Palestine Arabs Seen Willing to Consider Rapprochement with Israeli Government

While the Israeli Government and the Arab League states negotiate for a peaceful settlement of the Palestine war through the medium of the U.N. mediator a development of possibly greater importance is the apparent willingness of the Palestine Arabs to consider a rapprochement without the services of Count Folke Benadotte or the Arab League.

From Nazareth it was reported this week-end that the Arab League for National Liberation–the Arab Communist Party of Palestine–has emerged from the underground and has opened on employment office in the Arab city in conjunction with the Israeli Ministry of Labor. During the last three days over 1,000 Arabs have signed up for work with the Israeli authorities and hundreds of others have queued up to register.

Also over the week-end there was a noteworthy broadcast from the Ramallah Arabic transmitter, chief political spokesman for the Arabs of Palestine. A political commentator said that there was grave dissatisfaction among the Palestine Arabs because the Arab League had appeared to ignore completely the wishes of the Palestine Arabs and had refused to allow them to participate in the present peace negotiations.

The commentator added that many Arabs in Palestine now doubted the ability of the Arab League to conduct further negotiations on their behalf as the League “had failed to solve oven the simple question of Arab refugees in Arab countries.” The commentator concluded by suggesting that the Arab national committee in Nablus should call a conference and elect its own political leaders to demand recognition from the Arab league.

Almost at the same time as the broadcast by the Ramallah radio, the Baghdad radio broadcast a talk by its political commentator, which was in a markedly different key but which revealed much of what is going on below the surface in Iraq. This commentator strongly criticized the Arab refugees in Arab states who have been complaining of the treatment they are receiving and “wish they had stayed in Palestine with the Jews.”