Time Capsule 1925 - Palestine

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    1la / FORETGN NEWSof illumination. He smiled and sentanese Crown Prince Hirohito who,liberated them. The Prince, beingfound light in the eyes of his Princess

    half of them to the Jap-in his garden at Tokyo,but recently married,Firefly.

    AUSPICIOUS BIRTH: Last August a great sea turtle emerged DEC. :iupon the beach at Kamakura, famed site of the imperialvilla of the Crown Prince Hirohito of Japan. Out rushedthe imperial household, agog at this omen of good luck.When the turtle, having laid exactly 70 eggs, retired into thesea, it was bruited throughout Japan that the Crown princessNagako would be certain to give birth to a male heir. Thena pair of sacred cranes nested in a great pine tree almost atthe imperial threshold, and this omen was thought to be socertain of fulfillment that the Japanese newspapers com-menced to refer to the expected child as "him."Last week the famed obstetrician, Professor Nobuhige Ku-riyama, waited hourly upon the Crown Princess; final prep-arations were made for an immense fCte. Then there cameinto the world the 124th descendant in direct line of the Em-peror Jimmu Tenno (660 B.C.), founder of the oldest reigningdynasty in the world. Unfortunately the infant thus auspi-ciously born proved to be a girl. Some 70 million dis-appointed Japanese were comforted by an announcement:"The Princess Nagako continues in robust health, and willpersonally nurse the granddaughter of the Emperor."

    PalestineIn an effort to control the unrest which had existed betweenArab and Zionist communities ever since World War I, theLeague of Nations made Palestine a mandate of Great Britainin 1922. The mandate lasted until 1948.HOSTILE ARABS: Hale and hearty at the age of 76, Arthur MARCH eJames Balfour, Earl of that name, descended from his bed-room one bright foggy morning into his electrically lit studyin his electrically lit house in Carlton Gardens, London. He

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    119sank agedly into a chair before his writing desk, opened a ca-blegram from Palestine sent by the Arab Executive, politicalagency of the Arabs, read:"Realizing that the Balfour Declaration contains a policythat is fatal to Palestine, the Arab Executive has passed thefollowing resolution:" 'Inhabitants who are victims of the aforesaid policy willwithhold the reception otherwise due to Lord Balfour. Onthe day of his arrival, meetings will be held in places of wor-ship for protest and prayer. Representatives of Arab bodieswill refrain from meeting him publicly or privately. The au-thorities responsible for the Holy Places and national in-stitutions will withhold leave of access to them. Arabicpapers will appear with black borders and brief commentsin English on the Balfour Declaration. Political authoritiesin Arab countries will associate themselves with the said pro-tests and prayers. The Palestine Government is notified thatit will be responsible for consequences resulting from Jewishdemonstrations, public or private, authorized or unauthor-ized.'"Why this hostility? The Balfour Declaration of 1917 haddeclared that "His Majesty's Government view with favorthe establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jew-ish people," but specifically stipulated that "nothing shallbe done which may prejudice the civil and religious rightsof the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine."The letter and the spirit of this agreement have been car-ried out, according to British and Jewish sources. But thefact remains that the British Government has tacitly un-dertaken to reconcile what are essentially irreconcilablepeoples and policies. Within Palestine, which is about thesame size as the state of New Hampshire, there are about757,182 people, of whom 77/, are Moslems (most of themArabs), I l/. Jews, 9f Christians, and 3l othet religions.The Moslems view with considerable alarm the infiltrationof the thrifty Jews, and since Britain tries ineffectually toside with both, a further issue between Arab and Britisheris created.The Arab, as he has been in possession of the country forcenturies, regards himself as a national of Palestine and con-sequently is opposed to the Jews coming into the country

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    tzo / FoF"r,tcN NEWSand considering themselves equally palestine nationals. Thisresentment is heightened by the fact that the Arabs, althoughowning most of the land, are poor; while the Jews seeminglyhave unlimited wealth behind them, which comes in fromthe Zionist organization.The Arab is opposed, as he always has been, to change;and the one thing that the Jews are doing is changing thewhole aspect of the land. The Jews, for the most part, settleon the swamps and the dry sand belts. The swamps theydrain and the sand patches they fertilize and irrigate. Inthese things the Arab finds good material for a constantstream of propaganda against the Jews, whom he chargeswith pursuing a policy calculated to drive the Arab fromthe country. Therefore, so long as the Balfour Declaration re-mains in force, all good Arabs must refuse to codperatewith the British Administration.MANHATTAN To HArFA: It was a historic occasion marked by uancH z-rthe presence of 5,000 excited Jews, for the president Arthurwas inaugurating a new steamship line with a sailing forHaifa, the port of Jerusalem, and carrying the flag of Judea(six-pointed star of David) on the high seas for the firsttime in 2,000 years. Men and women wept from emotionand when they were not weeping they were singing Hatikvah,Zionist anthem, or The Star-Spangled Banner.Considerable difficulty was experienced in getting visitorsoff the boat, and as a result it was nearly an hour late in sail-ing. Finally, an official of the Line pleaded that, if the boatdid not catch the tide, the company would lose $15,000.Soon after this, the President Arthur weighed anchor.lN THE PROMTSED LAND: Last week, nearly seven and a half ApRrL 13years after the Earl of Balfour had issued his declaration fa_voring the establishment of Palestine as a national home forthe Jewish people, he entered a special railway car providedby the Palestine Government and was whisked off acrossthe Suez Canal from Cairo to the holy land of two religions:Judaism, Christianity.Lord Balfour went to Jerusalem. On a spur of the Mountof Olives, known as Mt. Scopus, stands the Hebrew Uni_versity which he had come to open-which all Zionist Jewry

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    121considers of the utmost importance in the growth of whatmay be called modern Israel. He was met enthusiasticallyUy itre Jewish communities and by the Arabs with a paradeoi mourning and the silence of grief, a protest against the Bal-four Declaration.Before the opening ceremony took place, he visited Jaffa,motored to its suburb Tel-Aviv, a purely Jewish town where,it is said, everybody lives by doing someone else's washing'Everywhere the veteran Earl was received in manifest good-will.The great day came. Hawkers sold "Balfour biscuits"'"Balfour keftas" (rissoles), "Balfour chocolate," which wasnot strange in a land which has a model village named Bal-fouria. Dr. Chaim Weizmann, President of the World ZionistOrganization, declared the University open' Then Lord Bal-fouraroseandtheovationwassuchthatthewallsoftheamphitheatre were endangered. At length-silence'iord Balfour spoke in his best Eton and Cambridge man-ner, dwelt upon the significance i:f the event which hadbrought people from all the earth's cubbyholes' The speechendedonaBalfouriannote:agraceful,tactful,courageousplea for Arab goodwill and coOperation'

    ApRrL 20 LAST LAP: The last lap of Lord Balfour's visit to the HolyLand proved more exciting than the flrst and ended with re-grettable suddenness. The Earl and his party had proceededirom Jerusalem to Nazareth and Haifa in a sort of triumphaltour.Atallpoints,hewasmetbyenthusiasticJewishcol-onists; Arabs appeared to inform him that they lived peace-fully with their Jewish neighbors.Over the border in Syria (French mandate), things were dif-ferent. At Damascus, a furious mob twice attacked hishotel.Thesecondonslaught,whichstartedin"TheStreetThat Is Called Straight," almost ended in a disaster, for when

    the gendarmes had nearly been overpowered French troopsappeared and spanked off, with the flats of their swords'theseethingcrowd,whichwasyelling..DownwithBalfour ,'An hour or so after the second attack, Lord Balfour wasspiritedfromthespotinahigh-poweredautomobileandooly."upp"ared at Beirut, where he boarded a ship boundfor Alexandria, EgYPt.