Bevin Says Taking Palestine Issue to U.N. Does Not Mean Surrender of Mandate

The British Government’s decision to place the Palestine problem before the United Nations does not imply that Britain intends to surrender her mandate or to withdraw from the country, Foreign Minister Ernest Bevin last night told a private conference of 500 leaders of the Labor Party. He said that the only duty of the U.N. was to find a solution acceptable to both Jews and Arabs.

Bevin is to confer with the Cabinet on the form of the British proposals to the U.N., prior to making a statement in Commons this week. Informed circles think it unlikely that the matter will come before the U.N. until the September meeting of the General Assembly, because the Trusteeship Council cannot take actions except on matters referred to it by the Assembly. It is also thought unlikely that Britain will ask for an emergency meeting of the Assembly.

The Sunday Times reports that the Arab States will submit a proposal to the U.N. for the immediate establishment of an independent Palestine state under a constitutional government. Palestine Arabs allegedly indicated to Bevin that if independence were granted, they would be prepared to conclude a twenty-five year treaty of friendship and alliance with Great Britain.

JEWISH AGENCY EXECUTIVE MEMBER OPPOSES ANY KIND OF TRUSTEESHIP

Opposition to any kind of trusteeship for Palestine and the hope that Jewish aspirations will find support among some European members of the U.N. Assembly were voiced by S.Z. Shragai, the Labor-Mizrachi representative on the Jewish Agency executive, addressing a meeting of the Hapoel Hamizrachi here.

Shragai declared that nothing worse can emerge from the U.N. than the most recent British proposals to the Agency. He said that any trusteeship for Palestine would be opposed by both Arabs and Jews, and added that Jews could count on the support of many European nations “who are alive to the Jewish situation in Europe and know that it is the desire of their own Jewish citizens to be able to emigrate to Palestine.” He urged that European Jews exercise pressure on their governments to support Jewish claims in Palestine.

Shragai said that he believed that the United States government would lend its support in the U.N. to the Jewish claims. He emphasized that the Jews do not want Great Britain to abandon Palestine, provided she intends to carry out the policy embodied in the Balfour Declaration.

The London Times, in an editorial yesterday, said that the government cannot declare the Palestine Mandate unworkable without proposing alternatives which would fulfill its promises to the Jews. It pointed out that the Arabs will be in a strong position at the U.N., which is not bound by the Balfour Declaration, and which has promised to promote the independence of small nations on the basis of existing populations.

At a meeting of the Board of Deputies of British Jews this afternoon, Prof. Solig Brodetsky, president, announced that representatives of the Board would meet tomorrow with Colonial Secretary Arthur Creech-Jones to convey the organization’s views on the Bevin proposals, which have been rejected by the Jewish Agency. Brodetsky said that the British plan was conveyed to the Deputies last week and that the executive and Palestine committees of the organization have been studying it.