MIDDLE EAST: The Forgotten

MIDDLE EAST The ForgottenProminent Americans, led by former Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau Jr. and Vice President Alben Barkley, busied themselves last week trying to sell a $500 million Israeli bond issue in the U.S. Israel, it was pointed out. is taking in some 6,000 refugees a week, and needs help badly. Nothing was said, however, about the people who became refugees as a result of Israel’s birth—the 880,000 Palestinian Arabs uprooted by the Arab-Israeli war.* In December 1948, a U.N. resolution suggested that Israel take them back, but up to now Israel has successfully dodged the issue.

Today the Arabs are scattered in miserable camps from Egypt to Lebanon. The rest of the world has not behaved much more generously than the Israelis: in three years, U.N. contributed $74,922,541 for their upkeep (of which $43,450,000 came from the U.S.), barely enough to keep them alive. Private charity in the U.S. has raised a mere $8,000,000 to help them.t

Bitter Motto. The refugees huddle in leaky tents, dress in tatters, live on dates and flour. Their children run wild; the camps are periodically menaced by smallpox, dysentery, typhoid. The Arab refugees’ bitter motto: “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

In this frame of mind, they are easy victims of the West’s worst enemies in the Middle East: Jerusalem’s scheming Grand Mufti and the Communists. For some time the Reds and the Muftimen have been working together, each side thinking it could use the other’s propaganda talents. The Mufti’s influence was generally considered stronger (most Arabs deeply distrust Communism because of its atheistic teachings). But recently the Communists have scared the Mufti—and startled Western observers—with a surprising show of strength.

Secret Deal.’For some time, the Mufti’s representatives had been engaged in secret negotiations with U.N. Relief Boss John Blandford, a former high-bracket Washington bureaucrat. The Mufti agreed to Blandford’s proposal that the refugees be moved into Syria and resettled there. The Communists got wind of this and passed the word along to the refugees, charging that the Mufti was selling them out. A fortnight ago, despite protests from Mufti agents, they called a demonstration at Ein El Helwi camp on the Israeli border.

Organizer Saleem Abou el Naage, a handsome, sullen young man who had served a jail term for Red activities, shouted: “Every day there’s a new story we’ll be moved to Libya, or the Sinai desert or Syria or Jordan . . . Tell the Arab and foreign governments we’ll never go! There’s not enough dollars to make us forget our dearest Palestine. Here we live in a tent, fit for four chickens, not twelve people. Have you ever heard of such a camp in Russia or Communist countries? We are not Communists. We are Moslems. But we want the Western governments to know that if there is war, we will attack them from behind . . . Tell Truman and Attlee we’ll go back to our own country with God’s help!” The crowd roared agreement.

Swift Reversal. Last week, suddenly aware that the Communists were gaining followers at his expense, the Mufti swiftly reversed ground. His smart propagandist, Emile el Hourey, a Lebanese Christian, dashed back from vacation, had the Mufti cable all Lebanon camps denying that he had agreed to their transfer.

The incident ought to disturb not only the West’s conscience but its self-interest: 880,000 embittered Arabs, neglected by the West, are fast becoming its enemy.

-The Arabs, who lost their land to the Israelis, last week got it back—symbolically. Reviving the ancient tradition of shemittah, or sabbatical year (“And six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof: But the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still”— Exodus, 23:10-11), Israeli rabbis turned over all the Jewish land to an Arab for the new Jewish year which starts Oct. 1. The land transfer has no legal standing.

*By comparison, the U.S. Community Chest in 1950 got $168 million, the United Jewish Appeal in the same year $89,008,929.