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Arab Union of Railway Workers

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tags
aliasesAURW, Railway Arab Workers' Trade Union

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Summary

The name the Haifa-based organisation of Arab railway workers affiliated to the Palestine Arab Workers Society (PAWS) often used from 1930 onward, as the PAWS sought to distinguish its railway component and become a federation of trade unions (Comrades and Enemies: Arab and Jewish Workers in Palestine, 1906-1948, lines 1894-1896).

Details

  • In practice the boundaries between the AURW and the PAWS often remained vague, since many PAWS leaders were also current or former railwaymen; by 1934 the union was referring to itself in English-language correspondence as the Railway Arab Workers’ Trade Union, and Lockman uses AURW for the Arab railway workers’ union and PAWS for the broader organisation for clarity (Comrades and Enemies: Arab and Jewish Workers in Palestine, 1906-1948, lines 1894-1896).
  • In 1930 the AURW frustrated the Jewish-led union’s effort to reestablish links with Arab railway workers at al-Qantara, and in 1931-32 it pressed the Jewish-led union’s Arab members to quit and join it; it demanded the International Union of Railway, Postal and Telegraph Employees in Eretz Yisra’el (IU) divest itself of its Arab members and renounce representing all railway workers, refusing even to hold talks with Arabs who belonged to the IU (lines 1896-1904).
  • It cooperated with the IU through joint committees in 1934-36 — its secretary ‘Id Salim Haymur co-led the 1934 joint committee with IU secretary Michael Dana — proposed a merger in May 1934, and in April 1936 formally proposed both unions be dissolved and replaced by a unitary organisation; at the end of February 1936 it had formally declared the previous joint committee dissolved, explaining the decision in a lengthy Arabic statement in March 1936 (lines 1914-1948; Chapter 4 notes 47, 49).
  • During the 1936-39 Revolt in Palestine many of its key leaders were arrested by the British and held in detention for long periods, leaving the organisation paralysed and Arab railway workers without effective representation (lines 1948-1950).

Comrades and Enemies: Arab and Jewish Workers in Palestine, 1906-1948, Palestine Arab Workers Society, Palestine Railways, International Union of Railway, Postal and Telegraph Employees in Eretz Yisra’el, ‘Id Salim Haymur

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