Britain Defends Failure to Consult Jews on Macmahon Letters

The British Government today defender in the House of Commons its course in declining to hear Jewish views when an Anglo-Arab committee recently prepared the wartime MacMahon correspondence with Arab leaders, which was issued as a White Paper by the Government.

Sir Thomas Inskip, Minister for Coordination of Defense, replying on behalf of Colonial Secretary Malcolm MacDonald to a question put by Geoffrey Mander (Liberal), said he saw no reason why the committee, which was a joint body of British and Arab delegates to the Palestine conference, should have sought the views of the Jews or other third parties.

Earlier, the Jewish Agency for Palestine wrote Mr. MacDonald criticizing his failure to hear the Jews before publication of the MacMachon correspondence. The letter declared that it was incorrect to consider post-war settlement in Palestine as a favor of the British Government in view of the fact of the League of Nations’ responsibility for the Palestine mandate, one of whose principles are the Jews’ right to reconstruct their national home.