United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine
The United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine was a proposal by the United Nations, which recommended a partition of Mandatory Palestine at the end of the British Mandate. On 29 November 1947, the UN General Assembly adopted the Plan as Resolution 181 (II).[1]
"Partition of Palestine" redirects here. For the partition of Palestine into Israel, the Gaza Strip, and the West Bank, see 1949 Armistice Agreements.
UN General Assembly
Resolution 181 (II)
The resolution recommended the creation of independent Arab and Jewish States linked economically[2] and a Special International Regime for the city of Jerusalem and its surroundings. The Arab state was to have a territory of 11,100 square kilometres or 42%, the Jewish state a territory of 14,100 square kilometres or 56%, while the remaining 2%—comprising the cities of Jerusalem, Bethlehem and the adjoning area—would become an international zone.[3][4] The Partition Plan, a four-part document attached to the resolution, provided for the termination of the Mandate, the gradual withdrawal of British armed forces and the delineation of boundaries between the two States and Jerusalem. Part I of the Plan stipulated that the Mandate would be terminated as soon as possible and the United Kingdom would withdraw no later than 1 August 1948. The new states would come into existence two months after the withdrawal, but no later than 1 October 1948. The Plan sought to address the conflicting objectives and claims of two competing movements, Palestinian nationalism and Jewish nationalism, or Zionism.[5][6] The Plan also called for Economic Union between the proposed states, and for the protection of religious and minority rights.[7] Jewish organizations collaborated with UNSCOP during the deliberations, and the Palestinian Arab leadership boycotted it.[8]
The plan’s detractors considered the proposed plan to be pro-Zionist, with 56%[9] of the land allocated to the Jewish state although the Palestinian Arab population numbered twice the Jewish population.[10] The plan was celebrated by most Jews in Palestine[11] and reluctantly[12] accepted by the Jewish Agency for Palestine with misgivings.[13][8] Zionist leaders, in particular David Ben-Gurion, viewed the acceptance of the plan as a tactical step and a stepping stone to future territorial expansion over all of Palestine.[14][15][16][17][18][19] The Arab Higher Committee, the Arab League and other Arab leaders and governments rejected it on the basis that in addition to the Arabs forming a two-thirds majority, they owned a majority of the lands.[20][21] They also indicated an unwillingness to accept any form of territorial division,[22] arguing that it violated the principles of national self-determination in the UN Charter which granted people the right to decide their own destiny.[8][23] They announced their intention to take all necessary measures to prevent the implementation of the resolution.[24][25][26][27] Subsequently, a civil war broke out in Palestine,[28] and the plan was not implemented.[29]
Background
The British administration was formalized by the League of Nations under the Palestine Mandate in 1923, as part of the Partitioning of the Ottoman Empire following World War I. The Mandate reaffirmed the 1917 British commitment to the Balfour Declaration, for the establishment in Palestine of a "National Home" for the Jewish people, with the prerogative to carry it out.[30][31] A British census of 1918 estimated 700,000 Arabs and 56,000 Jews.[30]
In 1937, following a six-month-long Arab General Strike and armed insurrection which aimed to pursue national independence and secure the country from foreign control, the British established the Peel Commission.[32] The Commission concluded that the Mandate had become unworkable, and recommended partition into an Arab state linked to Transjordan; a small Jewish state; and a mandatory zone. To address problems arising from the presence of national minorities in each area, it suggested a land and population transfer[33] involving the transfer of some 225,000 Arabs living in the envisaged Jewish state and 1,250 Jews living in a future Arab state, a measure deemed compulsory "in the last resort".[33][34][35] To address any economic problems, the Plan proposed avoiding interfering with Jewish immigration, since any interference would be liable to produce an "economic crisis", most of Palestine's wealth coming from the Jewish community. To solve the predicted annual budget deficit of the Arab State and reduction in public services due to loss of tax from the Jewish state, it was proposed that the Jewish state pay an annual subsidy to the Arab state and take on half of the latter's deficit.[33][34][36] The Palestinian Arab leadership rejected partition as unacceptable, given the inequality in the proposed population exchange and the transfer of one-third of Palestine, including most of its best agricultural land, to recent immigrants.[35] The Jewish leaders, Chaim Weizmann and David Ben-Gurion, persuaded the Zionist Congress to lend provisional approval to the Peel recommendations as a basis for further negotiations.[37][38][39][40] In a letter to his son in October 1937, Ben-Gurion explained that partition would be a first step to "possession of the land as a whole".[41][42][43] The same sentiment, that acceptance of partition was a temporary measure beyond which the Palestine would be "redeemed ... in its entirety,"[44] was recorded by Ben-Gurion on other occasions, such as at a meeting of the Jewish Agency executive in June 1938,[45] as well as by Chaim Weizmann.[43][46]
The British Woodhead Commission was set up to examine the practicality of partition. The Peel plan was rejected and two possible alternatives were considered. In 1938, the British government issued a policy statement declaring that "the political, administrative and financial difficulties involved in the proposal to create independent Arab and Jewish States inside Palestine are so great that this solution of the problem is impracticable". Representatives of Arabs and Jews were invited to London for the St. James Conference, which proved unsuccessful.[47]
With World War II looming, British policies were influenced by a desire to win Arab world support and could ill afford to engage with another Arab uprising.[48] The MacDonald White Paper of May 1939 declared that it was "not part of [the British government's] policy that Palestine should become a Jewish State", sought to limit Jewish immigration to Palestine and restricted Arab land sales to Jews. However, the League of Nations commission held that the White Paper was in conflict with the terms of the Mandate as put forth in the past. The outbreak of the Second World War suspended any further deliberations.[49][50] The Jewish Agency hoped to persuade the British to restore Jewish immigration rights, and cooperated with the British in the war against Fascism. Aliyah Bet was organized to spirit Jews out of Nazi controlled Europe, despite the British prohibitions. The White Paper also led to the formation of Lehi, a small Jewish organization which opposed the British.
After World War II, in August 1945 President Truman asked for the admission of 100,000 Holocaust survivors into Palestine[51] but the British maintained limits on Jewish immigration in line with the 1939 White Paper. The Jewish community rejected the restriction on immigration and organized an armed resistance. These actions and United States pressure to end the anti-immigration policy led to the establishment of the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry. In April 1946, the Committee reached a unanimous decision for the immediate admission of 100,000 Jewish refugees from Europe into Palestine, rescission of the white paper restrictions of land sale to Jews, that the country be neither Arab nor Jewish, and the extension of U.N. Trusteeship. The U.S. endorsed the Commission's findings concerning Jewish immigration and land purchase restrictions,[52] while the British made their agreement to implementation conditional on U.S. assistance in case of another Arab revolt.[52] In effect, the British continued to carry out their White Paper policy.[53] The recommendations triggered violent demonstrations in the Arab states, and calls for a Jihad and an annihilation of all European Jews in Palestine.[54]
(Vote: For): President Truman later noted, "The facts were that not only were there pressure movements around the United Nations unlike anything that had been seen there before, but that the White House, too, was subjected to a constant barrage. I do not think I ever had as much pressure and propaganda aimed at the White House as I had in this instance. The persistence of a few of the extreme Zionist leaders—actuated by political motives and engaging in political threats—disturbed and annoyed me."[99]
United States
(Vote: Against): Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru spoke with anger and contempt for the way the UN vote had been lined up. He said the Zionists had tried to bribe India with millions and at the same time his sister, Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit, the Indian ambassador to the UN, had received daily warnings that her life was in danger unless "she voted right".[100] Pandit occasionally hinted that something might change in favour of the Zionists. But another Indian delegate, Kavallam Pannikar, said that India would vote for the Arab side, because of their large Muslim minority, although they knew that the Jews had a case.[101]
India
(Vote: For): Liberia's Ambassador to the United States complained that the US delegation threatened aid cuts to several countries.[102] Harvey S. Firestone Jr., President of Firestone Natural Rubber Company, with major holdings in the country, also pressured the Liberian government[88][96]
Liberia
(Vote: For): In the days before the vote, Philippines representative General Carlos P. Romulo stated "We hold that the issue is primarily moral. The issue is whether the United Nations should accept responsibility for the enforcement of a policy which is clearly repugnant to the valid nationalist aspirations of the people of Palestine. The Philippines Government holds that the United Nations ought not to accept such responsibility." After a phone call from Washington, the representative was recalled and the Philippines' vote changed.[96]
Philippines
(Vote: For): The promise of a five million dollar loan may or may not have secured Haiti's vote for partition.[103]
Haiti
(Vote: For): Shortly before the vote, France's delegate to the United Nations was visited by Bernard Baruch, a long-term Jewish supporter of the Democratic Party who, during the recent world war, had been an economic adviser to President Roosevelt, and had latterly been appointed by President Truman as United States ambassador to the newly created UN Atomic Energy Commission. He was, privately, a supporter of the Irgun and its front organization, the American League for a Free Palestine. Baruch implied that a French failure to support the resolution might block planned American aid to France, which was badly needed for reconstruction, French currency reserves being exhausted and its balance of payments heavily in deficit. Previously, to avoid antagonising its Arab colonies, France had not publicly supported the resolution. After considering the danger of American aid being withheld, France finally voted in favour of it. So, too, did France's neighbours, Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands.[86]
France
(Vote: For): Carlos Eduardo Stolk, Chairman of the Delegation of Venezuela, voted in favor of Resolution 181 .[104]
Venezuela
(Vote: Against): The Cuban delegation stated they would vote against partition "in spite of pressure being brought to bear against us" because they could not be party to coercing the majority in Palestine.[105]
Cuba
Reactions
Jews
Jews gathered in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem to celebrate the U.N. resolution during the whole night after the vote. Great bonfires blazed at Jewish collective farms in the north. Many big cafes in Tel Aviv served free champagne.[19][11] Mainstream Zionist leaders emphasized the "heavy responsibility" of building a modern Jewish State, and committed to working towards a peaceful coexistence with the region's other inhabitants:[116][117] Jewish groups in the United States hailed the action by the United Nations. Most welcomed the Palestine Plan but some felt it did not settle the problem.[118]
Some Revisionist Zionists rejected the partition plan as a renunciation of legitimately Jewish national territory.[118] The Irgun Tsvai Leumi, led by Menachem Begin, and the Lehi (also known as the Stern Group or Gang), the two Revisionist-affiliated underground organisations which had been fighting against both the British and Arabs, stated their opposition. Begin warned that the partition would not bring peace because the Arabs would also attack the small state and that "in the war ahead we'll have to stand on our own, it will be a war on our existence and future."[119] He also stated that "the bisection of our homeland is illegal. It will never be recognized."[120] Begin was sure that the creation of a Jewish state would make territorial expansion possible, "after the shedding of much blood."[121]
Some Post-Zionist scholars endorse Simha Flapan's view that it is a myth that Zionists accepted the partition as a compromise by which the Jewish community abandoned ambitions for the whole of Palestine and recognized the rights of the Arab Palestinians to their own state. Rather, Flapan argued, acceptance was only a tactical move that aimed to thwart the creation of an Arab Palestinian state and, concomitantly, expand the territory that had been assigned by the UN to the Jewish state.[17][122][123][124][125] Baruch Kimmerling has said that Zionists "officially accepted the partition plan, but invested all their efforts towards improving its terms and maximally expanding their boundaries while reducing the number of Arabs in them."[18] Zionist leaders viewed the acceptance of the plan as a tactical step and a stepping stone to future territorial expansion over all of Palestine.[14][17][18][19][8][126][127]
Addressing the Central Committee of the Histadrut (the Eretz Israel Workers Party) days after the UN vote to partition Palestine, Ben-Gurion expressed his apprehension, stating: