Bevin, Ernest

(1881–1951)

   British labour leader and foreign secretary. The son of a farmhand, Bevin rose through the ranks of the trade union movement and became the powerful leader of the Transport and General Workers Union, the largest in Britain. In World War II, he was a member of the War Cabinet for labour and national service. With the election victory of the Labour Party in 1945, he became foreign secretary in the Attlee Cabinet. Although the situation in Palestine was nominally in the domain of the colonial secretary, the burly, tough Bevin took personal charge of it, as it had become a major international crisis. The pro-Zionist platform of the Labour Party before the elections was forgotten. Bevin accepted the basic tenet of the 1939 White Paper, which was that the Arab world should not be antagonized by fidelity to the Jewish National Home commitment in the BALFOUR Declaration and the mandate. The conflict that ensued focused on the growing resistance movement in the yishuv in Palestine, the ‘illegal’ immigration, British repressive measures against both, and the repercussions in world public opinion, especially in the United States. In 1946 an attempt was made to blunt American criticism by setting up the Anglo-American Committee of Enquiry. But when President Truman endorsed the committee’s recommendation to let in 100,000 Jewish displaced persons, Britain refused to do so.

   In the same year, Bevin tried unsuccessfully to promote the so-called Morisson-Grady plan, which would have given the Jews local autonomy in a few cantons totalling 17 per cent of the territory of Palestine. At the beginning of 1947, the Palestine question was referred to the United Nations. While its Special Committee, UNSCOP, was in Palestine, the situation reached breaking point when the 4,500 Jewish survivors who had come in on the illegal boat Exodus were ordered by Bevin to be shipped back to Germany. In November 1947, the UN General Assembly adopted the partition plan that included the establishment of Jewish and Arab states. Britain refused to co- operate in implementing it and ended the mandate on 14 May 1948. On the same day, the independence of Israel was proclaimed. Bevin felt defeated and humiliated at the collapse of his Palestine policy. It was only eight months later, January 1949, that Bevin was willing to acquiesce in British de facto recognition of the new state.