{"id":210735,"date":"1947-06-16T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-03-12T20:03:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/?p=210735"},"modified":"2019-03-12T20:03:18","modified_gmt":"2019-03-12T20:03:18","slug":"auto-insert-210735","status":"publish","type":"document","link":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/document\/auto-insert-210735\/","title":{"rendered":"Testimony from representatives of the Palestinian Government -Special Committee on Palestine ( UNSCOP) 6th Meeting – Verbatim Record"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON PALESTINE<\/p><\/div>\n
VERBATIM RECORD OF THE SIXTH MEETING (PRIVATE)<\/p><\/div>\n
Held at the Y.M.C.A. Building, Jerusalem<\/p><\/div>\n
Monday, 16 June 1947, at 4:00 p.m.<\/p><\/div>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
| <\/p>\n PRESENT:<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| <\/td>\n | \n CHAIRMAN:<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Mr. Sandstrom<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Sweden<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| <\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | \n Mr. Hood<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Australia<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| <\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | \n Mr. Rand<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Canada<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| <\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | \n Mr. Lisicky<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Czechoslovakia<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| <\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | \n Mr. Garcia Granados<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Guatemala<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| <\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | \n Mr. Abdur Rahman<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n India<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| <\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | \n Mr. Entezam<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Iran<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| <\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | \n Mr. Blom<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Netherlands<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| <\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | \n Mr. Garcia Salazar<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Peru<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| <\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | \n Mr. Fabregat<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Uruguay<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| <\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | \n Mr. Brilej<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Yugoslavia<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| <\/td>\n | \n SECRETARIAT:<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Mr. Hoo<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Assistant Secretary-General<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| \n<\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | \n Mr. Garcia Robles<\/p>\n<\/td>\n | \n Secretary<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n <\/p>\n \n The Chairman called the meeting to order at 4:00 p.m.<\/p><\/div>\n \n Hearing of the Representatives of the Palestine Government.<\/u><\/p><\/div>\n The Chairman introduced the Chief Secretary of the Palestine Government, Sir Henry Gurney, and Mr. D.C. MacGillivray, and invited them to be seated. The Chairman said that the intention of the meeting was to seek further information concerning the material presented in A Survey of Palestine<\/i>, and he asked Sir Henry Gurney to give an outline of the administration of Palestine.<\/p><\/div>\n Sir Henry Gurney, after welcoming the members of the Committee, described how the administration of Palestine was constituted and drew the Committee’s attention to the distinction made in the text of the Mandate between the United Kingdom Government, the Mandatory Power, and the administration of Palestine, the latter being constituted by the Palestine Order in Council of 1922.<\/p><\/div>\n Sir Henry Gurney then referred briefly to the main provisions of the Order in Council of 1922, making special reference to the Legislative Council, the Courts, including the military tribunals, the structure of the Government, the administrative areas into which the country is divided, and produced maps to illustrate the administrative divisions of Palestine.<\/p><\/div>\n Members of the Committee then sought information from Sir Henry Gurney and Mr. MacGillivray on points arising from the Chief Secretary’s statement and on other aspects of the Palestine Administration.<\/p><\/div>\n Discussion opened on the position of Gaza which Sir Henry Gurney had described as almost entirely an Arab district.<\/p><\/div>\n In accordance with the request of members of the Committee for a full record of the information obtained, the questions and answers during this part of the meeting are reproduced for the most part in extens<\/i>o <\/i>as follows:<\/p><\/div>\n MR. GARCIA GRANADOS (Guatemala): What is the population?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: The district population is given on Page 13 of the Supplementary Volume under Gaza District. Gaza Sub-district has a settled population of 150,000, but in addition, there are some 90,000 nomad Bedouins,<\/p><\/div>\n MR. GARCIA GRANADOS (Guatemala): .What is the extent of the district in square miles? How large is it?<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MACGILLIVRAY: 13,689 square kilometres:<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: What is considered to be the Negeb?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: The Negeb is not an administrative area. There are differences of view as to what the Negeb precisely is. The word Negeb simply means “south”.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. GARCIA GRANADOS (Guatemala): Is this population contained within both Negeb and Gaza?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Yes.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. GARCIA GRANADOS (Guatemala): So the 13,689 square kilometres refers to Gaza and Negeb?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR, HENRY. GURNEY: That is the Gaza District, including Negeb. But the northern boundary is not determined by any legal instrument and is very often a matter of opinion.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. GARCIA GRANADOS (Guatemala): Do you know if the population is concentrated in the northern part, or is there a population in the southern part of Negeb?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: No, there is no population in the southern part.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. GARCIA GRANADOS (Guatemala): So Negeb is more or less deserted.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Yes.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MACGILLIVRAY: The Gaza District is divided into two sub-districts, the Gaza Sub-district end the Beersheba Sub-district. The Gaza Sub-district is shown on the map along the coast. It runs el on the coastal belt. The population of that Sub-district is rill-lost entirely settled end amounts to about 150,000. The population of the Beersheba Sub-district is predominantly Bedouin and amounts to about 90,000 Bedouins and 7,000 settled inhabitants. Most of the settled population are in the town of Beersheba. The density of the Beersheba Sub-district ranges from 1 per square kilometre in the south, to 30 per square kilometre in the northwest. The bulk of the population is in the northwest.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. LISICKY (Czechoslovakia): In the Gaza Sub-district, what is the density?<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MACGILLIVRAY: I am afraid I do not have those figures. <\/p><\/div>\n MR. LISICKY (Czechoslovakia): But it is much more?<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MACGILLIVRAY: Very much more.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. RAND (Canada): Those details are contained in these volumes?<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MACGILLIVRAY: Yes. They are. The density, figures are not given in the Survey. I am afraid they have to be worked out from the figures of the population end the figures given elsewhere of the areas, but we shall provide the density figures in writing for each Sub-district.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: We might ask later that it be pointed out in a graphic way on a map. Do you think that is possible?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: There is another map, number 5, the population map, which does show the density of the population.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: When was this map drawn up?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: 1944, but there have been changes since.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: I see the number of nomads is given here as 60,000.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: You will find in the Survey a figure of 67,000 for nomads. The nomads are very difficult people to estimate accurately and we would prefer that the Committee take 90,000 rather than 67,000 for these Bedouin nomads.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MACGILLIVRAY: Now since 1931, and for purposes of official population, the figure of the census in 1931 has always been taken for the Bedouin population, but the preliminary results of a survey which was undertaken last year, or less than a year ago, showed that the Bedouin population has increased, and the figure we now put forward in the Beersheba Sub-district is 91,000.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: May I ask if the Sub-district is the lowest administrative unit?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Yes. There are sixteen Sub-districts. Galilee has five sub-districts, Gaza has two, Haifa has one. They are all shown on the map.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: And the head of the administration in the District is the District Commissioner?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Yes, he is assisted by an assistant District Commissioner and District Officers. The administrative staff consists of six district commissioners, three deputy district commissioners, 39 assistant district commissioners, 53 district officers. That is shown on Page 31 of the Estimates.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: What is the administrative organization in the Sub-district?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: The assistant district commissioner is in charge of the Sub-district and he has under him the district officers. The number depends upon the size of the population.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: Is there any kind of local self-government?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Yes. The local councils and the village councils are all listed in Volume I of the Survey, Page 130. There are a large number of municipal councils, local councils. All of these are local authorities exercising their powers, making rates, legislating. These are elected bodies insofer as they have been able to carry out elections, but in some cases where the local conditions have been so acute, end the disputes have been so violent that it has been impossible to create an elected body, then we have had to put in a commission. But these do represent the government’s attempt to build up autonomy.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: Who constitute the electoral body?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: You mean the voters?<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: Yes. Who votes in the elections?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Anybody who fulfills the requirements of the Municipal Corporations Ordinances, in the case of municipalities. In Tel Aviv and Fetah Tiqva, the only all-Jewish municipalities, all males and females over the age of 21, whether or not of Palestinian citizenship, are entitled to vote.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: Where is that in the Survey?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Page 132, Volume 1.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: Otherwise, Jews and Arabs take part in these elections in different cases? Is there a census or list of voters?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: There is a voters’ roll. Both Jews and Arabs are enrolled as voters. They both vote; there is no separate roll. They vote on a common roll for the ward.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MACGILLIVRAY: There are in fact only four mixed municipalities, mixed Arab and Jew. There are no mixed local councils or village councils. They are either all Arab or all Jew.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. LISICKY (Czechoslovakia): What are these mixed councils?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: The four mixed municipal councils are: Haifa, Jerusalem, Tiberia and Safad.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. BLOM (Netherlands): Who are considered as Jews?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: There is no legal definition of Jew. <\/p><\/div>\n MR. BLOM (Netherlands): If a Jewish woman is married to a non-Jew, is she considered Jewish or not, in the legal sense? <\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: I do not know. The word Jew is not defined in any law.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. RAND (Canada): What, for instance, would be the municipal jurisdiction, what matters would be looked after in the municipal council?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Roads, electricity, sanitation, education. <\/p><\/div>\n MR. LISICKY (Czechoslovakia): Local police?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: No.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. RAND (Canada): Well, it would have powers of taxation? <\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Building —<\/p><\/div>\n MR. RAND (Canada): And taxation for carrying out those services only?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Yes, very much so. The municipal budget for Jerusalem for the present year is over five hundred thousand pounds.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: In these mixed councils, I suppose that Jews and Arabs sit together in the council and work together?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Yes.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: And may I ask what the experience is as regards this collaboration?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Well, it is only in these four councils. <\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: Yes, I mean that,<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: In Haifa, I think you will see for yourself that it is working very well. In Jerusalem, the system broke down a few years ago because the Arab mayor died and there was a dispute over his successor. Ever since then, it has been impossible to obtain an elected council for Jerusalem. We have had to carry on with a commission.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR ABDUR RAHMAN (India): The Arab mayor?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: The chairman is called a mayor.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MACGILLIVRAY: He is called a. mayor of an elected council; of a municipal commission, he is called chairman.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: In the municipalities where there is only an Arab or a Jewish council, the opposite group of the population has a right to vote, I suppose?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Yes.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: So it means only that the majority uses its power to exclude Council members from the other side.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Well, there are no municipalities other than the four we have mentioned which have any appreciable minority. Gaza has no Jews. Jaffa has no Jews. Tel Aviv has no Arabs.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. LISICKY (Czechoslovakia): But for Jaffa, for instance, you will see that there is quite a large sector of Jewish population.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MACGILLIVRAY: That is the exception.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: The Jaffa administrative area includes two Jewish wards which border on Tel Aviv and which Tel Aviv, in fact, looks after. It is a very acute problem of long standing.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. LISICKY (Czechoslovakia): So really there are two Jewish wards of Jaffa administered by the municipality of Tel Aviv.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Certain services are provided for.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. ENTEZAM (Iran): I would like to ask the following question. With regard to the electoral laws under which elections are conducted by the population, are those laws promulgated by the population or by the government? There is, of course, a difference in the electoral procedure as between Arabs and Jews. For example, we know that in the case of Jews, men and women over twenty-one are allowed to vote. That is different, apparently, from the procedure for Arab elections. Now, how does that procedure become reconciled in mixed districts? Is one method used or another?<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MACGILLIVRAY: In answer to the first question, to whether the law is made by the local authorities or by government, it is made by the government, and these provisions are contained in schedules which are attached to the Municipal Corporations Ordinance of 1934.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: Is it in the Survey?<\/p><\/div>\n Mr. MCGILLIVRAY: The law is not quoted in the Survey. A reference to it is given.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: Where?<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MCGILLIVRAY: It is in the Volume of Laws for 1934, Municipal Corporations Ordinance. As to the second question, in the mixed municipalities, they do follow the same formula as in the Arab municipality.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. LISICKY (Czechoslovakia): Even for the Jews?<\/p><\/div>\n MCCGILLIVRAY: For the whole population.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. LISICKY (Czechoslovakia): There is equality.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MCGILLIVRAY: It is the same.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. GARCIA GRANADOS (Guatemala): Do women vote?<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MCGILLIVRAY: No, women do not vote, except in Tel Aviv and Fetah Tiqva.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: One more question. To what extent are Jews in the Government service? Are they used in the Government service, the Jews and Arabs?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Yes. The Government employs, altogether, 45,000. Of those, 67.5 per cent are Arabs, 20.7 are Jews, 9.7 are British, and 2.1 per cent classified as “other”. This is as of December 1945. The table giving details is on page 89 of the Supplementary Volume. The proportion of Arabs may appear higher. One of the reasons for that is that Jewish health and education services, although subsidized by the government, are staffed by people who are not government employees; whereas, in the education service, almost all Arab education is done by government offices. That is one of the reasons why the proportion of Arabs is higher than the proportion of Jews. But the earnings of the Jews are proportionately higher than the earnings of the Arabs because they tend to occupy more senior positions than the Arabs.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MCGILLIVRAY: As seen by the table on Page 89, the earnings of the Jews come to 24.4 per cent but if to the amount from which that figure has been calculated is added the grants made to the Jewish community for .education and for health, that figure would come up to 29.5 per cent of the total.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR ABDUR RAHMAN (India): Out of these employees who are Jews or Arabs, how many of them are in the higher posts? How many are district commissioners or higher? How many of these are Arabs; how many of these are Jews; how many of these are British? I am speaking of numbers. Are there any Arabs or Jews in the Advisory Council?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: No.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR ABDUR RAHMAN (India): Secretaries to the government? Are there any?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Yes.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR ABDUR RAHMAN (India): How many Jews? How many Arabs?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: We don’t work under the system of secretaries of the government. You will remember that the 1939 White Paper did charge the administration with bringing in Palestinians to occupy higher posts in the service. We have been constantly endeavouring to carry that out, but there are certain conditions here which do not arise elsewhere, because there are areas within the administration where you cannot post an Arab to a Jewish area, or a Jewish officer to an Arab area, and where you have a mixed area, you cannot have either and you have to have a British officer. That is one of the difficulties which has prevented us from having any Jew or Arab as district commissioner. We have two assistant district commissioners and two or three more coming along, we hope, very soon. There are a number acting as assistants.<\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: Are they Arabs or Jews?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: They are both Jews and Arabs.<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MCGILLIVRAY: Of the two, one is an Arab and one is a Jew; but there are quite a number of others who have been acting for some time, both Jews and Arabs. <\/p><\/div>\n CHAIRMAN: Otherwise, can one say, in general, whether the Jews or the Arabs are prevailing in the top ranks. <\/p><\/div>\n MR. MGGILLIVRAY: I think that some indication of that can be seen from the table on Page 90 of the Supplement which is headed Numbers and Emoluments of Government Officers, by Salary Scale and Community, December 1945. You take the courts, the judges.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR ABDUR RAHMAN (India): I am coming to courts later. There are a number of questions I wish to put in that connection, and I am trying to divide them. I am just trying to take the administration first.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: So far as the administration is concerned, we only have two assistant district commissioners.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR ABDUR RAHMAN (India): Out of how many?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Out of 39.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR ABDUR RAHMAN (India): I am just trying to find out how much the British Government has been able to do in the last thirty years. I am trying to find out from the results what has been done toward fulfilment of the Mandate given to the Mandatory Power.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Well the facts are all on Page 91. <\/p><\/div>\n SIR ABDUR RAHMAN (India): Would you mind telling me how many judges of the high court you have?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: We have one chief justice, seven judges, five presidents of district courts.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR ABDUR RAHMAN (India): I am only asking for the high courts.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: Seven superior court judges.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR ABDUR RAHMAN (India): Has there ever been a Palestinian as Chief Justice?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: No.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR ABDUR RAHMAN (India): How many judges, normally speaking, have been Palestinians out of these seven?<\/p><\/div>\n MR. MCGILLIVRAY: We had the figure a year ago. There were then four judges, of whom two were British and two Palestinians.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR ABDUR RAHMAN (India): There were only four out of these seven posts. Are they all filled up?<\/p><\/div>\n SIR HENRY GURNEY: No.<\/p><\/div>\n SIR ABDUR RAHMAN (India): How many are filled?<\/p><\/div>\n |