Britain’s Palestine Partition commission today concluded a four-month inquiry in the Holy Land and prepared to leave tomorrow for England where, after brief hearings in London, it will prepare its report on the “surgical” solution to the Arab-Jewish problem. With the Arabs boycotting the investigation to the end, Jewish leaders and experts had the final word before the commission. At a final in camera session this morning, views and statistics believed favorable to partition were presented by David Ben Gurion, chairman of the Jerusalem executive of the Jewish Agency, Moshe Shertok, head of the Agency’s political department; Joseph Weitz, forestry chief of the Jewish National Fund, and Zalman Lipschitz, chief engineer of the Palestine Land Development Corporation.
Terrorism, unchecked during the entire course of the commission’s stay, reached a climax in July when 212 persons were killed and 466 wounded. Of the dead, 148 were Arabs, 62 Jews and two British soldiers. Wounded included 256 Arabs, 201 Jews, six British soldiers and three police agents. The toll constitutes a record in the 18 years of the British mandate over the Holy Land.
Bomb and bullet continued to take their toll even as the commission prepared to leave. Haifa was thrown into an uproar last night by three successive bombings at half-hour intervals, in which four Arabs were injured. British troops engaged a new band, comprising Arab youths called to a jihad (holy war) against Jews and British by Saad Addin Toukhan, a relative of the Nablus mayor, and killed two. Three Arab women were wounded by stray bullets. An Arab was blown to bits when he stepped on a hidden land mine at the entrance of Jenin. An Arab policeman was seriously wounded by a sniper near the Damascus Gate in Jerusalem. An Arab band attacked the American quarries near Jerusalem, wounding Haim Suri, a Jewish auxiliary policeman. Three Arab notables were shot and wounded by Arab terrorists as they sat drinking coffee in a Beisan park.
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.
