17 Reports to the State Council by the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister

We approach the UN General Assembly holding a larger section of the Land of Israel than was allocated to us in the November 29 resolution. We appear before the Assembly backed by an army, created from scratch in a single year, actually in much less than a year - an army which is perhaps the most important military force in the Middle East. Nevertheless, we do not approach this meeting in a state of over confidence.

The Assembly has before it the report of the late Count Bernadotte, who wished to revise the arrangements laid down in the November 29 resolution. There is no doubt that Bernadotte's report was prepared by its author jointly with very important elements on the international scene. The full and immediate approval of the report by the American and British governments testifies to this fact.

There are several positive elements in the Bernadotte report, along with the considerable number of negative ones. On the positive side, the report speaks of Israel as an established fact. The assumption that the truce must end with a peace settlement is also positive. There are two positive aspects on the territorial questions: (1) the proposal that all of the Galilee be included in the State of Israel; (2) indications that Jaffa should be included in the State of Israel; this is not said directly, but hinted at.

On the other hand, the report has extremely negative aspects. It suggests that every Arab individual has the right to decide whether he will return to his former home in the State of Israel. We do not believe that this is a decision to be made on an individual basis. It is a matter for negotiations between nations. The report also speaks of international supervision of certain areas within the country, which opens the way to an expansion of such supervision to the point where Israel would become a trusteeship. The gravest aspect of the report is its suggestion that the Negev be removed from the State of Israel. Israel's southern border, according to the plan, would run north of the Majdal-Faluja line. There is also mention of a special regime in the Port of Haifa, including the refineries, as well as the Lydda Airport. Then comes the section on an international regime in Jerusalem. Finally, mention is made of a Conciliation Commission, which would not only arbitrate on behalf of the UN, but exercise governmental powers backed up by international authority; this would limit our sovereignty.

My mission at the UN General Assembly will be to prevent the acceptance of Bernadotte's proposals by a two-thirds majority; this would leave the November 29 resolution as the legal basis for an international arrangement in the Land of Israel. I am not saying that we should regard the November 29 resolution as immutable. There was no contradiction between our demand for all of the western section of the Land of Israel as the Jewish State and our agreement to establish the State in part of the country. The initial demand was justified; so was the compromise. We demanded what was our due, and accepted what we could obtain. But we never said that what we accepted was our maximum demand; on the contrary, we made it clear that it was our minimum demand. If the November 29 resolution had been carried out in full, on the basis of co-operation between the two sides, we would have had to accept the obligations involved. But this did not happen. The partition plan was not put into effect; the only provision carried out was the one calling for the establishment of the State of Israel. Experience has shown the justification, the need, and the possibility of making revisions in the November 29 plan. We now demand Jerusalem and a corridor to it, Jaffa, and all of the Galilee.

The Government decided, before the publication of the Bernadotte report, not to raise the question of the borders. If the question arose, it was decided to demand the entire area allocated to the Jewish State under the November 29 resolution plus certain additional sections of the country. We will not agree to abandon the part of the Galilee that is in our hands; and, of course, we will not give up the Negev. The Government has decided to demand inclusion of New Jerusalem within the Jewish State, as well as a corridor to Jerusalem, the corridor we now hold. There is still the question of Haifa. We oppose making Haifa a free port. As far as the refugees are concerned, we must carry out a determined information campaign to explain the need for a fundamental solution to the problem, based on the settlement of these Arabs, or at least most of them, in the neighbouring states. This would be a blessing to their descendants, the neighbouring countries, and the Jews of Israel.

First of all, we are in the midst of a combined political and military campaign, and we should not consider one phase without taking the other into account. Neither will be decisive on its own. Secondly, two groups of interests are involved: those of the Arabs and the Jews of the Middle East on the one hand, and those of the Great Powers on the other. If only the interests of the Jews and Arabs were involved, the military factor would be decisive. The Arabs believed that their military strength would settle the issue, but they were wrong. They lost the military struggle. Indeed, were military factors in the Middle East to determine the outcome, then we could speak in terms not only of the November 29 resolution, but perhaps also of the Biltmore Program. But developments in the Middle East will not be decisive on their own. The larger world arena, with friendly and hostile forces, is also involved. In the present period, our military position is stronger than our political position, for not all the Great Powers are supporting us. Therefore, it seems to me, we cannot depend solely on the political struggle. At the same time, the military struggle alone, even if it develops to our advantage, will not be decisive; there are forces in the world that will see to it that it is not decisive.

It is incorrect to divide the world simply into two parts, East and West. The East is largely monolithic, the West much less so. There are differences between England and America, between England and France. There are even differences within the United States itself.

As the time for the meeting of the General Assembly approaches, we must ask ourselves whether a final decision will be made in that body rather than the Security Council. I doubt it. Perhaps there will be a two-thirds majority supporting a particular resolution. But will this resolution determine the course of events in Israel? I doubt that, too. The forces supporting the resolution are certainly strong enough to ensure that it is carried out, but will they want to do so? We must make a careful distinction between two completely different things: the attitude of governments and statesmen on the Palestine problem, and their ability and willingness to use the forces at their disposal to ensure that a resolution is put into effect. In other words, we must differentiate between the political and military positions of various governments.

Let me recall two instructive examples from the experience of the past year. The UN resolution of 1947 was supported by more than a two-thirds majority, including the US and the USSR; nevertheless, it was not implemented. The Arabs utterly disregarded the wishes of the UN. If they had had the military power to carry out their nefarious plans, nothing would have remained of the UN resolution. The Jews might have disappeared from the Land of Israel and there certainly would not have been a State of Israel. Yet no one at the UN would have uttered a word. Look at what happened when the Arabs defeated us in the Old City. Not a voice was raised against the desecration of the Holy City or the violation of the UN decision about Jerusalem's special status. It was not the UN decision that left New Jerusalem in our hands.

A second example: At the beginning of May, some of the great world figures, including General Marshall, warned us not to establish the State of Israel. And there were good friends who told us that we had no alternative but to accept Marshall's views. It seems, superficially, that these advisors were right. Marshall was backed by a gigantic force, which no Jewish force in Israel or elsewhere in the world could withstand. We would not have had the least chance if we had gone to fight the American Army. When we failed to accept Marshall's views, it was not because we thought our forces were stronger; we could not have been so foolish. We acted as we did because we doubted whether Marshall was willing to utilise the forces he represented to prevent the establishment of the State of Israel. The State was set up in opposition to Marshall, and the American Army was not used against us. Had it been, the State would have been destroyed at once. However, the very opposite happened: the United States immediately accorded de facto recognition to the State of Israel, although it has not yet recognised Israel de jure.

If we had not been able to differentiate between what a government said and what it was willing and able to do, the State of Israel would not have been established. Those who advised us not to establish the State did not err in their evaluation of the forces that stood behind Marshall; they did not exaggerate in the least; they erred in that they could not differentiate between what the American representative said and what the American government would do.

Now we face another struggle on the international scene. There are, theoretically, three possible means of solving the Palestine problem: by an agreement between the Jews and the Arabs, by a UN decision, or by a military decision in a struggle between the Jews and the Arabs. There is scarcely any chance of an agreement between the Jews and Arabs at this time. A UN decision would certainly give us much more than the Arabs would be willing to give us at this time. But this raises two questions: (1) If the Arabs oppose a UN decision, and there is every reason to assume that they will, even if we are also dissatisfied with it, how will the situation be different than it was in the November 1947 UN resolution? No matter how successful our information program, is there any chance that we can convince the UN to give us the Negev, a corridor to New Jerusalem, Ramle and Jaffa, central and western Galilee, at least the new section of Jerusalem, the port of Eilat, a continuous land area running up to the Dead Sea, and not impose external control on Haifa? And if, by some miracle, such a resolution is adopted by a two-thirds majority, won't we still have to fight to implement it, just as we had to fight this year for the November resolution? Is there any reason to believe that the UN will employ the necessary force to implement whatever resolution it adopts?

This brings us to the third possibility: a decision achieved by our military forces in this country. In the meantime, we have had the experience of a truce period. The truce has two consequences: it prevents the UN from enforcing its own decisions and it prevents the Jews and the Arabs from using force to achieve their aims. It remains open to doubt, however, whether a truce can solve the problem to the benefit of the Jews or of the Arabs. It only proves that there are elements in the outside world who wish to ensure that our military superiority does not allow us to tip the balance in our favour. If their attitude is strictly political, and they are not willing to use their military might to enforce it, there is no reason why we have to give in to this truce policy.

We are now about to begin a new stage, perhaps a decisive one, in the political struggle. We should not forget at this time the basic premise about which I spoke when I began my remarks, namely, that this is a combined struggle. In view of the military situation in the country at this moment, it is unlikely that the UN will adopt a resolution that meets our requirements with respect to the Galilee, the road to Jerusalem, Jerusalem, and the Negev. There is no reason to believe that political factors alone will solve this problem or solve it to our satisfaction. Our influence in the international arena is simply not adequate. If we do not take measures ourselves to make territorial adjustments, or at least the most vital ones, they will not be made at all. We will not achieve what we require in the Negev, on the road to Jerusalem, and in the Galilee simply through a political struggle.

The UN Observers declared that water had to be sent to Jerusalem. This was a basic condition of the truce Nevertheless, the Arabs blew up the pumping station at Latrun, and until this very day no water is flowing via Latrun to Jerusalem. We did not depend on the UN. Instead, we laid a new water pipeline and saved Jerusalem. A UN committee decided that we had the right to send convoys to the Negev during certain hours. The Egyptians have refused to honour this decision, and our settlements in the Negev would be dying of hunger if we had not found other ways of bringing in supplies. But these alternative routes are not safe. If the UN lacks the desire or the strength to carry out its decisions, must we sit by and accept the impotence of the UN? The conclusion of all this is clear: we cannot depend solely on political activity, or on political decisions, even if the decisions are desirable ones from our point of view. We must be ready to exploit the military factor whenever and wherever necessary.