Britain and the Arabs: A Study of Fifty Years, 1908 to 1958 - Lieutenant-General Sir John Bagot Glubb
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Sir John Bagot Glubb KCB CMG DSO OBE MC KStJ KPM, also known as Glubb Pasha and Abu Hunaik, was a British military officer who led and trained Transjordan's Arab Legion between 1939 and 1956 as its commanding general. He served in World War I, the Ikhwan revolt, World War II and the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. Wikipedia
He lived in the Middle East for 40 years, adopted 2 Arab children, commanded the Jordanian Arab Legion through the 1948 War and wrote about his unique life when in retirement. He was pro-Arab and believed the creation of Israel was extremely unjust. He had the usual prejudices, was strongly anti-Zionist but no more anti-semitic than was normal for the times and his class.
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JEWISH immigration into Palestine in 1925 had reached the record figure of 33,801. The Palestine Arabs were profoundly alarmed, and disorders broke out in 1926 in protest. Order was restored, however, and in 1927 and 1928 the figures of Jewish immigration fell sharply. Moreover, a considerable number of Jews emigrated from Palestine, with the result that, for a brief period, it appeared as if the mandate might, after all, prove to be workable. These hopes were terminated by the rise of the Nazis to power in Germany and their persecution of the Jews. Intense sympathy for the victims was felt in Western Europe and America, and strong pressure was brought to bear on the mandatory government of Palestine to permit the entry of more Jews. As a result, the immigration figures rose rapidly.
The figures for Jewish legal immigration from 1920 to 1936 were as follows:
Every possible form of argument was put forward to justify the entry of an ever-increasing number of Jews, The Zionists were perhaps already determined to take over Palestine as a Jewish state, but they normally hesitated to say so openly, for fear of provoking opposition. They there- fore concentrated all their efforts on the introduction of more and more Jewish immigrants, with the view to securing a Jewish majority. While the Arabs still constituted a majority, the Zionists resolutely opposed the introduction of democratic or representative institutions. (Grovern- ment by elected assemblies must wait until the Jews obtained a majority and would be able to ensure their own control.
Emotional appeals based on the sufferings of the Jews in Germany were probably the Zionists' strongest card during the 1930s. Much argu- ment was, however, devoted to prove that the Arabs themselves were
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profiting from Jewish immigration. If the problem were regarded on a short-term basis, these statements could be partially justified. An immense amount of Jewish capital poured into Palestine. The arrival of great numbers of Jews in the country produced intense activity, particularly in the building trade and in the port of Haifa. There was a consequent demand for labour. Not only could cvery Arab worker in Palestine obtain emiployment, but casual labourers from Trans-Jordan and Syria came over, principally to work in Haifa. Such expansion was, however, short-lived, for Jewish unemployment, in view of the great numbers of immigrants, led to a Jewish ban on the employment of Arab labour in Jewish undertakings. In less direct ways, however, the Arabs did profit. The large sums of Jewish capital imported led to general prosperity and increased government revenue, which could be spent on public works, roads, agriculture, education and other services from which the Arabs also benefited.
But the real answer to the argument that the Jews were benefiting the Arabs was that man does not live by bread alone. No amount of material prosperity can compensate a man for the loss of his personal freedom and social position, and the Arabs were beginning to realize that before long they might be reduced to the status of a subject race, hewers of wood and drawers of water to Jewish masters, and that in a land which for two thousand years had been indisputably theirs. (It inay be stated that the Arabs only conquered Palestine in 634 A.D., but the Muslim conquest did not involve any great movement of population. Thus the "Arab" Palestinians of today are basically the descendants of the "Byzantine" Palestinians of the first six centuries of our era.)
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The question which more than any other led to the Arab rebellion in Palestine was that of the eviction of Arabs from their lands. In the early 1920s, it is true, many Arabs sold land to the Jews. The prices offered were good, and the Jews were still in such a small minority that it did not occur to the sellers that the new immigrants could ever dispute the supremacy with the Arabs. As, however, the threat of Zionist power grew more alarming, the number of Palestinians willing to sell their land decreased. Here, however, arose the question of absentee landlords. In early times, all the land in the Arab countries in theory belonged to the government, and farmers were legally only tenants of the state.
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In practice, however, the cultivators owned, inherited, bought and sold the land as though it belonged to them, which for all practical purposes it did. There was no department of land registration, so nobody possessed legal documents proving their ownership, though in practice the neighbours usually knew to whom the land belonged. When, however, the Turkish Empire embarked on a policy of modernization during the latter half of the nineteenth century, the reformers were impressed by the fact that, in the modern states of the West, every landowner possessed a document to prove his legal title to his property. This process of modernization scemed to the reformers to require a similar system in Turkey. Two obstacles, however, rendered its execution difficult. Of these, the first was the absence of a survey of the land, on which the boundaries could be recorded. The second was the reluctance of the cultivators to allow their names to be known by the government. Conscription into the Turkish army was the nightmare of the Arabs, and it was widely believed that land registration was merely a government trick to persuadc the rural population to register, so that their sons could be forcibly taken as soldiers.
The result was that few cultivators registered their lands. The officials of the Lands Department, however, found in the new procedure a fruitful source of personal profit. In return for a bribe, many of them were willing to register any land in the name of anybody who asked for it. A number of enterprising persons, mostly town dwellers, "bought" land from the Turkish government in this manner. A few perhaps already had some connection with the district, had lent moncy to the farmers or had been in business relations with them. Others had no connection whatever with the land. In either case, a cash present to the land registry officer would often secure a valid title deed to a large area of farmland. In countries like Palestine, where the Turkish authorities exercised a large measure of control, the new landlord was often able to oblige the farmers to pay him rent on the strength of his "title". In tribal areas, where the government was weak, purchasers of title deeds put them away, in the hope that, some day or other, they might prove to he worth something. The absentec landlords rarely made any contribution to the development of the land. In most cases, the original farmers continued to cultivate as in the past, except that now they had to pay rent to a city dweller, whom they had rarely, or perhaps never, seen.
It will be recollected that, in Turkish times, Northern Palestine had formed part of the province or vilayet of Beirut,1 a fact which doubtless enabled the wealthy families of that city to become acquainted with the local officials. A number of transactions took place in which considerable tracts of land in Northern Palestine passed into possession of rich citizens of Beirut. Writing in 1883, Laurence Oliphant reported that: "The
See maps, pages 70 and 71.
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whole of the plain of Esdraelon is now all owned by one rich firm of Syrian bankers. … They own practically five thousand human beings as well, who form the population of thirty villages. Readers will be sur- prised to learn that almost every acre of the plain of Esdraclon is at this moment in a high state of cultivation … 1t presents one of the most striking pictures of luxurious fertility which it is possible to conceive."1
In Turkish days, Beirut was in the same country and province as Esdraelon, but according to the settlement at the end of the First World War, Palestine and Lebanon became different countries. Lebanese land- owners became foreigners, and were obliged to obtain passports and visas to visit their estates in Palestine. In such circumstances, they were will- ing, for a good price, to sell their lands.
An area of 50,000 acrcs in the plain of Esdraelon was sold by its owners, a Christian family of Beirut, to the Zionists for the sum of £726,000. As a result, about eight thousand Arabs, living in twenty-one villages, were obliged to abandon their homes and their livelihood. No attempt seems to have been made by the Palestine government to find employment for the persons evicted. A sum of £28,000 appears to have been distributed to some of the victims as temporary pocket money, but as this sum, if equally divided, would only amount to £3 10s. per head, it was scarccly cnough to maintain them for a month. Seven thousand Jews moved into the lands which had supported the eight thousand Arabs who had been rendered homeless. Nevill Barbour quotes Dr. Ruppin as stating that nine-tenths of the land bought by the Jews up to 1929 was acquired from absentee landlords in this manner. The Royal Commission on Palestine, reporting in 1937, stated that the evidence which they had received from government officers estab- lished the fact that up to 1930 or 1931 there was land available for Arabs displaced in this manner, but that from 1932 onward it had been extremely difficult for such people to find land.2
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… immigrants or conquering invaders have usually settled in the cities, while the blood of the country people has undergone much less foreign intermixture. However that may be, the fact remains that in all the Levantine countries the city dwellers are clever politicians, while the rural population are the people who fight. The interests of the two communities do not always coincide.
During the early stages of Jewish immigration, the principal opposition came from the politically-minded city dwellers, who claimed the right to national independence. The peasants at first were little affected, and indeed the rapid increase of the Jewish population in the cities created good markets for agricultural produce, meat, eggs and vegetables. But with the progress of eviction of the agricultural population from their lands, the country people became profoundly alarmed. The city and the country were united, thereby creating a dangerous situation. The massive Jewish immigration of 1934, 1935 and 1936 further alarmed both communities.
On 15th April, 1936, Arab bandits held up some cars on the road between Nablus and Tulkarm. A number of Arab and Furopean travellers were robbed, but two Jewish travellers were murdered. The following night, two Arabs living near a Jewish settlement were murdered by Jews, presumably in retaliation. A whole series of mutual reprisals ensued.
On 25th April, an Arab Higher Committee was constituted under the presidency of the mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Ameen al Husaini, and proclaimed a general strike throughout Arab Palestine, which was immediately observed all over the country. The Arab Higher Committee then addressed a letter to the high commissioner, Sir Arthur Wauchope, demanding a cessation of Jewish immigration and the prohibition of sales of land by the Arabs to Jews. The formation of a national government on a representative basis was also requested. The government gave no reply, the general strike continued and sporadic acts of violence began to increase.
In May 1936, the Jewish Agency asked for an exceptionally large quota of Jewish immigrants and the government agreed, not indeed to the full Jewish demands but to an increased number. As the cessation of immigration was the first objective of the Arab general strike, the agree-ment of the Palestine government to an increase in immigration was presumably an intentional challenge. At the same time, it was announced that the British government had decided to send out a Royal Commission to inquire into the situation.
It gradually became apparent that the country was really in a state of rebellion, and that the government was unable to restore order. In the towns the Arab general strike continued and paralysed the life of the country. In rural districts, the villagers cut the telephone wires, fired on passing vehicles and blocked the roads. But the most startling develop-
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ment which resulted was the rapid rise of excitement in the neighbouring Arab countries. Indignation ran high in Syria and Trans-Jordan. Irag felt herself obliged to intervene with a protest. Even the far-off Ibn Saud offered his mediation. This was an entirely new feature in the situation, and one, morcover, extremely injurious to the dignity of Britain, who was made to appear as incapable of controlling even so tiny a country as Palestine.
On 7th September, 1936, the British government announced its decision to mobilize an additional division in England and to send it to Palestine. Eventually the king of Irag, Ibn Saud and the Amir Abdulla issued an appeal to the Arab Higher Committee to call off the strike and the disorders, and rely on the British government's declared intention to do justice. As a result, the strike and the disturbances terminated on 12th October, 1936, alter a duration of six months.
The Royal Commission eventually left London for Palestine on 5th November, 1936. On the same day, the Palestine government issued a further schedule of permits for Jewish immigrants. In view of the fact that Jewish immigration was the main point at issue which the Royal Comimission was to study, the issue of more immigration permits on the day the Commission sailed from England was interpreted by the Arabs as a deliberate act of hostility by the Palestine government. It is indeed possible that the authorities did take this step intentionally. As the Royal Commission was coming out to study Arab grievances, the government may have thought it reasonable to make a concession to the Jews on the same day. The Palestine government was obsessed by this policy of balancing its favours between the two sides. Moreover, the authorities smarted under constant Zionist taunts that they were yielding to Arab violence.
The result of this action was disastrous. The Arab Higher Committee retaliated by ordering a boycott of the Royal Commission. The Arab struggle in Palestine was always haunted by this passion for boycott, which was ultimately to bring them to utter ruin. It was as though a man were to sue another in court, and when the hearing began the plaintiff were to refuse to plead. The defendant would obviously be the only person to gain by such tactics.
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The uncompromising rejection of the Royal Commission report by the Arabs was followed by a new intensification of the disorders. Thoughout August and September, a widespread campaign of murder and terrorism resulted in the loss of many lives, both Jewish and Arab. The mufti was at the height of his power. The Arab terrorists killed more Arabs whose patriotism was allegedly lukewarm, than they did Jews, organized groups of assassins being used for the purpose. Finally, on 26th Septcmber, 1937, Mr. L. Y. Andrews, the district commissioner of Galilee, was shot dead outside the Anglican Church in Nazareth, when on his way to attend divine service.
The Palestine government took repressive action, and on 1st October, 1937, the Arab Higher Committee was declared unlawful. Three members of the Committee were arrested and deported to the Seychelles. The mufti, apparently in view of his religious position, was not apprchended, but ten days later he escaped to Lebanon, where he set up his headquarters.
Disorders recommenced all over the country in the second half of October 1937, and lasted for a year and a half, The rebellion reached its peak during the summer and autumn of 1938, while the Munich crisis in Furope was threatening another world war.
As soon as the Munich crisis was past, measures of repression were tightened. Additional British troops were made available, and operations against gangs in the hills were undertaken. The general sirike, which had paralysed the towns for six months during 1936, was not repeated. All the fighting during the period from October 1937 to the spring of 1939 was done by the villagers, the urban population taking no actual part in the hostilities. The gangs would intercept vehicles on the roads, fire upon road convoys, sabotage the railways, cut telephone lines and attack police posts. Troops would drive to the scene of such incidents, sometimes arriving in time to engage the gang and at other times finding that the attackers had already vanished. Even where troops succeeded in engaging a gang, the action would normally be broken off at dusk, when the troops returned to their stations, The principal difficully encountered in dealing with the gangs, however, was due to the enthusiastic support which they received from the villages. The peasants not only acted as intelligence agents for the rebels, but they also har-
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boured and concealed them when pursued and, above all, kept them supplied with food.
In April 1939, a number of rebel gangs crossed into Trans-Jordan. The rebellion was obviously petering out under the pressure of the British troops in Palestine. It was hoped that, if rcbellion could be started in Trans-Jordan also, the Arab Legion would be unable to deal with it and that British troops would be sent across the Jordan, thereby easing the pressure on the Palestine rebels.
In fact, however, the Arab Legion made short work of the gangs in Trans-Jordan, Within a month, conditions had returned to normal. There were two reasons for the success of the Arab Legion. The first and most important was that the villagers in Trans-Jordan were loyal to their government and had no complaints or grievances. Instead of acting as intelligence agents for the rebels, they sent information regarding rebel movements to the government. They occasionally supplied meals to the terrorists, partly from fear of violence and partly owing to Arab standards of hospitality, but they did so without enthusiasm. The second reason for the success of the Arab Legion operations was that the troops did not brealk off the action and go home in the evening. They followed the gangs day and night, over the hills, through woods, down ravines and across the mountains of Gilead. If the gang stopped to cook a meal or rest in a village, the troops were on their heels - they had 1o leave their meal or jump up from their sleep and move on once more. But the key to guerilla operations or gang warfare is the sympathy of the civil population.
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I have fully described the fighting in Palestine elsewhere,1 and will make no attempt to give an account of it here. Suffice it to say that the Arab League, in December 1947, sent into Palestine a ragged force of volunteers from Syria, which it called the Liberation Army. It was without supplies, without training, without organization and without discipline. The headquarters of the Arab League being in Cairo, and Abdul Rahman Pasha Azzam, an Egyptian, being the permanent secretary-general, the actions of the League at this time were very nearly those of Egypt.
The Jews had foreseen, ever since the Arab rebellion of 1936, that the ultimate issue would be decided by force. During the Second World War, a Jewish brigade had been formed and had been trained by the British. It went into Europe and fought in the final stages of the Italian campaign. It had therefore obviously been trained to a level of efficiency comparable to that of European armies. In addition, when it was thought that the Germans might occupy Palestine, other Jews had been trained by the British in guerilla tactics. Many thousands of Jews who had served as officers or soldiers in different armies during the Second World War had arrived in Palestine by 1948. With this material, the Jews had built up the Hagana, or defence army, into reasonable troops. In addition, great quantitics of arms had been smuggled into the country or stolen from the British army, and large secret arsenals of weapons were located underground in the Jewish colonies.
The Arab League, however, had not troubled to inquire regarding Jewish strength or dispositions, or they could scarcely have imagined that a few untrained amateur bandits from Syria would suffice to defeat the Jewish army.
The Army of Liberation did immense harm to the cause of the Arabs in Palestine. It was incapable of inflicting any harm on the Jews, but it provided a pretext under which Jewish forces were able to invade a large and vital area of territory, which was allotted to the Arabs under the partition plan. This area was that connecting Jerusalem to the coastal plain, The Hagana occupied the whole of this area before the end of the British mandate, in order to keep open the road to Jerusalem, which the Army of Liberation and some Arab guerillas were attempting to cut, The partition plan had left the Jewish state in the coastal plain, and had given the whole range of the Samarian and Judaean moun-
* See A Soldier with the Arabs
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tains to the Arabs, a reasonable arrangement from the defence point of view. When, however, the Hagana occupiced the country right up to and including Jerusalem, the Jewish forces thereby reached the crest of the mountains. Thus the futile operations of the Army of Liberation gave away the greatest military asset which the Arabs possessed - the continuous face of the mountains facing west.
The various Arab armies entered Palestine on 15th May, 1948, and the British army withdrew to Haifa and commenced embarkation. The Jordan army, the Arab Legion, entered the arca alloted to the Arabs in Judea and Samaria. The Egyptians advanced through Gaza and Beersheba. The Syrians were repulsed on the border, and made little further move. The Lebanese, who had only about one thousand men, moved unopposed into Arab Galilee. The Iraqis, who at first brought only one armoured-car regiment and one battalion, failed to cross the Jordan opposite Beisan, and eventually moved up beside the Arab Legion at Nablus.
When, at the end of a month's fighting, a truce was arranged under the auspices of the United Nations, the Arabs were in a strong position. Had they immediately offered to negotiate through the United Nations, they would probably have secured better terms. But with incredible folly, at the end of four weeks' truce, the Arab League, led by Egypt, decided to renew hostilities. The decision was taken by the politicians, who rarely if ever consulted the soldiers. During the previous month's fighting, the press of the Arab countries had created a world of fantasy by daily reporting an unbroken succession of victories. As a result, the public, especially in Egypt, were surprised and annoyed at the conclusion of the armistice, when every day the press was describing more and more glorious successes. The politicians were criticized for agreeing to the truce, and accordingly decided to terminate it, regardless of whether such a course would, or would not, lead to ultimate victory. In reality, the month's truce provided exactly the breathing space which the Israelis required. They were able to reorganize and plan, and to conclude an agreement with the Iron Curtain countries for the supply of aircraft and warlike stores. The United Nations, it is true, had issued a ban on the supply of weapons to either side, and Russia and her satellites were members, but the fact did not prevent them from giving all possible assistance to Israel. It is interesting to remember this, in view of the fact that Russia has since performed a volte face, and now claims to be the champion of the Arabs. The second period of the fighting proved incontrovertibly that the Arabs had shot their bolt. There was still no co-operation whatever between them, and no common plan had ever been discussd. On the central front, the Israelis captured Lydda and Ramle, which the numbers of the Arab Legion were inadequate to defend.
In the previous pages, I have ventured to record many criticisms of the American and British governments and of the Zionists. To obtain a balanced picture, it is essential to discuss also the conduct of the Arab case. For the first twenty years or thereabouts, the defence of the Pales- tine Arab cause was conducted by themselves, under the leadership of the mufti, Haj Ameen al Husaini, His policy was characterized by an
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intense narrowness and by an utter refusal to compromise. He took the view that the mass immigration of Jews to Palestine, contrary to the wishes of the majority of its inhabitants, was unjust. The claim that, nearly two thousand years ago, the country had belonged to the Jews had, for its Arab inhabitants, no more validity than if the Americans were today to attempt to seize England, on the grounds that their ancestors had once migrated from there.
Even, however, if we admit that there was justice in his claim, we are obliged to recognize that his methods were lamentable. He was un- aware that politics is the scicnce of what is possible. Purely abstract justice is rarely obtainable in this imperfect world, and we must needs make do with what justice we can obtain. Several opportunities for com- promise presented themselves during the first twenly years, but all were utterly rejected, on the grounds that no Jewish immigrants at all should have been allowed to enter Palestine without the consent of its people. Had the Mufti been a more practical politician, there is at least a possi- bility that catastrophe might have been avoided.
In the 1930s, Arab terrorists operated in Palestine on a considerable scale, particularly against other Arabs, accused of lack of patriotism. This is a development to which modern race fanaticisms seem pecu- liarly liable. Terrorists often kill more of their own compatriots, who are allegedly lukewarm in the cause, than they do of the "foreign enemy". The activities of the terrorists tended to discredit the Mufti's leader- ship in Palestine. Had he been a patriot with high moral standards, it would have been difficult to resist a demand for his return to Palestine after the Second World War. The majority of the Palestinians were sick of terrorism and insecurity and longed for law and order, stable adminis- tration and settled government. After the fighting with Israel, the Pales- tinians themselves opted for unification with Jordan.
During the Palestine rebellion, which lasted from 1936 to 1939, the Arab states began to play an increasing role in the Palestine situation. At first the influence of Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Jordan was exercised in favour of moderation. After the Second World War, however, and with the formation of the Arab League, Egypt assumed the leadership. She, supported by Syria newly freed from French control, adopted the un- compromising extremism of the mufti, and thereby plunged the country into the fighting of 1948. After the resulting catastrophe, the Arab League accepted the 1947 partition plan, which it could originally have obtained without fighting. Not only so, but if the Arab League led by Egypt had seriously contested the 1947 partition in the United Nations, demanding specific modifications, a considerable rectification of that plan in their favour might well have been obtained by peaceful means. Another aspect of the refusal to compromise is the practice of a con- tinual harping on past grievances. In my opinion, a flagrant injustice occurred in Palestine, but the negative attitude of constant complaint is
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not productive of any positive policy. The Russians have been the principal profiteers from Arab rancour, which they have done their best to inflame and to exploit. By this means, they have insinuated them- selves into the Middle Fast and brought Egypt and Syria under their influence, To forgive and forget past injustices is sometimes not only virtuous but wise.