Jewish immigration into Palestine if Britain had accepted unlimited immigration

How large would Jewish immigration into Palestine have been if Britain had accepted unlimited Jewish immigration after World War 1? They would still have needed to pay for the trip, so this might have limited the possibility for some poor Jews.
 
Wouldn't there be massive riots in Mandatory Palestine if it'd continued in this fashion, given that there was already unrest in OTL?
 
Wouldn't there be massive riots in Mandatory Palestine if it'd continued in this fashion, given that there was already unrest in OTL?

It might not be realistic that Britain would accept it, but it is interesting to speculate how many would have arrived if they had the chance.
 

Deleted member 1487

Assuming ASB levels of willingness by the British, then hundreds of thousands would immigrate before the war, if not up to 1 million. Thereafter the Nazis would try and 'export' millions of Jews as they took Poland and other countries until they realized they needed the labor.
 
Assuming ASB levels of willingness by the British, then hundreds of thousands would immigrate before the war, if not up to 1 million. Thereafter the Nazis would try and 'export' millions of Jews as they took Poland and other countries until they realized they needed the labor.

According to a survey refered to in Wikipedia, 367,845 Jews immigrated legally between 1920 and 1945, so "hundreds of thousands" is in fact OTL.
 
I am aware I was referring to the high hundreds of thousands, like doubling that number at least.

Doubling would give the Jewish community a majority in Palestine - very very unlikely to be sustainable as most of the land was held by Arabs.

There would be a limit to the expansion of the Jewish immigration without access to more land i.e. willing Arab sellers or conflict.
 
Doubling would give the Jewish community a majority in Palestine - very very unlikely to be sustainable as most of the land was held by Arabs.

There would be a limit to the expansion of the Jewish immigration without access to more land i.e. willing Arab sellers or conflict.

Today there are far more people in the area than back then, due to further immigration and population growth.
 

Deleted member 1487

Doubling would give the Jewish community a majority in Palestine - very very unlikely to be sustainable as most of the land was held by Arabs.

There would be a limit to the expansion of the Jewish immigration without access to more land i.e. willing Arab sellers or conflict.
Right, which is why the British wouldn't allow it, because it would result in war in the area. However the OP asked how many would go if able and I answered to the best of my knowledge it would be close to double or more wanting to get out. Hitler would have loved to keep the Haavara agreement in place and continued to export his Jewish population for money:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haavara_Agreement

Had that continued German rearmament would have actually been supported via exports raising foreign exchange.
 
What about the Jews rebelling and forcing through a liberalization of immigration rules. I know they were in a minority, but they proved highly effcient fighters after 1948 even though they were attacked by several neighbouring states.
 

Deleted member 1487

What about the Jews rebelling and forcing through a liberalization of immigration rules. I know they were in a minority, but they proved highly effcient fighters after 1948 even though they were attacked by several neighbouring states.
There weren't enough in place pre-war to do much (that came after with hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants), though some tried:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lehi_(group)
They were being supplied by Poland, who wanted to export their Jews, but that plan was cut off by Poland being invaded; later they approached the Italians, but that didn't get off the ground and their leader was killed by the British. Understand though that the 1947-49 fighters were those that got experience during WW2 as part of the Jewish Brigades in the British army. They didn't have that experience until after the war ended. Also they were able to achieve that due to getting funding from American Jews and weapons from Soviet occupied Czechoslovakia (and sold by others due to the glut of arms floating around post-war Europe). Plus of course the Arabs were falling out among themselves at the same time, squabbling over who got what from Palestine.
 
Had the British not restricted immigration to the Mandate, the Shoah would have been averted. The Jews would have left Nazi occupied Europe with the clothes on their backs. The Nazis knew they could get away with genocide as they knew the rest of the world didn't want the Jews anymore than they did. The San Remo conference on Jewish refugees was summed up by the Canadian PM as " none is too many".

As an aside unrestricted Jewish immigration would probably have had a negative effect on the concurrent arab immigration. More refugees would mean more competition for jobs and lower wages. This would reduce the incentive for Iraqis and Egyptians to come in and take residence.
 
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