Resistance can take many forms. I don't question the inevitability of some reaction, but the Arab one was particularly unsophisticated, disorganized and violent.
The Arab reaction was particularly violent? That is a real hoot, Nadine. And what was the response of the Zionists after the implementation of the British White Paper of 1939? It certainly was not the practice of Havlaga, but terrorism. As an official British document, "The Political History of Palestine" (Memorandum to the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine, Jerusalem, 1947), describes:
"The lull in terrorist activity did not continue throughout the war years. The Jewish community resented the Land Transfers Regulations and the measures taken against unauthorized immigration. In 1942, a small group of Zionist extremists, led by Abraham Stern, came into prominence with a series of politically motivated murders and robberies in the Tel Aviv area. In the following year there came to light a widespread conspiracy, connected with Haganah (an illegal military formation controlled by the Jewish Agency), for stealing arms and ammunition from the British forces in the Middle East. In August 1944, the High Commissioner narrowly escaped death in an ambush outside Jerusalem. Three months later, on the 6th November, the British Minister of State in the Middle East (Lord Moyne) was assassinated in Cairo by two members of the Stern group. A third illegal Jewish organization, the Irgun Tzeva'i Leumi, was responsible for much destruction of Government property during 1944. The outrages perpetrated by the Stern group and the Irgun Zvei Leumi were condemned by the official spokesmen of the Jewish community;..."
"On the 22nd July 1946, the campaign conducted by terrorist organizations reached a new climax with an explosion which wrecked a wing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, containing the offices of the Government Secretariat as well as part of military headquarters, and killed 86 public servants, Arab, Jewish and British, as well as five members of the public. Later terrorist activities have included the kidnapping of a British judge and of British officers, sabotage of the railway system and of oil installations at Haifa, and the blowing up of a British Officers' Club in Jerusalem with considerable loss of life. In order that the administration of the country might proceed unhampered by terrorist reprisals against the British community as threatened, non-essential British civilians and military families were evacuated from Palestine and the remaining members of the British community were concentrated in security zones at the beginning of February 1947. In the same month 'statutory martial law' was imposed for a limited period (in specified areas);..."
Even Winston Churchill, the Prime Minister of Britain, and a staunch supporter of the Zionist political goal stated in a speech before the House of Commons:
"If our dreams for zionism are to end in the smoke of assassins' pistols and our labours for its future are to produce a new set of gangsters worthy of Nazi Germany, many like myself will have to reconsider the position we have maintained so consistently and so long in the past. If there is to be any hope of a peaceful and successful future for zionism, these wicked activities must cease and those responsible for them must be destroyed, root and branch;..."
More "revisionist" history, I guess.... |
