Political report of the Executive of the Jewish Agency submitted to the ... Zionist Congress and the ... session of the Council of the Jewish Agency · 1937-08-01 · 8.1937 · p. Seite 101

101 on these works large sums of money which would otherwise have been available for additional colonisation. 12. Government has failed to take adequate steps to ascertain the water resources of the country and to establish irrigation schemes which would have increased the possibilities of close settlement on the land and would have facilitated the absorption of Jewish immigration as contemplated by Article 6 of the Mandate. 13. Land settlement has not proceeded with sufficient dispatch. The actual system of land settlement is considered to be unsatisfactory. Settlement Officers exercise in effect the functions of judges instead of deciding claims in a summary manner on the land. It is submitted that much time would be saved if legal issues were reserved for determination by a Magistrate. There are two appeals possible from the decision of a Settlement Officer, one to the Land Court and one to the Supreme Court, when one appeal would be ample. Nor has an adequate staff been provided for settlement work which at the present rate of progress will continue for about 100 years before the land settlement of the entire country including Beersheba is completed. 14. It is submitted that Government should facilitate the settlement of the Beersheba area by placing a large tract of land at the disposal of Jewish colonising bodies, as was requested, so that an organised effort might be made to discover water for irrigation purposes. Government should moreover lend its assistance to this effort and secure for Jewish settlement such areas as may be found cultivable, whilst making due provision for the need of the existing Arab cultivators. With this object in view it should commence land settlement operations in the Negev area. IV. TRANSJORDAN Without raising the question of the present political status of Transjordan, the Jewish Agency considers the closing of that territory to Jewish immigration and settlement to be unjustified. The Jewish Agency is convinced that with the active assistance of the Mandatory Government, a beginning could be made with Jewish settlement in a suitable part of Transjordan which would redound to the benefit of the Transjordan population. The Jewish Agency submits that the Jewish colonising bodies should also be allowed to acquire land in Transjordan for the purpose of settling on it, subject to their agreement, those Palestinian Arabs whom they may have to provide with land. V. INDUSTRY 1. The general grievance under this head is that Government has not pursued any active policy of industrial development or given sufficient encouragement to industrial enterprise. It has followed an out-of-date policy of "laissez faire" at a time when