THE ACTIVITIES OF THE HAGANA, IRGUN AND STERN BANDS AS RECORDED IN BRITISH COMMAND PAPER No. 6873 by Tannous, Izzat (foreword) - [1960]

New York: The Palestine Arab Refugee Office, [1960]. 16 pp., containing several in-text photographic illustrations. Original blue printed wrappers, saddle-stapled. Ink-stamped date of "JAN 26 1961" on front wrapper. Wrappers moderately scuffed and worn. Very good.

First edition of the New York Palestine Arab Refugee Office's republication of the 1946 British Command Paper, STATEMENT OF INFORMATION RELATING TO ACTS OF VIOLENCE, detailing the composition and violent activities of Jewish paramilitary groups operating in Palestine at the time, including those of the Haganah (which would later form the core of the Israeli Defense Forces) and the extremist militias, the Irgun and Stern Group (Lehi). The latter two groups would conduct the Deir Yassin massacre of Arab civilians in April 1948, which played a major role in precipitating the exodus of 700,000 native Palestinians that year.

The massacre is mentioned in Izzat Tannous's foreword, which provides a Palestinian perspective on Zionism, the British Mandate, and the establishment of the Israeli state. Tannous (1896-1972), was a Christian Palestinian physician, who had been a leading advocate for Palestinian Arab rights since the mid-1930s. After partition and the declaration of the establishment of the state of Israel, Tannous established the Arab Palestine Office in Beirut in 1949 and the Palestine Arab Refugee Office in 1954. In 1964, he helped found the Palestine Liberation Organization and served as the head of its New York office until 1968.