February 1948: As Palestine descends into warfare following the UN Partition Resolution, Clarence Pickett and Rufus Jones of AFSC meet at Quaker House in New York to work on a petition by world Christian leaders for a “Truce of God” in Jerusalem.

Jerusalem is slated under the Partition Plan of November 29, 1947 to be internationalized and governed as a corpus separatum.

Among the signers of the petition are the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Presiding Bishop of the American Episcopal Church, Archbishop Athenagoras of the Greek Orthodox Church, the head of the international YMCA, and New York Riverside Church pastor Harry Emerson Fosdick. The group sends their petition to the chief rabbi of Palestine and the head of the Supreme Muslim Council in Jerusalem. They release the statement to the public on Easter Sunday, March 28, 1948.

To follow up on the petition, AFSC sends James Vail, a chemical engineer from Philadelphia, and Edgar B. Castle, an educational administrator from London, to Jerusalem. They arrive on April 22, 1948, and soon become convinced that an international police force of 4,000 is needed if the UN plan to establish the Jerusalem area as a corpus separatum can succeed. Their efforts to achieve this goal fail, but their contacts with Jewish, Palestinian, and Arab League officials contribute to a second, short-lived, truce. In the end, they recommend that AFSC cooperate with the International Committee of the Red Cross and the YMCA to provide relief to refugees in the conflict.

A Mission to Palestine on behalf of the AFSC and FSC