Emergency measures were invoked today to preserve order following the decision of 150 Arab leaders to launch a campaign of civil disobedience, including a rigid boycott of everything Jewish, in flat defiance of High Commissioner Wauchope’s warnings.
Fearing disturbances, the Government ordered discontinuance of traffic between Jaffa and Tel Aviv. Barbed wire barriers were erected at several places in Jaffa, and to prevent demonstrations military forces were moved up from Sarafend. (Later reports from Cairo said planes bearing British troops had departed for Palestine during the night.)
Police ordered fellaheen (peasants) in the suburbs not to enter Jerusalem today and Jewish officials who work in the predominantly Arab city of Jaffa were instructed not to report to work.
A Jewish-owned envelope factory at Atlith was set on fire last night.
Arab prisoners in chains, serving terms at hard labor in Nor Shemsh near Tul Karem, proclaimed a strike in solidarity with the Arab strike against Jewish immigration and sale of land to Jews.
Arab leaders prepared to launch a propaganda drive tomorrow throughout Palestine for continuation of the strike if the Government did not yield to their demands for restrictions on Jews and for setting up a national government.
The civil disobedience campaign is scheduled to go into effect next Friday, according to the decision of the Arab Supreme Council headed by Grand Mufti Ha j Amin el Husseini, and will include non-payment of taxes.
The High Commissioner cancelled a contemplated visit to the Sinai desert and returned to Jerusalem yesterday.
Numerous Government offices were transferred from Jaffa to the all-Jewish city of Tel Aviv. At the same time it was ordered that all Arab court cases be transferred from Tel Aviv to Jaffa.
Dr. Chaim Weizmann, president of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, will leave for London on Sunday, it was disclosed.
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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.
