Goldmann Challenges Bevin; Says There Was Never Possibility of Agreement

Foreign Minister Bevin’s charge that American interference wrecked the chances of an accord among Britain, the Arabs and the Jews was denied here today by Dr. Nahum Goldmann, member of the Jewish Agency executive, who participated in all the recent discussions between Bevin and the Zionists, and who presented the Jewish Agency partition plan to the U.S. Government.

Dr. Goldmann said that the Foreign Secretary’s claim that President Truman’s Yom Kippur statement had blasted the possibility of an imminent agreement with the Jews and Arabs was inaccurate, since there had never been any basis for agreement between the Jews and the British.

At the time the Truman statement was issued, the Jewish Agency was not even discussing long-term policy with Bevin, but only the conditions for participation in the Palestine Conference, Goldmann stated. The Agency would not have joined in the conference talks, even if Truman had refrained from issuing the statement, he added.

The basis for the Agency’s rejection of all British proposals was the fact that they were predicated on the fundamental assumption that Jews should remain a minority in any Palestinian state, Goldmann declared. He termed misleading Bevin’s statement that there were three alternative solutions: A Jewish state, an Arab state and a unitary state, since a unitary state would mean one with an Arab majority. The real alternatives, he continued, are a state with an Arab majority, or one with a Jewish majority, or partition. Recalling that Bevin’s objection to partition was that it would place certain Arabs under a Jewish majority, Goldmann pointed out that the Foreign Minister was quite ready, however, to place all 6600,000 Jews in Palestine under an Arab majority.

REVEALS DETAILS OF JEWISH AGENCY NEGOTIATIONS WITH BEVIN

He vigorously denied that the Agency had made establishment of a Jewish state the only basis for negotiations, as Bevin alleged. Goldmann said the Agency had submitted three proposals: A Jewish state, return to the mandate without the White Paper, or partition. He challenged Bevin’s assertion that partition was not within the scope of the mandate, citing the ruling of the League of Nations Mandates Commission, in 1937, which said that partition was permissible under the mandate.

It was the White Paper, not partition, which the Mandates Committee termed illegal, he stressed. He also pointed to the fact that Britain had not hesitated to declare the independence of Transjordan – which was also included in the mandate – and then want to the United States to secure endorsement of the move.

Goldmann said he found it amazing that “after twelve long talks with us between August and September, the most elementary notions of the mandate should be strange to the thinking of Mr. Bevin. He has suddenly discovered that the Jewish people are a ‘religion.’ This shows lack of understanding of the ABC’s of the problem and makes the whole mandate nonsense. The mandate speaks of a national home for the Jewish people, not of a religious home.”

Referring to Bevin’s statement that other nations were also unwilling to admit Jewish refugees, Goldmann said that that was the precise reason why the drafters of the mandate had promised Palestine as a Jewish national home, where Jews would have a legal right to enter.

Attacking as “fantastic” Bevin’s insistence on carrying out the terms of the White Paper, the Agency leader charged that the White Paper was not an international obligation, only a unilateral statement of policy. The mandate, which was more of a commitment than the White Paper was not being carried out, he added.