Jewish Groups Seen Backing Moslem Mayor

Ragheb Bey Nashashibi, the present Mayor of Jerusalem, is being supported by Jewish institutions, Near East and India, British magazine, declares. The magazine predicts that he will undoubtedly remain in his position.

At present Palestine is in the midst of municipal elections, the magazine reports, with the key to the situation in Jerusalem. A vigorous contest may be expected, it states.

“The Jewish institutions,” the magazine writes, “have drawn up a list of six candidates to fill the seats offered them (half of the twelve to be polled), and these will be notified to the electoral authorities. But that will not end the dispute. There is an organization in Jerusalem of rate-payers known as “Ha ‘Toshav” (The Citizen) which is fairly well represented on the Jerusalem Jewish Community Council, and no representative of this faction (which is rather Revisionist in its political views) has been included on the Jewish list.

“The Zionist-Revisionists themselves are known to be greatly dissatisfied with the inadequacy of participation proposed to them. It is not clear at the moment, therefore, whether the Jewish candidates to be proposed by the leading institutions will be returned unopposed, as the dissident factions may put up their own men for polling in the respective six Jewish wards.

FIGHT IMPENDS

The Moslems are to have four councillorships and the Christians two. The fight for political power among the Moslems—the tussle between the Nashashibi and the Husseini elements—is likely to be carried into the municipal sphere during the coming elections. The Arabic press hints at the impending fight. It is bruited that Ragheb Bey Nashashibi will, undoubtedly, remain the Mayor, so that some compromise between the contending parties may be expected. The Jewish institutions, according to rumor, have agreed to the candidature of Ragheb Bey Nashashibi as both Councillor and Mayor, and it is likely that he will stand for nomination in a ward with a Moslem majority and a Jewish minority, so that, in the event of a political opponent’s being placed against him, he may count upon the balance of the Jewish vote.”