Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-mkpzs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T03:27:40.798Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

HARRY TRUMAN'S RECOGNITION OF ISRAEL

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 November 2004

MICHAEL OTTOLENGHI
MICHAEL OTTOLENGHI
Affiliation:
Fordham University School of Law
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Historiographical accounts of Harry Truman's recognition of Israel have placed undue importance on this apparently sudden act on 14 May 1948. US Palestine policy has not been placed in the correct historical context of the Cold War. As a ‘Cold War consensus’ developed in Washington in the early post-war period, Palestine emerged as a secondary issue to the major concern that was the ‘Northern Tier’ of Greece, Turkey, and Iran. The US was guided by broad but clear objectives in Palestine: the attainment of a peaceful solution, a desire not to implicate US troops, and the denial of the region to the Soviets. Disagreements between the White House and the State Department were all expressed within these broad policy objectives. Israeli sources have been significant by their absence in the existing historiography of recognition. These sources reveal that for the Jewish community in Palestine, diplomatic victories were of secondary importance to the practical achievement of statehood. From both a Washington perspective, and the perspective from Palestine, US recognition was not regarded as a crucial issue at the time. It was a decision taken within the context of broad US objectives in Palestine, and it did not influence the decision of the Yishuv to declare statehood.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 47 , Issue 4 , December 2004 , pp. 963 - 988
Copyright
2004 Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

I would like to thank the British Council, Trinity Hall, Cambridge, and the Cambridge European Trust for their generous funding, and the staff at the Truman Library in Independence, Missouri, and the Central Zionist Archives in Jerusalem for their assistance to my research. Thanks to Prof. A. J. Badger, Dr S. P. Martland, and Prof. J. Steinberg for their helpful suggestions, as well as to my parents for their support throughout.