By December 20, 2017 Read More →

October 13, 1933 Arab General Strike

Arab Riots in Jerusalem 1948The Arab Press, already virulent enough, became steadily more inflammatory.  A new Press Ordinance was enacted under which newspapers publishing matter “likely to endanger the public peace” could be suspended with or without warning; but a number of warnings addressed to certain newspapers had little, if any, effect, and none was actually suspended in 1933.  By the early autumn such crude charges against the Palestine Government were being printed as that it was deliberately “flooding the country Jews with the object of displacing Arabs from the land and depriving them of their employment” or that “a mass immigration of Jews was being allowed and encouraged by Government so that when the Legislative Council was introduced the Jews would be in a majority.”  In August, the flames were fanned by the proceedings of the Zionist Congress at Prague – which demanded, with special reference to events in Germany, that the Jewish National Home should by “built as speedily as possible and on the largest scale” – and by reports that as many as 10,000 “illegal immigrants” had recently secured a footing in the country.  At a Moslem festival early in September the President of the Arab Executive, Musa Kazem Pasha el Husseini, made a violent speech against Jewish immigration and telegraphed to the High Commissioner demanding its immediate stoppage.  Further serious agitation followed, and public meetings were organized not only by the Isitqlal Party and the Moslem Young Men’s Association, but also by the Moslem-Christian Association: for Moslem and Christian Arabs were once more sinking their differences in the common cause.

Finally, early in October, the Arab Executive, whose members had been bitterly criticized in the Arab newspapers for their apathy and inertia, announced that a “general strike” would be declared on the 13th October and a demonstration made at the Government Offices at Jerusalem.  Despite the Government’s prohibition, the demonstration was attempted on the appointed date, and the angry mob was only dispersed after repeated baton charges by the police. In the course of the next few weeks the trouble spread to other parts of Palestine.

Source:  70, p. 83-84.

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