Sabbath Solace

Early in the afternoon of Sabbath eve two British minesweepers spotted their quarry entering Palestine's territorial waters near Haifa. She was a battered, 750-ton freighter jampacked with 1,350 Jewish refugees from Europe bent on entering the Holy Land. She had had a long, hard voyage--30 days from Goteborg, Sweden, which she had cleared as a Greek ship (the Ulua), bound for South America. Now she flew the blue-and-white Zionist flag and her bridge carried a freshly painted name: Chaim Arlosoroff (in honor of a murdered Palestine labor leader).

The minesweepers closed in, radioing their position to shore stations and to a nearby group of destroyers. From the rail of the Arlosoroff the immigrants shouted taunts as 13 British sailors drew up alongside and swung aboard. The sailors met a wall of wild-eyed men & women, most of them young and strong. Disregarding the sailors' guns and tear-gas grenades the Jews waded in, overpowered the British sailors, flung them into the sea.

Soon came more boarding parties, heavily armed. Fierce fights broke out as the immigrants refused to permit the British Navy to take over. While passengers clawed and pummeled the sailors, the ship zigzagged through converging Navy craft. Finally the Arlosoroff scraped aground, just 100 yards off Bat Galim, Haifa's seashore suburb. Behind the barbed wire on the beach, hundreds of Jews waved handkerchiefs at the immigrants, cheered as a dozen leaped overboard and struggled ashore--to certain capture. On the ship the fight continued.

The news spread to Haifa. Thousands stopped work and swarmed angrily toward Bat Galim. They passed Barclay's Bank Building, shattered by a bomb soon after the ship's interception (two Jews were killed). Then they ran into tough, maroon-bereted British paratroopers, who barred their way. Jews and soldiers traded insults. Then the Jews went away into the dusk of Sabbath eve. Four hours after the first encounter aboard the Arlosoroff the fight went out of the immigrants on the ship.

Death in the Afternoon. The Sabbath in Jerusalem was clear and sunny. About 40 British officers and their guests lunched at Goldsmith House, the three-story officers' club on King George Avenue. Afterwards, half a dozen went to the roof for sun baths; some retired for siestas. The rest left. Sir Henry Gurney, Chief Secretary of the Palestine Government, kept a golf date.

Midafternoon, the two sentries patrolling the entry through the barbed wire to Goldsmith House were startled by a small explosion in the rear of the building. Then bullets whizzed around them. One soldier fell, dead. A truck rumbled through the wire opening. Covered by a spray of machine gun and rifle fire from nearby buildings, three men dashed to the truck. Out of it and into the club's door and open windows they heaved suitcases. In a moment there was a heavy explosion. Hours later, when the rubble had been combed, the British announced the toll: 16 killed, 14 injured. Among the dead were eight Arab employees, one British civilian, one British officer.

It was the first major act of terror ever perpetrated on a Sabbath, the worst bombing since the King David Hotel explosion took 91 lives last July. In his office at the King David, Sir Henry Gurney got telephoned reports. There had been 14 terror attacks in a few hours. Three soldiers had been killed on mined roads. Mortar fire on a regimental camp had killed another. It was the worst day the British had experienced in Palestine.

Punishment. Sir Henry moved to Government House. There he and High Commissioner Sir Alan Cunningham got word that the Irgun Zvai Leumi, Jewish terrorist organization, claimed credit for blowing up Goldsmith House, in retaliation for attacks "on our brothers [on the Arlosoroff]."

Sir Alan and Sir Henry talked long to London, then gave the order they had long hesitated to invoke: martial law. Royal Irish Fusiliers moved into Jerusalem, encircled a great part of its old Mea Shearim section, where 15,000 Jews live. A greater cordon was thrown around Tel-Aviv and its suburbs. Telephones were cut off. For many hours no one was permitted to leave his house. About 275,000 Jews were isolated while house-to-house searches went on in many neighborhoods.

In Jerusalem a butcher boy, submitting to search, spoke the dejection many Jews now felt: "We are beaten." As the rubble of Goldsmith House was trucked away, a man said: "There go the hopes of Jews for statehood." Palestine's Arabs, who perhaps had some plans of their own (see below), rubbed their hands over the only solace which the Jewish Sabbath had brought. Said one prominent Arab: "Allah be thanked for the terrorists."

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