THE TABLET

A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER & REVIEW

Pro Ecclesia Dei, Pro Rccjina et Patria

FO UNDED IN 1840

JA N U A RY 14t h , 19 56

NINEPENCE

T w e n t i e t h -C e n t u r y G r a d u a te s : The Arts on the Defensive

A f t e r t h e F r e n c h E le c t io n s : It Might Have Been Worse. By Frank MacMillan

E v i d e n c e o f P r o g r e s s : Some Recent Catholic Statistics. By the Bishop o f Salford

M id d l e East C o n v e r s a t io n s : I : How they Feel in Jordan. By J. E. Alexander

Et EgO in A c a d ia . . . : Introduction to the French Canadians. By M. Bellasis

A c r O S S t h e I r o n C u r t a i n : A Journey without a Passport. By Reginald Colby

C r i t ic s ’ P a g e : American Art at the Tate, by Winefride Wilson ; Handel and the Human Voice,

by Rosemary Hughes ; Four New Films, by J. A. V. Burke B o o k s R e v i e w e d : Scotland under Charles I, by David Mathew ; Gibraltar, by José Pla ;

Socialism and the Individual, by William Angus Sinclair ; Chosen Words, by Ivor Brown ; Marie Corelli, by William Stuart Scott ; The Black Sheep, by Jacques Perry ; The Primrose Path, by Peter Forster ; The Lady in the Tower, by John Symonds ; Boy on a Dolphin, by David Divine ; The Oxford Junior Encyclopcedia, Volume XI ; The Record Guide, by Edward Sackville-West and Desm ond ShaweTaylor ; and Garbo, by John Bambridge. Reviewed by Oliver T. G. Welch, J. J. Dwyer, Colin Clark, M. Bellasis, Michael D e-la -N oy, Robert Cardigan,

B. C. L. Keelan and Rosemary Hughes.

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TROOPS FOR JORDAN

W HILE the British Government flies paratroops to Cyprus to be available for Jordan, the Soviet representative at the United Nations takes a further step forward to make Russia the champion of the Arab States against Israel. The Security Council is asked to condemn Israel for an aggressive incident against Syria. Anyone who recalls the way Britain made itself the friend of Syrian independence, at a great cost to Anglo-French solidarity, must reflect wryly on the way, a mere decade later, the Syrian Government should be preferring other friends.

It is no doubt true that no one need take too seriously news of street demonstrations and rioting crowds in Middle Eastern countries, for very small sums and no very elaborate organization can provide such demonstrations. The hostility which Saudi Arabia is showing to Jordan is not solely or even mainly on account of Jordan’s alliance with Britain. It has its dynastic origins. But it is intended to show the young king that he will have to choose, and must greatly weaken the close links between his country and Britain if he wants to be accepted by his Arab neighbours, who refuse to have any such links.

The drive against Britain’s entrenched position in Jordan follows immediately and logically on Britain’s withdrawal from the Canal Zone, and is a diplomatic part of the mounting preparation against Israel. Among the exhibits in the Victoria and Albert Museum which marks the three hundredth Anniversary of the formal readmission of Jews to this country is the original of the Balfour Declaration, with its clear proviso that nothing was to be done against the rights and interests of the existing Arab population in Palestine. It was of the Declaration that it lost the friendship of the Zionists, who resolved instead to make a sovereign State, so that they could rapidly increase its population. But it was a decision truly fateful, for it involved the creation of a vast Arab refugee problem. This decision was no doubt believed to be in the interest of the Jews, under the immediate impact of Hitler’s mass extermination. There was a cry for one corner of the earth where they need have no fear of the Government; of expulsion or worse. But it was an attempt to solve the problem of the homeless Jews by creating the problem of the homeless Arabs. It inflicted injustice on people with many friends. It was a policy achieved against Great Britain, for which we should not be held responsible ; but we must show ourselves fully aware of it.

An Egyptian correspondent of the Manchester Guardian has revived the suggestion, which has been put forward from time to time already, that the present drift towards war could best be arrested by the creation of a confederation, of a United States of the Middle East. Relations between the Arab States hardly suggest that this is practical politics. Kings are naturally and traditionally jealous of their sovereignty in their own domains, and Republics hardly less so, and it would be difficult to achieve anything more than an alliance ; and the history of the Arab League shows how difficult it is to maintain even that, whereas the virtue claimed for a confederation, of which the State of Israel would be one constituent State, is that in Arab eyes it would reduce the Jewish incursion to what alone might be tolerable for the Arabs. They would be a minority, protected constitutionally and legally, but in essence a permanent minority, in law as