The Jews to Go into the Sea

Tracking down statements can be difficult at times. Everyone "heard"/"read" it but years later, no one can find its source.

One such issue is, did Arabs threaten to throw the Jews into the sea, and when?

EOZ had this published tracing the history whether in 1948 or during the 1950s or on the eve of the 1967 war.

Of course, the "Palestine from the River to the Sea" chant basically means destroying Israel but it is not the same as actually throwing Jews into the sea. I noted previously a caricature of Israel as a ship sinking. Still, not exactly the same.

Well, we now have a testimony in real time, from August 1948*.

In this academic article on the machinations of British Intelligence Services during the 1940s, I read, on page 14, that England's Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin, "After being notified that the Arab leaders were blaming Britain for their defeat", instructed his diplomats in the Arab capitals, as well as in Washington and the UN, to respond that:

It is quite untrue to suggest that we have let the Arabs down or failed in any obligations towards them. We did not urge them to intervene by force in Palestine, nor did we promise them support if they did so. They went in of their own accord, in most cases without telling us beforehand. Very small measure of military successes which they achieved shows that their forces, while capable perhaps of occupying friendly territory, were not prepared for and incapable of undertaking major military operations, which would have been necessary to achieve the announced object of the Arab states, namely to drive the Jews into the sea.

I think that should settle matters.

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* The footnote reads: 

TNA, FO141/1247, no. 1454, London, 25 August 1948, Bevin to Cairo, and no. 821, August 21, Bevin to Kirkbride; Louis, Ends of British Imperialism, 635-6, 694-8 

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UPDATE

EOZ in a follow-up.