With the McMahon correspondence between the Arabs and the British, Britain’s government supported the establishment of an independent Arab state, a completely contradictory promise by the Balfour Declaration were the British promised to support the creation of a Jewish home in Palestine. Despite all of these promises and the purpose set by the League of Nations, the British mandate was trying to establish two things, the building of a Jewish national homeland and the preparation of the population for a self-government nation.
Throughout the region, Arabs were angered by Britain’s failure to fulfill its promise to create an independent Arab state and instead support the national Jewish homeland in Palestine. This situation caused some Arabs to oppose to the British mandate causing trouble between the British, Arabs and Jews in the region, trouble that got out of the hands of the British government. Every time the British tried to create a new compromise, both sides would reject it because it was either too little or too much for one party or the other, resulting in violent waves, making the state much more unstable.
As the years went by the British were unable to keep order, they relied on Royal Commissions to solve problems in Palestine. The first White Paper was issued by Winston Churchill stating that a national home did not mean making all of Palestine into a Jewish nation and that Jewish immigration would be regulated. From this day, every new gave of Jewish immigration resulted in riots and each beginning of violence resulted in an investigation by the Royal Commission, requested by the British to try to figure out what was going wrong.
The Essay on Long Term Causes of the Israeli-Palestine conflict
... British also argued that they had stated that areas that were not purely Arab would not be included in an Arab state. As Palestine had a Jewish ... was President of the World Zionist Organization. The paper doesn’t promise a state, but that is how it was interpreted by the ...
A total of five Royal Commissions occurred throughout the Mandate and all of them said that the guidelines set up by the British were all contradictory with one another. With every bad thing there must be a good one. Throughout the Mandate the economy of Palestine grew and an increase in the standard of living was seen. Jews that migrated into Palestine were mostly wealthy and as they kept coming into the region the more they would invest in buying land from the Arabs. It is estimated that about one-third of the population was Jewish and yet they were responsible for about 80% of the economic productivity.
The Jews brought modern European manufacturing and farming methods while the Arabs were just primarily involved in traditional agriculture. If the British mandate wouldn’t have supported the idea of a Jewish national homeland en Palestine, Palestine’s economy wouldn’t have grown as much as it did compared to its Arabs neighbors economy. The British Mandate was like a roller coaster for Britain, with ups but mostly downs. Within the Mandate the British were unable to keep its promises with the Jews and Arabs.
They were unable to maintain control in the region between the two parties and depended on the Royal Commissions advice. Despite all of these, it is important to recognize that Britain helped with the economic growth of Palestine, if they hadn’t allowed Jewish immigration this growth would have not been possible. Britain’s main purposes with the mandate in Palestine were not accomplished; Britain ended up stepping out and left these two people to fight amongst each other and to figure everything out on their own, it seemed that in the end the British gained enemies instead of allies with the Jews and Arabs.
