In the years immediately after World War II, as the United Nations transitioned from a noble idea to an actual international political body, eleven nations took up the British government’s request to determine the fate of its Middle East holdings.
The British had overseen Palestine since the end of World War I, when the League of Nations established the mandate system to govern the territories of the fallen Ottoman Empire. It was in that capacity that the British government issued the Balfour Declaration, which expressed support for the establishment of a “national home for the Jewish people” in Palestine.
Significant tensions between Jewish and Arab communities in Palestine marked the mandate period. Immigration of Jewish settlers to Palestine increased, leading to land disputes and clashes between the two communities. As it recovered and rebuilt from the devastation of World War II, the British government happily passed on the obligation of resolving the situation to the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP), formed in 1947.
As Elad Ben-Dror, an associate professor in the Department of Middle Eastern Studies at Israel’s Bar-Ilan University, wrote, “all members of [UNSCOP] united around the idea that the British mandate should come to an end and that the citizens of Palestine were entitled to independence. However, beyond this basic accord, disagreement existed between the members: one member chose to abstain, three recommended the foundation of one federal state over the whole area, and seven members recommended the foundation of two independent states, one Jewish and one Arab.”
Presiding over this complicated geopolitical matter was Brazilian diplomat Oswaldo Aranha, the chairman of UNSCOP.
Mr. Aranha was known for his diplomatic skills and his ability to...
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