Moslem emotions
Sir: Having just returned from eight days in Jerusalem I am astonished to read Mrs Silkin's grossly inaccurate retort (5 May) with reference to Mr Pinner's very fair rejoinder (21 April) to her earlier intrusion into your columns.
I happened to be living in the Holy Land at the period in question — 1944-49 — and can assure your readers that it is Mr Pinner and not Mrs Silkin who has done his homework . . . thoroughly.
After the first world war the mandates in the Middle East granted to France and Britain allocated Syria and Lebanon to the former, and Palestine and Transjordan to the latter. `The final ratification. . . separating Transjordan . . . so that the latter could become an automatic emirate . . .' was achieved through British pressure alone. So the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, as it now is, was part of the original British mandate.
The Palestinian Arabs never thought that the British would ever leave the Holy Land. Nor were they ready at that time to set up the state allotted to them by the UN General Assembly by more than the necessary two-thirds majority vote. All they and the neighbouring Arab states set out to achieve in 1948 was to prevent the establishment of the Jewish state. In the event they failed in their endeavour, thereby failing to have a state of their own and also, immediately making the proposed international enclave surrounding Jerusalem impossible.
I could wish that Mrs Silkin would refrain from innuendoes against. 'terrorists' whether Jewish or Palestinian.
C. Witton-Da vies Archdeacon's Lodging, Christ Church, Oxford
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