The Zionist movement is opposed to a trusteeship for Palestine, whether administered by Britain or any other power, David Ben Gurion, chairman of the Jewish Agency executive, declared here tonight.
In an address to the opening session of the 32nd annual Hadassah convention, Ben Gurion strongly attacked the Morrison Plan for federalization of Palestine as a “modified White Paper” and said that the only thing that can replace the British mandate is a Jewish state “which would rebuild the country to the benefit of the Jewish settlers and the present Arab population.”
He cited the recent elections in Palestine for delegates to the World Zionist Congress as evidence that the Jews there support the demand for a Jewish state and the activities of the Jewish resistance movement.
Ben Gurion charged the British with turning Palestine into a Police state without parallel in the civilized world, where policemen and soldiers can insult and beat and loot every Jew in the country.” He also accused the British of continuing racially discriminatory land laws, “the only ones left in the civilized world,” and of ignoring Jewish participation in the Allied war effort.
Commenting on the recent release of the imprisoned Jewish Agency leaders and the announcement that he personally was free to return to Palestine without fear of arrest, the Agency chairman said sarcastically that “the new Colonial Minister is to be congratulated, for this gesture of good will, but why were they put in a concentration camp to begin with?”
Ben Gurion praised the U.S. military authorities in Germany for housing and feeding 150,000 refugees in the American zone, although they were under no obligation to do so, and thanked President Truman for his various statements in support of Zionist aspirations.
Mrs. Moses P. Epstein, president of Hadassah, urged the Zionist movement to keep Zionism out of American politics and cited the unanimity with which Republicans and democrats both backed Jewish aims as proof that the mass of the American people “want justice for the Jews.” She compared the Jewish resistance in Palestine to the American Revolution.
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.
