“Mandate for Palestine”

The legal aspects of Jewish rights to a National Home in Palestine

Eli E. Hertz
1920 - Original territory assigned to the Jewish National Home

1922 - Final territory assigned to the Jewish National Home

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 1 Mandate For Palestine

 “In Palestine as of right and not on sufferance ...”

“When it is asked what is meant by the development of the Jewish National

Home in Palestine, it may be answered that it is not the imposition of a Jewish
nationality upon the inhabitants of Palestine as a whole, but the further
development of the existing Jewish community, with the assistance of Jews in
other parts of the world, in order that it may become a centre in which the Jewish
people as a whole may take, on grounds of religion and race, an interest and a
pride. But in order that this community should have the best prospect of free
development and provide a full opportunity for the Jewish people to display its
capacities, it is essential that it should know that it is in Palestine as of right and
not on sufferance. That is the reason why it is necessary that the existence of a
Jewish National Home in Palestine should be internationally guaranteed and that
it should be formally recognized to rest upon ancient historic connection.”

Winston Churchill
British Secretary of State
for the Colonies
June 1922

Copyright © 2007 Myths and Facts, Inc. and Eli E. Hertz

ISBN 10: 0-9741804-2-4

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Published by: Myths and Facts, Inc.

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Cover design and maps by Nick Moscovitz and Eli E. Hertz.

All rights reserved. Parts of this publication may be reproduced with attribution for non-commercial
use. For all other purposes, prior written permission of the publisher must be obtained.

All quotes included in this Pamphlet are taken verbatim from the given source.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 2 Mandate For Palestine

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Map: 1922 - Final territory assigned to the Jewish National Home ………………….. 1
Map: 1920 - Original territory assigned to the Jewish National Home ……………... 1
“In Palestine as of right and not on sufferance” …………………………………………….. 2
The legal aspects of Jewish rights to a National Home in Palestine …………………. 4
The two most significant events in modern history leading to the
creation of the Jewish National Home …………………………………………………………. 4
The founding of modern Zionism …………………………………………………………… 4
The Balfour Declaration ………………………………………………………………………… 4
The origin and nature of the “Mandate for Palestine” ……………………………………. 5
Recognition of historical connection to Palestine ………………………………………….. 5
Map: Jewish Palestine ………………………………………………………………………………… 7
Palestine is a geographical area, not a nationality …………………………………………. 8
There has never been a sovereign Arab state in Palestine ……………………………… 10
The “Mandate” defined where Jews are and are not permitted to settle …………. 11
Political rights in Palestine were granted to Jews only …………………………………. 12
Jewish Peoplehood in Palestine …………………………………………………………………. 13
Jerusalem in “Mandate” time …………………………………………………………………….. 13
Jewish rights to Palestine were internationally guaranteed ………………………..... 14
United States government and the “Mandate” policy …………………………………… 14
The “Mandate for Palestine” is valid to this day …………………………………………… 15
Futile efforts to challenge the “Mandate for Palestine” …………………………………. 17
Myth: The “Mandate for Palestine” is a Class “A” Mandate …………………………… 17
Myth: The “Mandate” violates Article 22 of the Covenant of the League ………… 18
Myth: Palestine was promised to the Arabs by Sir Henry McMahon ……………… 20
Map: 1947 Partition Plan ………………………………………………………………………….. 21
Myth: 1947 Partition Plan replaced the “Mandate for Palestine” …………………… 22
Myth: Arabs rejected the “unbalanced” Partition Plan …………………………………. 23
Myth: The 1949 “Green Line” is Israel’s internationally recognized border ……. 24
Myths: Palestinian Arabs seek peace with Israel …………………………………………. 24
Appendix A - “Mandate for Palestine” ………………………………………………………… 27
Article 25 of the “Palestine Mandate” …………………………………………………………. 35
Appendix B - Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations …………………. 37
Appendix C - Israel’s Declaration of Independence ……………………………………… 39
“Redemption of Palestine” ………………………………………………………………………… 42
Notes ………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 43

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 3 Mandate For Palestine

 “Mandate for Palestine”
The legal aspects of Jewish rights to a National Home in Palestine

The two most significant events in modern history leading

to the creation of the Jewish National Home
I. The founding of modern Zionism
Benjamin Ze’ev (Theodor) Herzl
(May 2, 1860 – July 3, 1904)

After witnessing the spread of antisemitism around the world, Herzl felt
compelled to create a political movement with the goal of establishing a Jewish
National Home in Palestine. To this end, he assembled the first Zionist Congress
in Basel, Switzerland, in 1897. Herzl’s insights and vision can be learned from his
writings:
“Oppression and persecution cannot exterminate us. No nation on earth has
survived such struggles and sufferings as we have gone through.

“Palestine is our ever-memorable historic home. The very name of Palestine

would attract our people with a force of marvelous potency.

“The idea which I have developed in this pamphlet is a very old one: it is the
restoration of the Jewish State.

“The world resounds with outcries against the Jews, and these outcries have
awakened the slumbering idea. ... We are a people - one people.” 1

II. The Balfour Declaration

The British Foreign Office, November 2nd, 1917
Dear Lord Rothschild,
I have much pleasure in conveying to you, on behalf of His Majesty’s
Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist
aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet.
“His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national
home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the
achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which
may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in
Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.”
I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the
Zionist Federation. 2
Signed,
Arthur James Balfour
[Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs]

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 4 Mandate For Palestine

The origin and nature of the “Mandate for Palestine”
The “Mandate for Palestine,” an historical League of Nations document, laid
down the Jewish legal right to settle anywhere in western Palestine, a 10,000-
square-mile 3 area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, an
entitlement unaltered in international law and valid to this day.
The legally binding document was conferred on April 24, 1920, at the San Remo
Conference, and its terms outlined in the Treaty of Sèvres on August 10, 1920.
The Mandate’s terms were finalized and unanimously approved on July 24, 1922,
by the Council of the League of Nations, which was comprised at that time of 51
countries, 4 and became operational on September 29, 1923. 5
The “Mandate for Palestine” was not a naive vision, briefly embraced by the
international community in blissful unawareness of Arab opposition to the very
notion of Jewish historical rights in Palestine. The Mandate weathered the test of
time: On April 18, 1946, when the League of Nations was dissolved and its assets
and duties transferred to the United Nations, the international community, in
essence, reaffirmed the validity of this international accord and reconfirmed that
the terms for a Jewish homeland were the will of the international community, a
“sacred trust” – despite the fact that by then it was patently clear that the Arabs
opposed a Jewish homeland, no matter what the form.
Many seem to confuse the “Mandate for Palestine” [The Trust], with the British
Mandate [The Trustee]. The “Mandate for Palestine” is a League of Nations
document that laid down the Jewish legal rights in Palestine. The British
Mandate, on the other hand, was entrusted by the League of Nations with the
responsibility to administrate the area delineated by the “Mandate for Palestine.”
Great Britain [i.e., the Mandatory and Trustee] did turn over its responsibility to
the United Nations as of May 14, 1948. However, the legal force of the League of
Nations’ “Mandate for Palestine” [i.e., The Trust] was not terminated with the
end of the British Mandate. Rather, the Trust was transferred over to the United
Nations.

Recognition of the historical connection to Palestine

Fifty-one member countries – the entire League of Nations – unanimously
declared on July 24, 1922:
“Whereas recognition has been given to the historical connection of the Jewish
people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national home
in that country.” 6
Unlike nation-states in Europe, modern Lebanese, Jordanian, Syrian, and Iraqi
nationalities did not evolve. They were arbitrarily created by colonial powers.
In 1919, in the wake of World War I, England and France as Mandatory (e.g.,
official administrators and mentors) carved up the former Ottoman Empire,
which had collapsed a year earlier, into geographic spheres of influence. This
divided the Mideast into new political entities with new names and frontiers. 7

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 5 Mandate For Palestine

Territory was divided along map meridians without regard for traditional
frontiers (i.e., geographic logic and sustainability) or the ethnic composition of
indigenous populations. 8
The prevailing rationale behind these artificially created states was how they
served the imperial and commercial needs of their colonial masters. Iraq and
Jordan, for instance, were created as emirates to reward the noble Hashemite
family from Saudi Arabia for its loyalty to the British against the Ottoman Turks
during World War I, under the leadership of Lawrence of Arabia. Iraq was given
to Faisal bin Hussein, son of the sheriff of Mecca, in 1918. To reward his younger
brother Abdullah with an emirate, Britain cut away 77 percent of its mandate
over Palestine earmarked for the Jews and gave it to Abdullah in 1922, creating
the new country of Trans-Jordan or Jordan, as it was later named.
The Arabs’ hatred of the Jewish State has never been strong enough to prevent
the bloody rivalries that repeatedly rock the Middle East. These conflicts were
evident in the civil wars in Yemen and Lebanon, as well as in the war between
Iraq and Iran, in the gassing of countless Kurds in Iraq, and in the killing of
Iraqis by Iraqis.
The manner in which European colonial powers carved out political entities with
little regard to their ethnic composition not only led to this inter-ethnic violence,
but it also encouraged dictatorial rule as the only force capable of holding such
entities together. 9
The exception was Palestine, or Eretz Israel – the territory between the Jordan
River and the Mediterranean Sea, where:
“The Mandatory shall be responsible for placing the country [Palestine] under
such political, administrative and economic conditions as will secure the
establishment of the Jewish national home, as laid down in the preamble, and the
development of self-governing institutions, and also for safeguarding the civil and
religious rights of all the inhabitants of Palestine, irrespective of race and
religion.” 10

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 6 Mandate For Palestine

 Jewish Palestine – ‫פלשתינה‬

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 7 Mandate For Palestine

Palestine is a geographical area, not a nationality
Delineating the final geographical area of Palestine designated for the Jewish
National Home as of September 16, 1922: 11
PALESTINE
INTRODUCTORY.
POSITION, ETC.
Palestine lies on the western edge of the continent of Asia between Latitude 30º
N. and 33º N., Longitude 34º 30’ E. and 35º 30’ E.
On the North it is bounded by the French Mandated Territories of Syria and
Lebanon, on the East by Syria and Trans-Jordan, on the South-west by the
Egyptian province of Sinai, on the South-east by the Gulf of Aqaba and on the
West by the Mediterranean. The frontier with Syria was laid down by the Anglo-
French Convention of the 23rd December, 1920, and its delimitation was ratified
in 1923. Briefly stated, the boundaries are as follows: -
North. – From Ras en Naqura on the Mediterranean eastwards to a point west
of Qadas, thence in a northerly direction to Metulla, thence east to a point west of
Banias.
East. – From Banias in a southerly direction east of Lake Hula to Jisr Banat
Ya’pub, thence along a line east of the Jordan and the Lake of Tiberias and on to
El Hamme station on the Samakh-Deraa railway line, thence along the centre of
the river Yarmuq to its confluence with the Jordan, thence along the centres of
the Jordan, the Dead Sea and the Wadi Araba to a point on the Gulf of Aqaba two
miles west of the town of Aqaba, thence along the shore of the Gulf of Aqaba to
Ras Jaba.
South. – From Ras Jaba in a generally north-westerly direction to the junction
of the Neki-Aqaba and Gaza-Aqaba Roads, thence to a point west-north-west of
Ain Maghara and thence to a point on the Mediterranean coast north-west of
Rafa.
West. – The Mediterranean Sea.
Arabs, the UN and its organs, and lately the International Court of Justice (ICJ)
as well, have repeatedly claimed that the Palestinians are a native people – so
much so that almost everyone takes it for granted. The problem is that a stateless
Palestinian people is a fabrication. The word Palestine is not even Arabic. 12
In a report by His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom of Great Britain
and Northern Ireland to the Council of the League of Nations on the
administration of Palestine and Trans-Jordan for the year 1938, the British made
it clear: Palestine is not a State, but is the name of a geographical area. 13
Palestine is a name coined by the Romans around 135 CE from the name of a
seagoing Aegean people who settled on the coast of Canaan in antiquity – the
Philistines. The name was chosen to replace Judea, as a sign that Jewish
sovereignty had been eradicated following the Jewish Revolts against Rome.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 8 Mandate For Palestine

In the course of time, the Latin name Philistia was further bastardized into
Palistina or Palestine. 14 During the next 2,000 years Palestine was never an
independent state belonging to any people, nor did a Palestinian people distinct
from other Arabs appear during 1,300 years of Muslim hegemony in Palestine
under Arab and Ottoman rule. During that rule, local Arabs were actually
considered part of, and subject to, the authority of Greater Syria (Suriyya al-
Kubra). 15
Historically, before the Arabs fabricated the concept of Palestinian peoplehood as
an exclusively Arab phenomenon, no such group existed. This is substantiated in
countless official British Mandate-vintage documents that speak of the Jews and
the Arabs of Palestine – not Jews and Palestinians. 16
In fact, before local Jews began calling themselves Israelis in 1948 (when the
name “Israel” was chosen for the newly-established Jewish State), the term
“Palestine” applied almost exclusively to Jews and the institutions founded by
new Jewish immigrants in the first half of the 20th century, before the state’s
independence.
Some examples include:
• The Jerusalem Post, founded in 1932, was called The Palestine Post until 1948.
• Bank Leumi L’Israel, incorporated in 1902, was called the “Anglo-Palestine
Company” until 1948.
• The Jewish Agency – an arm of the Zionist movement engaged in Jewish
settlement since 1929 – was initially called the Jewish Agency for Palestine.
• Today’s Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, founded in 1936 by German Jewish
refugees who fled Nazi Germany, was originally called the “Palestine Symphony
Orchestra,” composed of some 70 Palestinian Jews. 17
• The United Jewish Appeal (UJA) was established in 1939 as a merger of the
United Palestine Appeal and the fund-raising arm of the Joint Distribution
Committee.
Encouraged by their success at historical revisionism and brainwashing the world
with the “Big Lie” of a Palestinian people, Palestinian Arabs have more recently
begun to claim they are the descendants of the Philistines and even the Stone Age
Canaanites. 18 Based on that myth, they can claim to have been “victimized” twice
by the Jews: in the conquest of Canaan by the Israelites and again by the Israelis
in modern times – a total fabrication. 19 Archeologists explain that the Philistines
were a Mediterranean people who settled along the coast of Canaan in 1100 BCE.
They have no connection to the Arab nation, a desert people who emerged from
the Arabian Peninsula.
As if that myth were not enough, former PLO Chairman Yasir Arafat also
claimed, “Palestinian Arabs are descendants of the Jebusites,” who were
displaced when King David conquered Jerusalem.
Arafat also argued that “Abraham was an Iraqi.” One Christmas Eve, Arafat
declared that “Jesus was a Palestinian,” a preposterous claim that echoes the
words of Hanan Ashrawi, a Christian Arab who, in an interview during the 1991

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 9 Mandate For Palestine

Madrid Conference, said: “Jesus Christ was born in my country, in my land,” and
claimed that she was “the descendant of the first Christians,” disciples who
spread the gospel around Bethlehem some 600 years before the Arab conquest. If
her claims were true, it would be tantamount to confessing that she is a Jew!
Contradictions abound; Palestinian leaders claim to be descended from the
Canaanites, the Philistines, the Jebusites and the first Christians. They also
“hijacked” Jesus and ignored his Jewishness, at the same time claiming the Jews
never were a people and never built the Holy Temples in Jerusalem.

There has never been a sovereign Arab state in Palestine

The artificiality of a Palestinian identity is reflected in the attitudes and actions of
neighboring Arab nations who never established a Palestinian state themselves.
The rhetoric by Arab leaders on behalf of the Palestinians rings hollow. Arabs in
neighboring states, who control 99.9 percent of the Middle East land, have never
recognized a Palestinian entity. They have always considered Palestine and its
inhabitants part of the great “Arab nation,” historically and politically as an
integral part of Greater Syria – Suriyya al-Kubra – a designation that extended
to both sides of the Jordan River. 20 In the 1950s, Jordan simply annexed the
West Bank since the population there was viewed as the brethren of the
Jordanians. Jordan’s official narrative of “Jordanian state-building” attests to
this fact:
“Jordanian identity underlies the significant and fundamental common
denominator that makes it inclusive of Palestinian identity, particularly in view of
the shared historic social and political development of the people on both sides of
the Jordan. ... The Jordan government, in view of the historical and political
relationship with the West Bank ... granted all Palestinian refugees on its territory
full citizenship rights while protecting and upholding their political rights as
Palestinians (Right of Return or compensation).” 21
The Arabs never established a Palestinian state when the UN in 1947
recommended to partition Palestine, and to establish “an Arab and a Jewish
state” (not a Palestinian state, it should be noted). Nor did the Arabs recognize or
establish a Palestinian state during the two decades prior to the Six-Day War
when the West Bank was under Jordanian control and the Gaza Strip was under
Egyptian control; nor did the Palestinian Arabs clamor for autonomy or
independence during those years under Jordanian and Egyptian rule.
Only twice in Jerusalem’s history has the city served as a national capital. The
first time was as the capital of the two Jewish Commonwealths during the First
and Second Temple periods, as described in the Bible, reinforced by
archaeological evidence and numerous ancient documents. The second time is in
modern times as the capital of the State of Israel. It has never served as an Arab
capital for the simple reason that there has never been a Palestinian Arab state.
Well before the 1967 decision to create a new Arab people called “Palestinians,”
when the word “Palestinian” was associated with Jewish endeavors, Auni Bey

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 10 Mandate For Palestine

Abdul-Hadi, a local Arab leader, testified in 1937 before the Peel Commission, a
British investigative body:
“There is no such country [as Palestine]! Palestine is a term the Zionists invented!
There is no Palestine in the Bible. Our country was for centuries, part of Syria.” 22
In a 1946 appearance before the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry, also
acting as an investigative body, the Arab-American historian Philip Hitti stated:
“There is no such thing as Palestine in [Arab] history, absolutely not.” According
to investigative journalist Joan Peters, who spent seven years researching the
origins of the Arab-Jewish conflict over Palestine (From Time Immemorial,
2001), the one identity that was never considered by local inhabitants prior to the
1967 war was “Arab Palestinian.” 23

The “Mandate” defined where Jews are and are not

permitted to settle
The “Mandate for Palestine” document did not set the final borders. It left this for
the Mandatory to stipulate in a binding appendix to the final document in the
form of a memorandum. However, Article 6 of the “Mandate” clearly states:
“The Administration of Palestine, while ensuring that the rights and position of
other sections of the population are not prejudiced, shall facilitate Jewish
immigration under suitable conditions and shall encourage, in co-operation with
the Jewish agency referred to in Article 4, close settlement by Jews on the land,
including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes.”
Article 25 of the “Mandate for Palestine” entitled the Mandatory to change the
terms of the Mandate in the territory east of the Jordan River:
“In the territories lying between the Jordan and the eastern boundary of
Palestine as ultimately determined, the Mandatory shall be entitled, with the
consent of the Council of the League of Nations, to postpone or withhold
application of such provision of this Mandate as he may consider inapplicable to
the existing local conditions ...”
Great Britain activated this option in the above-mentioned memorandum of
September 16, 1922, which the Mandatory sent to the League of Nations and
which the League subsequently approved – making it a legally binding integral
part of the “Mandate.”
Thus the “Mandate for Palestine” brought to fruition a fourth Arab state east of
the Jordan River, realized in 1946 when the Hashemite Kingdom of Trans-Jordan
was granted independence from Great Britain.
All the clauses concerning a Jewish homeland would not apply to this territory
[Trans-Jordan] of the original Mandate, as is clearly stated:
“The following provisions of the Mandate for Palestine are not applicable to the
territory known as Trans-Jordan, which comprises all territory lying to the east of
a line drawn from ... up the centre of the Wady Araba, Dead Sea and River
Jordan. ... His Majesty’s Government accept[s] full responsibility as Mandatory
for Trans-Jordan.”

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 11 Mandate For Palestine

The creation of an Arab state in eastern Palestine (today Jordan) on 77 percent of
the landmass of the original Mandate intended for a Jewish homeland in no way
changed the status of Jews west of the Jordan River, nor did it inhibit their right
to settle anywhere in western Palestine, the area between the Jordan River and
the Mediterranean Sea.
These documents are the last legally binding documents regarding the status of
what is commonly called “the West Bank and Gaza.”
The September 16, 1922 memorandum is also the last modification of the official
terms of the Mandate on record by the League of Nations or by its legal successor
– the United Nations – in accordance with Article 27 of the Mandate that states
unequivocally:
“The consent of the Council of the League of Nations is required for any
modification of the terms of this mandate.” 24
United Nations Charter recognizes the UN’s obligation to uphold the
commitments of its predecessor – the League of Nations – and promises to carry
through to fruition the mandate system the League of Nations created, enshrined
in Article 22 of the League of Nations Covenant. 25

Political rights in Palestine were granted to Jews only

The “Mandate for Palestine” clearly differentiates between political rights –
referring to Jewish self-determination as an emerging polity – and civil and
religious rights, referring to guarantees of equal personal freedoms to non-
Jewish residents as individuals and within select communities. Not once are
Arabs as a people mentioned in the “Mandate for Palestine.” At no point in the
entire document is there any granting of political rights to non-Jewish entities
(i.e., Arabs). Article 2 of the “Mandate for Palestine” explicitly states that the
Mandatory should:
“... be responsible for placing the country under such political, administrative and
economic conditions as will secure the establishment of the Jewish national
home, as laid down in the preamble, and the development of self-governing
institutions, and also for safeguarding the civil and religious rights of all the
inhabitants of Palestine, irrespective of race and religion.”
Political rights to self-determination as a polity for Arabs were guaranteed by the
League of Nations in four other mandates – in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and later
Trans-Jordan [today Jordan].
International law expert Professor Eugene V. Rostow, examining the claim for
Arab Palestinian self-determination on the basis of law, concluded:
“… the mandate implicitly denies Arab claims to national political rights in the
area in favor of the Jews; the mandated territory was in effect reserved to the
Jewish people for their self-determination and political development, in
acknowledgment of the historic connection of the Jewish people to the land. Lord
Curzon, who was then the British Foreign Minister, made this reading of the
mandate explicit. There remains simply the theory that the Arab inhabitants of
the West Bank and the Gaza Strip have an inherent ‘natural law’ claim to the

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 12 Mandate For Palestine

 area. Neither customary international law nor the United Nations Charter
acknowledges that every group of people claiming to be a nation has the right to a
state of its own.” 26 [italics by author]

Jewish Peoplehood in Palestine

It is remarkable to note the April 22, 1925 Report of the first High Commissioner
on the Administration of Palestine, Sir Herbert Louis Samuel, to the Right
Honourable L. S. Amery, M.P., Secretary of State for the Colonies’ Government
Offices, describing Jewish Peoplehood:
“During the last two or three generations the Jews have recreated in Palestine a
community, now numbering 80,000, of whom about one-fourth are farmers or
workers upon the land. This community has its own political organs, an elected
assembly for the direction of its domestic concerns, elected councils in the towns,
and an organisation for the control of its schools. It has its elected Chief
Rabbinate and Rabbinical Council for the direction of its religious affairs. Its
business is conducted in Hebrew as a vernacular language, and a Hebrew press
serves its needs. It has its distinctive intellectual life and displays considerable
economic activity. This community, then, with its town and country population,
its political, religious and social organisations, its own language, its own customs,
its own life, has in fact national characteristics.” [italics by author]

Jerusalem in “Mandate” time

Two distinct issues exist: the issue of Jerusalem and the issue of the Holy Places.
Cambridge Professor Sir Elihu Lauterpacht, Judge ad hoc of the International
Court of Justice, a renowned expert of international law and editor of one of the
‘bibles’ of international law, Oppenheim’s International Law has said:
“Not only are the two problems separate; they are also quite distinct in nature
from one another. So far as the Holy Places are concerned, the question is for the
most part one of assuring respect for the existing interests of the three religions
and of providing the necessary guarantees of freedom of access, worship, and
religious administration [as mandated in Article 13 and 14 of the “Mandate for
Palestine” E.H.] … As far as the City of Jerusalem itself is concerned, the
question is one of establishing an effective administration of the City which can
protect the rights of the various elements of its permanent population - Christian,
Arab and Jewish - and ensure the governmental stability and physical security
which are essential requirements for the city of the Holy Places.” 27
The notion of internationalizing Jerusalem was never part of the “Mandate”:
“Nothing was said in the Mandate about the internationalization of Jerusalem.
Indeed Jerusalem as such is not mentioned – though the Holy Places are. And
this in itself is a fact of relevance now. For it shows that in 1922 there was no
inclination to identify the question of the Holy Places with that of the
internationalization of Jerusalem.” 28

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 13 Mandate For Palestine

Jerusalem the spiritual, political, and historical capital of the Jewish people has
served, and still serves, as the political capital of only one nation – the one
belonging to the Jews.
Jerusalem, a city in Palestine, was and is an undisputed part of the Jewish
National Home.

Jewish rights to Palestine were internationally guaranteed

In the first Report of the High Commissioner on the Administration of Palestine
1920-1925 presented to the British Secretary of State for the Colonies, published
in April 1925, the most senior official of the Mandate, the High Commissioner for
Palestine, underscored how international guarantees for the existence of a Jewish
National Home in Palestine were achieved:
“The [Balfour] Declaration was endorsed at the time by several of the Allied
Governments; it was reaffirmed by the Conference of the Principal Allied Powers
at San Remo in 1920; it was subsequently endorsed by unanimous resolutions of
both Houses of the Congress of the United States; it was embodied in the
Mandate for Palestine approved by the League of Nations in 1922; it was
declared, in a formal statement of policy issued by the Colonial Secretary in the
same year, ‘not to be susceptible of change.’ ” 29
Far from the whim of this or that politician or party, eleven successive British
governments, Labor and Conservative, from David Lloyd George (1916-1922)
through Clement Attlee (1945-1952) viewed themselves as duty-bound to fulfill
the “Mandate for Palestine” placed in the hands of Great Britain by the League of
Nations.

United States government and the “Mandate” policy

United States President Woodrow Wilson (the twenty-eighth President, 1913-
1921) was the first American president to support modern Zionism and Britain’s
efforts for the creation of a National Home for Jews in Palestine. (The text of the
Balfour Declaration had been submitted to President Wilson and had been
approved by him before its publication.)
President Wilson expressed his deep belief in the eventuality of the creation of a
Jewish State:
“I am persuaded,” said President Wilson on March 3rd, 1919, “that the Allied
nations, with the fullest concurrence of our own Government and people, are
agreed that in Palestine shall be laid the foundation of a Jewish
Commonwealth.” 30
On June 30, 1922, a joint resolution of both Houses of Congress of the United
States unanimously endorsed the “Mandate for Palestine,” confirming the
irrevocable right of Jews to settle in the area of Palestine – anywhere between the
Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea:
“Favoring the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish
people.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 14 Mandate For Palestine

 “Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of
America in Congress assembled. That the United States of America favors the
establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, it being
clearly understood that nothing shall be done which should prejudice the civil
and religious rights of Christian and all other non-Jewish communities in
Palestine, and that the holy places and religious buildings and sites in Palestine
shall be adequately protected.” 31 [italics in the original]
On September 21, 1922, President Warren G. Harding (the twenty-ninth
President, 1921-1923) signed the joint resolution of approval to establish a Jewish
homeland in Palestine.
The United States Government claimed in a note of November 20, 1920 that the
participation of the United States in the war entitled it to be consulted as to the
terms of the Mandates. The British Government agreed. The outcome was an
agreement calling to safeguard the American interests in Palestine. It concluded
with a Convention between the United Kingdom and the United States of
America, signed on December 3, 1924. It is imperative to note that the
Convention recites the whole text of the Palestine Mandate, including the
preamble! 32

The “Mandate for Palestine” is valid to this day

The Mandate survived the demise of the League of Nations and is valid to this
day. Article 80 of the UN Charter implicitly recognizes the “Mandate for
Palestine” of the League of Nations.
This Mandate granted Jews the irrevocable right to settle anywhere in Palestine,
the area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, a right unaltered
in international law and valid to this day. Jewish settlements in Judea, Samaria
(i.e., the West Bank), Gaza and the whole of Jerusalem are legal.
The International Court of Justice reaffirmed the meaning and validity of Article
80 in three separate cases:
• ICJ Advisory Opinion of July 11, 1950: in the “question concerning the
International States of South West Africa.” 33
• ICJ Advisory Opinion of June 21, 1971: “When the League of Nations was
dissolved, the raison d’etre and original object of these obligations remained.
Since their fulfillment did not depend on the existence of the League, they could
not be brought to an end merely because the supervisory organ had ceased to
exist. ... The International Court of Justice has consistently recognized that the
Mandate survived the demise of the League [of Nations].” 34
• ICJ Advisory Opinion of July 9, 2004: regarding the “legal consequences of the
construction of a wall in the occupied Palestinian territory.” 35
In other words, neither the ICJ nor the UN General Assembly can arbitrarily
change the status of Jewish settlement as set forth in the “Mandate for Palestine,”
an international accord that has never been amended.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 15 Mandate For Palestine

All of western Palestine, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea,
including the West Bank and Gaza, remains open to Jewish settlement under
international law.
Professor Eugene Rostow concurred with the ICJ’s opinion as to the “sacredness”
of trusts such as the “Mandate for Palestine”:
“‘A trust’ – as in Article 80 of the UN Charter – does not end because the trustee
dies ... the Jewish right of settlement in the whole of western Palestine – the area
west of the Jordan – survived the British withdrawal in 1948. ... They are parts of
the mandate territory, now legally occupied by Israel with the consent of the
Security Council.” 36
The British Mandate left intact the Jewish right to settle in Judea, Samaria and
the Gaza Strip. Explains Professor Rostow:
“This right is protected by Article 80 of the United Nations Charter, which
provides that unless a trusteeship agreement is agreed upon (which was not done
for the Palestine Mandate), nothing in the chapter shall be construed in and of
itself to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any states or any peoples or
the terms of existing international instruments to which members of the United
Nations may respectively be parties.

“The Mandates of the League of Nations have a special status in international

law. They are considered to be trusts, indeed ‘sacred trusts.’

“Under international law, neither Jordan nor the Palestinian Arab ‘people’ of the
West Bank and the Gaza Strip have a substantial claim to the sovereign
possession of the occupied territories.”
It is interesting to learn how Article 80 made its way into the UN Charter.
Professor Rostow recalls:
“I am indebted to my learned friend Dr. Paul Riebenfeld, who has for many years
been my mentor on the history of Zionism, for reminding me of some of the
circumstances which led to the adoption of Article 80 of the Charter. Strong
Jewish delegations representing differing political tendencies within Jewry
attended the San Francisco Conference in 1945. Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, Peter
Bergson, Eliahu Elath, Professors Ben-Zion Netanayu and A. S. Yehuda, and
Harry Selden were among the Jewish representatives. Their mission was to
protect the Jewish right of settlement in Palestine under the mandate against
erosion in a world of ambitious states. Article 80 was the result of their efforts.” 37

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 16 Mandate For Palestine

 Futile efforts to challenge
the “Mandate for Palestine”
Myth: The “Mandate for Palestine” is a Class “A” Mandate
There is much to be gained by attributing Class “A” status to the “Mandate for
Palestine.” If the inhabitants of Palestine were ready for independence under a
Class “A” mandate, then the Palestinian Arabs that made up the majority of the
inhabitants of Palestine in 1922 38 (589,177 Arabs vs. 83,790 Jews) could then
logically claim that they were the intended beneficiaries of the “Mandate for
Palestine” – provided one never reads the actual wording of the document:
1. The “Mandate for Palestine” never mentions Class “A” status at any time for
Palestinian Arabs.
2. Article 2 of the document clearly speaks of the Mandatory as being:
“... responsible for placing the country under such political, administrative and
economic conditions as will secure the establishment of the Jewish national
home.”
The “Mandate” calls for steps to encourage Jewish immigration and settlement
throughout Palestine except east of the Jordan River. Historically, therefore,
Palestine was an anomaly within the Mandate system, in a class of its own –
initially referred to by the British as a “special regime.” 39
Many assumed that the “Mandate for Palestine” is a Class “A” mandate, a
common but inaccurate assertion that can be found in many dictionaries and
encyclopedias, and is frequently used by the pro-Palestinian media and lately by
the ICJ. In the Court Advisory Opinion of July 9, 2004, in the matter of the
construction of a wall in the “occupied Palestinian Territory,” the Bench
erroneously states:
“Palestine was part of the Ottoman Empire. At the end of the First World War, a
class [type] ‘A’ Mandate for Palestine was entrusted to Great Britain by the
League of Nations, pursuant to paragraph 4 of Article 22 of the Covenant. ...” 40
Indeed, Class “A” status was granted to a number of Arab peoples who were ready
for independence in the former Ottoman Empire, and only to Arab entities. 41
Palestinian Arabs were not one of these Arab peoples. The Palestine Royal Report
clarifies this point:
“(2) The Mandate [for Palestine] is of a different type from the Mandate for Syria
and the Lebanon and the draft Mandate for Iraq. These latter, which were called
for convenience “A” Mandates, accorded with the fourth paragraph of Article 22.
Thus the Syrian Mandate provided that the government should be based on an
organic law which should take into account the rights, interests and wishes of all
the inhabitants, and that measures should be enacted ‘to facilitate the progressive
development of Syria and the Lebanon as independent States.’ The corresponding

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 17 Mandate For Palestine

 sentences of the draft Mandate for Iraq were the same. In compliance with them
National Legislatures were established in due course on an elective basis.
Article 1 of the Palestine Mandate, on the other hand, vests ‘full powers of
legislation and of administration,’ within the limits of the Mandate, in the
Mandatory.” 42
The Palestine Royal Report highlights additional differences between the
Mandates:
“Unquestionably, however, the primary purpose of the Mandate, as expressed in
its preamble and its articles, is to promote the establishment of the Jewish
National Home.

“... Articles 4, 6 and 11 provide for the recognition of a Jewish Agency ‘as a public
body for the purpose of advising and co-operating with the Administration’ on
matters affecting Jewish interests. No such body is envisaged for dealing with
Arab interests. 43

“... But Palestine was different from the other ex-Turkish provinces. It was,
indeed, unique both as the Holy Land of three world-religions and as the old
historic homeland of the Jews. The Arabs had lived in it for centuries, but they
had long ceased to rule it, and in view of its peculiar character they could not now
claim to possess it in the same way as they could claim possession of Syria or
Iraq.” 44

Myth: The “Mandate” violates Article 22 of the Covenant of

the League of Nations
The Palestinian [British] Royal Commission Report of July 1937 addressed Arab
claims that the creation of the Jewish National Home as directed by the
“Mandate for Palestine” violated Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of
Nations, 45 arguing that they are the communities mentioned in paragraph 4:
“As to the claim, argued before us by Arab witnesses, that the Palestine Mandate
violates Article 22 of the Covenant because it is not in accordance with paragraph
4 thereof, we would point out (a) that the provisional recognition of ‘certain
communities formerly belonging to the Turkish Empire’ as independent nations
is permissive; the words are ‘can be provisionally recognised’, not ‘will’ or ‘shall’:
(b) that the penultimate paragraph of Article 22 prescribes that the degree of
authority to be exercised by the Mandatory shall be defined, at need, by the
Council of the League: (c) that the acceptance by the Allied Powers and the
United States of the policy of the Balfour Declaration made it clear from the
beginning that Palestine would have to be treated differently from Syria and Iraq,
and that this difference of treatment was confirmed by the Supreme Council in
the Treaty of Sèvres and by the Council of the League in sanctioning the Mandate.

“This particular question is of less practical importance than it might seem to be.
For Article 2 of the Mandate requires ‘the development of self-governing
institutions’; and, read in the light of the general intention of the Mandate System
(of which something will be said presently), this requirement implies, in our
judgment, the ultimate establishment of independence.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 18 Mandate For Palestine

 “(3) The field [Territory] in which the Jewish National Home was to be
established was understood, at the time of the Balfour Declaration, to be the
whole of historic Palestine, and the Zionists were seriously disappointed when
Trans-Jordan was cut away from that field [Territory] under Article 25.” [That
excluded 77 percent of historic Palestine – the territory east of the Jordan River,
what became later Trans-Jordan – E.H.] 46
The Treaty of Sèvres, in Section VII, Articles 94 and 95, makes it clear in each
case who are the inhabitants referred to in Paragraph 4 of Article 22 of the
Covenant of the League of Nations.
Article 94 distinctly indicates that Paragraph 4 of Article 22 of the Covenant of
the League of Nations applies to the Arab inhabitants living within the areas
covered by the Mandates for Syria and Mesopotamia. The Article reads:
“The High Contracting Parties agree that Syria and Mesopotamia shall, in
accordance with the fourth paragraph of Article 22.

“Part I (Covenant of the League of Nations), be provisionally recognised as

independent States subject to the rendering of administrative advice and
assistance by a Mandatory until such time as they are able to stand alone...”
Article 95 of the Treaty of Sèvres, however, makes it clear that paragraph 4 of
Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations was not to be applied to the
Arab inhabitants living within the area to be delineated by the “Mandate for
Palestine,” but only to the Jews. The Article reads:
“The High Contracting Parties agree to entrust, by application of the provisions of Article
22, the administration of Palestine, within such boundaries as may be determined by the
Principal Allied Powers, to a Mandatory to be selected by the said Powers. The
Mandatory will be responsible for putting into effect the declaration originally made on
November 2, 1917, by the British Government, and adopted by the other Allied Powers,
in favour of the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, it
being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and
religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and
political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country…” 47
The second and third paragraphs of the preamble of the “Mandate for Palestine”
therefore follow and read:
“Whereas the Principal Allied Powers have also agreed that the Mandatory
should be responsible for putting into effect the declaration originally made on
November 2nd, 1917, by the Government of His Britannic Majesty, and adopted
by the said Powers, in favor of the establishment in Palestine of a national home
for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing should be done
which might prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish
communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by the Jews in
any other country; and

“Whereas recognition has thereby been given to the historical connection of the
Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national
home in that country” 48 [italics by author]

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 19 Mandate For Palestine

Articles 94 and 95 of the Treaty of Sèvres and the “Mandate for Palestine” make it
clear:
The “inhabitants” of the territory for whom the “Mandate for Palestine” was
created, who according to the Mandate were “not yet able” to govern themselves
and for whom self-determination was a “sacred trust,” were not Palestinians, or
even Arabs. The “Mandate for Palestine” was created by the predecessor of the
United Nations, the League of Nations, for the Jewish People.

Myth: Palestine was promised to the Arabs by Sir Henry

McMahon
Addressing the Arab claim that Palestine was part of the territories promised to
the Arabs in 1915 by Sir Henry McMahon, the British Government stated:
“We think it sufficient for the purposes of this Report to state that the British
Government have never accepted the Arab case. When it was first formally
presented by the Arab Delegation in London in 1922, the Secretary of State for
the Colonies (Mr. Churchill) replied as follows: – ‘That letter [Sir H. McMahon’s
letter of the 24th October, 1915] is quoted as conveying the promise to the Sherif
of Mecca to recognize and support the independence of the Arabs within the
territories proposed by him. But this promise was given subject to a reservation
made in the same letter, which excluded from its scope, among other territories,
the portions of Syria lying to the west of the district of Damascus. This
reservation has always been regarded by His Majesty’s Government as covering
the vilayet of Beirut and the independent Sanjak of Jerusalem. The whole of
Palestine west of the Jordan was thus excluded from Sir H. McMahon’s pledge.’

“It was in the highest degree unfortunate that, in the exigencies of war, the
British Government was unable to make their intention clear to the Sherif.
Palestine, it will have been noticed, was not expressly mentioned in Sir Henry
McMahon’s letter of the 24th October, 1915. Nor was any later reference made to
it. In the further correspondence between Sir Henry McMahon and the Sherif the
only areas relevant to the present discussion which were mentioned were the
Vilayets of Aleppo and Beirut. The Sherif asserted that these Vilayets were purely
Arab; and, when Sir Henry McMahon pointed out that French interests were
involved, he replied that, while he did not recede from his full claims in the north,
he did not wish to injure the alliance between Britain and France and would not
ask ‘for what we now leave to France in Beirut and its coasts’ till after the War.” 49
McMahon wrote a letter to The Times [of London] on July 23, 1937, confirming
that Palestine was excluded from the area in which Arab independence was
promised and that this was well understood by King Hussein. 50

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 20 Mandate For Palestine

 1947 Recommended Partition Plan

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 21 Mandate For Palestine

Myth: 1947 Partition Plan replaced the “Mandate for
Palestine”
Attempts by Palestinians in the past decade (and lately by the ICJ) to roll back
the clock and resuscitate UN Resolution 181, which recommended to partition the
Mandate into a Jewish state and an Arab state, six decades after they rejected it
as if nothing had happened in the interim, are a baseless ploy designed to use the
Resolution as leverage to bring about a greater Israeli withdrawal from parts of
western Palestine and to gain a broader base from which to continue to attack a
smaller Israel with even less defendable borders. In fact, both Palestinians and
their Arab brethren in neighboring countries have rendered the plan null and
void by their own subsequent aggressive actions over the years.
Israel’s independence is not a result of a partial implementation of the Partition
Plan. Resolution 181 has no legal ramifications – that is, Resolution 181
recognized the Jewish right to statehood, but its validity as a potentially legal and
binding document was never consummated. Like the schemes that preceded it,
Resolution 181’s validity hinged on acceptance of the General Assembly’s
recommendation by both parties.
Professor Lauterpacht clarified that from a legal standpoint, the 1947 UN
Partition Resolution had no legislative character to vest territorial rights to either
Jews or Arabs. In a monograph relating to one of the most complex aspects of the
territorial issue - the status of Jerusalem - Lauterpacht wrote that any binding
force the Partition Plan would have had to arise from the principle pacta sunt
servanda [Latin, “treaties must be honored”], that is, from agreement of the
parties at variance to the proposed plan. In the case of Israel, Lauterpacht
explains:
“... the coming into existence of Israel does not depend legally upon the
Resolution. The right of a State to exist flows from its factual existence –
especially when that existence is prolonged, shows every sign of continuance and
is recognised by the generality of nations.” 51
Reviewing Lauterpacht’s arguments, Professor Julius Stone, a distinguished
authority on the Law of Nations, added that Israel’s legitimacy, or the legal
foundation for its birth, does not reside with the United Nations recommendation
to partition Palestine, which as a consequence of Arab actions became a dead
issue. Professor Stone concluded:
“... The State of Israel is thus not legally derived from the partition plan, but rests
(as do most other states in the world) on assertion of independence by its people
and government, on the vindication of that independence by arms against assault
by other states, and on the establishment of orderly government within territory
under its stable control.” 52

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 22 Mandate For Palestine

Professor Stone wrote about this novelty of resurrection in 1981 when he
analyzed a similar attempt by pro-Palestinian “experts” at the UN to rewrite the
history of the conflict. (Their writings were termed “Studies.”) Stone called it
“revival of the dead”:
“To attempt to show ... that Resolution 181(II) ‘remains’ in force in 1981 is thus an
undertaking even more miraculous than would be the revival of the dead. It is an
attempt to give life to an entity that the Arab states had themselves aborted
before it came to maturity and birth. To propose that Resolution 181(II) can be
treated as if it has binding force in 1981, [the year that Professor Stone’s book was
written – E.H.] for the benefit of the same Arab states, who by their aggression
destroyed it ab initio, 53 also violates ‘general principles of law,’ such as those
requiring claimants to equity to come ‘with clean hands,’ and forbidding a party
who has unlawfully repudiated a transaction from holding the other party to
terms that suit the later expediencies of the repudiating party.” 54
Resolution 181 had been tossed into the waste bin of history, along with the
Partition Plans that preceded it.

Myth: Arabs rejected the “unbalanced” Partition Plan

The UN International Court of Justice uses the term “unbalanced” in describing
the reason for Arab rejectionism of Resolution 181. 55 This description hardly fits
reality. Seventy-seven percent of the landmass of the original Mandate for the
Jews was excised in 1922 to create a fourth Arab state – Trans-Jordan (today
Jordan).
In a statement to the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP),
the representative of the Jewish Agency for Palestine said the following about
fairness, balance, and justice:
“According to David Lloyd George, then British Prime Minister, the Balfour
Declaration implied that the whole of Palestine, including Transjordan, should
ultimately become a Jewish state. Transjordan had, nevertheless, been severed
from Palestine in 1922 and had subsequently been set up as an Arab kingdom.
Now a second Arab state was to be carved out of the remainder of Palestine, with
the result that the Jewish National Home would represent less than one eighth of
the territory originally set aside for it. Such a sacrifice should not be asked of the
Jewish people. 56

“… 17,000,000 Arabs now occupied an area of 1,290,000 square miles, including

all the principal Arab and Moslem centres, while Palestine, after the loss of
Transjordan, was only 10,000 square miles; yet the majority plan proposed to
reduce it by one half. UNSCOP proposed to eliminate Western Galilee from the
Jewish State; that was an injustice and a grievous handicap to the development of
the Jewish State.” 57

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 23 Mandate For Palestine

Myth: The 1949 “Green Line” is Israel’s internationally
recognized border
Israel’s pre-1967 borders reflected the deployment of Israeli and Arab forces on
the ground after Israel’s War of Independence in 1948. Professor Judge Stephen
M. Schwebel, the former President of the International Court of Justice clarified
in his writings “Justice in International Law” that the 1949 armistice demarcation
lines are not permanent borders:
“... The armistice agreements of 1949 expressly preserved the territorial claims of
all parties and did not purport to establish definitive boundaries between
them.” 58
United Nations Security Resolution 54 (July 15, 1948) called upon the Arabs to
accept a truce and stop their aggression:
“Taking into consideration that the Provisional Government of Israel has
indicated its acceptance in principle of a prolongation of the truce in Palestine;
that the States members of the Arab League have rejected successive appeals of
the United Nations Mediator, and of the Security Council in its resolution 53
(1948) of 7 July 1948, for the prolongation of the truce in Palestine; and that
there has consequently developed a renewal of hostilities in Palestine.” 59
The demarcation line that emerged in the aftermath of the war was drawn up
under the auspices of United Nations mediator Dr. Ralph Johnson Bunche. That
new boundary largely reflected the ceasefire lines of 1949 and was labeled the
“Green Line” merely because a green pencil was used to draw the map of the
armistice borders.

Myth: Palestinian Arabs seek peace with Israel

The PLO Charter, also known as “the Palestinian National Charter” or “the
Palestinian Covenant,” was adopted by the Palestine National Council (PNC) on
July 1-17, 1968. It reads:
“Article 2: Palestine, with the boundaries it had during the British Mandate, is
an indivisible territorial unit.

“Article 9: Armed struggle is the only way to liberate Palestine. Thus it is the
overall strategy, not merely a tactical phase. The Palestinian Arab people assert
their absolute determination and firm resolution to continue their armed struggle
and to work for an armed popular revolution for the liberation of their country
and their return to it. They also assert their right to normal life in Palestine and to
exercise their right to self-determination and sovereignty over it.

“Article 19: The partition of Palestine in 1947 and the establishment of the state
of Israel are entirely illegal, regardless of the passage of time, because they were
contrary to the will of the Palestinian people and to their natural right in their
homeland, and inconsistent with the principles embodied in the Charter of the
United Nations, particularly the right to self-determination.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 24 Mandate For Palestine

 “Article 20: The Balfour Declaration, the Mandate for Palestine, and everything
that has been based upon them, are deemed null and void. Claims of historical or
religious ties of Jews with Palestine are incompatible with the facts of history and
the true conception of what constitutes statehood. Judaism, being a religion, is
not an independent nationality. Nor do Jews constitute a single nation with an
identity of its own; they are citizens of the states to which they belong.” 60
The Fateh Constitution (referred to, at time, as Fatah) calls under Article 12
for the
“Complete liberation of Palestine, and obliteration of Zionist economic, political,
military and cultural existence.”
As for how it will achieve its goal to wipe Israel off the map, Fateh’s constitution,
Article 19, minces no words:
“Armed struggle is a strategy and not a tactic, and the Palestinian Arab People’s
armed revolution is a decisive factor in the liberation fight and in uprooting the
Zionist existence, and this struggle will not cease unless the Zionist state is
demolished and Palestine is completely liberated.” 61
The Hamas Charter (acronym for “Islamic Resistance Movement” and at time
referred to as the Hamas Covenant) states in its second paragraph: 62
“Israel will rise and will remain erect until Islam eliminates it as it had eliminated
its predecessors.” (The Martyr, Imam Hassan al-Banna, May Allah Pity his Soul).

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 25 Mandate For Palestine

Appendices:

Appendix A – “Mandate for Palestine” Document.

Appendix B – Covenant of the League of Nations.

Appendix C – Israel’s Declaration of Independence.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 26 Mandate For Palestine

 Appendix A - Mandate for Palestine 63

LEAGUE OF NATIONS.

MANDATE FOR PALESTINE,

TOGETHER WITH A

NOTE BY THE SECRETARY-GENERAL

RELATING TO ITS APPLICATION

TO THE

TERRITORY KNOWN AS TRANS-JORDAN,

under the provisions of Article 25.

Presented to Parliament by Command of His Majesty,

December, 1922

LONDON:

PUBLISHED BY HIS MAJESTY’S STATIONARY OFFICE.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 27 Mandate For Palestine

The Council of the League of Nations:
Whereas the Principal Allied Powers have agreed, for the purpose of giving effect
to the provisions of Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations, to
entrust to a Mandatory selected by the said Powers the administration of the
territory of Palestine, which formerly belonged to the Turkish Empire, within
such boundaries as may be fixed by them; and
Whereas the Principal Allied Powers have also agreed that the Mandatory should
be responsible for putting into effect the declaration originally made on
November 2nd, 1917, by the Government of His Britannic Majesty, and adopted
by the said Powers, in favor of the establishment in Palestine of a national home
for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing should be done
which might prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish
communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in
any other country; and
Whereas recognition has thereby been given to the historical connection of the
Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national
home in that country; and
Whereas the Principal Allied Powers have selected His Britannic Majesty as the
Mandatory for Palestine; and
Whereas the mandate in respect of Palestine has been formulated in the following
terms and submitted to the Council of the League for approval; and
Whereas His Britannic Majesty has accepted the mandate in respect of Palestine
and undertaken to exercise it on behalf of the League of Nations in conformity
with the following provisions; and
Whereas by the afore-mentioned Article 22 (paragraph 8), it is provided that the
degree of authority, control or administration to be exercised by the Mandatory,
not having been previously agreed upon by the Members of the League, shall be
explicitly defined by the Council of the League of Nations;
confirming the said Mandate, defines its terms as follows:
Article 1.
The Mandatory shall have full powers of legislation and of administration, save as
they may be limited by the terms of this mandate.
Article 2.
The Mandatory shall be responsible for placing the country under such political,
administrative and economic conditions as will secure the establishment of the
Jewish national home, as laid down in the preamble, and the development of self-
governing institutions, and also for safeguarding the civil and religious rights of
all the inhabitants of Palestine, irrespective of race and religion.
Article 3.
The Mandatory shall, so far as circumstances permit, encourage local autonomy.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 28 Mandate For Palestine

 Article 4.
An appropriate Jewish agency shall be recognised as a public body for the
purpose of advising and co-operating with the Administration of Palestine in
such economic, social and other matters as may affect the establishment of the
Jewish national home and the interests of the Jewish population in Palestine,
and, subject always to the control of the Administration to assist and take part in
the development of the country.
The Zionist organization, so long as its organization and constitution are in the
opinion of the Mandatory appropriate, shall be recognised as such agency. It shall
take steps in consultation with His Britannic Majesty’s Government to secure the
co-operation of all Jews who are willing to assist in the establishment of the
Jewish national home.
Article 5.
The Mandatory shall be responsible for seeing that no Palestine territory shall be
ceded or leased to, or in any way placed under the control of the Government of
any foreign Power.
Article 6.
The Administration of Palestine, while ensuring that the rights and position of
other sections of the population are not prejudiced, shall facilitate Jewish
immigration under suitable conditions and shall encourage, in co-operation with
the Jewish agency referred to in Article 4, close settlement by Jews on the land,
including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes.
Article 7.
The Administration of Palestine shall be responsible for enacting a nationality
law. There shall be included in this law provisions framed so as to facilitate the
acquisition of Palestinian citizenship by Jews who take up their permanent
residence in Palestine.
Article 8.
The privileges and immunities of foreigners, including the benefits of consular
jurisdiction and protection as formerly enjoyed by Capitulation or usage in the
Ottoman Empire, shall not be applicable in Palestine.
Unless the Powers whose nationals enjoyed the afore-mentioned privileges and
immunities on August 1st, 1914, shall have previously renounced the right to their
re-establishment, or shall have agreed to their non-application for a specified
period, these privileges and immunities shall, at the expiration of the mandate, be
immediately reestablished in their entirety or with such modifications as may
have been agreed upon between the Powers concerned.
Article 9.
The Mandatory shall be responsible for seeing that the judicial system
established in Palestine shall assure to foreigners, as well as to natives, a
complete guarantee of their rights.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 29 Mandate For Palestine

Respect for the personal status of the various peoples and communities and for
their religious interests shall be fully guaranteed. In particular, the control and
administration of Wakfs shall be exercised in accordance with religious law and
the dispositions of the founders.
Article 10.
Pending the making of special extradition agreements relating to Palestine, the
extradition treaties in force between the Mandatory and other foreign Powers
shall apply to Palestine.
Article 11.
The Administration of Palestine shall take all necessary measures to safeguard
the interests of the community in connection with the development of the
country, and, subject to any international obligations accepted by the Mandatory,
shall have full power to provide for public ownership or control of any of the
natural resources of the country or of the public works, services and utilities
established or to be established therein. It shall introduce a land system
appropriate to the needs of the country, having regard, among other things, to the
desirability of promoting the close settlement and intensive cultivation of the
land.
The Administration may arrange with the Jewish agency mentioned in Article 4
to construct or operate, upon fair and equitable terms, any public works, services
and utilities, and to develop any of the natural resources of the country, in so far
as these matters are not directly undertaken by the Administration. Any such
arrangements shall provide that no profits distributed by such agency, directly or
indirectly, shall exceed a reasonable rate of interest on the capital, and any
further profits shall be utilised by it for the benefit of the country in a manner
approved by the Administration.
Article 12.
The Mandatory shall be entrusted with the control of the foreign relations of
Palestine and the right to issue exequaturs to consuls appointed by foreign
Powers. He shall also be entitled to afford diplomatic and consular protection to
citizens of Palestine when outside its territorial limits.
Article 13.
All responsibility in connection with the Holy Places and religious buildings or
sites in Palestine, including that of preserving existing rights and of securing free
access to the Holy Places, religious buildings and sites and the free exercise of
worship, while ensuring the requirements of public order and decorum, is
assumed by the Mandatory, who shall be responsible solely to the League of
Nations in all matters connected herewith, provided that nothing in this article
shall prevent the Mandatory from entering into such arrangements as he may
deem reasonable with the Administration for the purpose of carrying the
provisions of this article into effect; and provided also that nothing in this
mandate shall be construed as conferring upon the Mandatory authority to

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 30 Mandate For Palestine

interfere with the fabric or the management of purely Moslem sacred shrines, the
immunities of which are guaranteed.
Article 14.
A special commission shall be appointed by the Mandatory to study, define and
determine the rights and claims in connection with the Holy Places and the rights
and claims relating to the different religious communities in Palestine. The
method of nomination, the composition and the functions of this Commission
shall be submitted to the Council of the League for its approval, and the
Commission shall not be appointed or enter upon its functions without the
approval of the Council.
Article 15.
The Mandatory shall see that complete freedom of conscience and the free
exercise of all forms of worship, subject only to the maintenance of public order
and morals, are ensured to all. No discrimination of any kind shall be made
between the inhabitants of Palestine on the ground of race, religion or language.
No person shall be excluded from Palestine on the sole ground of his religious
belief.
The right of each community to maintain its own schools for the education of its
own members in its own language, while conforming to such educational
requirements of a general nature as the Administration may impose, shall not be
denied or impaired.
Article 16.
The Mandatory shall be responsible for exercising such supervision over religious
or eleemosynary bodies of all faiths in Palestine as may be required for the
maintenance of public order and good government. Subject to such supervision,
no measures shall be taken in Palestine to obstruct or interfere with the
enterprise of such bodies or to discriminate against any representative or
member of them on the ground of his religion or nationality.
Article 17.
The Administration of Palestine may organist on a voluntary basis the forces
necessary for the preservation of peace and order, and also for the defence of the
country, subject, however, to the supervision of the Mandatory, but shall not use
them for purposes other than those above specified save with the consent of the
Mandatory. Except for such purposes, no military, naval or air forces shall be
raised or maintained by the Administration of Palestine.
Nothing in this article shall preclude the Administration of Palestine from
contributing to the cost of the maintenance of the forces of the Mandatory in
Palestine.
The Mandatory shall be entitled at all times to use the roads, railways and ports
of Palestine for the movement of armed forces and the carriage of fuel and
supplies.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 31 Mandate For Palestine

 Article 18.
The Mandatory shall see that there is no discrimination in Palestine against the
nationals of any State Member of the League of Nations (including companies
incorporated under its laws) as compared with those of the Mandatory or of any
foreign State in matters concerning taxation, commerce or navigation, the
exercise of industries or professions, or in the treatment of merchant vessels or
civil aircraft. Similarly, there shall be no discrimination in Palestine against
goods originating in or destined for any of the said States, and there shall be
freedom of transit under equitable conditions across the mandated area.
Subject as aforesaid and to the other provisions of this mandate, the
Administration of Palestine may, on the advice of the Mandatory, impose such
taxes and customs duties as it may consider necessary, and take such steps as it
may think best to promote the development of the natural resources of the
country and to safeguard the interests of the population. It may also, on the
advice of the Mandatory, conclude a special customs agreement with any State
the territory of which in 1914 was wholly included in Asiatic Turkey or Arabia.
Article 19.
The Mandatory shall adhere on behalf of the Administration of Palestine to any
general international conventions already existing, or which may be concluded
hereafter with the approval of the League of Nations, respecting the slave traffic,
the traffic in arms and ammunition, or the traffic in drugs, or relating to
commercial equality, freedom of transit and navigation, aerial navigation and
postal, telegraphic and wireless communication or literary, artistic or industrial
property.
Article 20.
The Mandatory shall co-operate on behalf of the Administration of Palestine, so
far as religious, social and other conditions may permit, in the execution of any
common policy adopted by the League of Nations for preventing and combating
disease, including diseases of plants and animals.
Article 21.
The Mandatory shall secure the enactment within twelve months from this date,
and shall ensure the execution of a Law of Antiquities based on the following
rules. This law shall ensure equality of treatment in the matter of excavations and
archaeological research to the nationals of all States Members of the League of
Nations.
(1)
“Antiquity” means any construction or any product of human activity earlier than
the year A. D. 1700.
(2)
The law for the protection of antiquities shall proceed by encouragement rather
than by threat.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 32 Mandate For Palestine

Any person who, having discovered an antiquity without being furnished with the
authorization referred to in paragraph 5, reports the same to an official of the
competent Department, shall be rewarded according to the value of the discovery.
(3)
No antiquity may be disposed of except to the competent Department, unless this
Department renounces the acquisition of any such antiquity.
No antiquity may leave the country without an export licence from the said
Department.
(4)
Any person who maliciously or negligently destroys or damages an antiquity shall
be liable to a penalty to be fixed.
(5)
No clearing of ground or digging with the object of finding antiquities shall be
permitted, under penalty of fine, except to persons authorised by the competent
Department.
(6)
Equitable terms shall be fixed for expropriation, temporary or permanent, of
lands which might be of historical or archaeological interest.
(7)
Authorization to excavate shall only be granted to persons who show sufficient
guarantees of archaeological experience. The Administration of Palestine shall
not, in granting these authorizations, act in such a way as to exclude scholars of
any nation without good grounds.
(8)
The proceeds of excavations may be divided between the excavator and the
competent Department in a proportion fixed by that Department. If division
seems impossible for scientific reasons, the excavator shall receive a fair
indemnity in lieu of a part of the find.
Article 22.
English, Arabic and Hebrew shall be the official languages of Palestine. Any
statement or inscription in Arabic on stamps or money in Palestine shall be
repeated in Hebrew and any statement or inscription in Hebrew shall be repeated
in Arabic.
Article 23.
The Administration of Palestine shall recognise the holy days of the respective
communities in Palestine as legal days of rest for the members of such
communities.
Article 24.
The Mandatory shall make to the Council of the League of Nations an annual
report to the satisfaction of the Council as to the measures taken during the year

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 33 Mandate For Palestine

to carry out the provisions of the mandate. Copies of all laws and regulations
promulgated or issued during the year shall be communicated with the report.
Article 25.
In the territories lying between the Jordan and the eastern boundary of Palestine
as ultimately determined, the Mandatory shall be entitled, with the consent of the
Council of the League of Nations, to postpone or withhold application of such
provisions of this mandate as he may consider inapplicable to the existing local
conditions, and to make such provision for the administration of the territories as
he may consider suitable to those conditions, provided that no action shall be
taken which is inconsistent with the provisions of Articles 15, 16 and 18.
Article 26.
The Mandatory agrees that, if any dispute whatever should arise between the
Mandatory and another member of the League of Nations relating to the
interpretation or the application of the provisions of the mandate, such dispute, if
it cannot be settled by negotiation, shall be submitted to the Permanent Court of
International Justice provided for by Article 14 of the Covenant of the League of
Nations.
Article 27.
The consent of the Council of the League of Nations is required for any
modification of the terms of this mandate.
Article 28.
In the event of the termination of the mandate hereby conferred upon the
Mandatory, the Council of the League of Nations shall make such arrangements
as may be deemed necessary for safeguarding in perpetuity, under guarantee of
the League, the rights secured by Articles 13 and 14, and shall use its influence for
securing, under the guarantee of the League, that the Government of Palestine
will fully honour the financial obligations legitimately incurred by the
Administration of Palestine during the period of the mandate, including the
rights of public servants to pensions or gratuities.

The present instrument shall be deposited in original in the archives of the

League of Nations and certified copies shall be forwarded by the Secretary-
General of the League of Nations to all members of the League.
Done at London the twenty-fourth day of July, one thousand nine hundred and
twenty-two.
Certified true copy:
For the Secretary-General,
RAPPARD,
Director of the Mandates Section.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 34 Mandate For Palestine

 NOTE.
__

GENEVA,
September 23rd, 1922.

ARTICLE 25 OF THE PALESTINE MANDATE.

Territory known as Trans-Jordan.
NOTE BY THE SECRETARY-GENERAL.
The Secretary-General has the honour to communicate for the information of
the Members of the League, a memorandum relating to Article 25 of the Palestine
Mandate presented by the British Government to the Council of the League on
September 16th, 1922.
The memorandum was approved by the Council subject to the decision taken at
its meeting in London on July 24th, 1922, with regard to the coming into force of
the Palestine and Syrian mandates.

-----

MEMORANDUM BY THE BRITISH REPRESENTATIVE.

1. Article 25 of the Mandate for Palestine provides as follows:-

“In the territories lying between the Jordan and the eastern boundary of
Palestine as ultimately determined, the Mandatory shall be entitled, with the
consent of the Council of the League of Nations, to postpone or withhold
application of such provision of this Mandate as he may consider inapplicable to
the existing local conditions, and to make such provision for the administration
of the territories as he may consider suitable to those conditions, provided no
action shall be taken which is inconsistent with the provisions of Articles 15, 16
and 18.”
2. In pursuance of the provisions of this Article, His Majesty’s Government invite
the Council to pass the following resolution:
“The following provisions of the Mandate for Palestine are not applicable to the territory
known as Trans-Jordan, which comprises all territory lying to the east of a line drawn
from a point two miles west of the town of Akaba on the Gulf of that name up the centre
of the Wady Araba, Dead Sea and River Jordan to its junction with the River Yarmuk ;
thence up the centre of that river to the Syrian Frontier.”

Preamble.- Recitals 2 and 3.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 35 Mandate For Palestine

Article 2.-The words “placing the country under such political administration and
economic conditions as will secure the establishment of the Jewish national
home, as laid down in the preamble, and”.
Article 4.
Article 6.
Article 7.- The sentence “The shall be included in this law provisions framed so as
to facilitate the acquisition of Palestinian citizenship by Jews who take up their
permanent residence in Palestine.”
Article 11.- The second sentence of the first paragraph and the second paragraph.
Article 13.
Article 14.
Article 22.
Article 23.
----
In the application of the Mandate to Trans-Jordan, the action which, in Palestine,
is taken by the Administration of the latter country, will be taken by the
Administration of Trans-Jordan under the general supervision of the Mandatory.

3. His Majesty’s Government accept full responsibility as Mandatory for Trans-

Jordan, and undertake that such provision as may be made for the
administration of that territory in accordance with Article 25 of the Mandate shall
be in no way inconsistent with those provisions of the Mandate which are not by
this resolution declared inapplicable.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 36 Mandate For Palestine

 Appendix B – Article 22
Covenant of the League of Nations 64

UNITED
NATIONS A
Distr.
General Assembly UNRESTRICTED

A/297
30 April 1947

ORIGINAL: ENGLISH

QUESTION OF PALESTINE
ARTICLE 22 OF THE COVENANT OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

1. To those colonies and territories which as a consequence of the late war have
ceased to be under the sovereignty of the States which formerly governed them
and which are inhabited by peoples not yet able to stand by themselves under the
strenuous conditions of the modern world, there should be applied the principle
that the well-being and development of such peoples form a sacred trust of
civilization and that securities for the performance of this trust should be
embodied in this Covenant.
2. The best method of giving practical effect to this principle is that the tutelage of
such peoples should be entrusted to advanced nations who by reason of their
resources, their experience or their geographical position can best undertake this
responsibility, and who are willing to accept it, and that this tutelage should be
exercised by them as Mandatories on behalf of the League.
3. The character of the mandate must differ according to the stage of the
development of the people, the geographical situation of the territory, its
economic condition and other similar circumstances.
4. Certain communities formerly belonging to the Turkish Empire have reached a
stage of development where their existence as independent nations can be
provisionally recognized. subject to the rendering of administrative advice and
assistance by a Mandatory until such time as they are able to stand alone. The
wishes of these communities must be a principal consideration in the selection of
the Mandatory.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 37 Mandate For Palestine

5. Other peoples, especially those of Central Africa, are at such a stage that the
Mandatory must be responsible for the administration of the territory under
conditions which will guarantee freedom of conscience and religion, subject only
to the maintenance of public order and morals, the prohibition of abuses such as
the slave trade, the arms traffic and the liquor traffic, and the prevention of the
establishment of fortifications or military and naval bases and of military training
of the natives for other than police purposes and the defence of territory, and will
also secure equal opportunities for the trade and commerce of other Members of
the League.
6. There are territories, such as South West Africa and certain of the South Pacific
Islands, which, owing to the sparseness of their population, or their small size, or
their remoteness from the centres of civilization, or their geographical contiguity
to the territory of the Mandatory, and other circumstances, can be best
administered under the laws of the Mandatory as integral portions of its territory,
subject to the safeguards above mentioned in the interests of the indigenous
population.
7. In every case of mandate, the Mandatory shall render to the Council an annual
report in reference to the territory committed to its charge.
8. The degree of authority, control, or administration to be exercised by the
Mandatory shall, if not previously agreed upon by the Members of the League, be
explicitly defined in each case by the Council.
9. A permanent Commission shall be constituted to receive and examine the
annual reports of the Mandatories and to advise the Council on all matters
relating to the observance of the mandates.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 38 Mandate For Palestine

 Appendix C – Israel’s Declaration of Independence

Provisional Government of Israel

Official Gazette: Number 1; Tel Aviv, 5 Iyar 5708, 14.5.1948 Page 1

The Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel

The Land of Israel was the birthplace of the Jewish people. Here their spiritual, religious and
political identity was shaped. Here they first attained to statehood, created cultural values of
national and universal significance and gave to the world the eternal Book of Books.
After being forcibly exiled from their land, the people kept faith with it throughout their
Dispersion and never ceased to pray and hope for their return to it and for the restoration in it of
their political freedom.
Impelled by this historic and traditional attachment, Jews strove in every successive generation to
re-establish themselves in their ancient homeland. In recent decades they returned in their
masses. Pioneers, defiant returnees, and defenders, they made deserts bloom, revived the Hebrew
language, built villages and towns, and created a thriving community controlling its own economy
and culture, loving peace but knowing how to defend itself, bringing the blessings of progress to
all the country's inhabitants, and aspiring towards independent nationhood.
In the year 5657 (1897), at the summons of the spiritual father of the Jewish State, Theodore
Herzl, the First Zionist Congress convened and proclaimed the right of the Jewish people to
national rebirth in its own country.
This right was recognized in the Balfour Declaration of the 2nd November, 1917, and re-affirmed
in the Mandate of the League of Nations which, in particular, gave international sanction to the
historic connection between the Jewish people and Eretz-Israel and to the right of the Jewish
people to rebuild its National Home.
The catastrophe which recently befell the Jewish people - the massacre of millions of Jews in
Europe - was another clear demonstration of the urgency of solving the problem of its
homelessness by re-establishing in Eretz-Israel the Jewish State, which would open the gates of
the homeland wide to every Jew and confer upon the Jewish people the status of a fully privileged
member of the community of nations.
Survivors of the Nazi holocaust in Europe, as well as Jews from other parts of the world,
continued to migrate to Eretz-Israel, undaunted by difficulties, restrictions and dangers, and
never ceased to assert their right to a life of dignity, freedom and honest toil in their national
homeland.
In the Second World War, the Jewish community of this country contributed its full share to the
struggle of the freedom- and peace-loving nations against the forces of Nazi wickedness and, by
the blood of its soldiers and its war effort, gained the right to be reckoned among the peoples who
founded the United Nations.
On the 29th November, 1947, the United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution calling
for the establishment of a Jewish State in Eretz-Israel; the General Assembly required the
inhabitants of Eretz-Israel to take such steps as were necessary on their part for the
implementation of that resolution. This recognition by the United Nations of the right of the
Jewish people to establish their State is irrevocable.
This right is the natural right of the Jewish people to be masters of their own fate, like all other
nations, in their own sovereign State.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 39 Mandate For Palestine

Accordingly we, members of the People's Council, representatives of the Jewish Community of
Eretz-Israel and of the Zionist Movement, are here assembled on the day of the termination of the
British Mandate over Eretz-Israel and, by virtue of our natural and historic right and on the
strength of the resolution of the United Nations General Assembly, hereby declare the
establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz-Israel, to be known as the State of Israel.
We declare that, with effect from the moment of the termination of the Mandate being tonight,
the eve of Sabbath, the 6th Iyar, 5708 (15th May, 1948), until the establishment of the elected,
regular authorities of the State in accordance with the Constitution which shall be adopted by the
Elected Constituent Assembly not later than the 1st October 1948, the People's Council shall act as
a Provisional Council of State, and its executive organ, the People's Administration, shall be the
Provisional Government of the Jewish State, to be called "Israel."
The State of Israel will be open for Jewish immigration and for the Ingathering of the Exiles; it
will foster the development of the country for the benefit of all its inhabitants; it will be based on
freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of Israel; it will ensure complete equality
of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will
guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture; it will safeguard the
Holy Places of all religions; and it will be faithful to the principles of the Charter of the United
Nations.
The State of Israel is prepared to cooperate with the agencies and representatives of the United
Nations in implementing the resolution of the General Assembly of the 29th November, 1947, and
will take steps to bring about the economic union of the whole of Eretz-Israel.
We appeal to the United Nations to assist the Jewish people in the building-up of its State and to
receive the State of Israel into the community of nations.
We appeal - in the very midst of the onslaught launched against us now for months - to the Arab
inhabitants of the State of Israel to preserve peace and participate in the upbuilding of the State
on the basis of full and equal citizenship and due representation in all its provisional and
permanent institutions.
We extend our hand to all neighbouring states and their peoples in an offer of peace and good
neighbourliness, and appeal to them to establish bonds of cooperation and mutual help with the
sovereign Jewish people settled in its own land. The State of Israel is prepared to do its share in a
common effort for the advancement of the entire Middle East.
We appeal to the Jewish people throughout the Diaspora to rally round the Jews of Eretz-Israel in
the tasks of immigration and upbuilding and to stand by them in the great struggle for the
realization of the age-old dream - the redemption of Israel.
Placing our trust in the Almighty, we affix our signatures to this proclamation at this session of
the provisional Council of State, on the soil of the Homeland, in the city of Tel-Aviv, on this
Sabbath eve, the 5th day of Iyar, 5708 (14th May, 1948).

David Ben-Gurion
Daniel Auster Mordekhai Bentov Yitzchak Ben Zvi Eliyahu Berligne Fritz Bernstein Rabbi Wolf
Gold Meir Grabovsky Yitzchak Gruenbaum Dr. Abraham Granovsky Eliyahu Dobkin Meir Wilner-
Kovner Zerach Wahrhaftig Herzl Vardi Rachel Cohen Rabbi Kalman Kahana Saadia Kobashi
Rabbi Yitzchak Meir Levin Meir David Loewenstein Zvi Luria Golda Myerson Nachum Nir Zvi
Segal Rabbi Yehuda Leib Hacohen Fishman David Zvi Pinkas Aharon Zisling Moshe Kolodny
Eliezer Kaplan Abraham Katznelson Felix Rosenblueth David Remez Berl Repetur Mordekhai
Shattner Ben Zion Sternberg Bekhor Shitreet Moshe Shapira Moshe Shertok

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 40 Mandate For Palestine

“Redemption of Palestine …”
“ … [the Jews] are much more than hewers of wood and drawers of water; they
read, they think, they discuss; in the evenings they have music, classes, lectures;
there is among them a real activity of mind. And the-third factor is that they are
fully conscious that they are not engaged in some casual task, without special
significance other than the provision of their own livelihood; they know quite well
that they are an integral part of the movement for the redemption of Palestine;
that they, few though they may be, are the representatives, and in a sense the
agents, of the whole of Jewry; that the daily work in which they are engaged is in
touch with the prophecies of old and with the prayers of millions now. So they
find the labour of their hands to be worthy in itself; it is made lighter by
intellectual activity; it is ennobled by the patriotic ideal which it serves. That is
the reason why these pioneers are happy.” [italics by author]
The High Commissioner
Administration of Palestine
Jerusalem, 22nd April, 1925

This document uses extensive links via the Internet. If you experience a broken link, please note
the 5-digit number (xxxxx) at the end of the URL and use it as a Keyword in the Search Box at:
www.MEfacts.com.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 41 Mandate For Palestine

Notes:

1 The Jewish State by Theodor Herzl, 1896. Translated from German by Sylvie D’Avigdor. This edition
was published in 1946 by the American Zionist Emergency Council.
2 The British Foreign Office, November 2, 1917.
3 “The total land area of Palestine is estimated at 26,320 square kms. or 10,162 square miles. In addition
there is an inland water area of 704 square kms. or 272 square miles, comprising Lake Huleh, Lake
Tiberias and one half of the Dead Sea. The total area of the country is thus 27,024 square kms. or 10,434
square miles.” See “A Survey of Palestine” Volume I. Chapter III, p. 103. Prepared December 1945-
January 1946 for the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry.
4 The 51 member countries of the League of Nations as of July 24, 1922: Albania, Argentina, Australia,
Austria, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, British India, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba,
Czechoslovakia, Denmark, El Salvador, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras,
Italy, Japan, Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, Latvia, Liberia, Lithuania, Luxembourg,
Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Panama, Paraguay, Persia, Peru, Poland, Portugal,
Republic of China, Romania, Siam, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Union of South Africa, United
Kingdom, Uruguay, and Venezuela.
5 See: Appendix A: “Mandate for Palestine.”
6 See the preamble to the “Mandate for Palestine.”
7 See introductory chapter to Bernard Lewis, The Crisis in Islam: Holy War and Unholy Terror (New
York: Modern Library, 2003), pp xvi, xx-xxi.
8 For a discussion of this characteristic, which has stymied attempts to create genuine nationhood and
transformed anti-Zionism into unifying factor around which Arab nationalism could be crystallized, see
Avi Shlaim’s review of Adeed Dawisha’s Arab Nationalism in the 20th Century: From Triumph to
Despair, reviewed in The Guardian, March 29,2003. See:
http://education.guardian.co.uk/higher/books/story/0,10595,924043,00.html. (10818)
9 This insight was raised in a July 11, 2003 op-ed piece in the Hebrew daily Yedioth Aharonoth.
10 See Article 2 of the “Mandate for Palestine.”
11 See “Introductory,” Page 1 of the Report by the Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Northern Ireland to the Council of the League of Nations on the Administration of Palestine
and Trans-Jordan for the year 1938.
12 For more on this subject, see Popular Searches: Territories and Palestinians, at:
http://www.MEfacts.com.
13 Until recently, no Arab nation or group recognized or claimed the existence of an independent
Palestinian nationality or ethnicity. Arabs who happened to live in Palestine denied that they had a
unique Palestinian identity. The First Congress of Muslim-Christian Associations (Jerusalem, February
1919) met to select Palestinian Arab representatives for the Paris Peace Conference. They adopted the
following resolution: “We consider Palestine as part of Arab Syria, as it has never been separated from it

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 42 Mandate For Palestine

 at any time. We are connected with it by national, religious, linguistic, natural, economic and
geographical bonds.” See Yehoshua Porath, The Palestinian Arab National Movement: From Riots to
Rebellion (London: Frank Cass and Co., Ltd., 1977), vol. 2, pp. 81-82.
14 For a Christian perspective of the “Palestinian people” myth, see “The Jewish Roots of Christianity” –
“The Myth of Palestine” at: http://www.rbooker.com/html/the_myth_of_ palestine.html. (11500)
15 See the 1st Congress of Muslim-Christian Associations to the Paris Peace Conference, Jerusalem,
February 1919. For an in-depth article on Palestinians’ Syrian identity, see Daniel Pipes, “Palestine for
the Syrians?” Commentary (December 1986) at: http://www.danielpipes.org/pf.php?id=174. (11501)
16 Document texts can be found in the Yale University online law library. British documents, such as the
White Paper of 1939, speak of “Jews and Arabs” or “the Arabs of Palestine,” and even the United
Nations 1947 Partition Plan speaks of “Arab and Jewish states.” There were no “Palestinians.” See:
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/mideast/mideast.htm. (11587)
17 Mentioned in the report by the High Commissioner on the Administration of Palestine 1920-1925 to the
Right Honorable L. S. Amery, M.P. Secretary of State for the Colonies. Government Offices, Jerusalem,
April 22, 1925.
18 “Dear pupil, do you know who the Palestinians are? The Palestinian people are descended from the
Canaanites.” See the survey and quotes from Palestinian textbooks at:
http://www.edume.org/reports/1/4.htm. (11503)
19 For information on the coining of the name Palestine and Philistine origins, see Rockwell Lazareth,
“Who are the Palestinians? What and Where is Palestine?” at:
http://www.newswithviews.com/israel/israel14.htm. (11504)
20 See Daniel Pipes, Greater Syria: History of an Ambition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990) at:
http://www.danielpipes.org/books/greaterchap.shtml. (11498)
21 “Political History & System of Government - Jordan’s State Building and the Palestinian Problem,”
Embassy of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, at:
http://www.jordanembassyus.org/new/aboutjordan/ph3.shtml. (11589)
22 For this and a host of other quotes from Arab spokespersons on the Syrian identity of local Arabs, see:
http://www.yahoodi.com/peace/palestinians.html. (11921)
23 See Jim Gerrish, “The Lie of the Land or How to Steal a Heritage,” Church & Israel Forum, at:
http://www.churchisraelforum.com/the_lie_of_the_land.htm. (11570) Gerrish quotes Eliyahu Tal,
Whose Jerusalem? Jerusalem, International Forum for a United Jerusalem, 1994. p. 93, and Joan
Peters, From Time Immemorial, 1984, pp. 139-140 – respectively.
24 Ibid.
25 See the Charter of the United Nations at:
http://middleeastfacts.org/content/UN-documents/ UN_Charter_One_Document.htm. (11032)
26 See Eugene V. Rostow, The Future of Palestine, Institute for National Strategic Studies, November 1993.
Professor Rostow was Sterling Professor of Law and Public Affairs Emeritus at Yale University and
served as the Dean of Yale Law School (1955-66); Distinguished Research Professor of Law and
Diplomacy, National Defense University; Adjunct Fellow, American Enterprise Institute. In 1967, as

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 43 Mandate For Palestine

 U.S. Under-Secretary of State for Political Affairs, he became a key draftee of UN Resolution 242. See
also his article: “Are Israel’s Settlements Legal?” The New Republic, October 21, 1991.
27 See: Judge, Sir Elihu Lauterpacht, Jerusalem and the Holy Places (London: The Anglo-Israel
Association, 1968).
28 Ibid.
29 Report of the High Commissioner on the Administration of Palestine 1920-1925, Jerusalem, April 22,
1925, p. 24-25.
30 Palestine Royal Commission Report, July 1937, Chapter II, p. 24.
31 Palestine Royal Commission Report, July 1937, Chapter II, p. 31.
32 Palestine Royal Commission Report, July 1937, Chapter II, p. 31.
33 ICJ – International status of South West Africa. Advisory Opinion of July 11, 1950. See at:
http://www.mefacts.com/cached.asp?x_id=10954. (10954)
34 Legal consequences for states of the continued presence of South Africa in Namibia (South West Africa)
notwithstanding Security Council Resolution 276 (1970). International Court of Justice, Advisory
Opinion of June 21, 1971 (paras. 42-86) states: “The last resolution of the League Assembly and Article
80, paragraph 1, of the United Nations Charter maintained the obligations of mandatories. The
International Court of Justice has consistently recognized that the Mandate survived the demise of the
League, and South Africa also admitted as much for a number of years. Thus the supervisory element,
which is an essential part of the Mandate, was bound to survive. The United Nations suggested a system
of supervision that would not exceed that which applied under the mandates system, but this proposal
was rejected by South Africa.” See:
http://www.lawschool.cornell.edu/library/cijwww/icjwww/idecisions/isummaries/inamsummary7106
21.htm. (11654)
35 Advisory Opinion of July 9, 2004, paragraph 49. See:
http://www.mefacts.com/cache/html/icj/10908.htm. (10908)
36 See Eugene V. Rostow, The Future of Palestine (Washington: Institute for National Strategic Studies,
1993). Professor Rostow was Sterling Professor of Law and Public Affairs Emeritus at Yale University
and served as the Dean of Yale Law School (1955-66). In 1967, as U.S. Under-Secretary of State for
Political Affairs he was a key draftee of UN Resolution 242. See:
http://www.mefacts.com/cache/html/bio/10956.htm. (10956)
37 Eugene V. Rostow, The Future of Palestine [see note 33 above]. Adapted from the paper delivered at the
American Leadership Conference on Israel and the Middle East on October 10, 1993 in Arlington,
Virginia.
38 United Nations 1922 Census. See: http://www.unu.edu/unupress/unupbooks/80859e/80859E05. htm.
(11373)
39 Palestine Royal Report, July 1937, Chapter II, p. 28, paragraph 29.
40 See Paragraph 70 in the ICJ Advisory Opinion, July 9, 2004.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 44 Mandate For Palestine

41 A Class “A” mandate assigned to Britain was Iraq, and assigned to France were Syria and Lebanon.
Examples of other types of mandates were the Class “B” mandate assigned to Belgium administering
Ruanda-Urundi, and the Class “C” mandate assigned to South Africa administering South West Africa.
42 Palestine Royal Report, July 1937, Chapter II, p. 38.
43 Ibid. p. 39.
44 Ibid. p. 40.
45 See Appendix B: Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations.
46 Palestine Royal Report, July 1937, Chapter II, p. 38.
47 The Peace Treaty of Sèvres, August 10, 1920, The Treaties of Peace 1919-1923, Vol. II, (New York:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1924).
48 See the full text of the “Mandate” in Appendix A.
49 Palestine Royal Report, July 1937, Chapter II, p. 20.
50 Memorandum on the British Pledges to the Arabs Report, March 1939.
51 See: Judge, Sir Elihu Lauterpacht, Jerusalem and the Holy Places (London: The Anglo-Israel
Association, 1968), page 52.
52 Professor Julius Stone (1907-1985), Israel and Palestine, Assault on the Law of Nations (Baltimore:
The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1981), p. 127. The late Professor Stone was recognized as one of the
twentieth century’s leading authorities on the Law of Nations. His work represents a detailed analysis of
the central principles of international law governing the issues raised by the Arab-Israel conflict. He was
one of a few scholars to gain outstanding recognition in more than one field. Professor Stone was one of
the world’s best-known authorities in both Jurisprudence and International Law.
53 Latin: From the beginning.
54 Professor Julius Stone, Israel and Palestine, Assault on the Law of Nations (Baltimore: The Johns
Hopkins University Press, 1981), p. 128.
55 ICJ discussion on the Partition Plan in paragraph 71 of the Court’s ruling. See:
http://middle eastfacts.org/content/ICJ/ICJ-Ruling-HTML.htm. (10908)
56 Yearbook of the United Nations 1947-48. 1949. I . 13. December 31, 1948. See:
http://www.mefacts.com/cache/html/un-documents/11270.htm. (11270)
57 Delivered by Dr. Abba Hillel Silver, October 2, 1947.
58 Justice in International Law, Selected Writings of Judge Stephen M. Schwebel (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1994). Professor, Judge Schwebel served on the International Court of Justice since
January 15, 1981. He was Vice-President of the Court from 1994 to 1997 and President of the Court from
1997 to 2000. Professor Schwebel is former Deputy Legal Adviser of the United States Department of
State and Burling Professor of International Law at the School of Advanced International Studies of The
Johns Hopkins University (Washington). Opinions quoted are not derived from his position as a judge
of the ICJ.
59 See: UN Security Council Resolution 54 (1948) http://www.mefacts.com/cache/html/un-
resolutions/10894.htm. (10894)
60 See: http://www.mefacts.com/cache/html/palestinians/10366.htm.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 45 Mandate For Palestine

61 See: http://www.mefacts.com/cache/html/israel/10910.htm.
62 See: http://www.mefacts.com/cache/html/territories/11537.htm and
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/mideast/hamas.htm.
63 See: http://middleeastfacts.org/content/UN-Documents/Mandate-for-Palestine.htm.
64 See: http://middleeastfacts.org/content/UN-Documents/A-297-30-April-1947-conenant-article-
22.htm.

© 2007, Eli E. Hertz 46 Mandate For Palestine