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The customs revenue collected at various ports of entry and rail- way and caravan centres for the same two years was as follows :

1919-20 /E

1920-1 E

Acre

214

534

Beersheba ....

463

3'4

Gaza

10,092

6,695

Haifa

164,391

169,031

Jaffa

146,204

186,336

Jerusalem ....

93,779

71,161

Khan Yunis

645

586

Ludd

1,893

5,255

Tul Keram ....

5,094

5,642

Qantara ....

5,375

3,446

Total ....

428,150

449,000

Municipalities. There are 22 municipalities in Palestine: Jeru- salem, Ramalla, Beit Jala, Bethlehem, Hebron, Jaffa, Ramleh, Ludd, Gaza, Khan Yunis, Mejdel, Feluje, Beersheba, Nablus, Tul Keram and Jenin in Samaria; Nazareth, Tiberias and Safed in Galilee; and Haifa, Acre and Shefa 'Amr in Phoenicia. In 1919-20 their total revenue amounted to 89,000 (Jerusalem 29,500, Jaffa 14,700) and their ordinary expenditure to 89,000. They had a balance of 9,000 from the previous year and obtained loans and grants from Government amounting to 10,000, repaying debt to the amount of Ei 1,000.

Education. Palestine before the British occupation contained numerous schools supported by religious bodies and charitable organizations abroad, some of which were undoubtedly supported more in the political interests of the countries concerned than for strictly religious or educational purposes, and it is possible that in the future certain institutions may suffer financially from the decay of that political driving-force. For the year 1919-20 the Military Administration granted 46,000 for Moslem education, and for 1921-2 the Civil Administration has allotted 103,000, and employs 443 teachers. In addition to this the Zionist Organization in 1920-1 provided for 135 educational institutions with 523 teachers and 12,830 Jewish pupils at a cost of about 110,000. Christian schools in 191920, generally open to pupils of all denomi- nations, provided for some 7,000 children, but many of these institu- tions had been adversely affected by Turkish requisitions during the war and had not recovered.

Defence. Under the final rearrangement of the Ottoman army before the World War Palestine formed part of the recruitment area of the VIII. (Damascus) Army Corps, and after the war was held by a considerable army of occupation composed of British and Indian troops. This, consisting of three Army Corps with a ration strength of over 460,000 men and some 163,000 beasts at the time of the Armistice, was reduced to 23,000 men on April I 1920, and to 7,700 men on April I 1921. The scheme of local defence provides for the formation of two battalions of troops to be recruited in Palestine, and a police force has already been raised consisting on April I 1921 of 78 officers and 1,392 other ranks, divided into four categories :

Mounted

Foot

Railway

Prisons

N.C.O.s. Men.

47 397

72 712

4 50

16

85 and Swardresses

Total

444

784

54

109

Railways. Although several schemes for railway construction in Palestine were proposed during the period 1910-4, nothing was done. On Oct. 14 1913 a Franco-Turkish agreement provided for an extension of the standard-gauge line from Rayak in Syria to Ludd in Palestine, where it would join the then existing narrow-

fiuge line from Jaffa to Jerusalem. By the same agreement a rench firm was to obtain concessions for building harbours at Haifa and Jaffa, and a little later a concession was granted to the Perrier Bank to run a tramway from Jerusalem to Bethlehem. None of these proposals was carried out, but during the war the Turkish Government built an extension of the Hejaz railway from Jenin on the plain of Esdraelon through Messudiye (56 km.) to Nablus (15 km.) on the one hand, and on the other to Tul Keram (20-5 km.) and thence to Ludd (42-5 km.), and from Junction Sta- tion to Beersheba (83 km.), whence the line was taken on to El 'Auja (66 km.) for the attack on Egypt. A narrow-gauge branch line was run from Tine on the Junction Station-Beersneba railway to Beit Hanun (39 km.), near Gaza, with a branch from Deir Sineid to Huj (12 km.), and another from Tul Keram to the forest near Caesarea (24 km.), which was cut down for fuel. Owing to the shortage of railway material the lines between Damascus and Mezeirib (63 km.), Haifa and Acre (18 km.) and Jaffa and Ludd (20 km.) were stripped and the rails sent south to be used for the new extensions. Later the Beersheba El 'Auja extension was stripped in its turn and the Tine-Beit Hanun-Huj branch was removed after the arrival of the British.

The British-built standard-gauge line laid across northern Sinai, Qantara-Romani (41 km.), opened July 1916; Romani-El 'Arish (114 km.) Jan. 1917, El 'Arish-Rafa (45 km.) Mar. 1917, reached

Deir el Belah (219 km.) from Qantara in June 1917, and a branch from Rafa to Karm (34-5 km.) was opened Oct. 28 1018. This was later continued to Beersheba (24-5 km.) and opened May 3 1918. The metre-gauge railway from Ludd to Jerusalem, much damaged during the military operations in the autumn of 1917, was restored and reopened Jan. 27 1918. Meanwhile, the standard-gauge from Belah had been opened to Deir Sineid (28 km.) Nov. 28 1917, and to Deiran (43 km.) Jan. 8 1918. On Feb. 4 1918 it was opened to Ludd (15 km. or 305 km. from Qantara) and carried on to Rantie (9 km.) a little later in readiness for the next forward move. While waiting for this, the standard-gauge was opened to 'Artuf (31 km.) on March 31 and to Jerusalem (29 km.) June 15. This last section was laid by day, while the narrow-gauge which it superseded continued to work by night. The Turkish narrow-gauge between Junction Station and Irgeig (72 km.) on the Rafa-Beersheba line was converted to standard gauge between May 18 and July 8; thus Gen. Allenby was able to dispose of a double line of standard gauge from his advanced base at Ludd to Rafa, to which point the railway from Qantara had been double-tracked by April 17 1918. Later, in 1919-20, the sector Junction Station-Irgeig was dismantled. A number of narrow- gauge lines were laid benind the front between Dec. 1917 and Sept. 1918 : Ludd to Jaffa (20 km.), Ludd to Ras el 'Ain (22 km.), Sarona (on the Jaffa line) to near Jelil (14 km.), Kefr Jinnis on the Ras el Ain line to Lubban (18 km.), Sheikh Muannis on the Sarona line to Carrick Hill (3 km.), and from Jerusalem to Eire (28 km.). The standard-gauge started north once more on the heels of the Sept. advance, and was superimposed on the Turkish line from Ras el 'Ain to Tul Keram (32 km. from Rantie) which was reached on Oct. 15. The extension to Haifa (66 km. ; 413 km. from Qantara) was opened early in Jan. 1919 and soon afterwards the narrow-gauge Acre branch (18 km.) was restored. On Oct. 5 1920 the standard-gauge was opened between Ludd and Jaffa (20 km.).

Agriculture. The crop returns for 1920-1 show the following figures in kilogrammes:

Kgm.

Wheat 62,897,017

Barley 27,233,948

Beans 2,061,306

Peas. 3,441,525

Lentils 2,724,635

Kersenneh (Jilbaneh) 4,599,944

Durra 3,352,9i6

Sesame 2,488,229

Olive Oil 6,706,059

Grapes ' 5,490,306

Figs 5,419,878

Melons 16,351,022

Almonds 238,090

Total Kgm. 170,004,875

Oranges, Lemons, etc. 537,43 boxes

Of this total of 170,004,875 kilogrammes the production according to districts was as follows:

Kgm.

Jerusalem 27,589,480

JaTa 40,866,228

Gaza 11,170,179

Phoenicia 35,852,954

Beersheba 9,005,058

Samaria 17,686,452

Galilee 27,834,524

Of the 537,000 boxes of oranges and lemons the Jaffa district produced 498,000, Phoenicia being second with 36,000.

Trade. The bulk of the sea-borne commerce of Palestine passes through its three chief ports of Gaza, Jaffa and Haifa. Of these Haifa, before the war, had begun to supplant Beirut to a certain degree as the port of Damascus, the Hauran and Gilead and, in virtue of its connexion by rail with Medina, handled goods in transit for that area as well ; consequently its trade was Syrian rather than Palestinian and recovered sharply after the end of the Italo- Turkish War in 1912. Gaza was concerned almost entirely with an export trade of barley, chiefly used for making beer in England, while Jaffa, with all its drawbacks, served as the chief port for exports and imports of purely Palestinian origin and destination. The standard-gauge railway leading to Egypt is also a great trade route, more particularly for passengers and those classes of goods which suffer from the delays still inevitable in bad weather at Jaffa.

The total trade of Palestine for the first complete year during which the whole country was under British administration and at peace, April 1919 March 1920. was:

Imports

Exports

April-June 1919. July-Sept. " . Oct.-Dec. ". Jan.-March 1920

1,098,938 861,869 984,926 1,296,334

130,463 129,719 196,552 236,968

4,242,067

693,702