From Churchill and the Jews (Martin Gilbert, 2007) pp 52-6
At midnight on 23 March 1921, Churchill left Egypt for Palestine by overnight train. Sir Herbert Samuel and T. E. Lawrence accompanied him. At that time 83,000 Jews and 600,000 Arabs lived between the Mediterranean Sea and the River Jordan, in what was known as Western Palestine. No Jews lived east of the river. Churchill’s principal object in going to Jerusalem was to explain to Emir Abdullah the decision of the Cairo Conference, and of the British Government, that Britain would support him as ruler of the area of the Mandate lying east of the River Jordan — hence its name, Transjordan — provided that Abdullah would accept a Jewish National Home within Western Palestine, and do his utmost to prevent anti-Zionist agitation among his people east of the Jordan.
Lawrence had already secured a pledge from Feisal, Abdullah’s brother, that ‘all necessary measures’ would be taken ‘to encourage and stimulate immigration of Jews into Palestine on a large scale, and as quickly as possible upon the land through close settlement and intensive cultivation of the soil.’
On the morning of 24 March, Churchill’s train reached Gaza, the first large town within the southwestern boundaries of the Palestine Mandate. Gaza had a population of more than 15,000 Arabs, and fewer than a hundred Jews. A British police guard of honour met him at the railway crossing, and a mounted escort took him to the town. Captain Maxwell Coote, a Royal Air Force officer who had served as Churchill’s Orderly Officer in Cairo, later recalled that there was ‘a tremendous reception by a howling mob, all shouting in Arabic “Cheers for the Minister” and also for Great Britain, but their chief cry over which they waxed quite frenzied was “Down with the Jews”, “Cut their throats”. Mr Churchill and Sir Herbert were delighted with the enthusiasm of their reception, being not in the least aware of what was being shouted. Lawrence of course, understood it all and told me, but we kept very quiet. He was obviously gravely anxious about the whole situation. We toured the town surrounded by this almost fanatical mob which was becoming more and more worked up by its shouting. No one appeared to have bargained for this, but all went off without incident.”
It was twenty-two years since Churchill had last been in a Muslim setting, when he had been part of the British Army fighting the Sudanese Islamic khalif. His views on Islam had been formed then, and were not favourable. In his book The River War, first published in 1899, he had written: ‘How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries. Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live. A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity.’
Churchill had gone on to write: “The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine, must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men. Individual Moslems may show splendid qual tes ~ but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytising faith ft has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step, and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilisation of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilisation of ancient Rome.
Before Churchill rejoined the train in Gaza, he was presented with a petition signed by the leading Muslims of the town, setting out their aspirations for Arab statehood in Palestine, and protesting against Jewish immigration. The Arab reaction to Churchill’s arrival in Palestine did not bode well for fulfilling Lloyd George’s instructions for a cheap — and a tranquil — administration. On 25 March there were Arab demonstrations in Haifa to protest against any further Jewish immigration. The British Mandate authorities, who had announced a ban on all public meetings during Churchill’s visit, tried to break up the demonstrations. Violence followed, and the police opened fire. A thirteen-year-old Christian boy and a Muslim Arab woman were killed. Following this police action, anti-Jewish now broke out in Haifa, during which ten Jews and five policemen were injured by knives and stones.
Taking up residence in Government House — the former German hospice on the crest of Mount Scopus, the Augusta Victoria, modelled on the castle of Hohenstaufen in the Rhineland – Churchill worked for three days on the task ahead of him: to listen to both Arab and Jewish representatives, and to give them his answer to their respective requests. He also set up his easel and, as a keen amateur painter, painted the sunset over the city.
On Sunday 27 March Churchill went to the British Military Cemetery on the Mount of Olives, to attend a service of dedication. After the service he made a short speech. ‘It was a company of many people and diverse faiths,’ he said, ‘which had met to commemorate the victorious dead, who had given their lives to liberate the land and to bring about peace and amity amongst its inhabitants, but there remained the duty and responsibility on those who were present to see that the task was completed.’
The cemetery, established after the conquest of Jerusalem at the end of 1917, contained the graves of 2,180 British soldiers, 143 Australians, fifty South Africans, forty British West Indians and thirty-four New Zealanders, as well as sixty men whose bodies it had not been possible to identify, and the graves of sixteen German, five Italian and three Turkish soldiers. “These veteran soldiers,’ Churchill said, ‘lie here where rests the dust of the Khalifs and Crusaders and the Maccabees. Peace to their ashes, honour to their memory and may we not fail to complete the work which they have begun.” The ceremony ended with three volleys fired by a guard of honour, and the sounding of the Last Post.
On 28 March Churchill welcomed Abdullah to Government House in Jerusalem. Abdullah insisted that an Arab Emir in Palestine was the best solution ‘to reconcile the Arabs and the Jews.’ He expressed his fears to Churchill, asking him: ‘Did His Majesty’s Government mean to establish a Jewish kingdom west of the Jordan and to turn out the non-Jewish population? If so, it would be better to tell the Arabs at once and not to keep them in suspense . . . The Allies appeared to think that men could be cut down and transplanted in the same way as trees.’
Churchill sought to put Abdullah’s mind at rest, telling him that there was ‘in his opinion, a great deal of groundless apprehension among the Arabs in Palestine. They appeared to anticipate that hundreds and thousands of Jews were going to pour into the country in a very short time and dominate the existing population. This was not only not contemplated, but quite impossible.’ There were then more than 600,000 Arabs in Palestine and 80,000 Jews. ‘Jewish immigration would be a very slow process and the rights of the existing non-Jewish population would be strictly preserved.’
‘A very slow process’ was not what the Zionists had envisaged. But Churchill assured Abdullah that if the Emir promised not to interfere with Zionist activity in Western Palestine, the British Government would promise that the Zionist clauses of the Mandate ‘would not apply’ in Transjordan, and that the Transjordan Government ‘would not be expected to adopt any measures to promote Jewish immigration and colonization.” This promise effectively destroyed Weizmann’s appeal for Jewish economic development east of the Jordan, and ended Zionist hopes of being able to extend the area of their settlement into the biblical lands of Bashan and Gilead. –
As a result of his meetings with Abdullah, Churchill was able to report back to London that Transjordan would become an Arab kingdom ruled by Abdullah, and that Western Palestine, from the Mediterranean to the River Jordan, would be ruled by Britain, with a commitment to continued Jewish immigration.
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