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the United Nations in favour of partition, while the activities on the side of the Arabs are intended to destroy that decision, I say that an outrage is an outrage, and a murder is a murder, and it is our plain and obvious duty to see to it that outrages and murders are stopped. And we are, I submit, clearly bound to ask ourselves, what, if anything we have done to further the objectives which we laid down last November, and to counter the opposition which we all knew would, and which in fact did, arise. I fear the answer is nothing. It is certainly very little, despite the earnest efforts of the Commission, and much quite obviously has been done with the contrary object. It is now suggested, as I understand it, though the proposal is far from clear in some of its implications, and the various statements that have been made do not always appear to me to have been consistent, that because of this series of murders and outrages partition at this stage has become impossible. I say to you not only that these abominable incidents should have been foreseen and prevented, but that to put them forward as a reason for abandoning the decision arrived at after most careful and anxious consideration only a few months ago seems to the New Zealand delegation to be a most fantastic distortion of logical thought. If, indeed, the considered decision of the General Assembly is to be stultified, to be defeated by the application of illegal and reprehensible violence, if the Assembly allows its decision to be abandoned because it is challenged and opposed by force, then the Assembly will be taking upon itself a responsibility which will bear tragic fruit for many many generations to come. But one is entitled to ask how is the Assembly to go about it to provide force if force is necessary, as, of course, it is. I will not content myself by saying, as I am fully entitled to say, that force should have been provided last November, but I would venture very gravely to doubt whether the force that would be required to implement trusteeship would be any less than the force that would be required to implement partition. And if the members of the United Nations should be willing each to take its proportionate part in enforcing a decision of the United Nations in respect of a trusteeship for Palestine, those members should, on any logical basis, equally be willing to provide their proportionate share of a United Nations force to implement the decision to which it pledged itself last November. That is the policy which the New Zealand Government has instructed me to support at this meeting. We still believe that, with all its defects, however imperfect we may all agree that solution is, the decision of last November is nevertheless the best solution that the situation offers. We believe that, having made the decision in November, we should, undeterred by lawless violence, proceed to enforce that decision by the united action of the members of the United Nations. And I call upon my colleagues to take thought, to take serious thought, before they abandon their decision of principle as the direct result of outrages and murders which might well have been foreseen and, indeed, I believe, were foreseen before that decision was made. I call upon my colleagues in this Assembly to take thought, careful thought, before they strike that tragic, perhaps irreparable, blow to the United Nations that would be involved in capitulation by the world to threats and violence. It is the old, old problem which the League of Nations was not prepared
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