Palestine: A Modern History (ص 26)

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Palestine: A Modern History (ص 26)

المحتوى

$4. Polarisation: The Military Administration 1917-1920
School for Sciences), Jam ‘iat al-Shabiba al-Yafiyya (The Jaffa Youth
Society), Jam ‘iat al-Ta‘awun al-Massihi (The Social Christian Welfare
Association), and Al-Jam ‘ia al-Ahliyya (The National Society) which
was similar to the local Zionist Organisation, composed of Jatta’s
leading Muslim and Christian families and was responsible for dealing
with the Government.
Other efforts were directed at thwarting Zionist efforts by practical
means. During June a member of the British political staff in Palestine
reported that in Jerusalem
...a society was being formed by Christians and Moslems with a
program to combatwJewish predominance; to counteract Jewish
-influence and to impede by all possible means, the purchase of
land by the Jews.*
Ahother importdnt literdry-political association al-Nadi al‘Arabi
(The ‘Arab Club) was reactivatéd in Jerusalem during Juné 1918 by Haj
Amin al-Husseini (brother of the Mufti Kamel al-Husseini) and other
young Jerusalemites ostensibly dedicated to the revival of the Arabic
language and literature.*”
During August 1918, it was reported that al-Jam ‘ia al-Islamiyya (The
Islamic Society) founded soine years earlier in’Jerusdlem ‘with a view to
preserving Muslim property from being acquired or exploited by
Christians or Jews’, was reactived.*® Atlother society al-Ikha‘wa al-‘Afaf
(Brotherhood and’ Chastity) closely connected with guarding Muslim
property was reported as being active on a later date-*?
In one of his more perceptive reports on the political situation,
Clayton provided an atcount of the economic factors at play within the
ranks of Palestinian Arab opposition to Zionism:
Class Attitudes
The’ great majority ofthe more or less educated Arabs regard any
prospect of Zionist extension with fear and dislike. The small land-
owner. with his shiftless and antiquated methods -of cultivation
realises that he cannot hold his own against, Jewish science and
energy; the trader foresees the day when Jewish enterprise, backed
by Jewish mpney and employing modern business methods will
inevitably squeeze him off the market; the small Effendi, whose
one ambition has always,been to secure a Government appointment,
sees an administration in which the better educated, and more
intelligent Jew, will predominate, thereby lessening the chances for
him and for his glass of obtaining the coveted official post. . the
Polarisation: The Military Administration 1917-1920
classes to which I have alluded above will spare no effort to induce
in the peasantry a hostile attitude towards the Jews. They are in
closer touch with the lower: strata of society than any other class,
and it is not difficult for them to persuade an ignorant and gullible
population that Zionism is only another'word for robbing them of
their lands and even of their means of livelihood.*°
Clayton apparently neglected to add the city and town workers
(portérs, dock-workers, labourers engaged in traditional industries, etc.).
According to Ormsby-Gore, ‘The main problem is the competition
betwéen Jewish and Arab labour’.5!
It should be pointed out that some of the classes referred to in
Clayton’s report had, in spite of their opposition to Zionism, a vested
interest in befriending the prevailing government on which their
economic well-being and ambitions. depended. Thvs,-in spite of a clear
convergence of British policy and Zionism in Palestine, no public
manifestations of Palestinian Arab antipathy to British military occupa-
tion on. a mass scale were discernible and recruiting for Faisal’s army
was, still going on.5? Some Palestinjan notables were trying through
personal contacts and diplomacy to dissuade British officials on: the
spot from supporting Zionism. .
In August 1918, Ormsby-Gore reported that ‘The Moslem-Effendi
class which has:no real political cohesion and above all no power of
organisation is either pro-Turk or pro-British’ and in any case they ‘will
not dare to do anything to embarrass a British, military administration
backed with British bayonets’.
This. did not mean that the Palestiniar Arabs were not constantly
protesting and complaining against the British pro-Zionist .policy:
The Christians complain of favouritism shown by the authorities to
the Jew. The Moslems complain among other things that the-Sharif
has no representative and played no part in the entry into Jerusalem
and that recruiting for Feisal’s Army has only just been allowed as
we have,,only conceded it because we had to send the majority of
our troops to France... It is incontestable that the policy has
greatly added to our difficulties.**
The considerations that Ormsby-Gore referred to were real and as
long as the War was going on, the political notables and their Muslim-
Christian Societies were unable to articulate Palestinian Arab opposi-
tion to Zionism in any effective manner. On 4 August Clayton reported
cy
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aN aat
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تاريخ

1978

المنشئ

Abdul-Wahhab Kayyali

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