Immigration Legislation And Its Administration Since May, 1939 in Palestine, British Mandate: A Survey of Palestine: Volume I - Page 165. Chapter VII: Immigration: Section 1:

CHAPTER VII.

IMMIGRATION.

Section 1.

IMMIGRATION LEGISLATION AND ITS ADMINISTRATION SINCE MAY, 1939.

The Immigration Ordinance, No. 38 of 1933*, was in force at the time at which the Royal Commission investigated the problems of Palestine; that is to say that its administration was conducted under conditions of a world at peace when machinery was at the disposal of the Department of Migration in Europe through the services of His Majesty's passport control officers and consuls.

2. The war progressively destroyed that machinery and until Europe is re-established it would serve no useful purpose to describe that machinery in any detail. Very briefly, the administration of the legislation lay with the Department of Migration in Palestine which was able to secure the requirements of the law through the services of His Majesty's diplomatic officers abroad. As war progressed, the diplomatic missions were withdrawn and communication with Europe behind the enemy lines became impossible. Since the liberation of Europe the administration has been conducted partly through the High Commissioner and certain diplomatic officers in Eastern Europe and partly through the military formations in Western Europe. These communications involve in many instances the Foreign Office, Ambassadors, the War Office and the Colonial Office. A certain simplification has recently been made by reintroducing control in Western Europe through the Department of Migration and the visa sections of His Majesty's embassies in Paris and in Home.

3. So much for administrative channels. The important changes lie in the realm of policy and are expressed through amendments in the immigration legislation itself.

4. Until 1938 Jewish immigration into Palestine was conducted solely according to the capacity of the country to absorb new arrivals, the formula adopted in the White Paper of 1922. This operative principle of policy was expressed through the Immigration
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* Drayton, Vol. ll, page 745.

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