Anglo-french Entente Possible in Mid-east

General Weygand, the French High Commissioner of Syria, has exploited the secret ambition of the British authorities in Palestine to exert as direct a power as possible in Transjordania, writes the “Eclair” here, on the subject of General Weygand’s visit to Palestine.

“He has offered a pretext to our friends by giving them a very plausible excuse for intervening to a larger extent in the ambiguous affairs of that master-deceiver, Abdullah. This is a great art- to make an opportune appeal to sympathy and friendship by asking your friend to do something that he is very anxious to do.

“But we must not minimize the value and the cordiality of the British gesture by throwing too indiscreet a light on what is going on behind the scenes. Since August, the High Commissioner of Palestine has, with the approval of the Colonial Office, taken the following measures: The Transjordanian Gendarmerie have been transferred to the control of the British authorities in Jerusalem, and British detachments have penetrated into Transjordania with instructions to maintain order on the frontiers. The Emir Abdullah has been compelled under threat of deposition to expel from his domain the champions of independence, and to sign an extradition agreement with Syria. Our British friends imposed on the Emir the permanent presence of English forces in his country and a religious control of his finances. Abdullah protested for the sake of appearances. But he accepted all the conditions and carried them into effect. The British authorities handed over to us fifty prominent brigands, the notorious Emir Mahmoud el Faour among them. Since the end of September peace and order have reigned in Syria.

“By this master stroke and by means of the Franco-British Entente in the Middle East. Britain is now sovereign in Transjordania and France can carry out in peace the mission which she has modernism in Syria. The two nations, realizing that union was necessary for both of them in face of Pan-Arabism and Oriental intrigues, have created in these countries a useful precedent,” the paper concludes.