Palestine Problem

Beginning with scenes of concentration camp survivors and ending with shots of refugees being welcomed to Palestine by friends and relatives, this issue describes how the protectorate has benefited in terms of health, wealth and development thanks to the influx of Jewish refugees. This March of Time issue notes the opposition of the League of Arab States to increased immigration but expresses optimism that Attlee’s government will agree to the Zionists’ demands.

Jewish immigration to Palestine had been severely limited by the British Government’s White Paper of 1939. Labour’s victory in the 1945 elections heralded a change, with Clement Attlee’s government committed to a more liberal immigration policy in Palestine. This is emphasised here by the clip of Labour Party Chairman (and Zionist) Harold Laski, whose strong words of warning to the League of Arab States that the ‘remnant of European Jewry will not be sacrificed to make a holiday for Arab landlords’ sound very much like a provocation but are in accord with the strongly pro-Jewish editorial line of the film itself.