“If the Jews who are engaged in criticizing the Jerusalem Municipality continue their agitation and carry through their intention of getting a Jew appointed as Mayor of Jerusalem, there will be trouble”, writes the Bethlehem Arab paper, “Sowt Ashaab, in its current issue.
“We shall not allow a Jew to become Mayor of Jerusalem”, it continues. “The Jews are pleased at the disagreement among the Arabs of Palestine today. They will soon find that we are a strongly united nation. If the Government, with a Jew as High Commissioner, a Jew as Attorney-General, and a Jew as Director of Immigration, appoints a Jew as Mayor of Jerusalem despite our protests, there will be disturbances in the country. The Zionists had better give up their ambitions and not force the Arabs to act, for if we act it will destroy what little remains of their hopes. This is especially so now when the situation in the Arab Peninsula has turned the attention of the whole world to the Arab question. We advise the sons of Israel to choose an uninhabited country in which to build their national home.”
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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.