Vengeance Into Murder

When an ugly fact bobbed up to bother Queen Victoria she knew how to tuck the thing away comfortably out of mind. There are still Britons with that talent. Last week His Majesty's government decided to tuck away the fact of racial conflict between Jews and Arabs in Palestine (TIME, Aug. 26, et seq.]. The thing was attempted by Prime Minister James Ramsay MacDonald in the course of his great speech outlining policy (see p. 25). Said he:

"There was no racial conflict in what happened in Palestine the other day. It is a situation where the leaders of both races ought to join together and with common voice and with a passion shared equally in both their hearts condemn what was nothing less than an ordinary piece of political crime.

"This is no conflict between Moslem and Jew; this is simply an uprising of lawlessness and disorder, whatever its motive may be. So far as we are concerned it is not a question of Moslem or Jew, Christian or nonChristian. It isn't a question like that at all. . . ."

Intellectually such words are nonsense. Emotionally, they may prove to be the acme of British commonsense. The situation in Palestine had become quiet last week, with 5,000 British troops policing the land, disarming both, Jews and Arabs, recovering loot seized in the riots, massacres and town-burnings of last fortnight. Quite possible the best way to quench the strife of Islam v. Israel was to make both factions feel that further slaughter would be common murder, not glorious and justifiable vengeance taken upon a rival race and creed.

Mopping Up. The colonial secretary in charge of Britain's Palestine mandate is famed Economist Sidney Webb, Baron Passneld. Last week he instructed the British High Commissioner at Jerusalem, Sir John Chancellor, to take steps for "the collection of evidence before it disappears" as to whether the Jew-Arab clashes which began last month at Jerusalem's famed Wailing Wall were "spontaneous or pre-conceived." This evidence will be sifted by a special British parliamentary com- mission, created last week by Baron Passfield and chairmanned by Sir Walter Shaw, recently Chief Justice of the British Straits Settlements, a colonial jurist of tact and renown.

All week ephemeral charges were made by Arab and Jewish organizations in Palestine and throughout the world, each race trying to put major blame on the other. But the colonial office ignored all such manifestations, prepared to finish the mopping up as a matter of police methods and British justice. Said Baron Pasfield:

"Britain does not intend to abandon her duties; despite the unthankful character of her job. We will continue the difficult task of maintaining order and upholding the national Jewish home in Palestine."

Warburg on Cooperation. First of world-renowned Jews to propose a constructive program for dealing with the Palestine situation was Manhattan's wealthy Felix Warburg, international banker (Kuhn, Loeb & Co.) who was in London when the killings started but returned home last week on the Homeric.

The thing to be done in Palestine, ac cording to Banker Warburg, is to start "small joint committees" of Arabs and Jews locally "working for better roads, better schools, for better technical education, for better civil service training." Only by such local work, he believes, can a basis of co-operation be built up between the Zionist and Arab executives and with the British mandate government. "Eventually," said Banker Warburg, "through recommendations by such joint committees better understanding, more ample co-operation and greater watchfulness against vicious agitation will be brought about."

Eye Witnesses. Lurid were the tales told last week by U.S. citizens who escaped the massacre at Hebron where eight U. S. Jews were killed by Arabs (TIME, Sept. 2). Typical was the account given by David E. Winchester of Chicago, who reached Palestine only eleven weeks ago for post-graduate work at the Talmudic school in Hebron. "When the trouble started a friendly Arab hid me in the building where he was living," said Student Winchester. "When a marauding party entered, the friendly Arab said there were no Jews there. But they searched the building and found me. An Arab with a knife advanced toward me as the door was flung open. I prayed for mercy. Almighty God came to my rescue and gave me strength.

"We struggled and I grabbed the knife and wrested it from the Arab. Only the Almighty could have given me the strength. Another Arab, however, felled me with a long piece of iron. All around was a tremendous sound. I did not lose consciousness and could feel the cold blades of knives cut into my flesh as I lay there stunned and defenseless. They left me for dead. . . ."

"Lead On!" Jewish campaigners for the Palestine emergency relief fund staged rallies throughout the U. S., last week, whooped up Arab atrocity stories, collected cash which reached a total of $607,718. Among non-Jewish orators who warmed up such gatherings, Manhattan's jaunty, obliging Roman Catholic Mayor James ("Jimmy") Walker was well nigh without a peer. Clapping on a Hebrew skullcap he cried to 2,000 Jews in Brooklyn: "Lead on! Whether to Palestine or elsewhere, we will follow and see that never again shall the hand of the persecutor be laid on you in any other land!"