The British authorities rejected this proposal; according to the Minutes of the Ninth Session of the League of Nations' Permanent Mandates Commission: Colonel Symes explained that the country was described as "Palestine" by Europeans and as "Falestin" by the Arabs.

[23] The first High Commissioner, Sir Herbert Samuel, a Zionist and a recent British cabinet minister, arrived in Palestine on 20 June 1920 to take up his appointment from 1 July.

Samuel established his headquarters and official residence in part of the Augusta Victoria Hospital complex on Mount Scopus on what was then the northeastern edge of Jerusalem, a building that had been constructed for the Germans circa 1910.

[26] When Kamil al-Husayni, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, died in March 1921, High Commissioner Samuel appointed his half-brother, Mohammad Amin al-Husseini, to the position.

The two main Jewish leaders, Chaim Weizmann and David Ben-Gurion, had convinced the Zionist Congress to equivocally approve the Peel recommendations as a basis for more negotiation.

In 1942, there was a period of great concern for the Yishuv, when the German forces of General Erwin Rommel advanced east across North Africa towards the Suez Canal, raising a fear that they would conquer Palestine.

This event was the direct cause for the founding, with British support, of the Palmach[60] – a highly trained regular unit belonging to Haganah (a paramilitary group composed mostly of reserves).

Meanwhile, Palestinian sources "were not eager to glorify the names of those who cooperated with Britain not so many years after the British put down the Arab Revolt of 1936-1939, and thereby indirectly helped the Jews establish a state.

From the Palestine Regiment, two platoons, one Jewish, under the command of Brigadier Ernest Benjamin, and another Arab, were sent to join Allied forces on the Italian Front, having taken part in the final offensive there.

The Second World War and the Holocaust started shortly thereafter and once the 15,000 annual quota was exceeded, Jews fleeing Nazi persecution were interned in detention camps or deported to places such as Mauritius.

Despite the pressure of world opinion, in particular the repeated requests of the U.S. President, Harry S. Truman, and the recommendations of the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry that 100,000 Jews be immediately granted entry to Palestine, the British maintained the ban on immigration.

After the assassination of Lord Moyne, the Haganah kidnapped, interrogated, and turned over to the British many members of the Irgun ("The Hunting Season"), and the Jewish Agency Executive decided on a series of measures against "terrorist organisations" in Palestine.

Seven members (Canada, Czechoslovakia, Guatemala, Netherlands, Peru, Sweden, and Uruguay) recommended the creation of independent Arab and Jewish states, with Jerusalem to be placed under international administration.

On that same day, the British garrison in Jerusalem withdrew, and the last High Commissioner, General Sir Alan Cunningham, left the city for Haifa, where he was to leave the country by sea.

[109] Around 4,500 Transjordanian troops, commanded partly by 38 British officers who had resigned their commissions in the British Army only weeks earlier, including overall commander, General John Bagot Glubb, entered the corpus separatum region encompassing Jerusalem and its environs (in response to the Haganah's Operation Kilshon)[110] and moved into areas designated as part of the Arab state by the UN partition plan.

With the end of the Mandate, the remaining British troops in Israel were concentrated in an enclave in the Haifa port area, through which they were being withdrawn, and at RAF Ramat David, which was maintained to cover the withdrawal.

[114] Article 62 (LXII) of the Treaty of Berlin, signed on 13 July 1878,[115] dealt with religious freedom and civil and political rights in all parts of the Ottoman Empire.

Difference of religion could not be alleged against any person as a ground for exclusion or incapacity in matters relating to the enjoyment of civil or political rights, admission to public employments, functions, and honours, or the exercise of the various professions and industries, "in any locality whatsoever".

In 1947, the Foreign Secretary, Ernest Bevin, admitted that, during the previous twenty-five years, the British had done their best to further the legitimate aspirations of the Jewish communities without prejudicing the interests of the Arabs, but had failed to "secure the development of self-governing institutions" in accordance with the terms of the Mandate.

On the Husseini-Nashashibi rivalry, an editorial in the Arabic-language Falastin newspaper in the 1920s commented:[131] The spirit of factionalism has penetrated most levels of society; one can see it among journalists, trainees, and the rank and file.

[136] The British authorities' attitude towards Palestinian press was initially tolerant, given they had assessed that their impact on public life was minimal, but restrictive measures were soon increasingly introduced.

After the outbreak of World War II, emergency laws were enacted and the British closed almost all the newspapers, with the exception of Falastin and Al-Difa, due to the moderation of their tone and the publishing of censored news.

Nahum Sokolow, History of Zionism[146]One of the objectives of British administration was to give effect to the Balfour Declaration, which was also set out in the preamble of the mandate, as follows: Whereas the Principal Allied Powers have also agreed that the Mandatory should be responsible for putting into effect the declaration originally made on November 2nd, 1917, by the Government of His Britannic Majesty, and adopted by the said Powers, in favour of the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing should be done which might prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.

[149] In March 1930, Lord Passfield, the Secretary of State for the Colonies, had written a Cabinet Paper[150] which said: In the Balfour Declaration there is no suggestion that the Jews should be accorded a special or favoured position in Palestine as compared with the Arab inhabitants of the country, or that the claims of Palestinians to enjoy self-government (subject to the rendering of administrative advice and assistance by a Mandatory as foreshadowed in Article XXII of the Covenant) should be curtailed in order to facilitate the establishment in Palestine of a National Home for the Jewish people."

The two main Jewish leaders, Chaim Weizmann and David Ben-Gurion, had convinced the Zionist Congress to approve equivocally the Peel recommendations as a basis for more negotiation.

The Consul said that the Emir Abdullah urged acceptance on the ground that realities must be faced, but wanted modification of the proposed boundaries and Arab administrations in the neutral enclave.

[153] A collection of private correspondence published by David Ben Gurion contained a letter written in 1937 which explained that he was in favour of partition because he did not envision a partial Jewish state as the end of the process.

The Arabs had also increased their numbers rapidly, mainly as a result of the cessation of the military conscription imposed on the country by the Ottoman Empire, the campaign against malaria and a general improvement in health services.

In the recognition of this enemy and of the common struggle against it lies the firm foundation of the natural alliance that exists between the National Socialist Greater Germany and the freedom-loving Muslims of the whole world.

The elimination of the socalled Jewish national home and the liberation of all Arab countries from the oppression and exploitation of the Western powers is an unchangeable part of the Great German Reich policy.