___________________________________________________ Politics
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___________________________________________________ Palestine

Arab Factionalism and Social Disintegration, 1939-1948

Issa Khalaf
State University
of New York Press
History of the Middle East

Conclusion

The Reasons for the Disintegration of Palestinian Society with an Emphasis on the Persistence of Factionalism

The history of Palestine and the fate of its people cannot be fully understood without taking into account the multiplicity of internal and external variables that shaped and determined that small country's course. That course might even have been manageable had it taken a path similar to the other Arab, and indeed Third World, states: colonial domination, nationalism and decolonization, and the subsequent colonial legacy. But that was not to be. Anew factor, Zionism, that complicated the history of Palestine and the life of its people, came into the picture. At a time when the Palestinian Arabs, and Arabs generally, began to develop a national consciousness, another group of people began to colonize the country, animated by their own nationalist goals, which were based on a religious identity. Add to this Britain's nurturing of the Zionist movement (basically for imperial reasons), and the direct effects on Arab Palestine of its colonial policies, and one has an extremely complex mixture and interaction of factors that shaped the outcome of Palestinian politics and society during the mandate period.

When the British took over the mandate, they found a society that was already undergoing social, economic, and political changes. These changes had begun under Ottoman rule, accelerated by internal, regional, and international economic factors as well as by the impact of religious missions from the West. Too, the British found a strongly entrenched urban notable elite that had been, in the previous century, consolidating its power and privileges through a gradual process of land accumulation, a process made favorable by the Ottoman state's policies and, equally, its impotence. Finally, the British found a difficult agrarian situation, again perpetuated by the Ottoman state. The Arab agrarian economy, already based on highly unequal relationships between landowner and peasant, was being gradually subjected to socio-economic processes whose dy-

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namics were slowly having a dislocating effect on the rural social econ- omy and society.

The colonial state, not surprisingly, did not have much intention of changing the relationships it had encountered. These political and socio-economic relationships were characterized by regional, familial, local, and social divisions, shaped by the Ottoman millet system and administrative practices. The prevailing divisions were actually encouraged by the Ottoman state in its feeble efforts to control its empire through the deliberate perpetuation of traditional social organization. The central state's weak authority and reliance on local notables in turn reinforced that socio-political organization. Politics was carried out on a factional basis, under which the notables were secure in their roles as possessors of landed wealth and as intermediaries between state and society, a society over which they had influence but a state they were never allowed to control.

For the British not to have dealt with the local, traditional elite would of course have been foolish, not to mention the fact that, at the beginning of the mandate, there were no other leaders. But to insist on maintaining traditional social and political relationships throughout the mandate in the face of countervailing socio-economic change and the impact of Zionist colonization, was destructive, at least for the Palestinian Arabs.

And this change was inevitable. If nothing else, imperial intrerests dictated a communications infrastructure, including ports, harbors, roads, and airports. When the population rebelled, as the Palestinian Arabs frequently did, the colonial power took to building a security system, basically police stations and prisons. Too, much building had to be done to house the colonial government and its administrative structure, in addition to military needs, needs that exploded during the mandate's last decade.

While the British were thus having an unintended impact on Arab society, the Zionists, with their importation of capital and skills and land buying, were also causing and effecting changes in Palestinian society. Money was spent in Palestine on rent, construction, and agricultural products, not to mention the employment of Palestinian workers in Jewish plantations, construction sites, and factories, at least during the early part of the mandate.

The Arab social and political economy also was changing itself, so to speak. Expanding population, migration to urban centers and the coast, investment in industry and citrus, increased agricultural productivity, the expansion of commerce, tourism and trade, all these factors were having a phenomenal impact on Palestinian society. A new commercial elite was growing, a conscious and relatively cohesive working class made its presence felt, and a middle class of varied background predominated in the cities. All this while the urban notable elite's basis for power and factio

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factional politics, the patronage system, was being rapidly undermined.

But these complex, interlinked factors combined to the Palestinians' disadvantage. They coalesced to weaken the society by causing sharply uneven change and ongoing dislocation in the countryside, thus increasing the structural fragmentation in rural society; by inhibiting the growth and consolidation of a new elite; and by ensuring a contradictory developmental path for those migrants who were being turned into workers.

So what does all this mean for factionalism in Palestinian society? First, as to the role of the British in this regard, the disjointed changes occurring in Palestinian Arab society were encouraged by mandatory social and economic practices and policies. Colonial programs in the countryside, towards migrant labor, and towards the nascent urban working class, tended to exacerbate the tension, confusion, division and contradictory processes in the social structure. The pursuit of social order and minimum government involvement in social policy sharply conflicted with socio-economic changes. The Arabs became increasingly dependent on the state for jobs and social justice, a role the state was unwilling to fulfill. (Though some may argue that it wasn't the colonial state's business to meet Palestinian needs and expectations, the answer is that it should not have been the colonial state's business to forcibly rule others, implant a competing community in their midst, and tax them in order to finance its control over them.)

The rapid transformations of the forties heightened rural social mobility and awareness. But the state also was unwilling and unable to accommodate these changes. The impermanent and insecure nature of the newly emerging strata left them greatly weakened. The resultant aggravation of uneven development at the lower levels of the social structure contributed to the lack of cohesion in Palestinian rural society, leaving a severely disrupted traditional social organization vulnerable and fragile in the face of enormous external pressures. And it should be recalled that these processes in the forties came on the heels of a three-year rebellion in the late thirties which, with its sacrifices and the brutal repression it elicited from the British, had already severely weakened and exhausted Palestinian society and communal unity.

The British therefore attempted to maintain the rural society as they found it, and their policies towards migrant workers and labor were also meant to perpetuate the status quo. The net effect was the erection of impediments to wider social and structural integration. Rather than helping along the inexorable processes of change, the state tried to contain them, and thus served to hinder the trend towards national integration. That hindrance was to be seen in policies towards education, economy, local politics, and social programs in general. Given the need to maintain control and protect imperial interests, as well as to fulfill promises made to

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the Zionists, it would have been surprising indeed if the British did install a progressive regime concerned solely with the welfare of the indigenous people.

Aside from the direct role of the state, its support of the demographic minority had negative consequences on Palestinian society. Despite attributes of interdependence there really was no harmony between Arab and Jewish economies and societies. The benefits the Arabs accrued from Jewish colonization were incidental. Zionism, for political/ideological reasons, really never did have any intentions of either integrating in the wider society or accepting it in its vision of a Jewish state. This, more than the socio-cultural chasm between the two societies and Arab rejection of Jewish aspirations, determined the largely self-contained and competitive nature of the Jewish community in Palestine.

The autonomous nature of the Yishuv and British furtherance of its aims (in land, immigration, and industry) implied many things for Palestinian structural fragmentation and political factionalism. It is without doubt that the full potential development of the Arab economy and industry was inhibited by the Jewish presence. Arab capital could not compete and utilize all its resources. Colonial tariff and fiscal policies ensured the growth of Jewish-owned industry, which was able to directly compete with the fledgling Arab manufacturing sector and even sell a large array of consumer products in the Arab market. This had a retarding effect on the growth of a new, non-factionalist based elite.

Too, the presence of the Jews indirectly engendered an uneven development that exacerbated tension in the social structure. In the first half of the mandate, a significant part of Arab migrant labor became dependent on employment in Jewish plantations (and less so in Jewish industry). Simultaneously, the Arabs were increasingly being blocked from employment in Jewish concerns. By the opening decade of the forties, Arab employment in Jewish industry was practically non-existent. Additionally, Jewish competition for jobs with the state sector hurt the development of Arab labor. It depressed wages and took jobs away from the less skilled Arab workers. This situation was magnified during the forties (because of the vast number of jobs available). Without the presence of Jewish workers in the big cities, the growth of the skilled Arab working class would have been more significant.

Lastly, Jewish land purchases also strongly affected the Palestinians in a number of ways. Because purchased land became permanently alienated, this contributed to landlessness, severe fluctuations in employment, land scarcity, congestion, and frustration in the countryside. While the relationship between Arab landowner and peasant had indeed been unequal, characterized by exploitation through work and debt and leaving a rapidly growing rural population in a continued state of underdevelop-

Conclusion 235

ment, this situation was mitigated by communal farming arrangements and an interdependent web of socio-cultural relations. Zionist colonization, on the other hand, was underpinned by an ideology which directly pursued religio-ethnic exclusivity in land ownership, and whose dislocating effects were traumatic.

Land purchases also had an indirect effect on Palestinian factionalism, although this was a problem many Arabs brought upon themselves. As almost all relied on the Jewish sector for funds from time to time, land sales had a divisive influence on the national movement. The suspicion, mistrust, cynicism, resentment, antagonism, and demoralization that was engendered at all levels of Palestinian Arab society by land sales cannot be overemphasized. The issue of land sales and accusations and counteraccusations regarding it continued throughout the mandate and formed an ongoing basis for conflict.

The state also aggravated factionalism at the national and elite level. Politically, the state refused to accept or recognize the Palestinian Arabs as a national entity or people. This began with the Balfour Declaration. Many features of the Ottoman millet system were incorporated into the mandate; the various communities could obtain government right to administer their own religious, cultural, and educational establishments. Thus, an Arab community, unlike a Jewish community, was not legally recognized.

But this alone did not faze the development of a national movement or strong nationalidentity. The government also increased tension in the national movement in another way. It failed to develop self-governing institutions except for the few municipal councils, relying on the traditional leadership of men like the Mufti and town mayors. Although the Palestinians boycotted the first legislative council proposal made in early 1922 and an offer for an Arab agency in 1923, they subsequently (in the late 1920s and throughout the rest of the mandate) were ready to consider and/or accept some form of self-government as a step towards effective representation. During the mandate's last decade, this was seen through the futile efforts to get Britain to adhere to its own policy, the White Paper.

However, the Palestinians wavered continually and were deeply fearful of the long term implications of any self-governing proposal which was ambiguous towards the Jewish National Home policy and which would leave Zionist ambitions unchecked. The British commitment to a Jewish National Home and its vague formulation led to ambiguity and contradictions about legal status, the political system, and independence. The dilemmas and pressures posed for the Arab leadership by such a situation led to continual disagreement about strategy and decision-making and aggravated mutual suspicions and factionalist conflict. Also, the lack of representative institutions denied Palestinian society a truly demo-

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cratic voice, a situation which allowed the notability to continue with its infighting.

More fundamentally than self-governing institutions, the lack of effective power over the state meant that the Palestinian Arab notability which headed the national movement would be unable to use the resources of the state to centralize power in its hands and thereby develop into a cohesive stratum. The elites could not use their access to state resources to advance themselves and hasten the process of differentiation in the notability, Unlike the elites in the surrounding countries, the Palestine Arab elite's power, like Palestinian society in general, was curbed by extraordinary factors. There was no continuity between economic wealth and ultimate political power, The colonial state did not mediate and protect the indigenous elite's economic interests. Rather, it protected and nurtured the advanced economy and industry of a competing community. Also, the lack of central power further factionalized the national movement, whose autonomous (i.e., notable family) components fought each other for predominance. If they had had a stake in national power, their interests might have dictated their cooperation in the maintenance of stability and power among themselves.

Aside from exogenous socio-economic and political factors that directly and indirectly contributed to the continuation of Palestinian Arab factionalist politics and structural factionalism and fragility at the lower levels of Palestinian society, there is the internal process, concerned with the impact of social change on national integration, to consider.

It is clear that traditional vertical cleavages were being subjected to rapid social change in which the society was in the uncertain transition between old and new social groups and classes and old and new politics. It is without doubt that the traditional urban notable elite was losing, and lost in some regions, its patronage social power base. Despite the contradictory and prohibitive effects of external variables on Palestinian social change, family ties and personal followings competed with clearly newly emerging social groups and classes. A remarkably conscious and relatively socially cohesive Arab urban working class was taking shape. Also, there was a landless peasant work force neither rooted in the urban social and political economy nor permanently attached to the rural countryside. Finally, there was the growing entrepreneurial or commercial elite that had the potential to challenge the urban notability, This elite, located largely in Jerusalem and the coastal towns, especially Jaffa and Haifa, differed from urban notables in the sense that it did not derive its income from land nor was it dependent on a factional base.

An additional challenger to factionalist-based politics and the notability was the bourgeois middle class. As understood here, the term "bour- geoisie" not only includes traders, merchants, manufacturers and busi-

Conclusion 237

nessmen, but also the professionals, intellectuals, and bureaucrats. These elements were marked by socio-economic as well as social and cultural similarities, Their lifestyles, world outlook, dress, consumption habits, and political perceptions and expectations contrasted dramatically with the urban notable or provincial elites. Along with the commercial elements, they formed the discontented middle and lower middle segments in the towns and villages (as teachers, civil servants). They gave the bourgeoisie as a whole much of its self-consciousness as a class. Throughout the mandate they articulated and gave substance to Palestinian cultural nationalism. By the late forties, in concert with commercial elements, they were beginning to make attempts at party organization (Al-Shlab, Arab Front in Jaffa, Arab Nationalist Bloc) and cooperated with the workers and such men as Ahmad al-Shugayri, Musa al-'Alami, and Yusif Haykal. They were in a better position to come together via the medium of political parties than any other group or class, except the workers, It took an alliance of the professional middle class (particularly the intellectuals) and the working class (FATU) to create a radical political party (ALNL).

Despite the dramatic changes of the forties, there were, as we have pointed out numerous times, countervailing forces, external and internal in nature, that prohibited the full potential development of these changes. The working class was still structurally (i.e., economically, though not socially or politically) feeble, and its development uneven and overly tied and dependent on the colonial state. The migrant wage laborers constituted a huge, "floating" element that was moving from place to place in search of jobs, even up to 1947-48. And the elite came mostly from middle/upper Muslim and Christian families of commerce who had no power in society and no continuous socio-economic connections. Its most important members, the manufacturers, faced additional impediments to their growth and transformation into a middle/upper middle class bour- geoisie. Also, this commercial stratum was not economically or socially cohesive, reflecting the different backgrounds of its members.

Finally, the middle class elements (professionals, intellectuals, and bureaucrats) were not a socially integrated stratum, mainly because of their different socio-economic backgrounds, though they shared similar occupations. Some were the children of landed families and continued to be an integral part of these families, Others belonged to small families who pursued retailing and trade. Still others were members of the new commercial elite.

But even in the face of these realities, social change had become inexorable and proceeded very far, far enough to have weakened, openly challenged, and perhaps replaced, within a few short years, the power and position of the urban notables who, contrary to what is generally believed, did not form a socio-economic continuum (in privileges, wealth,

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control). By the forties they no longer represented an economically and socially secure elite whose landed, rentier wealth was conceived by some to have been heirarchically connected to the countryside in an unbroken chain, Patronage by this time could no longer serve as a stable context for factionalist politics.

The urban notable elite, actually the Mufti and those individuals connected with him in the AHC and based in Jerusalem, maintained their hold on power because of nationalist sentiments and also through the use of the threat of Zionist danger to mute internal opposition and delay the formation of an independent opposition. In the last decade of the mandate, everyone's energies were supposed to be directed towards the national cause. And the national cause was double-edged, being an added reason for the potential loss of power by the notables. If the notables did not assume an aggressive vanguard role in the national movement, then that movement would easily have come under the control of an educated new generation of middle class elements and, though small, a very socially and politically aware working class, groups who were discontented with the notables' perennial factionalism.

The urban notables were practically sustained because of the symbol and leadership of the Mufti. For he was, and by extension those of his social class, except the factionalist opposition (NDP), were preeminent Palestinians whose lives were spent in national, anti-colonial, and anti-Zionist struggles. As is made clear in this book, because the notability was never allowed national power, and was therefore not connected to the colonial state as in the other Arab countries and most countries of the Third World, it found itself leading the national movement. Its monopoly on nationalist sentiment became its primary source for legitimacy, even though it was resented and occassionally attacked by almost all the other urban elements.

That the notability used nationalism to maintain power is an indicator of the strength of nationalist sentiment in Palestinian society at the time, Palestinian national thought and expression evolved from a patriotic to a pan-Arab (and perhaps pan-Islamic) to a Palestinian national form, this evolution being partly shaped by the intensity of the struggle with Zionism. Though there was no national institutional foundation and no ideological clarity or agreement (not unusual), it was quite clear that almost all called for Palestinian national self-determination in the territory of mandate Palestine, The idea of nationalism had taken hold, and nationbuilding was, relative to the region, quite developed. Institutional development, by which I mean the development and running of state institutions and power, was never allowed to assume its course by the colonial authorities (though it was allowed to do so in the other Arab countries, overseen by the colonial presence). Palestinian political organization and

Conclusion 239

coordination of the national movement, however, were national in their reach and scope.

But though a national political culture became widespread, with its attendant national organization and articulation, the national movement was fragmented by the elites who led it, who could not unite in the face of very difficult challenges. This elite factionalism was partly a result of urban notable manipulation of nationalist sentiment, not necessarily because the elite reflected the true nature of the society it led. That society, as we have seen, had changed relatively dramatically. Also, the traditional elite was sustained in power (local, not state) directly by the colonial authorities, and indirectly through the denial of institutional development and democracy at the formal (state) national level.

All this is not to say that there were not concrete social divisions that might have helped prolong the leadership of the urban notables. Though the urban strata were pretty much at the forefront of Palestinian nationalist thought and organization, the countryside certainly was more divided by vertical, mainly familial and kin, cleavages. These cleavages were encouraged by the provincial and rural families who were relatively better-off than the rest. These lesser families served as the backbone of the factionalist and clientelist system in the countryside and as the connections or intermediaries of the urban notable elites. In the forties, the elites' links to these elements were based more on so cio-cultural and traditional loyalties than on economic power.

The peasantry could not be expected to see things with the clarity of the middle strata or working class. Social and religious prestige, ascription, illustrious family histories, all these factors helped determine the light in which the peasantry viewed the traditional elite. The peasantry did understand, however, the idea of a Palestinian national identity based in a defined territory. This is evidenced by the 1936-39 revolt and the strong support given in the forties to the Mufti, who, as was mentioned at numerous points, appealed to the peasantry on the basis of a nationalist-populist-religious idiom. He was the kind of authority and leader that they understood and followed. While rural classes therefore had a sense of national identity, though elusive, the mobilization and organization of the countryside was based on personal appeals and connections and on the immediate experience of dislocation caused by Zionism. National identities existed side by side with familial or local identities and loyalties. Obviously, this very much hindered full national integration.

It must also be emphasized that the role of the family, kinship, and the network of social relationships by which these were characterized, was part of Arabic and Middle Eastern culture. This culture was as much a part of urban as it was of rural life. There were, in addition, rural/urban divisions and regional divisions, the latter mostly reinforced by the fac-

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tional elites, as well as socio-economic differences between the coastal and mountainous regions.

But in describing traditional social organization, one can go on indefinitely about the kinds of vertical cleavages and segmentation that existed. This was no more unusual in late mandatory Palestine than it was in other Middle Eastern and Third World countries. Therefore, Palestinian Arab society in the forties was no less (in fact, more) nationally aware or integrated than other peoples living under similar socio-economic conditions. While this is not unique, then, it did make nation and state building for the Palestinian Arabs a more problematic venture than it was for the Zionists. Moreover, it must be reemphasized that Zionist colonization was unique in many ways and the colonial state did all it could to nurture the development of the Jewish community and block the Palestinian Arabs from obtaining national self-determination.

Taking all these factors into consideration, in addition to the fact that Arab Palestine was being subjected to enormous disruptions and tensions caused by rapid social change and conflictual colonial policies, it can be readily seen that Palestinian society in the forties was in unstable flux, vulnerable to collapse under severe pressure. Arab Palestine was experiencing dislocation on a wide scale. The transitional social structures uneasily coexisted with a factionalist system prolonged by an insecure traditional elite. This rendered the society extremely fragile. With an absent (Arab) central authority, Arab society did not have the social resources to organize and unite itself. Moreover, during the mandate's last decade the urban notable elites led a disjointed society without the solid factional base that they once held. Their popular support was not really widespread and their hold over Palestinian society was much more tenuous than appeared. Thus, aside from structural factionalism, the forties also were characterized by much distrust and cynicism, despite the strength of national sentiment.

This socio-political context did not auger well for the Palestinians when conflict finally erupted between them and the Zionists. The fragmentation in Palestinian society, which was intensified both by external and internal political and socio-economic factors, was worsened by the existing divisions among the Arab regimes. The mistrust centered around various dynastic intrigues and individual state interests. It cannot be said, however, that, except for the Hashemites, there were any sinister Arab motives or ambitions towards Palestine. Even among the Hashemites, Null Pasha and the 'Iraqi branch reflected a more genuine interest in the unity of the Arab East. All of Nuri's intrigues revolved around this central pivot. His vision was rooted in a more realistic potential for unity in the area of the Fertile Crescent. Despite 'Iraqi territorial ambitions, however, there was no proclivity to accept partition as 'Abdullah was willing to do.

Conclusion 241

'Abdullah adhered to a vision of expansion of territory and crown; Nuri al-Sa'id reflected a broader Arab nationalist vision.

In addition to Arab intrigue, the disorganization among the Arabs was rooted in the social backwardness and fractured nature of Arab society in general. The divisions in Arab politics were mirrored in the state of nationalism and the pan-Arab national movement. The Arab regimes tried to monopolize the unorganized national sentiment in general, and towards Palestine in particular, in an effort to sustain their legitimacy and deflect internal dissent.

The weaknesses in the Palestinian ranks were compounded by Arab opposition to a Palestinian authority. The Hashemites' campaign against the Mufti and AHC was relentless. They opposed a Palestinian authority in Palestine because the leadership of the Mufti obstructed their plans and ambitions towards Palestine. Though the Egyptians-Syrians-Saudis supported the creation of a provisional government and an administrative authority in Palestine, it was mainly because of their attempt to block Hashemite ambitions. The other Arab states were concerned as much with (Abdullah's duplicity as they were with the Zionists. It was the balance of power, not warm feeling towards the Mufti, that dictated their posture.

But even this posture began to wane in the last weeks of the mandate, and it eventually turned into one of opposition to the Mufti. The central reason for the change in attitude was Arab fear and reluctance to intervene in Palestine. This was especially true for the Egytpians and Sdudis. It became increasingly important to control the Palestinians as the Arab states found themselves sucked into the Palestine conflict. As the tide of war turned against the Palestinians and the Arab public became restless, the non-Hashemite bloc, particularly the Egyptians, felt compelled to cooperate (militarily) with `Abdullah. It was easier and safer to deal with a regime which would react in a measured response to war in Palestine, than it was to deal with the unpredictable Mufti and his followers in Palestine. In other words, they were apprehensive that the Mufti's power and influence in Palestine would become an impediment to the political, diplomatic, and tactical flexibility required in dealing with the Palestine conflict. Thus, by spring 1948, there was an unwitting congruence of interest between the Hashemites and the non-Hashemite bloc.

It seems paradoxical that the Mufti's influence began to wane so rapidly in the halls of the Arab League, given his popularity within Palestine and in the Middle East. But his strength and influence in Palestine was not the same as it was outside of Palestine. His weakness outside reflected the fractured and disorganized state of the national movement in the Arab world. Nationalism was amorphous and could not be easily organized and mobilized at a pan-Arab level, despite spontaneous nation-

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alist outbursts. The Mufti's popularity existed, but there was no coherent organization to translate it into action. In addition, the regimes monopolized the sentiments of Arab nationalism over Palestine in their bids to outdo each other and therefore took the wind out of the Mufti. The Arab regimes' need for survival and caution outweighed the risk with the public of stripping the Mufti of any influence within the Arab League. Moreover, the divisions in the Palestinian leadership and their dependence on the Arab states exposed them to weakness, control, and manipulation from the outside.

The British, too, helped weaken the prospect of a Palestinian administrative authority before the mandate's end in mid-May. Because the British, anxious about retaining their influence in the area, concretely and otherwise, distrusted the Mufti's nationalist opposition to imperalism, they also put their lot in with 'Abdullah, The prospects for a British base and rights in an independent Arab Palestine (that is, a partitioned Palestine, but under Palestinian authority) did not seem promising under the Mufti, who was perceived as a potential destabilizer in the area. All sides, therefore, did not desire an effective Palestinian authority.

Blocking the emergence of a Palestinian Arab state, as called for in the United Nations partition resolution, was the especial preoccupation of the British/Zionist/Trans-Jordanian triangle, the Zionists' connection in this triangle being their intensive negotiations with 'Abdullah, from which the British benefited. The Zionists and 'Abdullah had been talking since the early 1920s, the inevitable and explicit logic of their aims being to prevent the legitimate expression of Palestinian nationalism. When British interests converged with the interests of the other two, the Palestinians actually faced tremendous odds in preventing their own suppression and the loss and division of their patrimony.

The Hashemite-Zionist collusion would of course provide 'Abdullah with an enlarged crown and the Zionists with their state. The deal with 'Abdullah meant that the Zionists were left free to defeat the Palestinians and the Arab states and so establish their state. But the Zionists were not truly interested in a deal with 'Abdullah or anyone else if it meant checking their expansionist ambitions. The collusion with the Hashemites served to neutralize a potentially powerful foe. When things on the battlefield went in Jewish favor, as they did beginning in April, then it mattered little whether their ally was in a difficult position, and certainly agreements were not meant to be kept by them if there was a chance at more land-grabbing. The limited fighting 'Abdullah's Legion did around Jerusalem was more because of Jewish aggression than because of the monarch's design.

For the British, by the third month of 1948, they were in active duplicity with 'Abdullah, aware of his talks with the Zionists. Their preemi-

Conclusion 243

nent goal was the maintenance of the British presence in the Middle East. To this end, they also colluded with `Abdullah by politically supporting his plans, by blocking any Arab interventions, by suppressing the Palestinians, by subsidizing (along with the Jewish Agency, which regularly gave 'Abdullah money) his Legion and crown, by protecting his regime, and by using British officers on the Arab Legion to secure, through a defensive and inactive posture, their political/imperial aims and 'Abdullah's political/territorial ambitions.

Given Arab disunity, the Palestinians were not only almost totally vulnerable but also would have needed a miracle to save them. However, no doubt the fact that the Palestinians were unable to create any sort of administrative structure or authority influenced British thinking and strategy and Arab states policies. For the Palestinians also weakened themselves. Throughout the mandate, the notables were unable to achieve for any significant length of time a united political program or to cooperate in effectively creating local autonomous institutions that would have served as a basis for governing their people. Despite the fact that they were denied legislative councils and national self-rule, the Palestinians could have developed self-governing institutions at the community level at their own initiative. However, the notability worried that such institutions would mean wider participation and more democratic representation and therefore a weakened grip.

Partly because of a lack of well-developed community level institutions, the elite fought for domination over and created an amorphous and fractured national movement and helped block the emergence of more effective political and administrative organization. In the last few critical months of the mandate, no real thought or concrete plans were being worked out for the assumption of local control upon British evacuation, regardless of what the Arab states did or did not do in this matter. With the AHC out of the country, and with no strong interim government or authority, social disunity was bound to ensue in the resulting vacuum. Certainly, both the Mufti from the outside and the AHC members and followers in Palestine (Jamal, Khalidi, the PAP) were continually hostile to wider representation (from workers and the middle classes). The full potential of the Palestinians was not utilized precisely because of narrow factionalist interests.

Factional division among the Palestinian Arabs was aggravated by the politico-military disorganization and disharmony of the Arab states. Almost everything was lacking among the volunteers, particularly arms and effective central command. There was no coherent strategy for defense. Training among the irregulars was short in duration and late in activation, and there were not enough well-trained and disciplined commanders. This had its toll: treachery and desertion took place in many

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towns. It also had a demoralizing effect on the Palestinians. As concerns the wider Arab effort, the Military Committee in Damascus either was dangerously naive or strapped by its masters (it would seem it was a mixture of both). Also, there was a tendency to believe, whether among the Palestinians or the MC, that what was lost might yet be retrieved. This might have accounted for the readiness to evacuate and retreat, in the belief that it was temporary. A dangerous complacency, as it turned out.

Finally, the Arab effort would have been much more effective if the Palestinians themselves had taken primary military and political command in their own country. Despite the difficulties, the Palestinians displayed little ability to contend with the enormous task at hand. Though the Mufti pleaded with the Arab states that, if supplied with money and weapons, the Palestinians could deal with the situation militarily, he failed to foster the kind of unity needed to support his contention. This indicates, at the very least, that the Palestinians seriously underestimated the strength of their adversary. More importantly, the Mufti could have allowed more flexibility to local bodies such as the NCs. Instead, the Mufti showed favoritism towards one town or faction over the other by disbursing funds according to loyalty. This engendered further alienation and demoralization.

Having said all this, it is important to consider the practical effects on events of a more united and effective Palestinian leadership. What would have changed? For one thing, a united leadership would have gained more credibility, legitimacy, and authority among the Arab states. If the Palestin- ians developed a local administrative structure and authority, with a united leadership speaking on their behalf to the outside world, they would have been better equipped to deal with all external parties. They might also have been more effective in their resistance and avoided the rapid disintegration of their society. There seems to have been a law of direct proportionality at work: The more the Palestinians were divided, the easier it was for the Arab states (and others) to control them and sap their legitimacy and strength. Certainly, a leadership that could not develop the necessary cooperation (or undertake flexible and tactical political pos- tures) was inviting trouble for its people.

But all of this belongs to the realm of speculation, considering the rapid development of politico-military events at the mandate's end. Much of what happened to Palestine between 1947 and 1948 was beyond the Palestinians' control. First, after the partition resolution, the British would have preferred a Palestinian leadership that accepted some form of partition settlement and showed amenability to their presence. Effective local administration or not, what motivated the British was their need for a continuing presence in the area. Palestinian nationalism was too hostile

Conclusion 245

to British colonialism, especially because of the latter's support of Zionism.

Second, the Mufti wisely feared the entry into Palestine of Hashemite troops and vainly attempted to pre-empt this eventuality. He knew the Palestinians would be unable to stop the occupation of any part of Palestine either by Hashemite or any other Arab troops. Even if the Palestinians used their organizational, administrative and military capabilities to their full potential, which they were capable of doing, the subsequent loss of Palestine to a powerful enemy would have, and did, make this supposition meaningless. The Palestinians were powerless to do anything about 'Abdullah's Arab Legion. Though the Mufti obviously did not foresee the loss of Palestine, what he tried to get from the Arab League was a commitment that would guarantee the authority and legitimacy of the AHC once Arab soldiers entered Palestine. Again, even if the Palestinians were united and organized, they needed a collective Arab guarantee that they would respect the right of the Palestinian people to govern themselves. With Hashemite ambitions and Arab disagreement, this was nearly impossible.

Even more impossible to have been able to deal with was Zionist military power and ambitions. For in the end, when all is said and done, the Palestinian Arabs lost Palestine because of the brutal realism, single-mindedness, and determination of their enemy to get what it wanted. Realizing this, perhaps the Palestinians should have been "realistic" and compromised with their enemies by accepting the "right" of the Jews to establish a state in Palestine. While in hindsight this now seems the wise thing to have done, it is enormously difficult to judge them either way on this count. It would have taken prophetic powers to have foreseen what eventually happened, and a vision wider than humanly possible to succumb to and accept the idea that, by giving away more than half of their country, as the United Nations partition plan called for, they would have acted realistically. How realistic indeed it would have been to accept the loss of the most fertile parts of one's country, to have some 500,000 of one's people come under hostile (Zionist) sovereignty, to have lost fields, homes, farms, and towns, and to have been sandwiched between powerful neighbors east and west, is not easy to say.

When the Zionists made "concessions" it was to agree to take less than the entire country. They were, after all, losing nothing, despite their own perceptions and beliefs over their right to Eretz(the Land of) Israel. And in the sweeping emotions, hatreds, fears, distortions, and profound mistrust between Palestinians and Jews, Zionist arguments over right- that they had a religious attachment to and identity with the land that gave birth to their heritage and culture, that they lived on that land long ago, that the Palestinians should weigh their claims as against the entire

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Jewish people, that the Jewish people deserved a "home" after limitless years of persecution-could hardly be expected to fall on receptive ears. The Jewish experience and sentiments simply could not be internalized or empathized with, meaning very little to most Palestinians, who, through their daily experience, saw an aggressive Zionism which consistently denied their very peoplehood, and which was intent on taking their land. Besides, the Palestinians had their own legal, moral, and historical arsenal, an arsenal that prevented them from coolly and clearly assessing their situation. It would, therefore, have taken a lot more than such Jewish arguments for them to concede Jewish rights, which, as the Palestinians well knew, really meant a Jewish state in their midst.

But it wasn't merely a matter of Palestinian rejection or even mutual denial. The logic of Zionist ambitions, as aggressively advanced and symbolized in Ben-Gurion, really left very little room for the continued existence of a Palestinian nation. It is by now a matter of historical record that the mainstream Labor Zionists, not to mention the so-called Revisionists (who also demanded Trans-Jordan and other Arab lands), would not have been content with anything short of dominating the entire country. Partition and its limits, whether in 1937 or 1947, were seen by Ben-Gurion as a stepping-stone for expansion. He considered neither boundaries nor agreements sacred. They were to be broken when convenient-the inherent maximalist aims of Zionism's vision were not to be lost sight of. It is certainly true that the Palestinian leaders, notably the Mufti, were generally intransigent in the sense that they refused to consider any sort of modus vivendi short of a constitutional state based on the strength of the respective proportions-which basically meant Palestinian control and the Jewish minority remaining that way. It is quite as true, however, that the most Zionism offered the Palestinians was the "opportunity" to exist as a subordinate minority and to eschew any ideas of existing as a nation. And that was Zionism's good side. Ben-Gurion quite forcefully made it clear that, should the Palestinians resist, then the Zionists, or the Jewish state, would know what to do with them.

The Zionist leadership did not indicate what its acceptable boundaries were; how the Palestinians would fit into a state defined by Jewishness; how, indeed, they would fit into a state that would insist on making way for millions of Jews yet did not have the land to absorb them; how, within this scenario, Palestinian property, political, and civil rights would even be protected; and what would happen to Palestinians in a Jewish state and to those outside it-assuming they accepted partition and created a state of their own-once the millions of Jews were brought in. The point is, there was absolutely nothing in Zionist ideology that would have prevented the realization of the kind of state (Greater Israel) that the movement envisioned.

Conclusion 247

Even if the Palestinian national movement had accepted the idea of a Jewish state, it is highly improbable that this state would have welcomed those Palestinians who would have come under its jurisdiction or been contained by the neighboring Palestinian state. It was a difficult proposition to create a viable Jewish state, with the Palestinians remaining within it and next to it, on the basis of such notions as pluralism, political democracy, and justice. From its inception, Zionism refused to define the limits of what it wanted, nor to truly come to grips with the implications of its own program, particularly the place of Palestinians in a Jewish state. Basically, it denied the existence of a Palestinian nation as vigorously as the Palestinians refused to concede its claims. Equally, Zionism denied the implications of the realities of its own aspirations and the possibility that it didn't quite represent the most enlightened or beneficial intrusion into the Palestinians' lives.

The logic of the Zionist vision as it worked itself out was made clear in 1948. The determination to produce the state that was promised in the 1947 partition resolution was rapidly overtaken by an inexorable dynamic: security, the fear of a Fifth Column, and the need for consolidation became blurred and indistinguishable from visions of a Greater Jewish State, free from as many Palestinians as possible. Thus, when it became clear that conquest and expulsion were working out extremely well, these pretty much became a widespread practice by Apri1 1948. Fear, the tendency to flee in the face of Jewish advances, the effect of Zionist assaults, Arab incompetence, tactical evacuation, all these were not necessarily related to direct Zionist action, nor could the Zionists possibly have foreseen the ease with which they sliced through Palestine and the collapse of its people. However, there existed the overpowering temptation to "transfer" the Palestinians once the opportunity presented itself, which was the underlying object of Plan D. And that opportunity arose from April onwards. Expulsion, physical and psychological terror, destruction of villages and crops to prevent return, atrocities; all were part of the Zionist menu as they sought to take advantage of the transformations that were occurring before their eyes.

Certainly, as the Palestinian people were pretty much denied by both Revisionists and Laborites, they were already dehumanized, the Zionist mentality and psyche seeing little injustice in wanting to clear out the local natives (not very different from the experience of colonial-settler societies). (This of course did not apply to the Zionist left across the board, but more to the Ben-Gurionist-led and inspired part.) Therefore, of the 400,000 Palestinians who became refugees from December 1947 through May 1948, a large majority were pushed out by direct and indirect Zionist actions. From the beginning of June onwards, the additional 300,000-plus refugees became so through deliberate policy. Again, security and legiti-

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mate existence became blurred and subordinate to the euphoric possibility of realizing the political/territorial/demographic vision. In the end, internal Palestinian weakness, fragmentation, and division were not by themselves enough to have caused the disintegration of the society. A very weak and vulnerable society still needed military/terroristic pressures to cause its collapse.

* * *

The fundamental character of the Palestine problem began as early as the late nineteenth century with Zionist colonization and was accelerated with the beginning of colonial rule. The political, economic, social, and diplomatic complexities that confronted the Palestinian Arabs during the mandate reached their apex in the forties. In this last decade, these pressures finally culminated in the disintegration of Palestinian society. Effective social and political organization is difficult enough to achieve in traditional societies. However, from the beginning, Arab Palestine was subject to unique internal and external forces that it really could not contend with or control.