During the British Mandate for Palestine (1922-1948)—the early years of the Arab-Jewish conflict in the region—the two parties repeatedly used the law to gain leverage against each other and influence international opinion. By the late 1920s and 30s, the conflict had become as much a battle fought in the courtroom as in the streets, playing out in three trials involving two key issues: the interplay between conflicting British promises to the Arabs and Jews during World War I, and the parties’ rights and claims to the Western Wall.

Steven E. Zipperstein, a former federal prosecutor and the author of Law and the Arab-Israeli Conflict: The Trials of Palestine, will join us to discuss how all three parties—Arab, Jewish, and British—used the law and the legal process with varying degrees of success to advance their objectives during the Mandate years. In writing his book, Zipperstein delved into primary source documents, including transcripts of the public and secret testimony before the Shaw (1929), Lofgren (1930), and Peel (1936-37) Commissions, as well as diaries, letters, and government files. The arguments the parties made in those trials, he says, continue to resonate in the conflict today, nearly 100 years later.

Steven E. Zipperstein is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Middle East Development at UCLA. He also teaches in UCLA’s Global Studies program and School of Public Affairs, and as a Visiting Professor at Tel Aviv University Law School.

This Amram Scholar Series program is sponsored by the Leo & Elizabeth Goodman Public Issues Endowment Fund.

Steven E. Zipperstein comes to Washington Hebrew through a partnership with the Jewish Book Council.

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Presented in partnership with the Jewish Book Council and sponsored by the Leo & Elizabeth Goodman Public Issues Endowment Fund. 

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