The First Arab-Israeli War Documentary || UNSCOP and the Partition Resolution – Part 04

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He asked Rendel for "advice," and the ambassador, "purely personally," recommended abstention. More formally, London declined to offer advice and added high-mindedly that it deprecated attempts by any power "to influence others." Holland referred to the problem posed by "her population of 16 million but assured the Zionists that it would stick to its UNSCOP representative's pro-partition position. Speaking of all three Benelux countries, a Zionist diplomat concluded, after the vote: "Their affirmative vote at the end came with some relief."

Britain itself decided to abstain. But without doubt British diplomats around the globe, and especially in New York, "privately" advised various countries on the best course of action. From the Zionist standpoint, the Anglo-Saxon Dominions were an easier sell, and in the event, all four voted for partition. But it was not all smooth sailing. Public opinion after the Holocaust strongly supported Jewish statehood. But the governments all had economic and political interests that militated in the opposite direction, and the traditional alignment of their foreign policies with London's seemed to indicate abstention. In June 1947 the Jewish Agency's Michael Comay discovered that the New Zealand UN deputy head of delegation, J. S. Reid, was "strongly anti-Zionist." Reid left him with the impression that "the New Zealand Legation is completely under the sway of the British Embassy." Comay was somewhat reassured by the South African minister, H. T. Andrews, who said that although "for 90% of the time, the Dominions' views roughly coincided with those of Britain," occasionally they took an independent tack and that the British "would not insist on unanimity" in the Palestine vote. London, for its part, was careful not to be seen to be "pushing" the Dominions.

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