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This booklet contains the texts of addresses delivered before the United Nations at Lake Success, on May 8 and 12, 1947 by Dr. Abba Hillel Silver, President of the American Section of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, Mr. Moshe Shertok, Head of the Political Department of the Agency and Mr. David Ben-Gurion, Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Agency. These addresses were printed in the Congressional Record of May 16, 1947, and reprinted in this booklet. It specifically states that it was not printed at government expense.
A special session of the UN General Assembly, the first of its kind, was summoned in April 1947 and decided, in Resolution 106 (s-l) of May 15, to establish the UN Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP), consisting of representatives of 11 states. UNSCOP members visited Palestine, neighboring countries, and camps of displaced persons in Europe. They heard oral testimonies, received written communications from individuals and organizations, and finally submitted a report to the General Assembly. The UNSCOP report (A/364) unanimously recommended that the Mandate over Palestine be terminated and that Palestine be granted independence as soon as possible, after a brief transition period. The majority of the UNSCOP members proposed the political partition (subject to an economic union) of Palestine into a Jewish state, an Arab state, and a separate City of Jerusalem. A minority of the members urged the formation of a Federal State of Palestine. The report was discussed by the General Assembly, at its second regular session, in the Ad Hoc Committee on the Palestine Question, which, after a prolonged debate, endorsed, with modifications, the UNSCOP majority plan. Strong Arab opposition was countered by a unique alliance between the United States and the Soviet Union, supported by many smaller countries.
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