TURKEY IN ASIA—JEWS IN PALESTINE. (Hansard, 26 February 1883)

§ MR. SERJEANT SIMON

asked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether his attention has been called to a letter from Mr. Lawrence Oliphant, in the "Times" of the 30th January, according to which, in pursuance of an order of the Vilayet of Syria, issued in December last, the Camaikan of Haifa had prevented the landing at that place of a number of Jews who had arrived by sea, many of them being emigrants from Roumania, who had left their country because of the disabilities and oppression to which 833 Jews are there subjected, with the intention of forming part of an agricultural colony which was being established in Palestine, whilst the rest were of other nationalities, and included British subjects with British passports, who had come there for temporary purposes, or merely to visit the country. That notwithstanding the protest and remonstrances of the British Vice Consul, the Camaikan presisted in his refusal to allow any of them to land, and threatened to employ force, if necessary, to prevent it. That, in consequence, these unfortunate people, to the number of 120, were taken by sea, in violent, stormy weather, under great suffering and privations, to Alexandria; and, whether Her Majesty's Government will cause inquiry to be made into the circumstances, and will represent the case to the Turkish Government, with a view to the protection of Her Majesty's Jewish subjects in the future, and to the rescinding, if possible, of the order prohibiting the settlement of Jewish emigrants in Palestine?