The terms of the League of Nations Mandates had an origin outside of the organization. They were drafted in the councils of the Allies of World War I. The League of Nations could not alter the terms of a mandate in any substantial way.^[6] It was the original intention of the League of Nations that the Mandatory regime in Palestine would lead to independence.

In 1937, members of the Permanent Mandates Commission of the League of Nations had privately informed the leadership of the Jewish Agency that the Palestine Mandate could not be implemented according to the Agency's wishes. Faced with the prospect of remaining a minority in greater Palestine, the Jewish Agency Executive decided that partition was the only way out of the impasse.^[7] The principle of partition was placed on the agenda of the Twentieth Zionist Congress. In a 15 July 1937 editorial, David Ben-Gurion implied that partition could never be an acceptable long-term solution: 'The Jewish people have always regarded, and will continue to regard Palestine as a whole, as a single country which is theirs in a national sense and will become theirs once again. No Jew will accept partition as a just and rightful solution.'^[8] During the Congress, Ben Gurion supported the proposal to partition Palestine into a Jewish and an Arab state.^[9] At the same time, he delivered speeches which made it clear that he did not accept partition as a final solution: 'If I had been faced with the question: a Jewish state in the west of the land of Israel in return for giving up on our historical right to the entire land of Israel I would have postponed the establishment of the state. No Jew is entitled to give up the right of the Jewish nation to the land. It is not in the authority of any Jew or of any Jewish body; it is not even in the authority of the entire nation alive today to give up any part of the land'... ...'this is a standing right under all conditions. Even if, at any point, the Jews choose to decline it, they have no right to deprive future generations of it. Our right to the entire land exists and stands for ever.'^[10]

The Zionist Congress continued to publicly propose that Palestine be established as a Jewish Commonwealth according to the Biltmore proposals, while at the same time admitting in private that they had a partition plan of their own that was acceptable as a basis for negotiations.^[11] During the debate on partition in November 1947, Mr Husseini (of the Arab Higher Committee) referred to Ben Gurion's previous contention that no Zionist could forego the smallest portion of the land of Israel, and suggested that the Revisionists were being more honest about their territorial aspirations than the representatives of the Jewish Agency.^[12] By December 1947, the Jewish community in Palestine let it be known that they had tens of thousands of well equipped and well trained fighters.^[13]

In the White Paper of 1939, the British Government had determined that it was under no legal obligation to facilitate the further development of the Jewish National Home, by immigration, without respecting the wishes of the Arab population. The 1939 Zionist Congress denied the moral and legal validity of the White Paper. The opinion of the Permanent Mandates Commission, which had the duty "to advise" the Council of the League of Nations "on all matters relating to the observance of the Mandates" was divided. Four members felt the White Paper violated the terms of the mandate, while three members did not. An analysis prepared by the UN Secretariat concluded: 'It remains a matter of speculation whether the Council of the League, in the circumstances existing in the summer of 1939, would have sided with the majority of four or the minority of three of the Permanent Mandates Commission. The outbreak of war in September 1939 prevented the Council from considering the question.'^[14][15]

When the Jewish and Arab leadership could not agree on a course of administration that would lead to a unified independent state, the government of the United Kingdom requested that the Question of Palestine^[16] be placed on the Agenda of the United Nations General Assembly. They asked that the Assembly make recommendations, under Article 10 of the Charter,^[17] concerning the future government of Palestine.^[18] The British proposal recommended that a special committee be established to perform a preliminary study designed to assist the General Assembly in developing recommendations. The United Nations Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP) was an advisory committee to the Ad Hoc Committee on the Palestine Question. Membership on the Ad Hoc Committee was open to all the members of the United Nations. The General Assembly resolution called for the establishment of a United Nations Palestine Commission with a mandate to implement the plan of partition. The United Kingdom recognized the United Nations Palestine Commission as the successor government of Palestine.^[19] But the United Nations had not agreed to automatically fall heir to all of the responsibilities either of the League of Nations or of the Mandatory Power in respect to the Palestine Mandate. It had merely agreed to facilitate the transfer of sovereignty from the Mandatory to the provisional governments and to administer and govern a small trusteeship.^[20]

The Palestine Mandate

In November 1917, as General Allenby was preparing to conquer Palestine, the British Foreign office issued the Balfour Declaration of 1917, a letter from the Foreign Secretary, Lord Balfour, to Lord Rothschild, head of the British Zionist movement. The declaration stated:

"His Majesty's Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country."

From the outset, there were important preliminary legal questions regarding the validity of the Balfour Declaration of 1917, the Anglo-French Declaration, the League of Nations British Mandate of Palestine, and the competence of the United Nations or its members to enforce a solution against the wishes of the majority of the indigenous population. The United States Senate had not ratified the Treaty of Versailles, in part, due to reservations about the legitimacy of the League of Nations System of Mandates.^[33] The US government subsequently entered into individual treaties to secure legal rights for its citizens, and to protect property rights and businesses interests in the mandates. In the case of the Palestine Mandate Convention, it recited the terms of the League of Nations mandate, and subjected them to eight amendments. One of those precluded any unilateral changes to the terms of the mandate.^[34] The United States insisted that the convention say that it 'consents' rather than 'concurs' with the terms of the mandate and declined to mention the Balfour Declaration in the preamble of its portion of the agreement. It did not agree to mutual defense, to provisionally recognize a Jewish State, or to pledge itself to maintain the territorial integrity of the mandate.^[35]

There were also suggestions that the Mandate should have been placed under the UN trusteeship program in accordance with the guiding principles contained in Chapter 11^[36] and Chapter 12^[37] of the UN Charter. All members were required to recognize the 'fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion' when dealing with non-self governing peoples. In that respect the UN system was portrayed as 'a real advance over the League of Nations Covenant and the mandate system established under it.'.^[38] All of these issues were more or less brushed aside by routine procedural decisions according to the delegate from Colombia. His observations and comments were addressed to the Ad Hoc Committee on 25 November 1947.

Article 26 of the Palestine Mandate^[39] provided that:

'The Mandatory agrees that, if any dispute whatever should arise between the Mandatory and another member of the League of Nations relating to the interpretation or the application of the provisions of the mandate, such dispute, if it cannot be settled by negotiation, shall be submitted to the Permanent Court of International Justice...'

The Jewish Agency claimed that the Mandate created a binding legal obligation to establish a sovereign Jewish State. The UNSCOP report to the General Assembly said the conclusion seemed inescapable that the undefined term "National Home" had been used, instead of the term "State", to place a restrictive construction on the scheme from its very inception.^[40]

The UN never reached a unanimous conclusion. Nothing in the terms of the Mandate precluded the establishment of a Jewish State in all of Palestine. However, a minority felt that nothing in the terms of the post-war treaties and the mandate precluded the establishment in Palestine of a Jewish state denominated along the lines of a 'domestic dependent nation'.^[41]

On 29 November 1947, the United Nations General Assembly voted 33 to 13, with 10 abstentions, in favour of the Partition Plan, while making some adjustments to the boundaries between the two states proposed by it. Three countries — Haiti, Liberia, the Philippines — were pressured by the United States if they would consider changing their votes, in order to provide the two-thirds majority required for the plan to pass, and subsequently switched them between November 25 to November 29.^[81]

The division was to take effect on the date of British withdrawal from the Mandate Territory of Palestine. Of the permanent members of the Security Council, France, the United States, and the Soviet Union voted the resolution while the Republic of China and United Kingdom abstained.

     In favour      Switched to in favour     Abstained      Against      Absent

In favor, (33 countries, 59%):

• 30 countries (54%) initially in favour:
  • Australia, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Byelorussian SSR, Canada, Costa Rica, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, France, Guatemala, Iceland, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Poland, Sweden, South Africa, Ukrainian SSR, United States of America, Soviet Union, Uruguay, Venezuela.

• An additional 3 (5%) switched to in favor:
  • Haiti, Liberia, Philippines.

Against, (13 countries, 23%):

• Afghanistan, Cuba, Egypt, Greece, India, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey, Yemen.

Abstentions, (10 countries, 18%):

• Argentina, Chile, Republic of China, Colombia, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Honduras, Mexico, United Kingdom, Yugoslavia.

Absent, (1 countries , 0%):

• Thailand

On the day after the vote, a spate of Arab attacks left seven Jews dead and scores more wounded. Shooting, stoning, and rioting continued apace in the following days. The consulates of Poland and Sweden, both of whose governments had voted for partition, were attacked. Bombs were thrown into cafes, Molotov cocktails were hurled at shops, a synagogue was set on fire.

Fighting began almost as soon as the plan was approved, beginning with the Arab Jerusalem Riots of 1947. On 1 April 1948, the Security Council adopted Resolution 44 "to consider further the question of the future government of Palestine."^[82]

In February 1948 the British representative report that in the period from 30 November 1947 to 1 February 1948. there 869 Killed and 1,909 Wounded, for total of 2,778 Casualties: British 46 Killed 135 Wounded; Arabs 427 Killed 1,035 Wounded; Jews 381 Killed 725 Wounded; Others 15 Killed 15 Wounded. The Palestine Commissioner said that without 'the efforts of the [British] security forces over the past month, the two communities would by now have been fully engaged in internecine slaughter.'^[83]

On May 14, one day before the British Mandate expired, the new Jewish state named the State of Israel announced its formal establishment and the formation of the provisional government. The UN Resolution is mentioned in Israel' Declaration of Independence as recognizing the right of the Jewish People to establish a state. In accordance with the UN Resolution, the Declaration promised that the State of Israel would ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex, and guaranteed freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture.

Eleven minutes after the Declaration of Independence was signed, US President Harry Truman de facto recognized the State of Israel, followed by Iran (which had voted against the UN partition plan), Guatemala, Iceland, Nicaragua, Romania and Uruguay. The Soviet Union was the first nation to recognize Israel de jure on 17 May 1948, followed by Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Ireland and South Africa.^[84] The United States extended official recognition on 31 January 1949.^[85][86] The Arab League had announced the establishment of a civil administration throughout Palestine on the same day.^[87][88] The All-Palestine government did little more than issue passports and raise its own militia, the Holy War Army. The government was eventually recognized by Egypt, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Saudi Arabia.^[89]

The declaration was followed by an invasion of the new state by troops from Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon and Syria, starting the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, known in Israel as the War of Independence (Hebrew: îìçîú äòöîàåúý, Milhamat HaAtzma'ut). Although a truce began on 11 June, fighting resumed on 8 July and stopped again on 18 July, before restarting in mid-October and finally ending on 24 July 1949 with the signing of the armistice agreement with Syria. By then Israel had retained its independence and increased its land area by almost 50% compared to the partition plan. Following independence, Moetzet HaAm was transformed into the Provisional State Council, which acted as the legislative body for the new state until the first elections in January 1949.