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PALESTINE: THE ARABS, THE JEWS, AND THE PEEL REPORT W. S. MCCULLOUGH I. THE ARABS O N October 30 , 1918, the war with Turkey ended, and on November 7, the French and British governments issued a joint Declaration: "The object aimed at by France and Great Britain in prosecuting the war in the East ... is the complete and definite emancipation of the peoples so long oppressed by the Turk., and the establishment of National Governments and Administrations deriving their authority from the initiative and free choice of the indigenous populations .'" This seemed to offer the Arabs, including those in Palestine, the prospect of independence which some of their Icaders had long sought. I The Arab nationalist movement had arisen in Syria and the Lebanon in pre-War days, encouraged by educational enterprises (notably American), through which the ferment of Western nationalism was brought to bear on the Near East. At first this movement exercised no great influence over the mass of the Syrians, but in intellectual and politically-minded circles, especially in the cities, it became an issue of some importance. Partly checked by the Young Turks and driven underground, it nevertheless continued to thrive, and spread from Syria in to other parts of the Arab world, as for instance Iraq, where it had a firm hold after 1912. Nationalist agitation was aided not only by numerous secret societies but also by an Arabic press, whose growth was almost phenomelH . W. V. Temperley (~d.). His/ory of fJu PelJu Conjtrmu of Pari;, vol. VI, 1924, 140_ 1. 468 .PALESTINE: THE PEEL REPORT nal. Between the years 1904 and 1914 the number of Arabic newspapers founded in three areas now under mandates, is significant: the Lebanon, 1 I7; Syria, 73; Palestine, 26. Many of these papers were short-lived owing to Turkish suppression, but their very birth was a sign of the times.' The "Revolt in the Desert," which T. E. Lawrence has made so familiar, and which has primary reference to the revolt (in June, 1916) of the Emir Hussein of the Hejaz against his Turkish rulers, was therefore not an isolated event. Arab princes in the Arabian peninsula, no less than Arabs in more civilized areas, had long harboured the' desire for independence. The en trance of' Turkey into the Great War suggested that the time was at hand when the cherished dream could become a reality. Thus it was that as early as January, 1915, Iraqi and Syrian leaders sen t down to the Meccan Emir proposals for a military mutiny in Syria against the Turks. In the same year Sir Henry McMahon, High Commissioner in Egypt, exchanged letters with the Emir Hussein on the future of the Arabs. Great Britain agreed, in return for the Emir's assistance in the war against Turkey, to recognize and support the independence of the Arabs within certain' territorial limits. Whether Palestine was understood to be within these limits, is a moot point. The British government (and now Sir Henry McMahon himself, in a letter to The Times, July 23, 1937) has maintained that western Palestine was to be outside the .proposed boundaries ; the Arabs take the contrary view. On the whole the Arabs have done rather well out of the Great War. Arabia proper is free of foreign control, its dominant figure being King Ibn Sa'ud; Iraq is an 2For:l brief study o( Arab nationalism b~ fore t914, see P. W. IrelRnd, Iraq, 1937, chap. xiii T. E. Lawrence, SlUtn Pillars oj Wisdom, t935 , chaps. iv, v, lxix. 469 THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO QUARTERLY independent kingdom; Trans-Jordan is virtually selfgoverning ; Syria and the Lebanon, while sti'll under French mandates, expect relative independence within a few years. Of all the Arabic-speaking territories that were controlled by Turkey prior to 19'14, Palestine alone has come no nearer, under the E!ritish mandate, to the Arab goal of political freedom . When the War broke out, the Arabs of Palestine numbered about 600,000; the Jews, about 55,000, The former had not been in the van of the Arab nationalist movement, but they were naturally influenced by it, and they shared in the hopes aroused by Hussein...

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