LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
" THE UNHOLY LAND"
StR,—Mr. Hodgkin's article on The Unholy Land gives the gloomy prospect of war as the only way out of the conflict. Having just returned from the land, I recognise that the outlook is serious enough, but it is not, I believe, as desperate as the writer makes out. Your note on the government of Jerusalem in the same issue draws attention to the plan of the United Nations for an international city. If that plan is carried out, if the Governor is appointed at once by the Trusteeship Council, and if the Special Police Force which is to assist in maintaining law and order is established, then Jerusalem may be a focus of peace and order. According to the resolution of the Assembly of the United Nations, the aims of the administration of Jerusalem are: (a) To ensure that order and peace, and especially religious peace, reign in Jerusalem and (b) to foster co-operation among all the inhabitants of the city in their own interest, as well as to encourage and support the peaceful development of the mutual relations between the two Palestinian peoples throughout the Holy Land. The British Governinent's welcome announcement that it will co-operate in achieving these aims gives good hope.
Mr. Hodgkin's statements about " two wholly incompatible national- isms," and there being no place for the Arabs in the new dispensation of the Jewish State, are too sweeping. The idea of a bi-national State in Palestine was held consistently by -the Jewish Agency till 1937, when the Royal Commission recommended partition into two States. It has been held steadfastly by a section of the Jewish population to this day. The Commission of the United Nations also was divided on the question of a unitary federal State or partition into two States ; and it may be unfortunate that the alternative was not more thoroughly examined. Nor are the Jews regardless of the Arabs in their prospective State. At the outset there will be 300,000 Arabs, constituting some 40 per cent. of the population in the State ; and in the international " liberty" of Jerusalem (which includes Bethlehem) there will be roughly 100,000 Arabs and 100,000 Jews. Circumstance as well as principle will compel the Jews to pursue a way of understanding with the Arabs. It is a disservice to exaggerate the hostility and distrust which have been engendered by despair, fomented by extremists, and fed by reckless partisanship. It is time for the peacemakers to rally their forces in Jerusalem, which may be again " the threshold of peace."—Yours sincerely,
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