Yehoshua Porath – författare

First Published in 1986. The Arab League, founded in 1945, was regarded by many as a ploy of the British to secure the cooperation and goodwill of the Arabs during the Second World War and as an instrument to ensure the British presence in the Middle East after the war. This book presents a different picture. The British policy was a far cry from supporting the Arab unity movement. On the contrary, the British Government tried to forestall that movement or, at least, to postpone its implementation until after the end of the Second World War. Anthony Eden's famous Mansion House speech of May 1941 was not intended to signal a drastic change in the British Middle Eastern policy, but rather to fore­ stall a strongly pro-Zionist proposal which had been put forward by Winston Churchill. It is true that there were some British personalities (mainly unofficial) who supported the Arab unity trend, but the thrust of their positive argument was that a broader framework of Arab federation would be instrumental in helping to solve the intractable problem of Palestine. What might surprise some readers is the fact that some highly important Zionist leaders were the main protagonists of that idea, believing that if the Arabs were to obtain satisfaction of their national aspirations through unity they {the Arabs) would adopt a much more moderate attitude towards the Zionist movement in Palestine. The Arab leaders and rulers tried to bring about a higher degree of cooperation or even a federation of their countries, either for dynastic or political reasons. But the British negative reaction was not always crystal clear, owing to the more favourable attitude typical of many, including the top, British representatives in the Middle East.

The resurgence of Palestinian nationalism in the wake of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war tended to overshadow the fact that Palestinian national consciousness is not a new phenomenon, but traces its origins back to the time when the first stirrings of nationalism were being felt in many parts of the under-developed world. This work, first published in 1974, is based on both Arabic and Hebrew primary sources as well as English and French official and unofficial documents, and was the first detailed study of the infancy period of Palestinian nationalism. The book begins by establishing the position of Palestine and Jerusalem in Islamic history and their significance within the concepts of Islam, and outlines the social and political features of the Palestinian population at the beginning of the First World War. The author then charts in detail the development of Palestinian nationalism over the decade after the War. Two major forces influenced this development and reacted with it: Zionism, with its ambitious schemes for settling Jews in Palestine and creating a National Home for them there, and Arab nationalism on a wider scale, which was emerging spontaneously with the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire and the spreading of ideas of self-determination. The growing threat posed by Zionism awoke the Palestinian population to the need for organization and the establishment of their own identity to oppose it, while the focus of their national aspirations widened or narrowed according to the ability which they felt at any given time to confront Zionism and achieve self-expression within a Palestinian rather than an all-Syrian national framework. The events of these turbulent years – the confrontations with the British, delegations, boycotts, proposals and rejections, the emergence of al-Hajj Amin al-Husayni, the Wailing Wall conflict and its repercussions – are all described within the context of these wider considerations, which also include Britain’s own role as holder of the Mandate over Palestine.

The resurgence of Palestinian nationalism in the wake of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war tended to overshadow the fact that Palestinian national consciousness is not a new phenomenon, but traces its origins back to the time when the first stirrings of nationalism were being felt in many parts of the under-developed world. This work, first published in 1974, is based on both Arabic and Hebrew primary sources as well as English and French official and unofficial documents, and was the first detailed study of the infancy period of Palestinian nationalism. The book begins by establishing the position of Palestine and Jerusalem in Islamic history and their significance within the concepts of Islam, and outlines the social and political features of the Palestinian population at the beginning of the First World War. The author then charts in detail the development of Palestinian nationalism over the decade after the War. Two major forces influenced this development and reacted with it: Zionism, with its ambitious schemes for settling Jews in Palestine and creating a National Home for them there, and Arab nationalism on a wider scale, which was emerging spontaneously with the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire and the spreading of ideas of self-determination. The growing threat posed by Zionism awoke the Palestinian population to the need for organization and the establishment of their own identity to oppose it, while the focus of their national aspirations widened or narrowed according to the ability which they felt at any given time to confront Zionism and achieve self-expression within a Palestinian rather than an all-Syrian national framework. The events of these turbulent years – the confrontations with the British, delegations, boycotts, proposals and rejections, the emergence of al-Hajj Amin al-Husayni, the Wailing Wall conflict and its repercussions – are all described within the context of these wider considerations, which also include Britain’s own role as holder of the Mandate over Palestine.

This book, first published in 1977, continues the author’s study of the Palestinian National Movement from the first volume, The Emergence of the Palestinian-Arab National Movement, 1918-1929. Based on Arab, Jewish and British archival and secondary sources, it examines in exhaustive detail the events in the crucial decade leading up to the Second World War.