Speech #800156793

That joint resolution represented the considered conclusion of the Congress at that time. immediately following the First World War. and has represented the policy of every President before and since that time. beginning with President Wilson. who earlier had issued a statement not only in favor of a Jewish national home. but also in favor of a Jewish commonwealth. This resolution was the next waymark. followed by the treaty between the United States and Great Britain in 1924. signed on December 3. 1924. and proclaimed by President Coolidge on December 5. 1924. as ift effect being a convention between the United States and Great Britain as to our endorsement of this policy regarding Palestine and the obligation into which we mutually entered. that the Balfour declaration and the mandate of the League of Nations to Great Britain for the handling of Palestine should be carried out. Among other things was the provision in article 6 of this convention. as carried over from the mandate: The administration of PalestineAnd this is very significant in the construction of the languagewhile insuring that the rights and position of other sections of the population are not prejudicedIn other words. the Arabs and the Christians were not to be prejudicedshall facilitate Jewish immigration under suitable conditions and shall encourage. in cooperation with the Jewish agency referred to in article 4That is. the Zionist Agencyclose settlement by Jews on the land. including state lands and wastelands not required for public purposes. Subsequently. in article 24. it was provided that there should be no change in the terms of this mandate without the approval of the Council of the League of Nations and without the approval of the Government of the United States. Following that. after a series of terroristic tactics during the period of the thirties. when the Jewish development at Palestine had far exceeded the bounds that anyone had apparently anticipated. as the 75.000 Jews in Palestine in 1920 had grown to the 600.000 that were found there at the end of 1940. and as vast developments had been carried outthe desert had literally been made to blossom as the rose. vineyards and orchards had been established. great irrigation projects had been carried out. and Palestine was well on its way to realize the dream of the disciples of Zion that it should be the homelandthen duringthe thirties. terroristic tactics by the Arabs. underthe leadership of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. finally caused the British Government to pause. and finally bend its knee in abject surrender. under the socalled white paper of 1939 which was issued by the Chamberlain government in May 1939. as a statement of policy. That is embodied in full in this document. I shall quote from the last 10 lines which. it seems to me. have a very pertinent bearing. as this was the paper which terminated Jewish immigration. which pronounced that this land would be indefinitely the property of the Arabs. with the Jews left there. as a result. a rather hopeless minority. Instead of with the great vision they had had. namely. of having a homeland of their own. The authors of the British white paper saidand I quote from page 29: In looking to the future.