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Jewish National Council Prepares to Draft Constitution for Projected Palestine State

October 23, 1947
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The Jewish National Council today established a legal department for the specific purpose of drafting a constitution and civil and criminal codes for the projected Jewish state which would be formed if the United Nations accepts partition as the solution of the Palestine problem. The department is headed by Dr. Zerach Warhaftig, of the Labor Mizrachi.

The Jewish Agency today expressed satisfaction with a statement yesterday by High Commissioner Sir Alan G. Cunningham that the government would be responsible for the maintenance of law and order until Britain surrendered the Mandate. Commenting on his statement to the members of a Jewish village in northern Palestine, who ?ade specific requests for security measures, that if they wanted protection they must refrain from attacking government forces, the Agency asserted that the Jews of northern Palestine were as opposed to extremism as were the British. Dispatches from the northern frontier report that an all-British detachment arrived there to take up reguard positions shortly after Cunningham’s visit.

A Jerusalem magistrate, Dr. G. Schultz, today issued a warrant for the arrest of Capt. Roy A. Farran, who earlier this month was cleared by a military court on charges of having participated in the kidnapping and murder of a 17-year-old Jewish ?outh, Alexander Rubovitz. Since Farran is now in England, extradition proceedings ?ll have to be undertaken before Farran can be tried by a Palestine civil court on the kidnapping and murder charges.

(In London, the Colonial Office indicated that “unless and until” the Palestine Government makes a formal application for Farran’s extradition, no action will be taken in England. A spokesman added that any such application would have to ## made to the “appropriate authorities” through the Colonial Office.)

Anchel Spielman, allegedly leader of the Sternists in Tel Aviv, yesterday scaped from the Jerusalem Central Prison where he was serving a ten-year term, it as disclosed here today. The police today refused to supply any details of Spiel?n’s flight, during which he had to ponetrate successive barbed wire zones and ?ozens of heavily armed guards.

IRGUN SAYS IT WILL NOT ATTACK INTERNATIONAL POLICE FORCE

The Irgun tonight distributed a statement in Tel Aviv promising not to shoot soldiers of a U.N. police force sent to Palestine to maintain order as a result of decision on Palestine. The underground group stressed, however, that it was still ?posed to the “vivisection of our homeland” and would find “other ways” of fighting.The Revisionist Central Council also issued a statement expressing its opposite to the idea of partition.

Henry Wallace today declared that there “will not be peace throughout the world until peace is restored in Palestine.” Speaking at a meeting of the Jewish ?rnalists Association, Wallace said that he was happy to learn of Jewish efforts live in peace with the Arabs. Later, at a reception tendered him by American ?dents studying in Palestine under the G.I. Bill of Rights, he declared that antimitism was increasing in the U.S. and that any depression in the U.S. would bring ?cial suffering to minorities.

Two bombs were thrown into stores owned by Arabs in Jaffa, causing damage ?mated at $10,000 and one injury. The Arab shopkeepers were known to have dealt ?h Jews.

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