American Zionists Oppose Magnes Plan for Bi-national State in Palestine

The Zionist Organization of America today officially went on record as opposing the reported plan of Dr. Judah L. Magnes, President of the Hebrew University at Jerusalem and a leader of the new Ichud party in Palestine, advocating the formation of a bi-national State in Palestine, in a statement of policy adopted at a special meeting of its National Executive Committee held under the chairmanship of Judge Louis E. Levinthal, president of the organization.

Characterizing the views that have been credited to Dr. Judah L. Magnes, in reports to the American press concerning the future of Palestine, as “wholly at variance with the American Zionist position,”the statement warns against “unauthorized political negotiations by Dr. Magnes and his associates.” It asserts that the “crux of the issue is the large scale immigration of European Jews after the war, their right of free entrance into Palestine and their settlement there under self-governing conditions:” and reaffirms the resolution of the Extraordinary Zionist conference held in New York, May 8, 1942, which demanded that the “gates of Palestine be opened to Jewish immigration and that Palestine be established as a Jewish Commonwealth integrated in the structure of the new democratic world.”

In a cable, containing the gist of the resolution, sent to the Jewish Agency for Palestine, the ZOA Executive declared that “no plan or complicated political frameworks which do not clearly and effectively insure the objectives set forth in that resolution, can be acceptable to American Zionists.”