WHY ZION WAITS IN PALESTINE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLII, Issue 2133, 27 May 1920, Page 4

WHY ZION WAITS IN PALESTINE.

Immediate establishment of Zionism in Palestine is not tu be expected, according to one recent investigator, who finds that conditions are not much improved after two years of occupation by the British, and’who is also impressed with the belief that the fault lies partly with the Jews themselves. A resident Jewish writer is, on the other hand, more optimistic, and looks t'o work as the means to salvation tor “Palestiim Redempta.* in an article appearing in The Christian Register it. is staled that “the cost of ‘living is from live to seven times what it was —in part due, to be sure, to world-wide conditions, but also due to restricted import and taxation.’’ The water supply is. inadequate, roads need improving, and wood cannot be cut or transported. There are no horses to he had; there are few carriages and donkeys, and the ladling stock is out of date. Further, “it cannot be denied that the decision of (he British Government in the matter of Zionism has also had a bad effect upon the public mood.’’ This observer of conditions in the Holy Lund continues: “You will remember that Britain made certain promises to Prance, to Faisal, and to the Zionists —each in an hour of need —which have been found to be in their execution, mutually exclusive. That is one of the reasons for watchful waiting. A move in anyt direction brought a crowd from two others.' She could not afford to offend Prance, the ally. She could not afford to offend the Zionists. Yet why not ! That is a mystery. Her promises tu them were couched in such vague terms as to mean anything almost, short of excluding -lews■ 1 ro-m Palestine. Although powerful, and, for differ; out reason--, often pro-German or anti-Uimsian during the eonllict, their .resentment would lie nothing

compared witir that o) offended isiam. At this very momeni the bad feeling among Syrian Christians, Moslems and Druses —the two hitler traditionally ’ pro-British —because Palestine is now surely to be given tu the Jews, is a factor not to tie neglected. The Jews are haled, as all Orientals are lulled by other Orientals who wear a different coat. And they are feared by the less clever people of the soil, as all foreign capitalists are feared. finally they are a worry to the pious tor an apparently opposite reason the alleged radical tendencies of certain of their number.

The truth, is. there are amongst the Jews in Palestine at least eight, parlies. There are the anti-Zion-ists, pious people who do not want lo interfere with God’s own plans of si Then the neutrals. Titcii .-upi) inters of the central Zionist organisation, mostly Russian. Fourthly, the Mizrahi, or religious Zionist party. Fifthly, the rather com fort abte and lukewarm bourge-

ois party, too comfortable to yearn for residence on barren hillsides or under mouldy arches in an atmosphere of sewer-gas, and therefore small in number, and transient. Gixthlv, the .international socialists. Seventh! v, Bolshevik. Eighthly, the Palestinian party, which is in part a separate entity and in part a tendency throughout the other parties. Tiiev are individuals who, as speakers of somewhat better Hebrew, believe that they should have a very large share of influence in the direction of events and shaping of policies. The Jews, of whom there are manv, who would abolish Zionism because a menace to their present citizenship, do nut, of course, eomo to Palestine,

“The question now is: In vhat guise is the ‘establishment of a Jewish home in Palestine’ to be effected; And the whole land cries out; ‘How long.’ Do something.’ ” Bui a different note, resulting, perhaps, from a closer appraisal, comes from A. D. Gordoon, a Palestinian workman, excerpts from whose letters appear in The Mnccabean, a Zionist organ. His, message is “plain home-talk,’ lor everything in Palestine wears “the same homely-work-a-day physiognomy as anywhere else,’’ ami “you will find here the same tnvialties, the same meanness, if you like —as anywhere else.’ This tiller of the soil sees salvation iu work, mid he urges: ••Congregation upon our own soil ,o.nins cue end of intellectual para- , ui>ni upon an alien body politic. Fur better or worse, we must have our homeland, our own work. I hero is no tie between men so strung as common work. Nothing hut common work can regenerate us—not debates or researches on formulas of compromise. The Jews of every laud have their local tasks, but there is only one universal Jewish task: to prepare a corner of the earth for our own national life. With the end of the Avar we may begin now. Part of the ground is ploughed and waiting. - ’