ABSTRACT
On the eve of Yom Kippur in September 1928, some Jews placed a screen, some lamps and a large ark along the pavement of an old wall in the Old City of Jerusalem in preparation for the next morning’s prayers. Jews had worshipped undisturbed at this wall for ages. Enforcement of the White Paper was suspended for three months, pending the production of evidence of Ottoman practice regarding precisely which religious paraphernalia could be brought to the wall. Elite politicians during the Mandate belonged to a particular socio-economic group, one which emerged seamlessly from the Ottoman period, when social and political offices were hereditary. The urban elite began to replace the rural elite as holders of power with the Ottoman reforms known as tanzimat. The old Muslim aristocracy were involved in running schools, municipalities and religious institutions. The Palestine Order in Council 1922 gave the World Zionist Organization official consultative status in Palestine.
