Who
owns the land?
1937 Peel Commission report on the British Mandate of Palestine
Chapter IX. - The Land
A summary of land legislation enacted during the Civil Administration shows the efforts made to fulfil the Mandatory obligation in this matter. The Commission point to serious difficulties in connection with the legislation proposed by the Palestine Government for the protection of small owners. The Palestine Order in Council and, if necessary, the Mandate should be amended to permit of legislation empowering the High Commissioner to prohibit the transfer of land in any stated area to Jews, so that the obligation to safeguard the right and position of the Arabs may be carried out. Until survey and settlement are complete, the Commission would welcome the prohibition of the sale of isolated and comparatively small plots of land to Jews. They would prefer larger schemes for the rearrangement of proprietorship under Government supervision. They favour the proposal for the creation of special Public Utility Companies to undertake such development schemes subject to certain conditions.
An expert Committee should be appointed to draw up a Land Code.
Recommendations are made with a view to the expediting of settlement (the need for which is paramount) and to the improvement of settlement procedure.
The present system of Land Courts is contributory to delay. Until survey and settlement are complete there should be two or three Land Courts separate from the District Courts and each under a single British Judge.
Up till now the Arab cultivator has benefited on the whole both from the work of the British Administration and the presence of Jews in the country, but the greatest care must now be exercised to see that in the event of further sales of land by Arabs to Jews the rights of any Arab tenants or cultivators are preserved. Thus, alienation of land should only be allowed where it is possible to replace extensive by intensive cultivation. In the hill districts there can be no expectation of finding accommodation for any large increase in the rural population. At present, and for many years to come, the Mandatory Power should not attempt to facilitate the close settlement of the Jews in the hill districts generally.
The shortage of land is due less to purchase by Jews than to the increase in the Arab population. The Arab claims that the Jews have obtained too large a proportion of good land cannot be maintained. Much of the land now carrying orange groves was sand dunes or swamps and uncultivated when it was bought.-------------
Seems to me that after Allenby conquered the Central Power allied Ottomans in the Middle East that during the decades of British Government in Palestine (1917-1948) Jewish land purchases were subject to British approval.
Peel Commission
