The British land-sea-air blockade of Palestine will end tonight with the termination of the Palestine Mandate and no attempt will be made to interfere with Jewish immigration, Defense Minister A.V. Alexander announced in commons today.
Although the British will not permit the port of Haifa to be used for the disembarkation of immigrants during the period of evacuation of British troops, civilian personnel and supplies, the Jews may use any other port in the country for this purpose, he emphasized.
Britain will not immediately recognize the Jewish republic in Palestine, a high Whitehall official stated today. However, he did not exclude the possibility that such recognition might be accorded at a later stage if circumstances warrant it. It was stressed that the Foreign Office wishes to have the door kept open for a choice of solutions in settlement of the Palestine problem.
A group of noted Anglo-Jewish leaders, in a letter to the Times today, expressed the hope that when “time has healed the scars of the present lamentable conflict,” the Jews of Palestine will again turn to Britain for guidance and counsel. Signatories to the letter included Lord Reading, Neville J.Laski, former president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, Lord Bearsted, Sir Robent Waley-Cohen, Anthony and Edmond de Rothschild and Norman Bentwich, former Attorney General of Palestine.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.