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At the time of the British Mandate the citadel in the old city of Acre was used as a prison. In total, the prison contained 700 Arab prisoners and 90 Jewish prisoners, the latter mainly members of the Jewish underground groups Haganah, Lehi, and Irgun, who had been captured by the British.

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On July 22, 1946, a bomb demolished the southern wing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem. This newsreel shows the aftermath of the explosion.

"The hotel housed the British army headquarters, and the Palestine government offices, and casualties were very heavy," the British reporter announces, as workers on-screen sift the rubble for bodies. "The tragic scene is like a serious incident during the Blitz."

The Zionist paramilitary group Irgun later claimed responsibility for the attack - the deadliest against the British during the Mandate period - an act of revenge on the British administration following the Black Sabbath arrests.

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"Sixty-five deaths are reported, and there is little or no hope of survival for any of the 58 missing," the narrator continues. The final count would reach 91 dead.

(The Associated Press and Movietone News recently released their vast video archives on YouTube, allowing the public to freely access a million minutes worth of historical news clips dating back to 1895 - including many iconic scenes from Israel's history featured in this Times of Israel series.)

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WATCH: The King David Hotel bombing, 1946

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On July 22, 1946, a bomb demolished the southern wing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem. This newsreel shows the aftermath of the explosion. "The hotel housed the British army headquarters, and the Palestine government offices, and casualties were very heavy," the British reporter announces, as workers on-screen sift the rubble for bodies.

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Read the history of Jewish Defense Organizations in Israel below. Then, choose at least 2 events involving the underground movement and add a comment to each:

1. What stood out to you the most about this event?
2. What do you think motivated these groups to act as they did?

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Operation Agatha (Saturday, June 29, 1946) sometimes called Black Sabbath ("השבת השחורה") or Black Saturday because it began on the Jewish sabbath, was a police and military operation conducted by the British authorities in Mandatory Palestine. Soldiers and police searched for arms and made arrests in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, and Haifa, and in several dozen settlements; the Jewish Agency was raided. The total number of British security forces involved is variously reported as 10,000, 17,000, and 25,000. About 2,700 individuals were arrested, among them future Israeli Prime Minister Moshe Sharett. The officially given purpose of the operation was to end "the state of anarchy" then existing in Palestine. Other objectives included obtaining documentary proof of Jewish Agency approval of sabotage operations by the Palmach and of an alliance between the Haganah and the more violent Lehi (Stern Gang) and Irgun, destroying the Haganah's military power, boosting army morale and preventing a coup d'état being mounted by the Lehi and Irgun.

June 16, 1946 saw the " Night of the Bridges", when the Palmach blew up eight road and rail bridges linking Palestine to neighbouring countries. On June 17, the Lehi attacked railway workshops in Haifa. Shortly afterwards, the Irgun kidnapped six British officers. One officer subsequently escaped and two were released. The Irgun announced that the remaining officers would be released only in exchange for the commutation of death sentences for two Irgun members.

The British Army had, for months, wanted to take military action against the Zionist underground organizations, but had been blocked by High Commissioner Alan Cunningham, who was also particularly opposed to military action being taken against the Jewish Agency. Cunningham changed his mind after the "Night of the Bridges" and flew to London to meet the British Cabinet and army chief Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery in London. Montgomery formulated the plan for Operation Agatha. With reluctance, Cunningham accepted it, hoping that, with the more militant Zionists restrained, the way would be opened to reaching a political settlement with the more moderate (and pro-British) leaders such as Chaim Weizmann. During the operation, in a radio broadcast, Cunningham said: "[The arrests] are not directed against the Jewish community as a whole but solely against those few who are taking an active part in the present campaign of violence and those who are responsible for instigating and directing it ... ."

Chief of the Secretariat, Sir John Shaw, outlined the official objective of the operation at a press conference in Jerusalem: "Large-scale operations have been authorized in an effort to end the state of anarchy existing in Palestine and to enable law-abiding citizens to pursue their normal occupations without fear of kidnapping, murder, or being blown-up." Shaw, believing that the British should end the existing situation by either partitioning Palestine into Jewish and Arab states and then leaving or dismantle the Jewish Agency, which claimed administrative authority yet secretly supported acts by the underground Zionist military organizations, and governing without it, approved of the operation.

Underlying the official objective were a number of others. One was to obtain documentary proof of the Jewish Agency's approval of sabotage operations by the Palmach and of an alliance between the Haganah and the more violent Lehi (Stern Gang) and Irgun in carrying out violent acts. Another was to forestall a coup d'etat. In June, members of the Jewish Agency's Executive and the Haganah High Command had met with delegates of the Irgun and Lehi at which the latter, according to intelligence, had stated their intention of asking the Yishuv to participate in a coup "for the proclamation of a future Jewish State and the interruption of all relations with the existing Palestine Administration." Another, in the wake of the "Night of the Bridges", was to break the military power of the Haganah. As the Haganah had appeared to be acting in collusion with the Lehi and Irgun, the British authorities believed, mistakenly, that this was also necessary because the Haganah might co-operate with the prospective Irgun and Lehi coup. Lastly, Montgomery had stated that the operation was necessary in order to boost army morale.

On June 29, Operation Agatha began, lasting until July 1. Curfews were imposed throughout Palestine, low-flying planes circled Jerusalem, roadblocks were put up, trains were flagged down, and passengers were evacuated and escorted home. Special licenses were required for the operations of emergency vehicles. British troops and police raided the Jewish Agency headquarters in Jerusalem, the Jewish Agency office in Tel Aviv, and other Jewish institutions such as the Women's International Zionist Organization and the Histadrut. A total of 27 Jewish settlements in Palestine were searched, and the residents of these settlements sometimes put up fierce resistance. Four Jews were killed resisting British searches. Mass arrests of Jewish leaders and Haganah members were carried out. A total of 2,718 people were arrested, including four members of the Jewish Agency Executive, seven Haganah officers, and nearly half of the Palmach's fighting force. However, due to a Haganah intelligence warning, most Haganah commanders were able to evade arrest.

Searches of Jewish settlements uncovered 15 arms caches, including one of the Haganah's three central arsenals at Kibbutz Yagur, where more than 300 rifles, some 100 2-inch mortars, more than 400,000 bullets, some 5,000 grenades and 78 revolvers were confiscated. The arms were displayed at a press conference, and all the men of Yagur were arrested.

Agatha triggered echoes of the Holocaust in the minds of many people. Women ripped their clothing to expose concentration camp tattoos. There were incidents of people in the settlements herded into cages while screaming that this was what the Nazis did. A minority among the British troops exacerbated the situation by shouting " Heil Hitler," scrawling swastikas on walls, and referring to gas chambers while conducting searches.

After Agatha ended, the kidnapped British officers were released, and High Commissioner Alan Cunningham commuted the Irgun members' death sentences to life imprisonment.

The Haganah and Palmach were dissuaded from continued anti-British operations. However, the more extreme groups, the Lehi (Stern Gang) and the Irgun Tzvai Leumi, headed by future Prime Minister Menachem Begin, continued and even intensified their attacks.

Specifically, the Irgun retaliated for Operation Agatha by bombing the south wing of the King David Hotel, which was the headquarters of the British government in Palestine. One reason for bombing the South wing was because that was the location where it was presumed that the British had taken the documents from the Jewish Agency.

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Operation Agatha (Saturday, June 29, 1946) sometimes called Black Sabbath ("השבת השחורה") or Black Saturday because it began on the Jewish sabbath, was a police and military operation conducted by the British authorities in Mandatory Palestine. Soldiers and police searched for arms and made arrests in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, and Haifa, and in several dozen settlements; the Jewish Agency was raided.

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In November 1917, the British government published the Balfour Declaration, favoring the establishment of a national Jewish homeland in Palestine. But as the years went by Arab pressure caused the British to change their policy. The number of Jews permitted to enter the country was drastically slashed and, after a certain tiny quota was filled, Jewish immigration to Palestine became illegal. The British even refused entry to refugees from Hitler's Germany.

Faced with little choice, Jews were forced to slip secretly into the country and by the late 1930s the number of illegal immigrants had reached the thousands. Finally, in 1938, the British attempted to stop these waves of immigration by building a detention camp near the village of Atlit, located south of Haifa. And so it happened that when 40 Iraqi Jewish refugees managed to sneak into Palestine in 1945, they were captured and brought to Atlit.

With no thought for the consequences - certain death for all 40 - the British decided to send these ma'apilim (illegal immigrants) back to Iraq. Jewish leaders in Palestine immediately decided to rescue them - and to empty out the rest of the camp as well.

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The operation was slated to take place on October 9, 1945. That night, all seemed quiet at the camp where over 200 babies, children, men and women were being held captive for the "crime" of entering their Jewish homeland without British permission. Silently, stealthily, six Palmachniks (pre-State commandos) who had infiltrated earlier in the guise of Hebrew teachers, cut the barbed-wire fences. After they took out the sentries, a larger Palmach force entered the camp.

Carrying babies and toddlers on their backs, the Palmachniks led the detainees into the darkness of the night. They walked through the fields behind Atlit, and then climbed the slippery cliffs of the Carmel ridge, continuing straight up through rocks and thorns.

The delousing station was terrifying to anyone brought forcibly to Atlit - for people were separated by sex and ordered to undress. The showers were especially traumatic for those who had been recent inmates of the concentration camps.

Thirty of them got lost and tramped all the way to Haifa; the rest made it to Kibbutz Beit Oren and Kibbutz Yagur where they mingled with thousands of Jews from the area who had gathered there to confuse the British. Not one of the escapees was recaptured. The commander of the operation was Nahum Sarig; second in command was former prime minister, the late Yitzhak Rabin.

Once the State of Israel was established in 1948 the camp was used to house new immigrants. In 1973, it was turned into a storage area and eventually became one huge garbage dump. Fourteen years later, with the help of the Jewish National Fund and the Society for the Protection of Nature and its Council for the Preservation of Historic Sites, work was begun on the restoration and reconstruction of the camp.

At its peak, Atlit occupied more than 22 acres of land. Three fences surrounded the camp, which was illuminated at night, and sentries patrolled the grounds. The watchtowers, barbed wire, and three of the 80 original huts have been restored.

Visitors view the delousing station, which was terrifying to anyone brought forcibly to Atlit - for people were separated by sex and ordered to undress. The showers were especially traumatic for those who had been recent inmates of the concentration camps.

Married couples were separated in the camp, but an hour a day was set aside for family visits. During that time, couples would grab a few minutes alone, while other inmates watched the door. The babies who were born as a result were automatically British citizens and could not be tossed out of the country.

One of the huts has been completely refurnished using lifelike mannequins. The clothes, books, dolls and other everyday items were donated by former inmates. Of special interest are the original boards on which people scratched their names and their countries of origin. By doing so, they hoped that friends and family members from whom they had become separated during the Holocaust would learn that they were alive.

On the site stands a bus that brought refugees to the camp. And, most recently, visitors also enter a ship similar in size in appearance to those vessels that transported "illegal" immigrants to Israel. Inside you sail the seas, rock in the storms, hear the British coming.

While horrifying to those detained, and painfully disappointing if you expected to find a new life in the Jewish homeland, Atlit was not a machine of destruction like the Eastern European concentration camps. And because a small quota of Jews was permitted into Palestine, at times an inmate would be released. One detainee escaped by climbing into the hollowed-out space of a friend's suitcase. When the friend was released, so was he.

The camp is open to visitors (for a fee), but you must call first and reserve if you want to enter the ship and take a tour in English. Phone 972-4-984-1980 for more information.

______________________________________________________________________

Aviva Bar-Am is the author of seven English-language guides to Israel. Shmuel Bar-Am is a licensed tour guide who provides private, customized tours in Israel for individuals, families and small groups.

All rights reserved.

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Relive the Great Escape, from Atlit detention camp

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In November 1917, the British government published the Balfour Declaration, favoring the establishment of a national Jewish homeland in Palestine. But as the years went by Arab pressure caused the British to change their policy. The number of Jews permitted to enter the country was drastically slashed and, after a certain tiny quota was filled, Jewish immigration to Palestine became illegal.

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The Exodus 1947 was a worn-out US-owned coastal freight passenger ship launched in 1928. Originally called the SS President Warfield, it sailed the Chesapeake Bay between Baltimore, Maryland, and Norfolk, Virginia, for over a decade. Transferred to the British under the Lend-Lease agreement as part of a group of shallow-draft ships, the President Warfield was later deployed in the Normandy invasion (June 1944). After World War II it returned to US waters.

Yet the ship was to take part in one more event which ensured its place in history, symbolizing the struggle for unrestricted immigration into Palestine.

Initially sold as scrap for slightly more than $8,000, the ship was acquired by the Hagana (an underground Jewish military organization). Hagana personnel arranged to dock the ship in Europe in order to transport Jews who sought to illegally immigrate into Palestine. The plight of the ship's passengers would capture the world's attention.

In July 1947, the President Warfield left Sète, France, for Palestine. It carried over 4,500 Jewish men, women, and children, all displaced persons (DPs) or survivors of the Holocaust. Even before the ship (by then renamed the Exodus 1947) reached Palestine's territorial waters, British destroyers surrounded it. On July 18 a struggle ensued between British naval forces and passengers on the ship. A Jewish crew member and two passengers were killed. Dozens suffered bullet wounds and other injuries.

Attempting to make an example of the Exodus 1947, the British towed the ship to Haifa and transferred the passengers onto three navy transports which returned to Europe. The ships first landed at Port-de-Bouc, France, where the passengers were ordered to disembark. When the French authorities refused to forcibly remove the refugees, British authorities, fearing adverse public opinion, sought to wait until the passengers disembarked of their own accord. The passengers, including many orphaned children, forced the issue by declaring a hunger strike which lasted 24 days. Mounting pressure from international media coverage pressed British authorities to find a solution.

The ships sat for three weeks in the sweltering summer heat, but the passengers refused to voluntarily disembark and the French authorities were unwilling to force them to leave. The British government then transported the passengers to Hamburg, where they were interned in camps in the British zone of occupation in Germany.

Displaced persons in camps all over Europe protested vociferously and staged hunger strikes when they heard the news. Large protests erupted on both sides of the Atlantic. The ensuing public embarrassment for Britain played a significant role in the diplomatic swing of sympathy toward the Jews and the eventual recognition of a Jewish state in 1948.

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The Exodus 1947 was a worn-out US-owned coastal freight passenger ship launched in 1928. Originally called the SS President Warfield, it sailed the Chesapeake Bay between Baltimore, Maryland, and Norfolk, Virginia, for over a decade. Transferred to the British under the Lend-Lease agreement as part of a group of shallow-draft ships, the President Warfield was later deployed in the Normandy invasion (June 1944).

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Hannah Arendt succinctly expressed the belief of the early Zionists: "Palestine was conceived as the place, the only place, where Jews could escape: from Jew-hatred ... At the core of this hope ... we find the old mentality of enslaved peoples, the belief that it does not pay to fight back, that we must dodge and escape in order to survive."
Early Jewish Defense
Setting Up a Defense
The Arab Revolt
Growing Jewish Militancy
The Holocaust Revives the Underground
The Revolt
The British Elections
The Outrage
Fallout
The British Cave
Jailbreak
The Final Straw
The Underground Surfaces
War Approaches
The Arab Invasion
Conclusion
Early Jewish Defense

Once they had escaped, the Jews expected to be welcomed with open arms into their homeland. When they were not, they were hesitant to fight for what they believed was rightfully theirs (in the early years their small number left them incapable of fighting). This pacifistic attitude dominated the early years of the Yishuv, but there were a few individuals who recognized at a very early stage that the Jews would have to fight for the land.

Setting Up a Defense

After the war, Jabotinsky continued to be an activist. In the riots of 1920, he and Pinchas Rutenberg organized a defense force to protect the Jews from the Arab onslaught; however, the British prevented the force from entering Jerusalem. Nevertheless, Jabotinsky was sentenced to 15 years in prison for his alleged role in the riot. Thanks to a report absolving Jabotinsky from Colonel Richard Meinertzhagen, the Chief Political Officer for Palestine and Syria, the sentence was commuted.

The immediate impact of the riots was to convince the Jewish community in Palestine of the need to protect themselves. The first self-defense organization, Bar-Giora, had been established in 1907 by Yitzhak Ben Zvi (later second president of Israel) to protect the early settlements against Arab mob violence. Following the riots, the left-wing Achduth Ha'Avodah party established the Haganah on June 12, 1920, to protect the settlers. In 1923, Jabotinsky formed the Betar youth movement, named after the Roman fortress where Bar Kochba made his last stand in the second century, to propagate his revisionist ideas and militant politics.

On December 5, 1936, Tehomi signed an agreement with Jabotinsky making Tehomi the group's commander and Jabotinsky its political leader. The alliance was short-lived, however, and Tehomi rejoined the Haganah a year later and took about one-third of his forces with him, agreeing to act according to the Jewish principle of havlaga (self-defense).

Again, there was a group of members, mainly Betarim, who weren't willing to restrict themselves to havlaga and advocated offensive action. They formed a new organization that accepted Jabotinsky's vision and believed that armed force was a prerequisite for the creation of a Jewish state, that Arabs who attacked Jews should expect retaliation, and that no one had a right to prevent Jews from immigrating. This organization became known as the Irgun Zvai Leumi (also known as IZL, Etzel, and the National Military Organization).

In 1937, the Irgun membership was only about 1,800. By comparison, the Haganah had approximately 17,000 men and 4,000 women under its command.

The Arab Revolt

The attacks outraged the Jewish Agency, which accused the Irgun of undermining their efforts to obtain a political settlement. The outcry induced the Irgun to return to the principle of havlaga, but this was only a temporary respite.

After the execution, the Irgun stepped up its activity, attacking Arab headquarters in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv on July 4, 1938, killing five Arabs. On the 6th, bombs placed in milk cans exploded in a Haifa market killing 23 Arab shoppers and wounding 79. Another bombing, this time in Jerusalem on the 15th, killed 10 and wounded 29. A little over a week later, on the 25th, an explosion in Haifa killed 39 Arabs and wounded 46. During this same period 44 Jews were killed by Arabs.

The violence in Palestine in 1938 took a heavy toll: 486 Arab civilians killed and 636 wounded; 1,138 rebels killed, 196 wounded; 292 Jews killed, 649 wounded; 12 others killed, 6 wounded; 69 British killed and 233 wounded.

To avoid complicating .the political struggle, the Haganah and Irgun did not engage in overt violence in response to the White Paper; instead, they began to engage in illegal immigration. According to Bauer, 16,000 people were smuggled into Palestine between 1938 and the outbreak of the war. The British had set up a blockade along the coast and seized ships carrying illegal immigrants and sent them to Mauritius. On November 25, 1940, a bomb was placed on a ship loaded with immigrants to protest the British policy. The bomb exploded and the sank killing 250 passengers.

Growing Jewish Militancy

In 1940, the Irgun split as the more militant members of the organization, led by Avraham Stern, decided to form a new group, which became known as Lohamey Heruth Israel (Fighters for the Freedom of Israel). It was also known as Lehi, F.F.I., and the Stern Gang. The group was small, ill-equipped, and had to rely on robberies for most of its financial support. Initially, violence was only seen as a part of the Lehi strategy to undermine British rule; however, it eventually came to be their sole course of action.

Bell asserts that Lehi was essentially anti-imperialist and sought cooperation with the Arabs. He also claims Stern was so determined in his opposition to England that he was willing to collaborate with the Axis powers although nothing came of his interest.

The Holocaust Revives the Underground

The news that arrived at the World Zionist Organization meeting in May 1942 describing the fate of European Jewry gave new impetus to the militant members of the Jewish community. The incident that had preceded the news from Europe, in which a ship full of illegal immigrants from Romania was turned away from Palestine by the British authorities and later sank, killing 768, had already given the Sternists all the motivation they needed to reemerge as a force to be reckoned with.

The aim of the revolt was to undermine British rule in Palestine. According to Begin:

Lehi had believed that the Irgun was not willing to fight to drive the British out of Palestine (ironically, the Irgun had the same view of the Haganah), and had taken it upon themselves to do the job. When Begin declared the beginning of the revolt, however, Lehi found that it was no longer fighting alone, but while the Irgun at least gave lip-service to the intent of attacking only military targets, Lehi "saw no political reason to spare the lives of Englishmen as long as they remained in Palestine." Lehi had determined that the British would not leave Palestine because of their interests in maintaining a military base in the Middle East, the oil refining operations in Haifa, and their own economic holdings.

Although it is not clear whether he was using hindsight or found evidence of a plan, Brenner claims that Lehi decided to undermine British interests by posing a constant threat to army installations and camps, interrupting transportation with mines, and intimidating soldiers with the threat of murder. To emphasize this threat, Lehi members would patrol the streets until they found a group of British police or soldiers and then open fire on them with submachine-guns or pistols. British oil interests were to be sabotaged while their economic interests were subject to sabotage or robberies.

The violence began to escalate in February 1944. In that month, the Irgun attacked the offices of the Immigration Department located in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, and Haifa in a symbolic protest against the closed gates of Palestine. On the 14th, Lehi members were caught putting up posters and shot two officers who tried to arrest them. Two weeks later, on the 27th, the Irgun bombed the income tax offices in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, and Haifa. The situation deteriorated in March. On the 2nd, the Irgun wounded a policeman, and on the 13th Lehi killed a policeman. On March 19, a member of Lehi was killed resisting arrest - four days later, Lehi retaliated by killing two officers and wounding a third. On the same day, the Irgun tried to bomb the CID [Criminal Investigation Division] stations in Jerusalem, Haifa, and Jaffa with only the Haifa bomb causing any injuries (three dead).

The British responded by imposing curfews on Jewish towns, engaging in mass arrests; and instituting the death penalty for carrying firearms. Designed to intimidate the underground and turn the Yishuv against them, the measures had the opposite effect. They made the underground more resolute and the community more antagonistic toward British rule.

The British did succeed, however, in scaring the leadership of the Yishuv. The Jewish Agency had objected to the dissidents' violence from the beginning. After the March 2 attack, Weizmann had sent a cable to the wounded officer in which he said:

The Jewish leadership was appalled at the violence; moreover, they were afraid the militants would upset the British and jeopardize the chance of a favorable disposition of the Mandate, a possibility the leadership still believed in. They also saw no point in the violence except to harden the British resolve to keep the gates closed and turn international opinion against the creation of a Jewish homeland. The Jewish Agency leadership also feared that their own positions were being threatened by the terrorists. Consequently, on April 2, the Agency formulated an official policy to increase propaganda against the dissidents, attempt to isolate them in the Yishuv, and prevent their activities.

In keeping with this policy, the Agency declared an open season on the Irgun and Lehi, cooperating whenever possible with the British administration. After two British officers were gunned down on April 1, the names of those responsible were given to the authorities, who surrounded a Lehi hideout and killed one man and left two more with a choice of surrender or suicide - they chose the latter.

The Revolt

As Yom Kippur approached in 1944, Begin announced that the shofar would be blown at the Western Wall, an act that had been prohibited by the British since the 1929 riots. On September 27, the shofar again sounded through the streets of Jerusalem while at the same time the Irgun was attacking four different British fortresses. Bell sees this event as a major psychological victory for the Irgun because they had forced the British into a "humiliating withdrawal" to avoid a confrontation at the Western Wall. In addition, the failure of the British to retaliate for the attacks on the fortresses indicated the "British could he challenged successfully, and that, as anticipated, Britain would not pursue a policy of vengeance. All the professed fears of the Jewish Agency were groundless."

According to Gurion, a former Irgunist, Moyne had also opposed the formation of a Jewish Army, refused to allow the to land in Palestine, sent another ship (the Atlantic) to Mauritius, and had ordered the there as well before it was blown up.

It is wrong to assume that we represent Zionism. In fact we represent, and we are, the real owners of Palestine and as such we are engaged in a struggle to free our country from the alien rulers who have taken possession of it.

The two men were viewed by some in the Jewish world as martyrs. After the verdict, the OSS reported that American Zionists, particularly those associated with the Revisionists, prominent rabbis, including Reform Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver, and some celebrities and member of Congress unsuccessfully petitioned the Egyptian government for amnesty.

The assassins were hung on March 23, 1945.

Again, it may reflect hindsight, but Bell suggests that Lehi had consciously attacked Moyne in Cairo to show the Arabs that they were not anti-Arab only anti-imperialism.

The attack also was meant to show the efficacy of armed resistance and to demonstrate that the British were not safe anywhere as long as they remained in Palestine. Brenner believes the assassination did have some impact on the Arabs, particularly in stimulating Egyptian nationalism. He also makes an even more tenuous connection between Moyne's death and the assassination of a former Prime Minister, Ahmed Mahir, who was pro-British. Apparently, some Lehi members advocated the formation of a "Semitic Bloc" to liberate the Middle East from foreign domination, an idea which made it possible for Palestinian Arabs to join the organization.

The assassination of Lord Moyne outraged the Jewish community in Palestine. Ben-Gurion called for a "liquidation of the terror" and appealed to the community to assist the authorities in the "prevention of acts of terror and the elimination of its perpetrators." It is frequently alleged that the Jewish community did nothing to stop the dissidents' activities, but the Jewish Agency did make a concerted effort, particularly after Moyne's death, to bring the Irgun under control. According to Begin, the Agency and Haganah handed over a large number (one British M.P. said 1,500) of Irgunists to the British. Begin was unwilling to retaliate against his fellow Jews: "No, not civil war," he said. "Not that at any price."

Friedman-Yellin, however, told the Haganah commander, Eliyahu Golomb in November 1944 that Lehi would shoot Haganah leaders and informers. Consequently, Brenner says, Lehi was left alone during the season.

Although Golomb succeeded in bringing "terrorist activity to a standstill," when the season ended in June 1945, the underground emerged even stronger:

The Haganah's Season had maimed without killing, created sympathy where none had existed before, endowed the Irgun with a long-desired legitimacy, and when ended assured Begin that the great divide had been safely if painfully passed: the revolt would have the toleration of the Yishuv.

The proof would not be long in coming.

The British Elections

The election was easily won by the Labor Party leading Davar to write: "The victory of the Labor Party...is a clear victory for the demands of the Zionists in British public opinion." The Zionist leaders anxiously awaited the new Prime Minister's initiatives on Palestine. Even the Irgun and Lehi ceased their activity to see what the government would do.

On August 25, Weizmann was informed by the Colonial Office that the immigrant quota would remain at 1,500 per month. On November 13, 1945, Foreign Secretary Bevin made a speech in Parliament which vitiated the Labor platform with regard to Palestine, promising only to launch another inquiry into the issue. In Bevin's view, England had never countenanced the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine, only a home.

The alliance engaged in sabotage and bombings to keep the British off balance and draw them into a guerilla war of attrition. For example:

On October 9-10, 1945, the Palmach attacked the Atlit detention camp and released 200 immigrants who were about to be deported.

On October 31, 1945, the Palmach attacked the railway network, sabotaging it in 153 places, and also sank two police boats in Haifa and one in Jaffa..

On November 25, 1945, the Palmach blew up two stations used by the British to monitor ships carrying illegal immigrants.

On December 27, 1945, Irgun and Lehi blew up the CID headquarters in Jerusalem and Haifa killing 10 and injuring 12.

On January 20, 1946, the Palmach attacked a radar station on Western Carmel used for the same purpose.

On February 22, 1946, Haganah fighters attacked three British bases in Shfar'am, Kfar Vitkin and Sarona.

On June 16-17, 1945, the Night of the Bridges, the Palmach blew up 10 bridges connecting Israel with the Arab countries.

Bell describes the situation that prevailed in 1946:

All 20,000 men of the Sixth Airborne Division had been moved to the Mandate, and British troop strength continued to rise to 80,000. There were also thousands of police, units of the Transjordan Arab Legion, and others attached to security duty. There were two cruisers, three destroyers, other naval units off the coast, and naval radar and communication bases on shore. The ratio of British security forces to the Jewish population was approximately 1 to 5. By 1946 the Mandate was an armed camp, the countryside studded with the huge, concrete Tegart fortresses, British army camps, reinforced roadblocks, and observation points. The cities were constantly patrolled, and all government buildings protected by concertinas of barbed wire and sentry blocks. There were armed guards on the trains. For safety's sake, the British withdrew into wired and sandbagged compounds, self-imposed ghettos. The largest, in Jerusalem, was dubbed Bevingrad...The newspapers in the Mandate were censored, and travel was restricted. The mails were monitored, as were all overseas cable traffic. The Mandate became a garrison state under internal siege, and the garrison, despite its size equipment, and determination, proved ineffectual and self-defeating.

On March 24, 1946, the Haganah engaged in its first major operation against the British, sending thousands of fighters to the beach in Tel Aviv to try to prevent the British from stopping the landing of the illegal immigrant ship Wingate. The ship was captured by the British, however, and the operation was cancelled after clashes left one Palmach soldier dead.

On April 23, 1946, the Irgun attacked a police station in Ramat Gan to steal arms. Dov Gruner was captured in the raid and would eventually become the group's first martyr. Two days after the Irgun raid, Lehi gunmen attacked the Sixth Airborne carpark and killed seven British soldiers. On June 10, the Irgun attacked trains in Lydda and on the Jerusalem to Jaffa route.

These attacks outraged the British, who began to turn on the Jewish population, rioting and looting in the streets, harassing people, and reacting with increasing severity to the slightest provocation. The British believed the terrorists could not function if it were not for the complicity of the Jewish community - all Jews were thus equally guilty. "And treated as guilty, many Jews began to regard British disgust as an honor, not a disgrace."

On June 29, Black Shabbat, the British launched a major raid throughout Palestine arresting more than 1,000 people including the acting chairman of the Jewish Agency, J.C. Fishman ( Ben-Gurion was out of the country), and Moshe Shertok. Agency documents were also seized. The British searched for the Haganah weapons caches, but found only one in Kibbutz Yagur. By the beginning of July, 2,718 Jews had been arrested, 4 killed, and 80 wounded.

Most of the leaders of the underground evaded capture, although one of Lehi's leaders was caught, his captor was eventually slain in retaliation. The Yishuv continued to hold contempt for the dissidents' methods, but became less willing to criticize them as British repression intensified.

The raids were not able to locate the kidnapped British soldiers so High Commissioner Cunningham gave in to Irgun demands and commuted the sentences of the Irgunists. The next day the Irgun released the hostages. The episode demonstrated once again to the Irgun that the British could be forced to capitulate. At the same time, the Irgun tried to show the British they meant what they said. Begin stresses the point in The Revolt that the Jewish community as well as the British could count on the Irgun to fulfill its promises. To their own misfortune, the British were still not convinced.

The Outrage

In the eyes of the Irgun, the British raids on the Yishuv confirmed the naiveté of the Jewish leadership. They had believed themselves immune from police retaliation and now found their headquarters occupied and many secret documents in British hands. The Irgun had little trouble deciding on an appropriate response. According to Begin, the Irgun believed that the scope of the reprisal should equal the magnitude of the attack. It followed from this notion that the proper retaliation for the attack on Jewish headquarters would be an attack on British headquarters.

British headquarters had been set up during the war in the southern wing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem. The hotel served as both the military and civil administrative headquarters and was, not surprisingly, extremely well guarded and heavily fortified. The Irgun plan was to smuggle bombs into the hotel and set them on a timer that would allow the building to be evacuated. Begin stressed the desire to avoid civilian casualties and said three telephone calls were placed, one to the hotel, another to the French Consulate, and a third to the Palestine Post, warning that explosives in the King David Hotel would soon be detonated.

On July 22, 1946, the calls were made. The French Consulate, located near the hotel, received the call and opened the building's windows as they had been instructed. The Palestine Post also received a call. The call into the hotel was apparently received and ignored. Begin quotes one British official who supposedly refused to evacuate the building saying: "We don't take orders from the Jews." As a result, when the bombs exploded, the casualty toll was high - a total of 91 killed and 45 injured. Among the casualties were 15 Jews. Bell acknowledged the Irgun's attempt to avoid civilian injuries by noting that few people in the hotel proper were hurt in the blast."

The bombing attracted the world's attention. Two days after the bombing Atlee said: "The British Government have stated and stated again they will not be diverted by acts of violence in their search for a just and final solution to the Palestine problem." The Jewish leadership issued the usual denunciations but the British were convinced the Haganah and Jewish Agency were responsible. The widespread publicity naturally cast the entire Jewish community as accomplices to terrorists. The negative publicity convinced the Jewish leaders that it was time to distance themselves from the dissidents; consequently, the Haganah withdrew from the underground alliance (on August 23).

Fallout

In December, two members of the Irgun were arrested during a bank robbery and were sentenced to prison and a flogging. The Irgun let it be known that they would retaliate in kind if the sentence was carried out. On December 27, one of the men was given 18 lashes.

The British Cave

The year 1947 began just as the previous years following the war - with violence and recriminations. On January 26, Dov Gruner's death sentence was confirmed and the Irgun vowed to hang a British soldier for every Jew who was put to death. To emphasize their threat, they kidnaped two Englishmen, a judge and a retired officer. The Yishuv response was typically outraged. Just a few days earlier (January 21), the Palestine Post reported:

Repudiation by the Yishuv and the Zionist movement of murder and the shedding of innocent blood as a means of political resistance. The Yishuv will defend itself with the necessary force against domination and coercion, intimidation and threats, the extortion of money, and the use of force.

The Jewish Agency was unable to ascertain the whereabouts of the kidnap victims; however, they did learn that Gruner was not going to be hung. When the Irgun received this information they released their captives unharmed.

We will no longer be bound by the normal rules of warfare. In [the] future every combatant unit of Irgun will be accompanied by a war court of the Jewish Underground Movement. Every enemy subject who is taken prisoner will immediately be brought before the court, irrespective of whether he is a member of the Army or Civilian Administration. Both are criminal organizations. He will be tried for entering illegally into Palestine, for illegal possession of arms and their use against civilians, for murder, oppression and exploitation; there will be no appeal against the decision of the people's court. Those condemned will be hanged or shot.

Since the British did not see the terrorists as an army operating under normal rules of warfare, they no doubt saw little reason to expect a change in their behavior. They were wrong.

Two members of Lehi were to be hung on April 21 and the Irgun tried unsuccessfully to kidnap soldiers to use as a threat. Rather than hang, however, the two men committed suicide. On April 22, Lehi fighters attacked an army transport near Rehovot. The following day the Cairo-Haifa train was ambushed and 8 people were killed and 27 wounded. On the 24th, Lehi destroyed the headquarters of the British Mobile Force and 4 soldiers were killed in an unrelated incident when their truck hit a mine. The following day 4 people were killed by a bomb at a police station in Sarona. The violence continued yet another day as a Haifa CID chief, an inspector, and 3 other officers were killed in Tel Aviv.

Jailbreak

The events of April were a mere prelude to the spectacular attack planned for May: the target, Acre prison. Acre was a centuries old fortress which had withstood attacks from some of the world's most awesome armies, including Napoleon's. The fortress now housed a prison holding hundreds of captured underground fighters. A former Irgunist, Itzhak Gurion, explained the motivation for attacking Acre:

The assault on the fortress was launched on May 4, 1947, and was a spectacular success for the underground.

Although the Acre operation was successful, there were several Irgunists who were captured. On June 9, the Irgun captured two policemen to use as bargaining chips but they escaped. Meanwhile, the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP) was on its way to Palestine and the Jewish leadership wanted to curb underground activities. While their activities were being curtailed, five of the Irgun's members were being sentenced, three to death, for their part in the Acre attack.

1) The Irgun considers Eretz Israel as the land of the Jewish people.
2) Eretz Israel consists of both sides of the Jordan, including Transjordan. "Transjordan"...is an English term that is incorrect. In the original Hebrew both sides of the Jordan were, in effect, called Transjordan." The early Hebrews... first conquered what is today known as Transjordan and crossed into Palestine from east to west. The Irgun considers the whole territory as Jewish territory and aims at the creation of a Jewish Republic under a democratic government.
3) Immediate repatriation of all Jews wishing to be repatriated to Palestine.
The exact number of Hebrew repatriates is unknown but runs into the millions. A choice should be given to all Jews who wish to return to Palestine. Their return is prevented only by British illegal rule and by British armed force, which should be removed. A Jewish government would undertake the repatriation of Jews with international help.
4) We reject any statement made by the Labor Party as to the transfer of any Arabs from the country. There is enough room in Palestine for all, both Jews and Arabs.
5) Since Britain has decided to keep the country under her own control by force of arms, there is no other way to accomplish our aims than to meet force with force.

The fourth point is particularly interesting in light of the claim that would be in the months ahead - especially after Deir Yassin - that the Irgun was trying to drive the Arabs out of Palestine. The reader should have noticed that the recitation of terrorist acts did not include a single operation against the Arab population of Palestine. It should also be noted that the Palestinian Arabs made no effort to join in the revolt or take any independent action to drive the British out of their homeland.

The Final Straw

On July 11, 1947, the left Sete, France, for Palestine carrying 4,515 refugees. On July 18, the ship had just about reached Gaza when it was intercepted by the British and forced to dock in Haifa. England's policy had been to deport illegal refugees to detention camps in Cyprus, but Bevin decided to employ a new tactic to discourage the immigrants; the refugees would be sent back to their original point of departure. In keeping with this policy, the passengers of the were herded onto three British prison ships and sent back to Sete. When the ships arrived on the 29th, however, the refugees refused to leave the ships. The London correspondent for Haaretz, Aryeh Felbaum, described what he saw:

On approaching the Ocean Vigour I witnessed the most terrible spectacle I have ever seen in my life. It was a spectacle I shall never forget. On the deck, in narrow, very high cages, worse than those in a zoo, surrounded by barbed wire, were crowded together my brothers and sisters of all ages. There the sun had beaten down on their heads for 18 days at sea. They had not even been able to lie down at night. Between the cages stood red bereted guards isolating each cage.

On August 22, the ships left Sete for Hamburg where they landed on September 9. The refugees aboard the Empire Rival left the ship quickly because they had left a bomb in the hold. The other two shiploads of people tried to remain on the ships, resisting any effort to displace them. Eventually, all three ships were emptied of their human cargo and delivered into the waiting arms of the Germans who interned them in camps.

While the tragedy of the was being played out, a new drama was unfolding in Palestine. On July 12, the Irgun finally succeeded in kidnaping two British officers, Sergeants Cliff Marin and Mervyn Paice. The British, aided by the Haganah, launched a massive search for the missing men but were unable to locate them. For over two weeks there was no word on the sergeants. During that period 13 British were killed and 77 wounded in underground attacks while only one terrorist was killed. Then, on July 29, three Irgunists involved in the Acre breakout were hung.

The Irgun response was delivered in the Irgunpress:

The same day the Irgun hung the two sergeants and booby-trapped their bodies.

As usual, the Jewish Agency issued denunciations. For example, Shertok said: "It is mortifying to think that some Jews should have become so depraved by the horrible iniquities in Europe as to be capable of such vileness."

This time the British could not be so easily appeased, the soldiers went on a rampage attacking cars and buses in Tel Aviv. Cafes and shops were also targets of the soldiers' rage which left 5 Jews dead, 15 seriously injured, and many more bruised.

The impact of the hanging of the sergeants was naturally outrage, but it was also symbolized by the Manchester Guardian headline: "Time To Go." Bell explains the prevailing attitude:

The Guardian was perceptive; for the wave of revulsion in Britain was directed as much against British presence and tactics as against Jewish terror: the exhausted Exodus refugees dragged screaming back from the Promised Land, the death of two young men trapped in a humiliating and pointless struggle against a persecuted people, the weekly lists of dead and maimed that brought no thanks from either Jew or Arab. So, instead of adamant demands for vengeance and reprisals, as some expected, the consensus gradually formed, as the Guardian predicted, that the time for evacuation had arrived.

The Irgun and Lehi were not about to ease the pressure on the British. On August 8, 1947, Sternists attacked trains near Haifa and Hedera. On September 26, Sternists robbed Barcley's Bank in Tel Aviv and, three days later, Irgunists blew up the police headquarters in Haifa, killing 10 and wounding 54. After a relatively quiet October, violence flared again in November. On the 5th, four soldiers were shot in an outdoor café in Haifa. Eight days later, four British civilians were gunned down on a Haifa street corner and Lehi avenged the shooting of three school girls and one boy training for the gang by tossing grenades into a café, killing one soldier and injuring 27. Two policemen were also shot in Jerusalem. The following day two more soldiers and two policemen were killed.

The Underground Surfaces

When the United Nations finally voted to partition Palestine, the vast majority of Jews were overjoyed. True, the Jewish state was not as big as they had hoped, and its checkerboard configuration was going to be difficult to defend, but at last, after 2,000 years, there was to be a Jewish state again in Palestine. There were a minority of Jews who were not satisfied; however, among them were the members of the Irgun and Lehi. This was Begin's reaction to the UN decision:

The partition of the Homeland is illegal. It will never be recognized. The signature by institutions and individuals of the partition agreement is invalid. It will not bind the Jewish people. Jerusalem was and will forever be our capital. Eretz Israel will be restored to the people of Israel. All of it. And for ever.

Violence erupted immediately after the UN decision as Arab mobs attacked Jews. The underground, which had concentrated all its efforts on driving the British out of Palestine, now had a new enemy to confront. According to Begin, the first counterattacks were launched on December 11-13, 1947. On December 29, the first wanton act against civilians was carried out when a bomb placed at the Damascus Gate in Jerusalem exploded killing 15 Arabs and wounding more than 50. On January 7, 1948, Irgunists pushed a barrel bomb loaded with scrap metal into a crowd at a bus stop near Jaffa Gate, which killed 17 Arabs and wounded 50 more.

The British remained an obstinate enemy. They had taken the position of "neutrality," refusing to cooperate in the implementation of the partition resolution and retaining control over Palestine. Even as that control began to slip away and the country began to slip into war, the British maintained their blockade, preventing immigrants who would be needed in the upcoming fight, from entering the country. Their neutrality also required them to enforce prohibitions against possessing arms even as the Arabs were attacking Jewish convoys and settlements. Meanwhile, Arab guerrillas were infiltrating the country with British knowledge. In addition, while an arms ban was being enforced against the Jews (the U.S. maintained an embargo throughout the war), Britain was arming the Arabs, directly through a subsidy to Transjordan, whose legion would soon invade Palestine (under the leadership of a British officer) and, indirectly, through an arms agreement with Iraq signed on January 9, 1948.

On February 22, six soldiers who defected from the British army planted explosives on Ben Yehuda Street in the heart of Jerusalem, destroying four buildings, killing 58 people and wounding 38. A week later, resistance fighters n attacked a British troop transport near Rehovot killing five soldiers and wounding 35.

The British were committed to pull out of Palestine, so the militants believed they had achieved their objective. In addition, by April 1948, the infiltration of Arab guerrillas and increasing severity of fighting with these irregular forces caused a shift in priorities from battling British forces to fighting the Arabs.

War Approaches

A more significant battle, from a military standpoint, took place at the end of the month when the Irgun decided to attack the predominantly Arab town of Jaffa. Begin claimed that Arab attacks emanating from Jaffa had killed or injured nearly a thousand Jews. Although this is probably an exaggeration, snipers and Arab mobs threatened Tel Aviv's civilian population. Begin also feared that Jaffa would be used by the Arabs to bombard Tel Aviv once the British withdrew.

The Irgun succeeded in neutralizing Jaffa as a military threat, but it was prevented from capturing the city by the intervention of British forces.

Meanwhile, Arab forces were also changing the situation on the ground and engaging in their own efforts to improve their strategic position in advance of the planned invasion by the surrounding Arab armies. For example, on May 4, the Arab Legion launched a devastating attack on the settlement at Kfar Etzion killing 240 people, many after they had surrendered. There were only four survivors.

The Arab Invasion

On May 14, 1948, just after Israel declared its independence, five Arab armies ( Egypt, Syria, Transjordan, Lebanon and Iraq) invaded Israel. Their intentions were declared by Azzam Pasha, Secretary-General of the Arab League: "It will be a war of annihilation. It will be a momentous massacre in history that will be talked about like the massacres of the Mongols or the Crusades."

That morning, units of the Haganah and the Irgun began Operation Pitchfork to take over the positions evacuated by the British. The Haganah took control of all the British positions in central and southern Jerusalem while the Irgun captured Sheikh Jarah, extending the Jewish perimeter as far as Mount Scopus.

Despite their large populations, at the time of the invasion the Arab armies were comprised of only 80,000 men. The Haganah had 60,000 trained fighters, a third of whom had combat experience, but on May 12, only 18,900 people were fully mobilized, armed, and prepared for war. The Jews' strategic position was even worse according to Collins:

In almost every instance the Arabs held the superior terrain. In Tulkarm they were less than ten miles from the sea and the possibility of cutting the Yishuv in half. The Arab communities of Lydda and Ramle were only minutes from the heart of Tel Aviv. The Negev seemed wide open to Egypt's armor. Jerusalem, above all, remained completely cut off.

The underground, which had been coming closer and closer to the surface finally was able to come out into the open after the proclamation of the new state. After May 15, the vast majority of the underground was absorbed into the Zahal, the Israeli Defense Forces, which was composed primarily of Haganah members. On May 28, Lehi formally disbanded as 850 of its fighters marched together to join the Zahal.

The activities of the underground did not cease entirely. Two events stand out. The first involved an effort by the Irgun to bring in a ship laden with arms. The tried to land at Kfar Vitkim on June 20, 1948. The leadership of the new state feared that the remaining dissidents were a threat to their authority and suspected a possible coup attempt. Ben-Gurion ordered the Zahal to prevent the ship from landing. The Irgun resisted and, after suffering a number of casualties, withdrew the ship and headed for Tel Aviv where the Zahal welcomed it with a barrage of shells. During what soon became an all-out battle the Altalena was set on fire and had to be abandoned. The fighting left 14 Irgunists dead and 69 wounded while two members of Zahal were killed and six wounded.

The other incident took place as the war with the Arabs was winding down and the UN had appointed Count Folke Bernadotte to mediate settlement talks. Bernadotte was a respected Swedish diplomat who had formulated a proposal to end the fighting, which involved Israel ceding most of the Negev to the Arabs and receiving in return more of the Galilee in the north. The provisional government of Israel rejected the plan. The remaining members of Lehi saw it as a threat to Israel's existence, and they considered Bernadotte a Nazi collaborator and a British pawn. On September 16, Bernadotte was assassinated by a group called Hazi ha-Moledeth (Fatherland Front), which was just a cover for Lehi. In all likelihood, the assassination was carried out by a very small number of ex- Lehi members acting on their own. No one was ever convicted for the murder.

Conclusion

When the war ended so did the terrorist activity of the Jewish underground. In August 1948, the newly formed Israeli cabinet voted to issue an ultimatum telling the Irgun and Lehi to join the IDF (thereby losing their own organizational identity) or force would be used against them. The groups disbanded and were integrated into the army the following month.

The members of the underground went on to found political parties and become respected citizens of Israel. The most well known was Menachem Begin, who founded the right-wing opposition Herut party and later served as Prime Minister. Begin's economics minister, Yaacov Meridor, had preceded Begin as the head of the Irgun. Yitzhak Shamir, Begin's foreign minister and later prime minister, was a leader of Lehi.

The gaining of respectability is seen by some as evidence that the dissidents were not terrorists but, as F.F.I.'s initials implied, freedom fighters. Begin uses an etymological argument in The Revolt in an attempt to show that the word "terror" could not be applied to a revolutionary war of liberation which is what they had undertaken. He makes a more convincing argument based on the Irgun's designs:

Begin and his cohorts attached a great deal more significance on their impact than they deserved. After all, terrorism had little impact on the British resolve to stay in Ireland. What impact they did have was mainly negative, particularly in terms of the publicity they gave to Palestine. The militants did put Palestine at the center of the world stage, but the international community, the media, the Jewish leadership, and most of the Yishuv considered the Irgun and Lehi terrorists. Brenner explains their actions as "a reflection of the international 'terrorism,' lawlessness and disrespect for human life which characterized the 1940's." The notion that the ends justify the means was certainly implicit in the underground ideology, but it did not start out that way.

The underground evolved from an organization designed to protect Jewish settlements into a human smuggling operation that succeeded in bringing more than 100,000 illegal immigrants into Palestine between 1934 and May 1948. An additional 65,000 were intercepted by the British between 1946 and February 1948 and interned on Cyprus. The possibility of partitioning Palestine generated ideological splits that fragmented the Jewish community into those who favored a political solution and those who believed a military campaign was necessary to liberate Palestine. Even the militants were willing to take the political route, however, when that option appeared promising. When diplomacy failed, violence was in their view the only alternative.

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The Role of Jewish Defense Organizations in Palestine

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Hannah Arendt succinctly expressed the belief of the early Zionists: "Palestine was conceived as the place, the only place, where Jews could escape: from Jew-hatred ... At the core of this hope ... we find the old mentality of enslaved peoples, the belief that it does not pay to fight back, that we must dodge and escape in order to survive."

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The biggest thing that stood out out to me was that 2,700 Jewish fighters were arrested. The British did this to keep a good relationship with the Arabs.

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The biggest thing that stood out to me is that the jews were trapped in this prison by the British. When I went to Israel I saw this place. I watched a video that the Jews tried to escape this prison, but they got caught and the British hung them one by one. I think that they tried to escape the prism because it wasn't fair that they got trapped.

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Everything in this stood out to me because I remember learning about this. I am not sure from school or not.

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Everything in this stood out to me because I remember learning about this. I am not sure from school or not.

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Jillian

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The biggest thing that stood out to me was that the British were friendly with the Jews and then they changed the immigration laws because of the Arabs pressuring them. I think that the Jews were scared when they went to the detention camps so they would be motivated to try and escape.

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The craziest thing that I thought about the Atlit Detention Camp is the fact that the Jews just went through the Holocaust and Oshtvist. Now they were going through this. So I would be thinking back then "How much damage are we going to take? How many times will we be harmed?"

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what stood out to me was Palmach blew up eight road and rail bridges linking Palestine to neighbouring countries. I feel that this was very harsh

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I think that its crazy because so many Jewish fighters were arrested 2700 to be exact. The British were doing evil stuff just to have a good relationship with the Arabs which may never work out.

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The biggest surprise of Operation Agatha to me was the amount of cities raided during this time. The British did this to avoid more Jews going to Israel and supporting Israeli independence.

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I think the independence of Israel motivates these groups to do this but I was surprised because it was a terrorist attack and I think it was the wrong way to get Israeli independence. Also it killed a bunch of innocent people and was diffidently morally wrong.

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The biggest thing that stood out to me was that they were able to get a victory over the British. They just wanted to be equal and that is why they freed those prisoners.

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The number of deaths and injuries surprised me the most because, even though it wasn't too many, for something so small it had such a big impact on these people.

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1. The biggest thing that surprised me was that they had to smuggle TNT into the prison for one breakout. Also, how serious this was and how they had to succeed and how their life basically depended on it
2. What motivated the Irgun was their goal. Their goal was to be free and live a normal life and that motivated them to continue

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What stood out to me most was that almost 3000 Jewish fighters were arrested. I think they did this to try and upset the Jews

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Something that stood out to me was how Agatha triggered echoes of the Holocaust in the minds of many people. I think they were motivated to arrest zionists underground members.

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What surprised me the most was the Israelis bombed this building for independence. The British were violent, but not cruel. This was bad like a terrorist attack. This is motivated by the British's 'authority' on the Jews

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The thing that stood out o me the most was how a little less than 3,000 of the Jewish fighters had been arrested.

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I hate that the Jewish people had to be in these camps right after the concentration camps. It seems like in this time period we never had a home where WE got to chose where to go, and what to do, not with other people always bossing us around and choosing what we will do.

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1. The biggest thing that surprised me was that their was so many deaths and how it was basically a terrorist attack
2. their motivation was that they thought they were better then the Jews

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It stood out to me that the Jews were keeping all these weapons that they weren't supposed to. They were just doing it so they could show that they wanted freedom and wanted to be able to go to Palestine.
I think it motivated the British to act like this because they needed to keep a good relationship with the arabs for oil.