But it had never been formally asked to give its judgement on the constitutional future of a particular territory, let alone one as explosive and contentious as Palestine. Even the fate of trust territories was not in practice entrusted to a decision by the UN itself. This British initiative might therefore have become a precedent of huge importance for the future. But Britian herself, although claiming she wished to seek the advice of the UN,'remained continuously ambivalent about the UN's role. She never committed herself to abide by a UN decision. When one was made which she felt to be totally unacceptable to one of the main communities involved, she refused to implement it, as did the Security Council. Though, therefore, the initiative was certainly a significant one in UN history, it did not have the effect of enhancing the UN's future role as some optimists at the time had foreseen. On the contrary, it perhaps acted as an awful warning of the dangers of committing to the UN responsibilities it was not equipped to fulfil.
The acting Secretary-General telegraphed all members, informing them of the British proposal for a special assembly and asking whether they agreed. If the majority accepted within thirty days such a session would be called. Forty members answered, and all but one agreed. The session was therefore called for 28 April 1947. Originally the only item on the agenda was the British proposal for 'constituting and instructing a Special Committee to prepare for the consideration of the question of Palestine at the second regular session'. But the Arab states felt that this mandate was far too vague. It raised the danger, in their eyes, that, under the influence of the United States and other states favouring the Jewish cause, proposals might be made for something other than the normal procedure for a mandate, independence of the entire territory. This could include federation, partition, creation of a separate Jewish state, and so on. Moreover, because of the existing rate of immigration, they wanted the time-scale for independence to be as short as possible.
They therefore proposed for the special session an additional item for discussion: 'the termination of the mandate over Palestine and the declaration of its independence'. They argued that there was no need for fact-finding, or for long discussions by a committee or the Assembly. The principle of the ultimate independence of Palestine had long been accepted, in the Covenant of the League of Nations and in declarations by Allied powers. All that the Assembly need do therefore was to apply the principles of the Charter and declare the granting of that independence under democratic rule - a step which would of course have precluded the creation of a Jewish state. The majority felt that this would prejudge the questions which the proposed committee had to decide. The possibility of independence would anyway be one of the questions the committee would discuss, and it should not be imposed on it in advance. For these reasons the proposed Arab agenda item was not adopted.
The Soviet Union, Poland and India none the less wanted a specific reference in the committee's terms of reference to 'the question of establishing without delay the independent democratic state of Palestine'. This was not designed as support for the Arab cause: the Soviet Union and Poland made no secret of their sympathies with the Jewish cause in Palestine, and Poland even made herself the spokesman for this, on the grounds that many Palestinian Jews had originally come from Poland (an ironic position in the light of subsequent Polish policy regarding Jews). It was designed rather as support for the general anti-colonial position that independence should be given as soon as possible to all the dependent territories, and the influence of colonial powers removed from the scene as quickly as possible.
But the United States, many Latin American countries and others favouring Jewish claims opposed the proposal for the same reason as they had opposed the Arab agenda item: it would prejudice the conclusions which the committee had to reach. Eventually, therefore, more non-committal terms of reference were agreed. These provided that the committee should prepare a report simply 'on the question of Palestine' . The committee would have wide powers to ascertain and record facts, would conduct investigations in Palestine and anywhere else it thought useful, taking account of the various religious interests in the area. It would then submit proposals 'for the solution of the problem of Palestine' before 1 September.
Postcolonial Challenges of United Nations
