Summary
Musa Kazim al-Husayni, the recently deposed mayor of Jerusalem elected president of the Arab Executive Committee in 1920, who in Banko’s account articulated an early Arab understanding of civil and political rights as inalienable and inherent in nationality by birth and descent, and was the first Executive leader to question the 1925 nationality legislation on behalf of emigrants in the Americas (The Invention of Palestinian Citizenship, 1918–1947, PDF p.81 / printed p.70).
Details
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Musa Kazim, then in his late sixties, came from the prominent al-Husayni family of Jerusalem; he opposed the British administration, his politics came to be respected by all sectors of Palestinian society, and until his death in 1934 he supported equal civil and political rights for all former Ottoman citizens (PDF p.81 / printed p.70).
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As Executive president he addressed a letter to Colonial Secretary Winston Churchill in 1921 pointing out that before the war the Jews of Palestine enjoyed the privileges and rights of citizenship in the Ottoman Empire, and expressing the belief that ‘countries with their civil and other rights and privileges are the property of their inhabitants and constitute an heirloom of the nation’; the Jewish, Christian and Muslim natives of Palestine (abnā’ filastīn) had ultimate control over their country (PDF p.81-82 / printed p.70-71).
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In the same letter he questioned the status of British Jews serving in the Palestine Administration, such as High Commissioner Herbert Samuel, arguing ‘it is obvious they cannot be both at the same time’, wondering if ‘Jew-ism’ was a nationality and concluding ‘one -ism must be sacrificed for the other, but which for which?’ (PDF p.82 / printed p.71).
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On the Balfour Declaration’s promise to maintain civil and religious rights, he argued civil rights ‘mean nothing more than equality and justice before the law and obviously no privilege is contained in this’, and that Palestinians’ civil rights as Ottoman subjects unquestionably included representation in a parliament, provincial government and native councils, and Arab employment in the highest judicial and civil servant positions; such rights were inalienable and could not be granted or taken away by the mandate administration, and he and his colleagues accused the British of conflating civil rights with religious rights (PDF p.82 / printed p.71).
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He was a member of the first Palestinian Arab Delegation (wafd) to London in 1921 (PDF p.83 / printed p.72).
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In 1921 he convinced the Arab members of Samuel’s consultative committee in Jerusalem to boycott its meetings on the basis that the Arab Executive alone could discuss constitutional and other matters with the British Government (PDF p.87 / printed p.76).
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He was the first Executive leader to question the nationality legislation of 1925 after emigrants in the Americas sent him numerous letters asking his help to induce the British authorities to offer Palestinian citizenship to the emigrants (PDF p.81 / printed p.70).
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In Banko’s Chapter 4 completion, Musa Kazim met Colonial Secretary Leopold Amery in summer 1926 and told him the public held Britain responsible for having transformed Palestinian emigrants into ‘orphans from the government’; after Amery refused changes, his open letter asked that the Order’s timeframe be extended one year, stressed that some emigrants had never received notice, and urged Palestinians to ‘stand up in order to defend [the emigrants’] rights, which are our rights’ (The Invention of Palestinian Citizenship, 1918–1947, PDF p.110-111 / printed p.99-100).
Related pages
The Invention of Palestinian Citizenship, 1918–1947, Arab Executive Committee, Muslim-Christian Association, Communitarian citizenship, Palestine Citizenship Order-in-Council 1925