From the Newsletter
Sovereignty Over the Temple Mount
The tension in East Jerusalem has to do with the issue of sovereignty over the Temple Mount. With the escalating violence and tensions in Jerusalem recently, the Temple Mount has become a major item on the social, religious and political agenda. The international community, including Israel, keep repeating the mantra “to maintain the status quo** there.” which states that the Muslim Waqf* manages the Temple Mount, as they have since the Muslim re-conquest of Jerusalem from the Christians in 1187.
This one-sided status quo ignores and denies the divine heritage of the Jews, their return to their land and the establishment of the State of Israel against all odds. To the Jews, it is the most sacred ground on earth. It’s the only Holy Mountain in the world because the Holy God of Israel says it’s His mountain.
In fear of Muslim reaction and threat of an Islamic Arab riot, as well as world criticism, most of Israel’s leaders are reluctant to take a stand for the spiritual right of the Jewish people to “worship the God of Israel on His Holy Mountain, the place He chose for His dwelling place”.
- Israel is told in Psalm 9:11: “Sing praises to the LORD, who dwells in Zion! Declare His deeds among the people.”
- Isa. 60:14 “and they shall call you The City of the LORD, Zion of the Holy One of Israel.
- Joel 3:21: “for the LORD dwells in Zion.”
- Ps. 132:13-14: “For the LORD has chosen Zion; he has desired it for His dwelling place: ‘This is My resting place forever; here I will dwell, for I have desired it.’”
- Ps. 87:1-3: “His foundation is in the holy mountains. The LORD loves the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob. Glorious things are spoken of you, O city of God! Selah.”
- Also see: Psalm 48; Ps. 87:5; Ps 149:2; Song 3:11; Isa. 33:14; Isa. 33:20; Jer. 9:19; Jer. 30:17; Zech.9:13; Isa. 59:2
History
According to the Hebrew Bible Solomon’s Temple was built atop what is known as the Temple Mount in the 10th century BCE. Solomons’ Temple was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BCE, and the Second Temple was built by the Jews, completed and dedicated in 516 BC.
Around 19 BCE Herod the Great began a massive expansion project on the Temple Mount. In addition to fully rebuilding and enlarging the Temple. The Second Temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 CE.
According to Wikipedia history encyclopedia, the history of the Temple Mount starts and ends with Israel.
Israelite period – Jerusalem was a Canaanite city called Jebus, established around 1850 BCE in the vicinity of the Temple Mount. The Jewish King David bought the area for fifty pieces of silver from the Jebusite Araunah who owned the area and used it as a threshing-floor (2Sam. 24:24). David wanted to build a sanctuary to the Lord, God of Israel, but the Lord said that David’s son would be the one to build Him the Temple. King Solomon, David’s son built the first Holy Temple on the site, outside Jerusalem’s wall on the northern edge of the hill.
Persian and Herodian periods – Solomon’s temple was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar II king of Babylon in 586 BCE and was rebuilt by the Jews under Persian rule around 516 BCE. Herod the Great expanded the Mount and renovated the temple. The Second Temple was destroyed in 70 CE by the Romans.
Roman and Byzantine periods – Roman emperor Hadrian rebuilt Jerusalem and changed the name of the city to Aelia Capitolina and built a temple to Jupiter on the site of the former second Jewish temple on the Temple Mount. All Jews were forbidden to enter the city or the surrounding territory around the city.
In 325 CE, Emperor Constantine I, who promoted Christianity, destroyed the Jupiter shrine on the Temple Mount. Jews were allowed to come to Jerusalem once a year, on Tisha b’Av (9th of the Jewish month of Av) to mourn the destruction of 2 temples.
In 534 CE Emperor Justinian built a huge substructure as a foundation for the new Church of St. Mary over the site of Solomon’s temple. Other than that, the Temple Mount was neglected by the Romans.
Byzantine period – The Byzantines built elaborate church buildings, monasteries and other public buildings on the Temple Mount.
Muslim period – In 637 CE Muslim Arabs conquered Jerusalem from the Byzantine Empire. Caliph Umar found the Temple Mount covered with rubbish. He built a mosque to the south of the rock over some ruins, known as the Al-Aqsa Mosque. The mosque was completely destroyed and rebuilt several times, the last one in 1035 CE is the one that still stands today.
In 691 CE Caliph Abd al-Malik built around the rock the Dome of the Rock (Qubbat as-Sakhra). The dome was covered in gold in 1920 [with textual and architectural narratives reinforced one another] ??.
For Muslims, the importance of the Dome of the Rock and Al-Aqsa Mosque makes Jerusalem the third-holiest city, after Mecca and Medina. The Dome of the Rock is located close to the area where the Holy Temple of Israel previously stood. The mosque and shrine are currently administered by a Waqf* (an Islamic trust).
The Crusaders – In 1099 the First Crusaders captured Jerusalem and the Temple Mount. The Dome of the Rock was converted into a church called Templum Domini (the Temple of the Lord) and al-Aksa became a church called Templum Solomonis (Solomon’s Temple.)
Back to Muslim rule – In 1187 Jerusalem was re-conquered by Saladin, and The Dome of the Rock and al-Aksa were changed back into Muslim houses of worship, and have remained so ever since.
The Ottoman Empire – with the expansion of the Turkish Ottoman Muslim Empire, Palestine was included in their conquests in 1516. They prohibited non-Muslims from setting foot on the Temple Mount until the early 19th century, when non-Muslims were again permitted to visit the site.
British Mandate – After WWI, the entire area, including Palestine (today the land of Israel) and Trans-Jordan (today Jordan), was given to the British Mandate, including the Old City of Jerusalem. It maintained the Muslim status quo of the Temple Mount sites. Later, when Jordan became an independent state, it established the current Waqf (religious Muslim Council of the holy places on the Temple Mount.)
After 1948
The State of Israel was established in 1948 after winning the war of independence against its five neighboring Arab nations. East Jerusalem and the West Bank remained in Jordanian hands. Under Jordanian control, Jews were completely expelled from the Old City including the Jewish quarter, and Jews were barred from entering the Old City for 19 years, effectively banning Jewish prayer at the site of the Western Wall.
Israel period – On June 7, 1967, Israel won the Six Day War against the armies of Egypt, Syria, and Jordan. In the fighting against Jordan, Israel gained control of The West Bank and East Jerusalem, including the Temple Mount.
The Knesset (Israel’s Parliament) passed the Preservation of the Holy Places Law, ensuring the protection of the Holy Places against desecration, as well as freedom of access thereto. The site remains within the area controlled by the State of Israel, with the religious administration of the site remaining in the hands of the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf. Arabs can enter the Temple Mount through one of ten different Muslim-only gates from various sites in the Old City. Tourists and Jews are only allowed access to the site through the Mugrabim Gate (via the Mugrabim Bridge) which is located just above and to the left of the Kotel, (Western Wall) plaza. Non-Muslims are not allowed to pray on the Temple Mount.
Insight
As we see, God has fulfilled His promises and closed the cycle. Now that Israel has come back to the Land, the Temple Mount is in Israel’s hands. For now, God allows it to be religiously administered under Muslim control. If Israel had taken control of the Temple Mount religiously, the Jewish religious leaders would have started building the third Temple, and it is not God’s time, it’s not His purpose yet for Israel. Mean through the Muslim Arabs, the enemy is doing everything he can to cause Israel to completely lose sovereignty over the Temple Mount.
What is the Waqf?
The Jerusalem Islamic Waqf is an Islamic religious trust organization, controlling and managing the current religious governing issues on and around the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem, including the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock. It was instituted by the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan after its conquest of the West Bank and East Jerusalem during the War of Independence in 1948. The King of Jordan is still supplying all of the funding needed to operate the Waqf. After winning the Six Day War in 1967, Israel has political and military sovereignty of the Temple Mount but allows the Waqf to retain the civil administration and religious authority for the Muslim holy sites on the Temple Mount.
What is status quo on the Temple Mount?
In the 18th century, the land of Israel (then called Palestine) was occupied by the Muslim Turkish Ottoman Empire. The leader Sultan Osman III decreed that the status quo be established to preserve the division of ownership and responsibilities of the holy sites in the Holy Land between the various sites important to Christians, Muslims, and Jews.
This status quo for Jerusalem meant that certain statuses for the holy sites would be kept and were recognized as being permanent or at least the way things should be. The city was divided into four quarters. The Temple Mount became a Muslim holy place, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre as well as other various Christian sites were recognized as belonging to the Christian world. Despite the arguments over who would control what aspects of these sites, the status quo has remained largely intact from the 17th century to the present and for the most part has not been changed.
After the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the status quo was not respected by Jordan who took control of the Old City of Jerusalem and expelled Jews prohibiting them from visiting their Holy Places in the city.
Now that God has given the Temple Mount, Western Wall and Judea and Samaria back to Israel, the enemy of God and Israel is working very hard to take them away from Israel and he is using the Muslim Arabs.
Even before Israel became a nation, at the time that Jews started to come back to the land as pioneers, the Arabs objected to their coming back and especially going up to Jerusalem to worship the Lord. From the beginning, Jews were accused of attempting to take the Temple Mount from the Muslims.
On June 17, 1967, a meeting was held at the al-Aqsa Mosque between Moshe Dayan (Israeli Chief of Staff at that time) and Muslim religious authorities of Jerusalem reformulating the status quo. Dayan offered that the Jews be given the right to visit the Temple Mount unobstructed and free of charge if they respected Muslims’ religious feelings and acted decently, without being allowed to pray. ‘Religious sovereignty’ was to remain with the Muslims while Israel retained ‘overall sovereignty’.
The Muslims rejected Dayan’s offer, as well as totally rejecting the Israeli conquest of Jerusalem and the Temple Mount. The Military Chief Rabbi Shlomo Goren and a group of other Jews also objected to the proposal, claiming that praying on the Mount symbolizes freedom and the return of the Jewish people to their homeland.
The High Court of Israel suggested that even though it is the right, as part of the freedom of expression, for Jews to enter the Temple Mount, to pray there and to have communion with their God, if it will most certainly cause injury to the public “it is possible to limit the rights of the person in order to uphold the public interest.”
Israeli police continued to forbid Jews praying on the Temple Mount. Several prime ministers have attempted to change the status quo but failed.
The 9th of Av and the weeks “Between the Straits”
“From the straits I called to Yah” Psalm 118:5
“The fast of the fourth month” in Zechariah 8:19 refers to an ancient memorial on the 17th of the month of Tamuz in the Hebrew calendar, a time set aside to soberly remember the breaching of the walls of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar. The three-week period between the 17th of Tammuz and the 9th of Av is known as “the Dire Straits” (or Between the Straits, see Lamentations 1:3 “All her persecutors overtake her in dire straits”.)
The period of the Dire Straits starts on the 17th of Tammuz (the month before Av) when Jerusalem’s walls were breached, it’s fall, the destruction of the two Holy Temples on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem on the same day, the 9th of Av, and the Jews going out of their land to Exile – the first time to Babylon for 70 years, and the second to a far greater Diaspora throughout the world for about 2000 years.
The Jews have experienced many calamities over the years, and it is amazing to learn that most of those calamities have occurred on the same day of the year, the 9th of Av.
The Destruction of the Jerusalem Temples, especially the Second Temple, changed the path of Jewish History and of the nation, dispersing the Jewish People among the nations, yet they have survived against all odds. They went through persecution, expulsions and relocation, suffering and calamities. Nonetheless, the wisdom and learning of Jewish tradition was not only preserved, but it also flourished in many countries, enriching the world in many ways.
The 9th of Av, Tisha b’Av, commemorates a list of catastrophes so severe that Jews believe God set them aside for suffering.
Some of the catastrophes and calamities that happened to the Jews on the 9th of Av:
- The First Temple was also destroyed on the 9th of Av (423 BCE). Five centuries later (in 69 CE), the Romans drew closer to the Second Temple, ready to torch it. The Second Temple was destroyed the same day as the first.
- When the Jews rebelled against Roman rule, they believed that their leader, Simon bar Kochba, would fulfill their messianic longings. But their hopes were cruelly dashed in 133 CE as the Jewish rebels were brutally butchered in the final battle at Betar. The date of the massacre was the 9th of Av!
- One year after their conquest of Betar, the Romans plowed over the Temple Mount, our nation’s holiest site.
- In 1290 CE on the 9th of Av, the Jews were expelled from England.
- In 1492, the Golden Age of Spain for the Jews came to an end when Queen Isabella and her husband Ferdinand ordered that the Jews be banished from the land. The edict of expulsion was signed on March 31, 1492, and the Jews were given exactly four months to leave the country. The Hebrew date on which no Jew was allowed any longer to remain in the land where he had enjoyed freedom and prosperity was the 9th of Av.
- World War II and the Holocaust, was actually the outcome of World War I that began in 1914. The day that Germany declared war on Russia, which set the First World War into motion was on the 9th of Av.
Is it by chance, or is it part of a Divine plan that has spiritual meaning? It may not be understood by the human mind, but God has a purpose and a plan that will be fulfilled in His time.
- In modern times, the evacuation of Jewish settlers from Gaza in 2005 occurred on the 9th of Av.
According to God’s plan, He intended the 9th of Av to be a day of joy and celebration. When He led the people of Israel out of slavery from Egypt into the Promised Land in the year 1313 BCE, the 9th of Av was the day they were to enter the land of at Kadish Barnea (the short distance from Egypt to the land of Israel.) Spies had been sent into the land and brought back the good fruit of the land to taste. However, 10 of the spies (besides Joshua and Caleb) gave a negative report to the people, lacking faith in God and full of fear. They said to the people that it would be better to go back to Egypt than to be killed by the giants of the land. Because of their unbelief, the day of joy turned into a day of mourning.
God was highly displeased by this public demonstration of distrust in His miracle working power and sent the people back in a long course of 38 years through the desert of Sinai until that whole generation died there, and only their children had the privilege of entering and possessing the Promised Land. (Num. 13-14)
One day, the people of Israel will look upon the pierced Yeshua (Zech. 12:10,) they will proclaim, Baruch haba b’shem Adonai (Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the Lord. Matt. 23:39.) Yeshua said that on that day they will see Him again, but this time they will see Him as He is: their Messiah and Savior. They will mourn for Him as for the firstborn Son. (Zech. 12:10). And then, All Israel will be saved. (Rom. 11:26) On that day God will turn the mourning into great joy again.
History from the Ottoman Empire to the Establishment of the State of Israel
Ottoman Empire (1517–1917)
Sultan Bayezid II, who ruled the Ottoman Empire from 1481 to 1512, welcomed the Jews who were expelled from Spain into the Empire. The Ottoman ruler considered the Jews industrious and believed that they could add to the economic development of the empire.
Palestine* was conquered by Turkish Sultan Selim II in 1516–17, and became part of the province of Syria and attached administratively to the province of Damascus. Under the Ottoman rule, the Land was ruled from the capitol of Turkey, Istanbul. Jews, Muslims, and Christians living in Palestine were all called Palestinians. Under the Ottoman Muslim law in the land, Jews and Christians were subject to a special tax (jizaya), and laws prohibiting of carrying arms, riding horses, building new houses of worship or repairing old ones, public processions and worship, proselytizing, and building homes higher than Muslim homes. There was also the requirement to wear distinctive clothing. *The Land of Israel was named Palestine by the Romans
Jews lived mainly in Jerusalem and in Nablus (Shechem), Hebron, Gaza, Safed (Tzfat, in central Upper Galilee) and the villages of Galilee. The community was comprised of descendants of Jews who had never left the Land, as well as immigrants from North Africa and Europe. Much of the activity occurred at Safed, which had become a Jewish center of religion and spiritual mysticism. Joseph Karo’s comprehensive guide to Jewish law, the Shulchan Aruch (Prepared Table) became a very authoritative manual in Judaism.
In 1537 Suleiman the Magnificent rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem.
By the 17th and 18th centuries, the Ottoman Empire lost some territories in Central and Eastern Europe. With the gradual decline in the quality of Ottoman rule, the land of Palestine became an area of widespread neglect. By the end of the 18th century, much of the land was owned by absentee landlords and leased to impoverished tenant farmers with heavy taxation. The Turks cut many trees in the great forests of Galilee and the Carmel Mountains, many natural lakes and water sources became swamps, arid and desert land was vast.
Jewish life started to decline by the loss of dominant position in trade and technology, as Christians gradually replaced them with active European political contacts.
Toward the last century of the Ottoman Empire, Herzl offered the to pay off the Turkish Empire’s debt to the British of 150 million pounds sterling in exchange for a charter allowing the Zionists to settle in Palestine. The offer was made to Ottoman leader, Sultan Abdul Hamid II. Hamid rejected the offer and blamed the Jews for the decline of the Ottoman Empire. As a result, Jews become the target of Muslims and Turkish hatred.
In 1798, Napoleon invaded the Middle East, seizing Cairo and areas in Palestine. He took Jaffa, Ramle, Lydda, Nazareth, and Tiberias, but was unable to take the port city of Acre (Akko). A Royal Navy squadron under Nelson destroyed the French fleet and made Napoleon’s position untenable.
In 1831 Mehemet Ali of Egypt seized Palestine from the Ottomans. His son Ibrahim Pasha, leading Egyptian troops took Acre.
The Ottomans regained control of Palestine in 1840. Ottoman Palestine consisted of two administrative areas. There was the autonomous Sanjak (district) of Jerusalem, which included an area from Jaffa to the Jordan River in the East and from the Jordan south to the borders of Egypt. The other area was part of the province of Beirut. This part was composed of the District of Balka (Nablus) from Jaffa to Jenin, and the district of Acre, which extended area around Jenin.
Between 1882 and 1948, a series of Jewish migrations to what is the modern nation of Israel, known as Aliyah (going up to the Land) commenced. These migrations preceded the Zionist period. The first wave, known as the “First Aliyah,” took place in the late 1800s. Most of these new immigrants came from Russia and Yemen and set up towns including Petah Tikvah, Rishon LeZion and Zikhron Ya’akov. The “Second Aliyah”, prior to World War I, was almost exclusively made up of Russian Jews, following pogroms and anti-Semitism in Russia. Inspired by Socialism and Jewish nationalism, this group started the first kibbutz and revived the Hebrew language.
Toward the end of World War I, the British forces defeated the Turks and conquered the area of Palestine from the Ottoman Empire. After winning WWI, the Versailles Peace Conference (which established the League of Nations in 1919) granted the United Kingdom control over the area west of the Jordan River now comprising the State of Israel, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip (known as the Mandatory Palestine), and on the east bank of what later became Jordan (as a separate mandate). Herbert Samuel, a former Postmaster General in the British cabinet, who was instrumental in drafting the Declaration was appointed the first High Commissioner of Mandatory Palestine, generally simply known as Palestine.
Lawrence of Arabia
In 1917, Britain had promised to create a Jewish national home as stated in the Balfour Declaration. At the same time, British Colonel Lawrence (aka Lawrence of Arabia,) who fought with Arab rebels against the Turks during World War I, promised the Arab tribes independence and a united Arab country, which would cover most of the Arab Middle East. With the war in Europe drawing to a close, Lawrence knew that at the upcoming Paris Peace Conference, “Greater” Syria was going to be divided into four political entities—Palestine, Transjordan, Lebanon, Syria and. and that the British would be taking the first two and possibly Iraq. The French would get the latter. He hurried to London to begin lining up support for the Arab cause before the division. Lawrence sought allies wherever he could find them. The most remarkable was Chaim Weizmann, head of the English Zionist Federation. In January 1919, on the eve of the peace conference, Lawrence had proposed an agreement between the leader of the Arabs, Faisal, and Weizmann. In exchange for Zionist support for a his leadership in Syria, Faisal would support increased Jewish immigration into Palestine, showing by this that he recognized a future Jewish state in the region. That agreement did not take place because of France’s interference. Also, senior British officials began to regard Lawrence as an enemy who stood in the way of victorious Britain and France dividing the spoils of war. In the end, Colonel Lawrence was barred from the peace conference and prevented any further contact with Faisal.
The British were anxious to keep Palestine away from the French and decided to ask for a mandate that would implement the Jewish national home of the Balfour Declaration, which America supported. In July 1922, the League of Nations entrusted Great Britain with the Mandate for Palestine recognizing “the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine.” Under the Mandate, the British were to help the Jews build a national home and promote the creation of self-governing institutions. The Mandate provided for an agency later called “The Jewish Agency for Palestine”, that would represent Jewish interests in Palestine to the British and promote Jewish immigration. A Jewish Agency was created only in 1929, delayed by the desire to create a body that represented both Zionist and non-Zionist Jews. The Jewish Agency in Palestine became in many respects the de-facto government of the Jewish Yishuv (Organized Jewish community).
Later on that year, the British declared that the boundary of Palestine would be limited to the area west of the Jordan River. The area east of the river, called Transjordan (now Jordan), was made into a separate British Mandate and eventually given independence, after Abdullah, the son of King Hussein of the Hijaz marched toward Transjordan with 2,000 soldiers and took over the entire country.
The British continued calling the land Palestine, a name given by the Romans in place of Israel, to prevent the Jews from claiming possession. (Many centuries later the Arab Muslim Empire conquered it.)
The Arabs opposed the idea of a Jewish national home and did not want to be living under Jewish rule. At the instigation of US President Wilson, the Crane commission had been sent to hear the views of the inhabitants. The Arabs lobbied the American King-Crane Commission, in favor of annexation of the Palestine mandate area to Syria, and later formed a national movement to combat the terms of the Mandate.
The British hoped to establish self-governing institutions in Palestine, as required by the Mandate. The Arabs did not accept proposals for such institutions if they included any Jews at all, and so no Arab institutions were created. The yishuv established the Elected Assembly and the National Council. The economy expanded, a Hebrew education network was organized and Jewish cultural life flourished.
Jewish Immigration and Arab Riots
In the spring of 1920, spring of 1921 and summer of 1929, Arab nationalists who opposed the Balfour Declaration, the Mandate and the Jewish nationalists in the land, instigated riots and pogroms against Jews in Jerusalem, Hebron, Jaffa, and Haifa. The Jews organized a small defense force called Haganah against the violent Arab attacks. The major instigators were, later Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, and Arif -El Arif, a prominent Arab Palestinian journalist. The Arabs claimed that Jewish immigration and land purchases were displacing and dispossessing the Arabs of Palestine.
(See article about Jews purchasing land in Palestine before the statehood of Israel)
The riots were also fueled by false rumors that the Jews intended to build a synagogue at the Wailing Wall, or otherwise encroach upon the Muslim rule over the Temple Mount compound, including the Al-Aqsa mosque. The pogroms led to the evacuation of most of the Jewish community of Hebron.
After World War I and until 1923, another group of Jewish immigrants from Russia came to the Land with the “Third Aliya”. This group set about creating a sustainable Jewish agricultural economy by strengthening and building the kibbutz. The next wave of Jewish immigrants was the “Fourth Aliyah”. It took place over a short period of time, from 1924 to 1929. These were Jews who were seeking to escape anti-Semitism in Poland and Hungary and were mainly from middle-class families. They established small businesses and created a more well-rounded economy.
Economically, the Arabs of Palestine benefited from Mandate and Zionist investment. The Arab standard of living increased faster in Palestine than other areas, and population grew prodigiously throughout the Mandate years. Under the rule of the Turkish Empire (the 400 years preceding the British) they were practically slaves, because of the heavy taxes.
In 1936 widespread rioting, later known as the Arab Revolt or Great Uprising, broke out. The revolt was co-organized by the Husseini family and Fawzi El Kaukji, a former Turkish officer, and was possibly financed in part by Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy. Thousands of Arabs and hundreds of Jews were killed in the revolt, which spread rapidly because of the unpreparedness of the British authorities. About half of the 5,000 residents of the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem were forced to flee, and the remnant of the Hebron Jewish community was evacuated as well.
Besides the defensive measures of the Haganah, new offensive underground groups were formed, (such as Lehi and Etsel headed first by Ze’ev Jabotinsky, and later by Menachem Begin) to fight the Arab violence and actions of the British who sided with the Arabs. In each riot, the British would prevent the Jews from protecting themselves, but made little or no effort to prevent the Arabs from attacking the Jews.
After failing to protect the Jewish community from the Arab mobs, the British appointed the Haycraft Commission to investigate the cause of the riots. Although the Commission concluded that the Arabs had been the aggressors, it rationalized and justified the Arab violence that it was a result of their fear of being displaced by Jewish immigration, or “their conception of Zionist policy as derived from Jewish exponents.”
To stop the disturbances, the commissions routinely recommended that restrictions be placed on Jewish immigration. Thus, the Arabs realized that they could always stop Jewish immigration by staging a riot. With each round of riots, the British would take another step away from their obligation under the Balfour Declaration. This policy of retreat and appeasement eventually led to the disintegration of the Mandate.
The Peel Commission of 1937 recommended partitioning Palestine into a small Jewish state and a large Arab one. The commission’s recommendations also included a voluntary transfer of Arabs and Jews to separate the populations. The Jewish leadership considered the plan, but the Palestinian and Arab leadership, including King Saud of Saudi Arabia rejected partition and demanded that the British curtail Jewish immigration. Saud said, “the Jews were a race accursed by God according to His Holy Book, and destined to final destruction and eternal damnation hereafter…”
With the rise of Nazism in Germany and extreme nationalism across Eastern Europe, nearly one-quarter of a million Jews entered Mandate Palestine between 1929 and the beginning of World War II. This group of immigrants included professionals, doctors, lawyers, and artists. They created a thriving art and architecture scene and thriving economy with the establishment of the Port of Haifa. Most arrived prior to 1936 when the British began imposing harsh restrictions on Jewish immigration as a result of increasing anger and violence in the Palestinian Arab community.
Repudiating the Balfour Declaration: The White Paper
In 1939, the British issued the White Paper of 1939, which severely restricted Jewish immigration, leaving many European Jews during the Holocaust with nowhere to go. Illegal immigration, though dangerous, became a necessity. The British restricted Jewish immigration in March 1938 to 3,000 for the following 6 month period. Consequently, there were less Jewish immigrants in 1938, a total of 14,000 compared to 66,000 in 1935. The Arabs still demanded more concessions from the British and continued their violent attacks against the Jews. By the end of the year, nearly 300 Jews had been killed and more than 600 wounded.
The Zionists persistently and naively clung to the belief that the Arabs would eventually accept their presence in Palestine, and recognize the benefits that Jewish settlement was bringing to the country. In 1934, Ben-Gurion told Palestinian nationalist Musa Alami that the Zionists were bringing “a blessing to the Arabs of Palestine” and that they had no good reason to oppose Jewish settlement.
The Arabs were finally satisfied when in 1939 Great Britain issued its latest White Paper, in which the Balfour Declaration and subsequent pro-Zionist policies were repudiated. The new British policy articulated in the White Paper called for the establishment of an Arab state in Palestine (not a Palestinian state) within 10 years and the restriction of Jewish immigration to no more than 75,000 total over the following five years — and none thereafter without the consent of the Arab population. Nevertheless, the Arabs rejected the 1939 White Paper.
The Palestinian Arabs did not really want an independent state; they wanted the whole of Palestine to be part of an independent Arab state of Syria, and the Jews out of the land. The Zionist leaders were shocked by this new White Paper and categorically rejected it. They saw it as a complete surrender to Arab extortion demands, and an abandonment of Great Britain’s obligation to the Jews.
The shift of the English government policy against the Jews came at the worst time in Jewish history. Hitler was occupying Czechoslovakia, and the mass persecution of the Jews by the Nazis was intensifying. With no way to escape by the closing of gates of Palestine by the British, the Jews were convinced that they needed to establish a Jewish state in their homeland, Israel.
At the same time, the British also took some drastic and often cruel steps to stop the riots. Husseini fled to Iraq, where he was involved in an Axis-supported coup against the British and then to Nazi Germany, where he subsequently broadcast for the Axis powers, was active in curtailing Jewish immigration from neutral countries and organized SS death squads in Yugoslavia.
Despite the wartime restrictions on Jewish immigration, the total population of Palestine increased from just over 1 million in 1931 to more than 1.9 million in 1946 – an increase of more than 80 percent in 15 years. During the 24 years of the Mandate (1922-1946), the population increased more than 180 percent.
The Arab population also grew rapidly as a result of immigration from neighboring Arab states (which constituted 36.8 percent of the total immigration into pre-state Israel), improved living conditions, a reduction in the Muslim infant mortality rate from 199 deaths per thousand live births in 1923 to 91 in 1946, and an increase in the average life expectancy from 37 years in 1926 to 49 in 1943. As a result, the Arab population alone increased 118 percent between 1922 and 1946.
The Holocaust
During World War II (1939-1945), many Palestinian Arabs and Jews (all were called Palestinians before 1948) joined the Allied forces. The Jews had a special motivation for fighting the Nazis because of Nazi persecution of Jews and growing rumors that the Nazis were systematically exterminating the Jews of Europe. These rumors were later confirmed, and the extermination of European Jews became a fact of the Holocaust. The threat of extermination also caused a great need for immigration to Palestine, but the gates of Palestine were closed by the British White Paper. In 1941 the British freed Jewish Haganah underground leaders in a general amnesty and they joined the British in fighting the Germans.
Maapilim – the Illegal Jewish Immigrants
The Jews of Palestine responded to the White Paper and the Holocaust by organizing illegal immigration to Palestine from occupied Europe, through the “Institution for Illegal Immigration”.
Rickety boats full of refugees tried to reach Palestine. Some of the ships sank or were caught by the British or the Nazis and turned back, or shipped to Mauritius or other destinations for internment. The SS Bulgaria docked in Haifa with 350 Jewish refugees and was ordered to return to Bulgaria, 280 Jews were killed. The Struma, a vessel that had left Rumania with about 769 Jewish refugees, got to Istanbul on December 16, 1941. There, it was forced to undergo repairs of its engine and leaking hull. The Turks would not grant the refugees sanctuary. The British would not approve transshipment to Mauritius or entry to Palestine. On February 24, 1942, the Turks ordered the Struma out of the harbor. It sank with the loss of 428 men, 269 women, and 70 children. Illegal immigration continued until late in the war. Despite the many setbacks, tens of thousands of Jews were saved by illegal immigration.
Reports of Nazi atrocities became increasingly frequent and vivid. Despite the desperate need to find a haven for refugees, the doors of Palestine remained shut to Jewish immigration. The Zionist leadership met in the Biltmore Hotel in New York City in 1942 and declared that it supported the establishment of Palestine as a Jewish Commonwealth. This declaration of the restatement of the Zionist goal went beyond the reneged Balfour declaration by the British. The Jews determined that the British were now an enemy to be fought, rather than an ally.
On November 6, members of the Jewish Lehi underground Eliyahu Hakim and Eliyahu Bet Zuri assassinated Lord Moyne in Cairo. Moyne, a known anti-Zionist, was Minister of State for the Middle East and in charge of carrying out the terms of the 1939 White Paper – preventing Jewish immigration to Palestine by force. He was also a personal friend of Winston Churchill. The assassination did not change British policy, but it turned Winston Churchill against the Zionists. Hakim and Bet Zuri were caught and were hanged by the British in 1945.
The Jewish Agency and Zionist Executive feared that British and world reaction to the assassination of Lord Moyne might endanger the Jewish Yishuv if they came to be perceived as enemies of Britain and the allies. Therefore they embarked on a campaign against members of the Lehi and Irgun underground organizations. Leaders were caught by the Haganah, interrogated and turned in. About a thousand persons were turned over to the British.
After the war, it was discovered that the Germans had murdered about six million Jews in Europe during the Holocaust. These people had been trapped in Europe because virtually no country would give them shelter. The Zionists felt that British restriction of immigration to Palestine had cost hundreds of thousands of lives. The Jews were now determined to bring the remaining Jews of Europe, about 250,000 people being held in camps for displaced persons, to Palestine.
In the summer of 1945, the Labor party came to power in Great Britain. They had promised that they would reverse the British White Paper and would support a Jewish state in Palestine. However, they reneged on their promise and continued the efforts to stop Jewish immigration. The Haganah continued to attempt to bring immigrants into Palestine illegally. The rival Zionist underground groups now united. In particular, the Irgun and Lehi groups used force to try to drive the British out of Palestine. This included bombing trains, train stations, an officers club and British headquarters in the King David Hotel, as well as the kidnapping and murder of British personnel. In Britain, newspapers and politicians began to demand that the government settle the conflict and stop endangering the lives of British troops.
The US and other countries pressured the British to allow immigration. An Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry recommended allowing 100,000 Jews to immigrate immediately to Palestine. The Arabs, on the other hand, pressured the British to block such immigration. The British found Palestine to be ungovernable and returned the Mandate to the United Nations, successor to the League of Nations. The report of the Anglo-American Committee provided a detailed summary of the British Mandate period and the security situation in Palestine, as well as a report on the effects of the Holocaust and the condition of European Jewry.
Partition
The United Nations Special Commission on Palestine (UNSCOP) recommended that Palestine be divided into an Arab state and a Jewish state. The commission called for Jerusalem to be put under international administration. The UN General Assembly adopted this plan on Nov. 29, 1947, as UN Resolution (GA 181), owing to support of both the US and the Soviet Union, and in particular, the personal support of US President Harry S. Truman.
There were about 600,000 Jews in Palestine, almost all living in the areas allotted to the Jewish state (most of the land was purchased with Jewish money) or in the internationalized zone of Jerusalem, and about 1.2 million Arabs. The allocation of land by Resolution 181 was intended to produce two areas with Jewish and Arab majorities respectively. Jerusalem and environs were to be internationalized. The relatively large Jewish population of Jerusalem and the surroundings, about 100,000, were geographically cut off from the rest of the Jewish state, separated by a relatively large area, the “corridor,” allotted to the Palestinian state. The corridor included the populous Arab towns of Lod and Ramla and the smaller towns of Qoloniyeh, Emaus, Qastel, and others that guarded the road to Jerusalem.
The Jews accepted the UN decision, but the Arabs rejected it. The Arab League, at the instigation of Haj Amin Al-Husseini, declared war to rid Palestine of the Jews.
While the Second World War was still in progress, the governments of the Arab States began to hold consultations regarding the reinforcement of their co-operation. The belief in the ideals on which that organization was based made them participate in its establishment and membership. These conversations led to the establishment of the League of Arab States as an instrument for the co-operation of the Arab States for their security, peace, and well-being.
The State of Israel Declared
The State of Israel was declared independent on Friday evening May 14, 1948. That night, the armies of Jordan, Egypt, Syria, and Lebanon invaded the new state. The Egyptian Foreign Minister informed the Security Council that “Egyptian armed forces have started to enter Palestine to establish law and order”. The Governments of the Arab League States issued a statement on May 15 as their forces were advancing into Palestine. The Arabs came up with many reasons and justifications (and lies) for the attack, such as: “As Palestine is an Arab country, situated in the heart of the Arab countries and attached to the Arab world by various ties – spiritual, historical, and strategic – the Arab countries, and even the Eastern ones, governments as well as peoples, have concerned themselves with the problem of Palestine and have raised it to the international level. The Zionist aggression resulted in the exodus of more than a quarter of a million of its Arab inhabitants from their homes and in their taking refuge in the neighboring Arab countries because of the aggressive intentions and the imperialistic designs of the Zionists, including the atrocities committed by them against the peace-loving Arab inhabitants. Therefore, as security in Palestine is a sacred trust in the hands of the Arab States, and in order to put an end to this state of affairs and to prevent it from becoming aggravated or from turning into chaos, the extent of which no one can foretell; in order to stop the spreading of disturbances and disorder in Palestine to the neighboring Arab countries; in order to fill the gap brought about in the governmental machinery in Palestine as a result of the termination of the Mandate and the non-establishment of a lawful successor authority, the Governments of the Arab States have found themselves compelled to intervene in Palestine solely in order to help its inhabitants restore peace and security and the rule of justice and law to their country, and in order to prevent bloodshed.”
Haganah fighters become the IDF, 1947-48
As the Jewish and Arab communities under the British Mandate continued to clash, the Haganah, Etzel, and Lehi (other, smaller underground Jewish fighting forces) helped fight for Israel’s independence leading up to the British withdrawal on May 13, 1948. Following many months of bitter fighting between the Jewish defense forces and hostile armed Arab groups, David Ben-Gurion declared the State of Israel’s independence. One of his first orders as Prime Minister was the establishment of the Israel Defense Forces and the dissolution and disarmament of all other paramilitary groups (namely the Haganah, Etzel, and Lehi). Very quickly, the people of Israel and its defenders learned to adjust to a more structured and disciplined fighting force. Thus, on May 31st, 1948, the IDF was born.