Abstract
The pushback within the AFSC articulated by Wriggins against resettlement as part of regional development was being felt elsewhere. On March 18, AFSC staffer George Mathues reported to James Read, secretary in the Foreign Service Section at AFSC, about a meeting of the American Volunteer Relief Agencies in the Middle East, an informal group organized by the US Department of State led by Special Assistant to the Secretary of State for the Middle East, Coordinator for Palestine Refugee Matters—and wealthy petroleum geologist—George McGhee. This group was comprised of a number of organizations including the National Catholic Welfare Conference (NCWC), the Near East Foundation, the Church World Service, and representatives from Gulf Oil, the Arab-American Oil Company, and the US Department of State. Mathues reported that Monsignor Thomas McMahon of the NCWC was adamant that UNRPR was not giving credit or financial support to other relief organizations, including his own. McMahon also decried the lack of coordination between UNRPR and private aid groups. Above all, McMahon stressed that “repatriation is the only answer to the refugee problem. It should be our “party” line, although we should not go into politics.”1
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Notes
See Michael J. Cohen, “William A. Eddy, the Oil Lobby and the Palestine Problem,” Middle Eastern Studies 30 (1994): 166–180.
For American Zionist efforts to influence the politics of Middle East oil companies prior to partition see Zohar Segev, “Struggle for Cooperation and Integration: American Zionists and Arab Oil, 1940s,” Middle Eastern Studies 42, no. 5 (2006): 819–830.
John A. DeNovo, “The Culbertson Economic Mission and Anglo-American Tensions in the Middle East, 1944–1945,” The Journal of American History 63 (1977): 913–936;
Robert Vitalis, “The ‘New Deal’ in Egypt: The Rise of Anglo-American Commercial Competition in World War II and the Fall of Neocolonialism,” Diplomatic History 20, no. 2 (1996): 211–240.
Peter L. Hahn, The United States, Great Britain, and Egypt, 1945–1956: Strategy and Diplomacy in the Early Cold War (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1991), 82–88;
Steven L. Spiegel, The Other Arab-Israeli Conflict: MakingAmerica’s Middle East Policy, from Truman to Reagan (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985), 45–46.
See the classic statements in Seymour Martin Lipset, “Some Social Requisites of Democracy,” American Political Science Review 53, no. 1 (1959): 69–105
and Walt W. Rostow, The Stages of Economic Growth (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1960).
Daniel Lerner, The Passing of Traditional Society: Modernizing the Middle East (Glencoe, IL: The Free Press), 79.
For the view of a Point IV administrator that illustrates American faith in the program see Jonathan B. Bingham, Shirt Sleeve Diplomacy-Point 4 in Action (New York: John Day, 1954).
Nicholas Owen, “Britain and Decolonization: The Labour Governments and the Middle East, 1945–1951,” in Demise of the British Empire in the Middle East: Britain’s Responses to Nationalist Movements, 1943–55, eds. Michael J. Cohen and Martin Kolinsky (London: Frank Cass, 1998), 3–22.
Wesley K. Wark, “Development Diplomacy: Sir John Troutbeck and the British Middle East Office, 1947–1950,” in British Officials and British Foreign Policy, 1945–1950, ed. John Zametica (Leicester: Leicester University Press, 1990), 231.
See generally Ritchie Ovendale, The Foreign Policy of the British Labour Governments, 1945–1951 (Leicester: Leicestershire, Leicester University Press, 1984).
Martin W. Wilmington, The Middle East Supply Centre (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1971).
Paul W. T. Kingston, Britain and the Politics of Modernization in the Middle East, 1945–1958 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996).
Gregory A. Barton, “Environmentalism, Development and British Policy in the Middle East 1945–65,” The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 38, no. 4 (2010): 619–639.
Mary C. Wilson, King Abdullah, Britain, and the Making of Jordan (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 184.
CAB 131/7. Defense Committee, Arms and Equipment for the Egyptians, Report by the Chiefs of Staff, D.O. (49) 58, 25 July 1949. See also David Tal, “Weapons Without Influence: British Arms Supply Policy and the Egyptian-Czech Arms Deal, 1945–55,” The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History 34, no. 3 (2006): 369–388.
See generally Elie Kedourie, “Britain, France, and the Last Phase of the Eastern Question,” in Soviet-American Rivalry in the Middle East, ed. J. C. Hurewitz, (New York: Praeger, 1969), 189–197;
Philippe Rondot, “France and Palestine: From Charles de Gaulle to Francois Mitterand,” Journal of Palestine Studies 16, no. 3 (1987): 87–100.
Alberto Tonini, “International Donors, The Refugees and UNRWA: France, Britain and Italy as Case Studies, 1950–1993,” in The Palestinian Refugees and UNRWA in Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza, 1949–1999 (Beirut: Centre d’Etudes et de Recherche sur le Moyen-Orient Contemporain, 1999), 8.
Peretz, Israel and the Palestine Arabs, 38–41. See also Neil Caplan, “A Tale of Two Cities: The Rhodes and Lausanne Conferences, 1949,” Journal of Palestine Studies 21, no. 3 (1992): 5–34;
Neil Caplan, Futile Diplomacy III: The United Nations, the Great Powers and Middle East Peacemaking, 1948–1954 (London: Frank Cass, 1997), 59–100.
Joshua Landis, “Early U.S. Policy toward Palestinian Refugees: the Syria Option,’ in The Palestinian Refugees: Old Problems — New Solutions,” eds. Joseph Ginat and Edward J. Perkins (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 2001), 77–87.
Compare Jalil al-Husseini, “Arab States and the Refugee Issue: A Retrospective View,” in Israel and the Palestinian Refugees, ed. Eyal Benvenisti (Berlin: Springer, 2007), 438–439. Al-Husseini neglects to mention the Syria political situation.
Lorton Heusel, Friends on the Front Line The Story of Delbert and Ruth Replogle (Greensboro, NC: Friends Historical Society, 1985), 110–111.
Copyright information
© 2013 Asaf Romirowsky and Alexander H. Joffe
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Romirowsky, A., Joffe, A.H. (2013). AFSC and the Politics of Regional Development. In: Religion, Politics, and the Origins of Palestine Refugee Relief. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137378170_6
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137378170_6
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, New York
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-47820-0
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-37817-0
eBook Packages: Palgrave Political & Intern. Studies CollectionPolitical Science and International Studies (R0)