Palestine Leaders and Press Warn People to Heed Churchill Warning

In the wake of Prime Minister Churchill’s statement in Commons on Friday, warning that Zionist aspirations in Palatine have been endangered by terrorist activities, Jewish leaders and the Hebrew press today emphasized the determination of Palestine’s Jews to root out the terror. Several papers, however, stress that responsibility for the terrorism must not be placed on the entire Jewish community.

At the same time, the Stern Gang distributed a pamphlet throughout the country admitting that it was responsible for the assassination of Lord Moyne; while the influential Arab newspaper Falastin writes that “the Churchill statement was no more than a friendly family rebuke.” It adds, however, that this is the right moment for Britain to proclaim that it still stands by the White Paper.

Addressing a mass-meeting in Haifa, Moshe Shertok, chief of the political department of the Jewish Agency, voiced “the Jewish people’s determination not to let pistol smoke dim the glory of Zionist constructive endeavor, and not to allow these stains to mar the Yishuv’s war effort.” The terrorists, he declared. must be treated as traitors.

The newspaper Davar, largest daily in the country, says that “the Cairo crimes and those preceding them are outside any political reckoning-the Zionist movement conducts its political struggle openly and with legal means.” The Yedioth Ahroncth assures the Prime Minister that “Zionism does not lead to Nazism.” It adds that Jews have withstood many provocations and that “it was not Zionism which led to the Cairo shootings, but the world’s cold-bloodedness, not the Balfour Declaration, but the failure to carry it out.” The Yishuv, it continues, is ready to stamp out the terror, “but this land was not given as a prize for good conduct and cannot be taken from us as a punishment. The rights of the oldest people in the world cannot be annulled by the deed of two insane youths.” Other papers urge the people to used Churchill’s warning, but reiterate that the terrorism is the responsibility of only a small group.