Summary
The office created by General Assembly resolution 186 (S-2) of 14 May 1948, whose holder — Folke Bernadotte in the accounts of other ingested sources — was instructed to render progress reports monthly, or more frequently, to the Security Council and to the Secretary-General for transmission to the Members of the United Nations, and to use his good offices to promote a peaceful adjustment of the future situation of Palestine (Progress Report of the United Nations Mediator on Palestine, lines 325-329, line 469).
Details
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The Mediator took up his responsibilities on 21 May 1948 and arrived in Cairo on 28 May 1948; his functions were defined by resolution 186 (S-2), adopted at the General Assembly’s 135th meeting on 14 May 1948, paragraph 3, part II, of which directed him to conform in his activities with that resolution and with such instructions as the General Assembly or the Security Council may issue (Progress Report of the United Nations Mediator on Palestine, lines 325-333, line 469).
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Resolution 186 (S-2) charged him also to arrange for the operation of common services necessary to the safety and well-being of the population and to assure the protection of the Holy Places, religious buildings and sites in Palestine (Progress Report of the United Nations Mediator on Palestine, line 869).
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On his own account of the role, in his report to the Security Council of 12 July 1948 (S/888) as quoted in the progress report, the Mediator must strive to encourage compromise rather than strict adherence to legal principles, can achieve success only by voluntary agreement, and his decisions have no binding effect and his suggestions or proposals may be rejected at will by the parties (Progress Report of the United Nations Mediator on Palestine, line 557).
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His progress report of September 1948 (A/648) presents his 27 June 1948 suggestions, his exchanges with the Provisional Government of Israel and the Arab League, his work on the demilitarization of Jerusalem and on the refugees, and his Conclusions proposing, among other things, a Palestine Conciliation Commission (Progress Report of the United Nations Mediator on Palestine, lines 485-555, lines 897-1053).
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Part Two of the progress report records the supervision of the two truces: the Mediator negotiated the first truce’s terms, effective 11 June 1948 (S/829), fixed the second cease-fire at 1500 hours (GMT) on 18 July 1948 under Security Council resolution S/902, and directed an observer organization headed in the first truce by Colonel Thord Bonde as Chief of Staff and in the second by Major-General Lundstrom as Chief of Military Staff, with the Truce Commission responsible for Jerusalem; some 500 complaints were dealt with in the first truce and some 300 in the second truce’s first seven weeks, and his assessment was that no substantial military advantage was gained by either side as a result of the truce supervision (Progress Report of the United Nations Mediator on Palestine, lines 1715-1793, line 1807, line 1915, line 1947).
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Part Two closes with the observer casualties under his supervision — four killed and seven wounded, all unarmed — and conclusions warning that truce supervision will lose effectiveness and become an object of cynicism if the period of maximum potentiality for constructive action is not seized (Progress Report of the United Nations Mediator on Palestine, lines 2241-2301, lines 2303-2349). Part Three records the disaster relief programme he organized under a Director of Disaster Relief at Beirut headquarters, with the Children’s Fund, the specialized agencies and voluntary agencies co-ordinated into one integrated plan in close association with the Arab League, for approximately 360,000 Arab refugees and 7,000 Jewish refugees as of September 1948 (Progress Report of the United Nations Mediator on Palestine, lines 2365-2427, lines 2547-2555, lines 2567-2585).
Related pages
Folke Bernadotte, Progress Report of the United Nations Mediator on Palestine, Palestine Conciliation Commission, Right of Return