By April 27, 2008 Read More →

U.N. Issues Arms to Truce Guards, Associated Press, San Francisco Chronicle, June 19, 1948.

United Nations Secretary General Trygve LieClick here to view the original article.

LAKE SUCCESS, June 18 (AP)-The United Nations issued 38 caliber police revolvers today to 50 guards recruited for emergency duty in Palestine. It was the first time in U. N. history that the force carried weapons.

U. N. officials said Trygve Lie, U. N. secretary-general, purchased the revolvers from New York City police by special arrangement with the State Department.

The guards will carry the revolvers when they depart by plane to morrow for Cairo and the Middle East. The U. N. plans to ship ammunition separately for distribution if Count Folke Bernadotte, U. N. mediator in the Middle East, decides the guards should carry guns.

Bernadotte asked for the guards to help supervise the four weeks’ Holy Land truce.

(United Press said it was reported at Lake Success that the U. S. and Great Britain and some other nations are planning to propose to the Security Council that the truce be extended another month.)

(The proposal probably will be made a few days before the present truce expires July 9, it was said.

(Following that extension, it was understood they will press for still more time, until a permanent settlement between the Jews and Arabs is reached.

Many diplomats, including some Jews and some Arabs, were known to believe that the present cease-fire agreement has brought an end to the Holy Land war.

(If fighting resumes at all, they believe it will be on a small scale, chiefly of the guerrilla type involving Arab and Jewish extremists.)

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