The Huleh lands issue in mandatory Palestine, 1920–34
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 10280745 |
|---|---|
| Authors | W P N Tyler (corresponding author) |
| Year | 1991 |
| Volume | 27 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 343-373 |
| Publication date | 1991-07-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Middle Eastern Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0026-3206 • E-ISSN: 1743-7881 |
| Publisher | Taylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/00263209108700865 |
| OpenAlex | W2011041693 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 4 |
| References cited | 4 |
Land, its ownership and utilization have been central issues in Palestine this century as Arabs and Jews struggled for control of the area west of the Jordan river. In the years immediately after the First World War the Zionists had high hopes that Britain, pledged by the League of Nations' Mandate to encourage 'close settlement by Jews on the land, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes', would actively support them in their quest for land. Britain was also required 'to introduce a land system appropriate to the needs of [Palestine] having regard ... to the desirability of promoting the close settlement and intensive cultivation of the land'.1 It was known that there were extensive tracts of poorly utilized state land in Palestine which were eminently suitable for development, close settlement and intensive cultivation. Accordingly the Zionists expected, as their leader Weizmann once put it, the government's 'fruitful and practical cooperation' in the task of encouraging close settlement by Jews on the land 'in the spirit' of these mandatory pledges.2 But hopes that government would allot extensive areas of state land to Jewish organizations were soon dashed. Enquiry revealed that there was little or no worthwhile state land which was not already occupied or cultivated by Arab tenants or squatters whose interests, government felt, needed protection. Even more disappointing were the government's decisions regarding the future of the Beisan and Huleh state lands. These were, in the view of both the government's special investigator, Sir John Hope Simpson, and Abraham Granovsky, a senior Jewish National Fund (JNF) official, 'the two most important and valuable areas' of state land,3 extensive tracts with a generous water supply and good soils, ideally suited for development and intensive cultivation. But when these areas 'were distributed, the Jews received not a single dunam'.4 In 1921 the Beisan lands were awarded to Arab fellahin and Bedouin tribesmen in
Ancient history · Palestine · Political science · History · Jewish and Middle Eastern Studies · Law · Middle East and Rwanda Conflicts · Middle East Politics and Society
| Unique citing works | 4 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,13 |
| Citation span | 1994 - 2019 (26) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 4 |