On This Day

17 November

KING AND ZIONISTS AGREE TO DIVIDE UP PALESTINE
On this day in 1947, before the UN announced its partition plan, Jewish Agency representative Golda Meir secretly met with King Abdullah of Jordan to divide up Palestine between the planned State of Israel and an expanded Jordan. Abdullah agreed the Jewish minority should establish a Jewish state on the larger part of Mandate Palestine while he would annexe to his kingdom all the areas to be allocated by the UN to an independent Arab State. In the event the Zionist militias conquered and held 78% of Palestine.

اتفاق الملك والصهاينة على تقسيم فلسطين

17 نوفمبر

في مثل هذا اليوم من عام 1947 ، قبل إعلان الأمم المتحدة عن خطة التقسيم ، التقت ممثلة الوكالة اليهودية غولدا مئير سراً مع الملك عبد الله ملك الأردن لتقسيم فلسطين بين دولة إسرائيل المخطط لها والأردن الموسع. وافق عبد الله على أنه يجب على الأقلية اليهودية إقامة دولة يهودية على الجزء الأكبر من فلسطين الانتدابية بينما سيضم إلى مملكته جميع المناطق التي ستخصصها الأمم المتحدة لدولة عربية مستقلة. بالرغم من ذلك احتلت المليشيات الصهيونية 78٪ من فلسطين.

According to Israeli historian Avi Shlaim, "the attempt to bypass the Palestine Arabs and forge links with the rulers of the Arab states became a central feature of Zionist diplomacy in the 1930s and 1940s".  Abdullah and his aides and agents were a source of information about the other Arab countries involved in the Palestine problem. Last but not least, through Abdullah the Zionists could generate mistrust, foment rivalry, and leak poison to weaken the coalition of their Arab adversaries. 

At the 17 November meeting they reached a preliminary agreement to coordinate their diplomatic and military strategies, to endeavor to prevent the other Arab states from intervening directly in Palestine. Twelve days later, on 29 November, the United Nations pronounced its verdict in favor of dividing the area of the British mandate into two states, one Jewish and one Arab. This made it possible to firm up the tentative understanding reached at Naharayim. In return for ‘Abdullah's promise not to enter the area assigned by the UN to the Jewish state, the Jewish Agency agreed to the annexation by Transjordan of most of the area earmarked for the Arab state.

In Zionist historiography [an earlier secret Abdullah-Meir] meeting of 10 May is usually presented as proof of the unreliability of Israel's only friend among the Arabs and as confirmation that Israel stood alone against an all-out offensive by a united Arab world. Golda Meir herself helped to propagate the view that King Abdullah broke his word to her; that the meeting ended in total disagreement; and that they parted as enemies...This charge helped to sustain the legend that grew up around the outbreak of war as a carefully orchestrated all-Arab invasion plan directed at strangling the Jewish state at birth.

The truth about the second Abdullah-Golda meeting is rather more nuanced than this self-serving Zionist account would have us believe... First, Abdullah did not go back on his word: he only stressed that circumstances had changed. Second, Abdullah did not say he wanted war: it was Golda Meir who threatened him with dire consequences in the event of war. Third, they did not part as enemies. On the contrary, Abdullah seemed anxious to maintain contact with the Jewish side even after the outbreak of hostilities. Abdullah needed to send his army across the River Jordan in order to gain control over the Arab part of Palestine contiguous with his kingdom. He did not say anything about attacking the Jewish forces in their own territory...

Part of the problem was that Abdullah had to pretend to be going along with the other members of the Arab League who had unanimously rejected the UN partition plan and were bitterly opposed to the establishment of a Jewish state. What is more, the military experts of the Arab League had worked out a unified plan for invasion...But the forces actually made available by the Arab states for the campaign in Palestine were well below the level demanded by the Military Committee of the Arab League. Moreover, King Abdullah wrecked the invasion plan by making last-minute changes. His objective in ordering his army across the River Jordan was not to prevent the establishment of a Jewish state but to make himself master of the Arab part of Palestine. ‘Abdullah never wanted the other Arab armies to intervene in Palestine. Their plan was to prevent partition; his plan was to effect partition. His plan assumed and even required a Jewish presence in Palestine although his preference was for Jewish autonomy under his crown. By concentrating his forces on the West Bank, Abdullah intended to eliminate once and for all any possibility of an independent Palestinian state and to present his Arab partners with annexation as a fait accompli."

One of the many paradoxes of the 1948 war was that the greatest understanding - that between Israel and Transjordan - was followed upon the outbreak of war by the bloodiest battles. One explanation of this paradox is that within the context of the tacit understanding between the two sides there was plenty of scope for misunderstandings. Jerusalem was the most likely area for misunderstandings to arise both because of its symbolic and strategic importance, and because the fact that it was to form a separate enclave under an international regime permitted both sides to keep their fears and their hopes to themselves. In the first round of fighting, which ended when the UN-decreed truce took effect on 11 June, Transjordan and Israel looked like the worst of enemies. During the rest of the war, however, they were, in the apt phrase of one Israeli writer, "the best of enemies."

5-minute video on the First Israel-Arab War