congress assures the Palestinian Arabs of its full sympathy towards
their struggle to free themselves from the grip of Western imperialism, which
in its view is a great menace to the Indian struggle.”
It
referred to it again in 1937:
“The
Congress strongly condemns the imperialist machinations and the reign of terror
unleashed with a view to coerce the Arabs in accepting the proposed partition
of Palestine.”
And
yet again in 1938:
“The
Congress condemns the decision of Great Britain as a mandatory power to bring
about the partition of the Palestine and the appointment of a commission to
carry out this project. The Congress records its emphatic protest against the
reign of terror in Palestine to force this policy upon the unwilling Arabs. The
Congress expresses its full sympathy with the Arabs in their struggle for
national freedom and their fight against British imperialism.”
Mr.
R. K. Nehru, former Secretary-General, Ministry of External Affairs and
ex-Ambassador to UAR, said in 1965:
“No
Afro-Asian can ignore the fact that the State of Israel is essentially a
foreign creation. India has not established diplomatic relations with the new
State. Indians felt that approval should not be shown of the way in which
Israel was created and is functioning. Israel is the result of an act of
imposition from outside. The creation of this new trend is not in line with the
general trend of the Afro-Asian resurgence.”
India
has thus followed a consistent policy since at least 1928. Prime Minister, Mrs.
Indira Gandhi, and External Affairs Minister, Mr. M. C. Chagla, have recently
adopted the same attitude.
The
only possible criticism of the Government of India is not that its policy is unjust,
but not prudent in so far as it goes against the USA, on which India
depends a great deal for food, finance and military ware and atomic umbrella.
If power is pitted against justice in international affairs, the
former often wins and the latter loses. Justice and morality are yet not the
governing factors in international
affairs. It is sad but true.