Prime Minister Clement R. Attlee this week-end called Viscount Montgomery, Chief of the British Imperial Staff, and the heads of the vorious armed services to a special emergency meeting of the Cabinet Defense Committee, it was loarned here today. During the two-hour parley, Attlee is reported to have told the military leaders that they must produce a final plan for the withdrawal of British forces from Palestine by Thursday, when the full Cabinet is slated to meet on a final Palestine decision.
Colonial Secretary Arthur Creech-Jones, who returned from Lake Success last Thursday, met with Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin shortly after receipt of a new United States appeal urging the British Government to agree to remain at the head of the Palestine administration during the trancition period prior to complete independence for the projected Arab and Jewish states.
In semi-official quarters it was reported that Britain will refuse to continue to remain in Palestine even if differences between the Soviet Union and America are ironed out. The government is expected to reiterate its refusal to implement any J. N. plan of which it does not approve.
CREECH-JONES REPORTED RETURNING TO UNITED NATIONS SESSION SHORTLY
Press reports during the week-end said that Creech Jones told members of the Cabinet that he must be able to announce definitely Britain’s intentions when he returns to Lake Sucess shortly. It is understood that following Thursday’s meeting, he will receive all instructions necessary for him to make an autheritative statement at the U.N., except for the actual date of the beginning of the evacuation. The final date, it is believed, will be cabled to him after meeting of the Cabinet.
The influential business weekly Economist proposes in its current issue that a joint Arab-Jewish provisional government be established to accept responsibility for carrying through parttion, and that it also face the consequences of failure to carry through such a policy. The magazine stresses the necessity of averting chaos after the British withdrawal and asserts that if the U.N. fails to provide a non-Palestinian authority in which power may be vested, then Britain will have to work out its own evacuation program.
“Unless evacuation were to be surrendered to chaos, it would be necessary as in India to set up some provisional government representing both sides,” it says. The Economist asserts that the bi-national authority would be temporary and in no way reflect the future government of the country.
Referring to the ex-Mufti of Jerusalem, the magazine declares that if the Arabs choose him it will be necessary to permit his return to Palestine. Such a ## the Economist suggests, may be better than “having him make mischief in ## or ##maseue.”
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