Racial Violence in Palestine The rioting, involving several deaths and
numerous casualties, which took place in Jaffa last. week is a depressing sign of the tension which exists between the Arabs and the Jews. The cause of the outbreak is said to be the killing of a Jewish immigrant by Arab highwaymen, followed by the' killing of two Arabs, it is alleged by Jews in revenge for the death of their countryman. The funeral of the Jew was the immediate occasion of the outbreak which was serious enough to necessitate the calling out of troops and to drive Jewish merchants in flight from Jaffa to Tel-Aviv. But it would be useless to pretend that the funeral was anything more than an occasion, or that the real cause was not the permanent and intense racial hostility which exists in Palestine today. When that hostility can be so easily inflamed into violence, if is clear that there is no great hope of success for the proposed Legislative Council, which, if it is to be useful and effective, must depend on co-operation between Jew and Arab. Yet it still may be better to give the two races a permanent legal representative body, even if it is only as a vehicle for the • ventilation of grievances which would otherwise find more violent means of expression.
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