ENGLAND IN PALESTINE By Norman Bentwieh
Like Milner's England in Egypt, Mr. Bentwich's England in Palestine (Kegan Paul, 12s. 6d.1 should be a standard work for years to come. The author is well qualified for the task : he served in the Army in Palestine during the War, and was legal adviser to the Government from 1918 to 1931. More- over, he writes dispassionately, although as a Jew he has suffered from the anti-Semitic prejudices cherished even by British officials who ought to have known better. The resuft is a plain and trustworthy narrative of events since the occupation, with an exact account of the administration such as is to be found in no other book. Transjordania is included in the survey. Mr. Bentwieh shows the complexity of the problems that arise in this little country—no larger than an English county and with less than a million people—by reason of the differences of race, religion, traditions and tempera- ment which make it another Macedonia. Even the little railway service belongs to three distinct bodies ; the metre- gauge line from Haifa to Deraa and the line thence south to Maan are Moslem religious property and are, not unnaturally, run at a loss. The author describes the riots of 1929 and the unhappy controversy that followed, in which Lord Passfield took a strongly anti-Jewish line. But he maintains that the situation has improved since then, and that with wise and firm administration Palestine should gradually attain peace and prosperity.
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