ABSTRACT
This chapter features the irony of a UN tirelessly working to advance the cause of the Palestinian Arabs yet being sidestepped as external negotiations bring the contestants together. The origins of the quarrel over Palestine are discussed first followed by an account of how the UN became involved. Inevitably, the emergence of a sovereign Israel pits Jew against Arab. UN peacekeeping forces are interposed and Resolutions passed. A long and difficult reconciliation process is discussed in outline. The UN has gone through a number of attitude changes during almost 50 years of concern. Initially, and in the tradition of the League of Nations, the UN was a forum and a listener
to a candid and often heated exposition of a case and a defence. In the 1940s and 1950s the world watched the process of debate and took sides. In the 1960s the UN, together with non-governmental bodies, earnestly rallied support for a campaign against what was seen as violation of human rights and persecution. Apartheid in South Africa had a parallel in the discrimination and forced separation in Israel, once known as Palestine. At this time the UN was something of a detached arbiter; it very cautiously interposed a peacekeeping force only when judged absolutely necessary.
