anna

“It is no coincidence that the rise of the far right is happening in the after-math of the Great Recession and has emerged as a reactionary alternative to neoliberalism and liberalism, both suffering a profound legitimacy crisis. Though they are distinct ideologies, the far right is the Frankenstein of liberalism. The prevailing liberal ideologies of individualism, freedom of opportunity, tolerance, respectability, and techno-solutionism have cultivated the far-right mobilizations now calling for the very destruction of liberalism.”
― Harsha Walia, Border and Rule: Global Migration, Capitalism, and the Rise of Racist Nationalism

“It will be a matter of great regret if the friendly spirit which characterised the relations between the Jewish employer in the P.I.C.A. villages and his Arab employees, to which reference has already been made, were to disappear. Unless there is some change of spirit in the policy of the Zionist Organisation it seems inevitable that the General Federation of Jewish Labour, which dominates that policy, will succeed in extending its principles to all the Jewish colonies in Palestine.

The present position, precluding any employment of Arabs in the Zionist colonies, is undesirable, from the point of view both of justice and of the good government of the country. As long as these provisions exist in the Constitution of the Zionist Organisation, in the lease of the Keren-Kayemeth and in the agreement of the Keren-Hayesod it cannot be regarded as desirable that large areas of land should be transferred to the Jewish National Fund. It is impossible to view with equanimity the extension of an enclave in Palestine from which all Arabs are excluded. The Arab population already regards the transfer of lands to Zionist hands with dismay and alarm. These cannot be dismissed as baseless in the light of the Zionist policy which is described above.”
― John Hope Simpson, Palestine. Report on immigration, land settlement and development

“There seems no reason why a Textile industry on the grand scale should be a success in Palestine, with labour paid at the rates fixed by the General Federation of Jewish Labour, while the mills of Japan and of Bombay, equipped with the most modern machinery, and employing the cheapest of labour, are unable to find sufficient markets for their goods. From the point of view of those whose ardent desire it is to import Jews from Poland and Russia and the Yemen into Palestine in large numbers, and whose object is gained when the immigrant has arrived in Palestine, it may be sufficient that temporary employment is assured. But the Government is responsible not only for the present, while the imported capital is supporting the new population, but for the future, when spending of the imported capital will be at an end and the immigrant will have to live on employment, which will then be dependent on the success of the mill in competition with the mills of the world.”
― John Hope Simpson, Palestine. Report on immigration, land settlement and development

“In discussing the question of the effect of Jewish Settlement on the Arab it is essential to differentiate between the P.I.C.A. colonisation and that of the Zionist Organisation.

In so far as the past policy of the P.I.C.A. is concerned, there can be no doubt that the Arab has profited largely by the installation of the colonies. Relations between the colonists and their Arab neighbours were excellent. In many cases, when land was bought by the P.I.C.A. for settlement, they combined with the development of the land for their own settlers similar development for the Arabs who previously occupied the land. All the cases which are now quoted by the Jewish authorities to establish the advantageous effect of Jewish colonisation on the Arabs of the neighbourhood, and which have been brought to notice forcibly and frequently during the course of this enquiry, are cases relating to colonies established by the P.I.C.A., before the Keren-Hayesod came into existence. In fact, the policy of the P.I.C.A. was one of great friendship for the Arab. Not only did they develop the Arab lands simultaneously with their own, when founding their colonies, but they employed the Arab to tend their plantations, cultivate their fields, to pluck their grapes and their oranges. As a general rule the P.I.C.A. colonisation was of unquestionable benefit to the Arabs of the vicinity.

It is also very noticeable, in travelling through the P.I.C.A. villages, to see the friendliness of the relations which exist between Jew and Arab. It is quite a common sight to see an Arab sitting in the verandah of a Jewish house. The position is entirely different in the Zionist colonies.”
― John Hope Simpson, Palestine. Report on immigration, land settlement and development