"...to practice the arts of peace": The United Nations and Palestine
In April 1947 the British government requested a special session of the U.N. General Assembly to discuss Palestine, over which it had been assigned a mandate by the League of Nations in 1917. Per the terms of that mandate, increasing numbers of Jews had settled in Palestine, and conflicts between them and Arabs had escalated.
Letter to C.H. Rieber, 1947
The General Assembly created a Special Committee on Palestine to investigate the situation and
Secretary-General Trygve Lie appointed Ralph Bunche as assistant to his representative on the committee. In a June 1947 letter to
C.H. Rieber, a former dean and professor at UCLA, Bunche mentioned the beginning of this assignment: "I had planned to visit California this summer and I certainly intended to get in touch with you . . . . But now my summer plans have been re-arranged for me, since I have been assigned to accompany the United Nations mission to Palestine. . . . I will need on this mission all of the philosophy, vision and patience which you and McIlwain [Charles Howard McIlwain, a political philosophy professor; Bunche considered him his best teacher at Harvard University] taught me -- and more." Bunche worked with the committee throughout the summer, drafted its majority and minority reports, then returned to his responsibilities in the Trusteeship Division.
A contentious General Assembly vote on November 29, 1947, approved the establishment of separate Arab and Jewish states following the withdrawal of British troops and created a commission to manage the transition, to which Bunche was appointed. Representatives from Arab and Muslim countries voted against it, then walked out, and a three-day general strike followed in Palestine.
Ralph Bunche and
Folke Bernadotte, 1948
After the last British soldiers left on May 14, 1948, tensions escalated further, and troops from Arab countries moved in. That same day the General Assembly created the position of mediator, to which the Security Council appointed
Count Folke Bernadotte; Lie named Bunche to assist Bernadotte and to serve as the secretary-general’s representative in Palestine.
The U.N. representatives arrived in the Middle East on May 27 and managed to secure a ceasefire on June 11. Negotiations continued throughout the summer, then Bernadotte was assassinated in September 1948 by members of a Jewish underground group opposed to the partition.
U.N. identification, 1948
Egypt-Israel Armistice Agreement
signing, Hotel des Roses, Rhodes,
February 24, 1949
The Security Council immediately named Bunche acting mediator. After six more months of delicate, demanding negotiations, an armistice agreement was by signed by Israel and Egypt on February 24, 1949. Further negotiations resulted in armistice agreements between Israel and Lebanon on March 23 and Israel and Jordan on April 3. Bunche returned to New York on April 18 and supervised negotiations between Israel and Syria from there; the two countries signed an armistice agreement signed on July 20.
On August 4, 1949, Bunche reported the completion of the mission in Palestine to the U.N. Security Council and requested that remaining responsibilities be transferred to the ongoing operations of the Palestine Conciliation Committee. A press release issued by the U.N. with the text of his statement marked what he hoped was the end of this assignment.
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