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May 10, 1943 camp workers' strike

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Summary

One-day strike of the workers at British and Allied military camps in Palestine, called unilaterally by the Histadrut for May 10, 1943 to win extension of the cost of living allowance to camp workers, over the opposition of the Palestine Arab Workers Society; nearly all the Jewish camp workers struck, while the extent of Arab participation is sharply disputed in the accounts Lockman records (Comrades and Enemies: Arab and Jewish Workers in Palestine, 1906-1948, lines 3419-3435).

Details

  • By early 1943 camp workers — some 35,000 Arabs and 15,000 Jews at British and Allied military bases by 1943, on the figures given in the chapter’s camp section — faced wages that prices had outrun (about 21 piastres a day for unskilled Arab labour, 28 for Jewish) and military reluctance to recognise local committees; at the end of March 1943 a government wages committee approved a substantial cost of living allowance for industrial and service workers, but the military authorities refused to extend it to camp workers (Comrades and Enemies: Arab and Jewish Workers in Palestine, 1906-1948, lines 3393, 3411).
  • The PAWS’s early-April 1943 Jaffa conference of some one hundred branch leaders and delegates called for large wage increases, the COLA, overtime and holiday pay, softer camp discipline and equalisation of Arab and Jewish wages, and remained willing to cooperate with the Histadrut in negotiations on condition the Histadrut desisted from recruiting Arabs (Comrades and Enemies: Arab and Jewish Workers in Palestine, 1906-1948, line 3415).
  • The Histadrut decided not to cooperate with the PAWS, held its own May 2 conference in Tel Aviv — some 147 delegates from ninety work sites, claiming to speak for all 50,000 camp workers — and announced a one-day strike for May 10 if the COLA was not granted; a PAWS telegram declaring the conference represented only the Jewish camp workers was apparently not read to the delegates (Comrades and Enemies: Arab and Jewish Workers in Palestine, 1906-1948, lines 3419-3421).
  • The PAWS denounced the unilateral call, campaigned intensively to convince Arab workers not to strike, issued a Hebrew leaflet appealing to Jewish camp workers not to join a “separatist” strike, and at the same time sent the Histadrut a letter offering to discuss cooperation; Histadrut leaders debated postponement but decided to proceed (Comrades and Enemies: Arab and Jewish Workers in Palestine, 1906-1948, lines 3423-3425).
  • On the day, nearly all the Jewish camp workers joined the strike (Comrades and Enemies: Arab and Jewish Workers in Palestine, 1906-1948, line 3433).
  • Lockman’s assessment: some thousands of Arab workers joined, especially at sites where the Histadrut was the only organised force and relatively remote from the three cities where the PAWS exercised most influence, but by far the greater part of the Arab majority of the camp labour force refused to follow the Histadrut’s lead; the strike was understood in private to have been a failure, and the British showed no sign of granting the COLA (Comrades and Enemies: Arab and Jewish Workers in Palestine, 1906-1948, line 3435).
  • The conflict over the strike helped precipitate the crisis that disintegrated the Palestine Communist Party as an Arab-Jewish organisation: Arab communists in the PAWS worked to convince Arab workers not to join, while many Jewish communists could not call on Jewish workers to break it (Comrades and Enemies: Arab and Jewish Workers in Palestine, 1906-1948, lines 3453-3457).

Where sources disagree

Lockman keeps the accounts of Arab participation side by side, all from line 3433:

  • The Arab press insisted the Histadrut’s attempt to bring the Arab workers out had been a complete failure, and a British Foreign Office dispatch similarly asserted the Arab workers had not joined in.
  • A PAWS leaflet depicted the Arab workers’ “100 percent” rejection of the strike as “decisive proof that the Histadrut has been taught a lesson, that it should refrain from claiming to represent the Arab workers because they have their own independent organization in the PAWS”.
  • The Histadrut’s organ Davar claimed the great majority of Arab workers had taken part.
  • The Palestine Post asserted that “solidarity between Arab and Jewish workers was complete in most camps, though some Arab workers remained at their jobs in two urban centres in compliance with the appeal of the Arab Labour Societies in Palestine”.
  • Some Histadrut officials estimated Arab participation at 17,000-20,000, about 50 to 60 percent of the Arab workforce, but a Histadrut leaflet issued a few days after the strike spoke more vaguely and modestly of “thousands” of Arab strikers.

Comrades and Enemies: Arab and Jewish Workers in Palestine, 1906-1948, Histadrut, Palestine Arab Workers Society, Federation of Arab Trade Unions and Labor Societies, Palestine Communist Party

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