he Palestine Crisis
The gravity of the situation in Palestine is emphasised by every
resh discovery of hidden arms, and there ran be no question that e Administration is abundantly justified in the rigorous measures has taken to deal with organised sabotage. The damage so .far sed was stated by the Prime Minister in the House of Commons on Monday to have amounted to more than L4,000,000, apart from the continuing indirect loss due to the destruction of communica- tions like the Jordan bridges. The sole excuse alleged for the shameful record of outrage is that the British Government has not adopted and executed the recommendations of the Anglo-American Commission within a limit of time which the Jews thought proper. The debate on Monday showed that an overwhelming mass of the House fully supported the Prime Minister in his restrained and con- vincing defence of the action taken by the Administration in Palestine. The critics of the Government's policy never got beyond an emotional, insistence on the Jewish demands. Mr. R. H. S. Cross- man, a rriember of the Anglo-American Commission, romanticised the Haganah as a heroic resistance organisation comparable to Partisans and maquis, though the Commission's report, which Mr. Crossman signed, stigmatised it as an illegal organisation, highly developed on a military basis, in possession of large secret stores of weapons and munitions, and working in close touch with the Jewish Agency, which, according to Mr. Grossman and his colleagues on the Commission, could have prevented the outrages committed by the Haganah if it chose, but did not choose. The Prime Minister undertook to produce the evidence which led to the recent arrest of members of the executive of the Jewish Agency, but in view of the statements contained in the Anglo-American Commission's report there can be little surprise that the military action should have been necessary. Meanwhile President Truman's action in offering to transport I 00,00C Jews to Palestine at a time when the whole question of immigration is under urgent consideration raises questions so serious that comment is better withheld.
