By the close of World War II, the British Mandate in Palestine had become a toxic burden for London.  Exhausted by years of war, mounting costs, and relentless unrest, Britain’s leaders concluded that holding on to Palestine was no longer tenable.  Prime Minister Clement Attlee and Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin saw Mandate Palestine as a “costly, painful, and thankless” task that drained resources and invited conflict .  Attlee openly argued that diminished British power meant it was time to “cut our losses” in Palestine just as Britain had in India .  Indeed, by 1947 Britain had roughly 100,000 troops stationed in Palestine, mostly inexperienced National Servicemen, and was spending millions per week to maintain order in a land increasingly at war with itself .  With postwar Britain economically exhausted and facing challenges from a resurgent Soviet Union, policymakers in Whitehall grew impatient to find a way out of the Palestine dilemma.

From the British perspective, the Mandate had drifted far from its original purpose.  In the 1930s, Britain tried to balance Jewish aspirations with Arab opposition by enacting the 1939 White Paper, which promised an eventual unified Palestinian state and sharply limited Jewish immigration .  But that policy pleased no one: Palestinian Arabs rejected any hint of a Jewish state, and Zionists denounced the White Paper as “betrayal” of the Balfour Declaration.  During World War II and its aftermath, Jewish refugee pressure and the horrors of the Holocaust made unlimited immigration a moral and political imperative.  The British nonetheless clung to the 75,000 certificate limit and annual quota set by the White Paper.  London even offered to extend immigration beyond 1944 at 1,500 per month to allow Holocaust survivors in Europe to enter, but domestic politics and Arab demands kept the policy deeply unpopular.  After the war, Attlee’s Labour government publicly reaffirmed the White Paper as policy, hoping to placate the Arab states.

Instead of settling the conflict, these rigid immigration limits provoked armed Jewish resistance.  By 1945 Jewish underground groups – principally the HaganahHaganah Full Description:The primary Jewish paramilitary organization during the British Mandate. It evolved from a decentralized defense force into a conventional army, eventually forming the core of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) after independence. The Haganah (“The Defense”) was the military wing of the mainstream Zionist labor movement. Unlike the more radical Irgun or Lehi, it generally cooperated with British authorities until the post-war period. It was responsible for organizing illegal immigration and, later, executing Plan Dalet. Critical Perspective:The transformation of the Haganah illustrates the process of state-building. By absorbing or dismantling rival militias (sometimes violently, as in the Altalena Affair), the Haganah established the state’s monopoly on violence. However, its involvement in village expulsions challenges the myth of the “purity of arms” often associated with the IDF’s origins.
Read more (the Zionist militia), the Irgun, and the Stern Gang (Lehi) – were waging an open revolt against the Mandate.  The British response had been to tighten security, but with limited success.  During 1945-47 alone the Palestine Police and Army suffered over 100 deaths and 390 wounded in clashes with Jewish militants .  The British began to treat all Zionist militias as illegal terrorists.  By late 1945 they were expelling ships carrying illegal Jewish immigrants and arming police to enforce immigration quotas.  These measures only unified the Jewish factions: the Haganah, which had largely refrained from attacking the British during the war against Germany, now allied tacitly with Irgun and Lehi cadres to strike targets of the Mandate .  Violent incidents proliferated – sabotage of railways, ambushes on police patrols, even the assassination of the British Minister Resident in the Middle East, Lord Moyne, by Lehi in 1944.  In turn, the British declared martial measures, curfews, and mass arrests.  In early 1946 the Irgun bombed the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, killing dozens of British and Arab officials – a dramatic sign that insurgents could hit at the heart of the Mandate.

Arab opposition, too, remained high and increasingly militant.  Palestinian Arab society had long united behind a demand for immediate independence and rejection of any Jewish state.  The 1936–39 Arab Revolt had forced Britain to curb Jewish immigration (the White Paper) but at great political cost.  After World War II, Palestinian leadership re-formed under the Arab Higher Committee, and Arab states formed the Arab League (1945) as they pressed for an Arab Palestine .  Between late 1945 and 1947 several Arab conferences – in Bloudan, Inshas and elsewhere – reiterated the pledge to block any Jewish state and to demand a unitary Arab-led Palestine .  While Palestinian Arabs remained militarily weaker than the organized Zionists, they were backed by increasing support from neighbouring Arab armies and volunteer fighters (the Arab Liberation Army) as the conflict loomed.

Imperial Calculation and the Decision to Leave

By 1947 it was clear to British leaders that the Palestine problem had become insoluble by colonial means.  There was no compromise that could satisfy both Arab and Jewish demands.  In London, policymakers debated a last-ditch strategy.  The British chiefs of staff argued for trying to keep Palestine as a strategic base, but Attlee and Bevin were skeptical.  Attlee believed British power had waned too far to enforce even a limited outcome by force.  In a striking comparison, he noted that maintaining “Pax Britannica” in Palestine by bayonets was unrealistic; better for Britain to emulate its withdrawal from India and cut “our losses” rather than be dragged into another costly colonial war .  In cabinet meetings Labour ministers frequently cited Britain’s dire postwar economy, extant commitments in Greece and the Far East, and looming Cold War pressures as reasons to extricate from Palestine.

Economics and exhaustion were major factors.  Palestine administration had become extremely expensive: running the police and army, subsidizing civil services, and backstopping the economy.  One estimate noted that Britain was spending well over £1 million per week on the Mandate by 1948, a huge drain on national resources.  British colonial administrators privately predicted a financial disaster if they stayed on.  The academic consensus is that war fatigue and budgetary pressures were major motives in the withdrawal decision .  Historian Shabtai Rosenne observed that postwar Labour governments “had taken the position that there was nothing in law to prevent termination” of the Mandate, and official accounts point to “economic necessity and plain exhaustion” as key reasons.

Diplomatically, Britain also faced pressure.  The United States, under President Truman, relentlessly prodded London to ease restrictions on Jewish refugees.  Truman demanded Britain accept 100,000 displaced Jews, seeing Palestine as their only haven .  Public opinion in Britain and abroad increasingly blamed Britain for the plight of Holocaust survivors.  Soviet pressure was less direct but implicit: Moscow supported ZionismZionism Full Description:A modern political ideology and nationalist movement that advocates for the establishment and maintenance of a Jewish state in Palestine. Critically, it is defined as a settler-colonial project that necessitates the systematic displacement, dispossession, and erasure of the indigenous Palestinian population to establish demographic and political supremacy. Zionism emerged in Europe not merely as a response to antisemitism, but as a colonial movement adopting the racial and imperial logic of the 19th century. It posited that Jewish safety could only be guaranteed through the creation of an ethno-state. Because the target territory was already inhabited, the ideology was fundamentally built on the “logic of elimination”—the requirement to transfer, expel, or subjugate the native Arab population to create an artificial majority. Critical Perspective:Structurally, Zionism functions as an exclusionary ideology. By defining the state exclusively as the expression of self-determination for Jewish people, it inherently renders indigenous Palestinians as demographic threats rather than citizens. Critics argue that this necessitates a permanent state of violence, apartheid, and military occupation, as the state must constantly police, cage, and destroy the native population to prevent them from reclaiming their land and rights. Further Reading The End of the British Mandate: Imperial Withdrawal and the Onset of War The UN Partition Plan of 1947: A Spark in a TinderboxThe 1948 War: Nakba and Independence Plan Dalet: A Blueprint for Conflict The Palestinian Nakba: A National Trauma Arab States’ Intervention and the Widening War The Palestinian Refugee Crisis The 1949 Armistice Agreements: A Frozen Conflict Israel’s Transformation: State-Building and Immigration The Arab World After 1948: Political Upheaval The Legacy of 1948: The Politics of Memory in the UN, and London feared losing influence if it clung to an unpopular stance in the Middle East.  In late 1947, Churchill (then in opposition) warned that refusal to concede would risk American goodwill and might even push the Soviets toward the Arab side.  All in all, Britain felt isolated on the question of Palestine.

Faced with these strains, the British cabinet finally decided to cast the problem onto the world stage.  In early 1947 Britain asked the new United Nations to handle Palestine.  The UN responded by forming UNSCOP, a special committee, which ultimately proposed partition into Jewish and Arab states.  When the UN General Assembly voted on 29 November 1947 to adopt the Partition Plan, the British government refused to endorse the decision, insisting that it would implement no settlement to which both peoples did not agree.  Instead, Britain announced that it would simply relinquish authority on a fixed date and allow the UN or successor bodies to take over.

Parliamentary statements on 11 December 1947 made this clear.  Colonial Secretary Arthur Creech Jones told the House of Commons that Britain would retain “undivided control” of Palestine only up to a single exit date – 15 May 1948 – after which “the whole complex of governmental responsibilities must be relinquished” .  British forces would withdraw gradually, relinquishing all legal authority at that appointed day, leaving any further order to the UN and the local communities .  In effect, London declared it would vacate the Mandate exactly as the UN had slated (more quickly than the August 1948 deadline the UN resolution mentioned), and would then formally hand over the country.  On 29 April 1948 the British Parliament passed the Palestine Act of 1948, legally setting the Mandate’s termination for midnight on 14–15 May.  The Act noted Britain’s “relinquish[ment]” of the Mandate role on that date .

British Administration in Disarray

In the final months of the Mandate, the retreat of British authority created a vacuum of power.  From late 1947 onward, the Mandatory government focused on winding down the administration and planning withdrawal.  Colonial officials were conscious of the risks.  In his December speech, Creech Jones frankly warned MPs that British forces could not guarantee order indefinitely: as withdrawal proceeded, any remaining garrisons would keep peace only in areas they occupied, and British control would end on 15 May .  In practice, however, the police and civil administration began unraveling even before that.

Communal violence exploded after the UN vote.  Arab and Jewish militias clashed street by street.  The British police, numbering over 3,700, found themselves understaffed and demoralized .  At times British troops were called in to quell riots, such as the Dec 1947 Jewish strike and ensuing Arab attacks, or the May Day 1948 violence in Haifa and Jerusalem.  Colonial Secretaries publicly lamented a breakdown of law and order: parliamentary records from March 1948 report “serious disturbances” driven by both Arab resentment and Jewish reprisals .  Yet they could do little to stop it.  In mixed cities like Jerusalem, Haifa, and Jaffa – flashpoints of ethnic tension – British troops and police tended to withdraw to barracks, leaving civilians to fend for themselves or for local militias.  The Mandatory government did attempt to create municipal defense forces: for example, it withdrew all British troops from predominantly Jewish suburbs and replaced them with Jewish police units and a guard force called Mishmar under the Palestine government, while encouraging an Arab municipal police force in Jaffa .  But these measures were stopgap and half-hearted.

By spring 1948, even those measures broke down.  The British were literally handing off control.  Former colonial officers advised the government to leave formal authority only in name.  In mid-April, the Palestine High Commissioner and military commanders essentially told the Jewish and Arab leaders to arrange their own affairs.  As one account notes, by March 1948 the British had agreed “make no effort to oppose” either the coming Jewish state or invasion from Transjordan.  In effect, London washed its hands of the conflict just as it was peaking.  When midnight struck on 14–15 May 1948, the last British soldiers left, ending the Mandate.  Notably, Britain abstained from voting on the UN resolution that “terminated” the Mandate , insisting instead that it was ceasing its obligations unilaterally.

Arab and Jewish Responses: Mobilization and War

The imperial exit was not a cessation of tension but the spark for all-out warfare.  Zionist and Palestinian Arab leaders had both anticipated the British departure and prepared accordingly.  Jewish leaders – primarily the Jewish AgencyJewish Agency Full Description:The pre-state executive organization of the Zionist movement. It functioned as a “state within a state” under the British Mandate, managing immigration, land purchase, and foreign relations, and eventually transitioning into the government of Israel. The Jewish Agency was recognized by the League of Nations as the official representative of Jews in Palestine. It built the institutions of the future state (schools, healthcare, labor unions) long before 1948. Critical Perspective:The efficiency of the Jewish Agency stands in stark contrast to the fragmentation of the Palestinian Arab leadership (the Arab Higher Committee). This institutional disparity explains the outcome of 1948 as much as military factors; the Zionists had a functioning government ready to take over the moment the British left, while the Palestinians did not.
Read more and the Haganah – had welcomed the UN Partition plan as a (partial) triumph.  They took the November 1947 vote as a mandate to set up state institutions on the ground.  Haganah commanders launched what became known as Plan Dalet (approved 10 March 1948) to secure territory for the future Jewish state.  This involved mobilizing about 35,000 fighters, stockpiling arms, and coordinating offensive operations into Arab-majority areas.  The Haganah saw the British pullback as an opportunity: with the Mandate ending, every day was a race to seize and hold ground.  Zionist leadership worked to train civil administration in towns, organize local defense, and drum up international support.  American Jewish donations and clandestine arms shipments (often running the British blockade) bolstered their capacity.  On 15 May 1948 – the day after the British left – the Israeli Declaration of Independence was proclaimed.  By the next day Israeli forces were massing along the former partition line.

The Revisionist paramilitaries (Irgun, led by Menachem Begin, and Lehi/Stern under Avraham Stern until 1942) were even more eager for action.  Long hostile to the British, they outright rejected the UN plan as too limited.  Irgun in particular resumed attacks on British targets (even as late as March 1948) and also fought Arab militias.  Revisionist leader Begin later boasted that his men sought “a Jewish State in all of Palestine and Transjordan” and were willing to fight both the British and Arab armies to get it.  In practice, most Revisionist fighters joined with Haganah units in the final war, although tensions remained (notably Irgun’s controversial raid on Deir Yassin in April 1948, which inflamed Arab outrage and accelerated flight from villages).

On the Arab side, Palestinian leaders had rejected partition as a betrayal.  In the weeks after the UN vote, the Arab Higher Committee – still led by Amin al-Husseini in exile – called for all-out rejection of the plan.  Arab states (Egypt, Transjordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq) publicly denounced partition and pledged to intervene.  Despite limited coordination, they rushed volunteer armies and mujahideen into Palestine to bolster local forces.  Thousands of troops of the Arab Liberation Army (mostly Syrians and Iraqis) entered and engaged Zionist units.  Meanwhile, Palestinian Arabs themselves flocked to nascent militias like the Holy War Army in the Galilee and Grand Mufti-backed troops in Jerusalem and the south.

As one British observer noted, the immediate Arab response to the UN resolution was mainly defensive: “the Arabs agreed that a Zionist state could not be tolerated” and resolved to prepare for combat.  Their plan of action was clear: they would refuse any cooperation with the UN plan, make military preparations (in Palestine and from Arab capitals), and seek instead a single independent Arab state encompassing all Palestine.  In fact, declassified British intelligence noted that Arab leaders tried to restrain popular mobs in late 1947, hopeful that formal armies would solve the problem.  But once the Mandate collapsed, large-scale conflict was inevitable.

When British troops withdrew, lawless clashes escalated into the 1947–48 civil war in Palestine .  Jewish units used Plan Dalet to capture dozens of villages and strategic positions, often where they had been only a thin minority before .  On 9 April, Irgun’s assault on the village of Deir Yassin caused a massacre and panic, leading tens of thousands of Palestinians to flee the urban corridor.  By late April, Haganah launched attacks on mixed cities.  Haifa, after British police withdrew, fell to Jewish forces on 23 April, precipitating a massive Arab exodus .  Jaffa, Palestine’s largest Arab city, was besieged and its population largely expelled by mid-May.  Throughout this period, the British stood largely aside; sometimes they even helped settle disputes or evacuated foreign civilians, but they made no unified effort to stop the fighting.

By midnight on 14 May 1948 (when the Mandate formally ended), the armies of five Arab states – Egypt, Transjordan, Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq – had begun moving into Palestine.  Within hours, David Ben-Gurion’s provisional Israeli government declared independence.  Arab regular forces crossed into the areas allocated as the Jewish state as per the UN plan, ostensibly to defend Palestinian Arabs against Zionist aggression.  The vacuum left by Britain’s exit meant there was no longer a buffer or peacekeepingPeacekeeping Full Description:A mechanism not originally explicitly defined in the Charter, involving the deployment of international military and civilian personnel to conflict zones. Known as the “Blue Helmets,” they monitor ceasefires and create buffer zones to allow for diplomatic negotiations. Peacekeeping was an improvisation developed to manage Cold War conflicts that the Great Powers could not agree to solve forcibly. It operates on the principles of consent (the host country must agree), impartiality, and the non-use of force except in self-defense. Critical Perspective:While often celebrated, peacekeeping is often criticized for “freezing” conflicts rather than solving them. By stabilizing the status quo, it can inadvertently remove the pressure for political solutions, leading to “forever wars” where the UN presence becomes a permanent feature of the landscape. Furthermore, peacekeepers have faced severe criticism for failures to protect civilians and for sexual exploitation and abuse in host communities.
Read more authority.  Almost immediately, clashes that had been local and irregular escalated into a full-fledged international war – the 1948 Arab–Israeli War .  In the first days alone, the new Israeli forces fought against advancing Arab armies on multiple fronts.  Tens of thousands of Palestinian Arabs fled or were expelled from their homes.

In short, Britain’s decision to withdraw without imposing a settlement meant that the Mandate’s final days descended into chaos.  The lines drawn at the UN table could not be enforced when the sole guarantor of order was leaving.  With British police gone, armed militias and armies contested every village and crossroads.  The retreat of imperial authority opened the gates to civil war, which immediately widened into international conflict.  As one contemporary British diplomat had warned months earlier, a premature end to the Mandate would almost certainly allow the invasion of Arab armies and “the entire Jewish position is based on UN action” – leaving Britain helpless once it “simply relinquish[ed]” control.

The timeline below highlights the key dates leading to this climax.

May 1939: British government issues the White Paper, rejecting Palestinian partition and promising an independent Palestine in 10 years.  It limits Jewish immigration to 75,000 over five years and vests future immigration policy in the Arab majority .  Both Arab leaders and Zionist representatives reject the plan (Arabs want immediate independence; Zionists call it a betrayal).

May 1942: The American Zionists hold the Biltmore Conference, demanding that Palestine be established as a Jewish Commonwealth (state) rather than merely a national home.  This marks a shift in official Zionist aims and heightens expectations after WWII.

1945: World War II ends with some 250,000 Jewish refugees in Europe.  President Truman urges Britain to admit 100,000 to Palestine; London refuses, maintaining the White Paper quotas despite growing American pressure .  Violent unrest grows in Palestine. 

Late 1945, full-scale riots force British troops into the streets of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

July 1946: Irgun bombs the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, killing 91 people (47 British, 41 Arab, 3 Jewish) – the deadliest single attack on the Mandate authorities.  The British respond with mass arrests of Jewish leaders and speed up their own plans to withdraw.

February–July 1947: The UN convenes the Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP).  In September 1947, UNSCOP recommends partition of Palestine into Jewish and Arab states.

29 November 1947: The UN General Assembly adopts Resolution 181 (the Partition Plan), assigning roughly 55% of the land to a Jewish state and 45% to an Arab state.  Britain abstains and announces it will withdraw.  In Palestine, the civil war erupts immediately .  Jewish and Arab fighters clash, and British troops focus on protecting their own withdrawal.

11 December 1947: Colonial Secretary Arthur Creech Jones announces in Parliament that the Mandate will be terminated on 15 May 1948 .  British forces are to keep “undivided control” only until that day, after which all governmental responsibility is relinquished.

Early 1948: Fighting intensifies.  Zionist militia unite under Plan Dalet (approved 10 March 1948) to secure territory for the future Jewish state.  Arabs attempt to coordinate with invading armies from Egypt, Transjordan, Syria, Lebanon and Iraq to prevent partition.

29 April 1948: Britain enacts the Palestine Act, formally abrogating the Mandate and reiterating that all authority will cease at midnight 14–15 May .  This law marks the definitive end of British legal claims to Palestine.

14–15 May 1948: At midnight the British Mandate expires.  Hours later (14 May local time), Jewish leaders declare the establishment of the State of Israel.  Within hours the armies of five Arab states invade the former Mandate territory.  The 1948 Arab–Israeli War has begun .

In sum, Britain’s withdrawal in 1948 – motivated by strategic exhaustion, economic strain, and frustrated diplomacy – left Palestine with no referee.  The end of imperial order meant both sides jumped to fill the void: one with statehood, the other with war.  What Britain hoped would be an orderly handover became instead a trigger for the bloodiest conflict the region had yet seen.