"NOT YET READY”

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26637, 6 December 1947, Page 7

"NOT YET READY”

ARABS IN PALESTINE FURTHER ATTACKS ON JEWS DEMONSTRATION PLANS POSTPONED Rec. 11 p.ip, LONDON, Dec. 5. On the instructions from the Mufti in Beirut, the Arab Higher Organisations last night called off the demonstrations planned for to-day, says the Jerusalem correspondent of the Daily Express The Mufti wants no more Arab attacks on Jews for the time being “ because we are not yet ready,” said Dr Hussein Klialidi, the Organisation’s secretary-general. “It Is all over for the present,” he added. “It is not in the Arab interest to clash with the British.” Dr Khalidi appealed to all Arabs not to demonstrate but to pray for help in the coming struggle.” He called for a return to normal life. The situation in Palestine was quieter, but there were several bad incidents. Nineteen Jews and 15 Arabs have been killed in Palestine since the United Nations adopted the partition plan. Haganah men escorting a Jewish bus convoy from Jerusalem to Tel-Aviv fought off an Arab attack near Ramleh. The Associated Press reports that skirmishes continued in the Jaffa-Tel-Aviv border area. One Arab was killed and several Jews and Arabs wounded. The police are reported to have shot one Jewish factory worker in Tel-Aviv. An Arab mob attempting to break out of the cordon at Jerusalem’s Jaffa Gate injured a British soldier. Arabs held up and stoned three air line cabs travelling with a convoy to Lydda Airport. They beat up the Jewish driver of one car. Alexandria Demonstrations About 5000 shrieking demonstrators brandishing clubs and iron bars rushed the British Consulate-General Buildings at Alexandria this afternoon, reports Reuter’s Cairo correspondent. The police used trams and empty police lorries to keep the mob off. The secretary-general of the Arab League, Abdul Rahman Azzam Pasha, told a gathering of 5000 students and Government workers in Cairo that the Arab League had opened a recruiting office there to make enlistments for fighting in Palestine. He asked them to volunteer. , , . . . . Steel-helmeted Highland infantry troops surrounded Jerusalem Old City to-night to prevent Arab breakouts. Haganah announced that it had completed plans to defend Jerusalems Jewish ouarters. It will divide the city into 10 zones, each under a Haganah officer, with mobile patrols reauy to rush to trouble spots. The correspondent of the Associated p> es« says that, although to-day was the last day of the Arabs’ three-day protest strike, a fresh wave of Arab violence is expected to-morr.ow, .vnich is the Moslem Sabbath. Thirty Jews attacked an Arab-owned orange grove in the Jaffa area witn hanG gienades and automatic fire, wounding one Arab. Plans for Jewish State

The London Daily Telegraphs diplomatic correspondent says Jewish Agencv representatives are being summoned' from all parts of the world to a meeting rc-xt week, at which the agency will draw up plans for taking over and administering the Jewish State in partitioned Palestine. The meeting will pay particular attention to defence. It is understood that the agency proposes to form a standing militia of 10,000, with a reserve of 20,000 recruited from membership of Haganah. Baruch Korff, the 32-year-old rabbi who was arrested in Paris in September on a charge of planning to drop Zionist propaganda leaflets on London from the air, iolo reporters in Boston of plans tor a 250,000 strong Palestine expeditionary army “to be led by American generals.” He said this army would be made up of American ex-servicemen and would be called the “ George Washington Battalion,” and would be forn ed within a few months fn'protect the rights of Jewish people and to prevent the infiltration of totalitarian ramies, which might try to enter on the pretext of protection, but would r.tn gr leave. Loan from United States

In New York a Jewish Agency spokesman said to-day that the agency would appeal to the United States Export and Import Bank for a loan to help establish Palestine’s Jewish State. The amount requested would depend on how much could be raised through private Jewish philanthropy in the United States, but it was assumed that tens of millions of dollars would be involved.

The new State, which will begin its official existence on October 1, will need large sums to finance a local militia, to set the complex administrative machinery in motion, and to deal with the vastly increased flow of immigrants. It is estimated that the immigration programme alone will cost over 300,000,000 dollars in 1948, enabling the absorption of 100.000 new settlers. The united Jewish appeal raised 103.000.000 dollars in 1946, and the goal for 1947 is 170,000,000 dollars. The, goal for 1948 is expected to be the highest in the appeal’s history. The Daily Express says hundreds of British ex-servicemen, including excommandos, war-time pilots and naval officers, are applying at Arab Legations in London offering their services if organised hostilities break out between the Jews and the Arabs. Official recruiting would be contrary to the Foreign Enlistment Act. but a list of volunteers is being kept at headquarters of the Palestine Arab Political Mission. An official of the mission is shortly expected to return from the Middle East with an announcement on service conditions and pay.