ABSTRACT
The state of land registration and ownership was one of chaos when the Mandatory Government came into being. Many of the official records had been destroyed or taken away and those that remained were for the time being equally useless in the absence even of a skeleton of an Administration. The prohibition on the registration of the ownership of land by foreign subjects or institutions was at once swept away. The disposal of the Beisan or Ghor Mudawwara lands was a subject that led to persistent and long-drawn-out criticism on the part of the Zionists of the action of the Administration. One case of land settlement that led to much and also long-drawnout controversy, which illustrates the opposite point of view to that of the Beisan lands was that of the Kabbara swamps. Absentee landlords sell large estates with little consideration for their tenant-cultivators or for occupiers with customary rights from time immemorial.
