anna

“Attempts were made to ascertain the reasons for these drastic provisions directed to exclude every Arab from the land purchased. The Executive of the General Federation of Jewish Labour were perfectly frank on the subject. They pointed out that the Jewish colonies were founded and established by Jewish capital, and that the subscriptions of which this capital is composed were given with the intention that Jews should emigrate to Palestine and be settled therethat these subscriptions would never have been given had it been thought that they would be employed to support Arab labourersthat it was the business of the Zionist Organisation to cause immigration into Palestine of as many Jews as possible, and that, if Arabs were employed, posts would thus be filled up for which Jews might have immigratedthat the position of agricultural labourer in the colonies, when occupied by a Jew, serves as a training for the immigrant and prepares him to take over a holding himself at a later dateand, finally, that if these posts were left open to the ordinary competition of the labour market, the standard of life of the Jewish labourer would be liable to fall to the lower standard of the Arab.”
― John Hope Simpson, Palestine. Report on immigration, land settlement and development

“It is the duty of the Government to look upon the country as one unit. The solution of the question facing the Government, in determining the number of Jewish labourers to be admitted, must depend, not on the amount of Jewish unemployment in reference to anticipated employment in the half year for which the schedule is framed, but on unemployment generally in Palestine. It is wrong that a Jew from Poland, Lithuania, or the Yemen, should be admitted to fill an existing vacancy, while in Palestine there are already workmen capable of filling that vacancy, who are unable to find employment. This policy will be unacceptable to the Jewish authorities.”
― 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