by Dr. EUGENE SOCKUT
The Hagana Command knew that erlatively few guns, spare parts, and munitions could be secretly gleaned from British Army depots, and that this small number could not meet their arms needs. Yehuda Arazi, a mysterious figure in Hagana undercover word, negotiated a secret agreement with Poland for 8mm Mauser bolt action rifles and “Browning Type” meedium machine guns of good quality, plus some Radom 9mm Parabellum pistols. Luckily, the British did not believe Arab reports that large planes had landed near their villages during the night. Needed raw materials were secretly imported for the Hagana underground workshops, which were expanding into production of light mortars and hand grenades. Submachine guns such as the 9mm Sten could now be manufactured along with the ammunition needed for them. Weapons were secretly stored in cellars, holes in the ground, and in the inner walls of buildings in the expectation of the conflict that all feared would follow the end of WWII.
During May, 1939, the British issued a “White Paper” restricting Jewish immigration to Palestine. Moshe Dayan and some 42 Hagana men were imprisoned in the fortress at Acre because of their opposition to this policy. However, in 1941 the British position in the Mid-East was threatened by the pro-Nazi Vichy French governments of Syria and Lebanon. The British needed their immediate neutralization to prevent General Irwin Rommel’s Afrika Corps from linking up with a feared Vichy French thrust through Palestine. Ironically, the British were again forced to use the people who they dnew would and could do the job.
Jewish volunteer Commando units were asked to protect the roads and bridges leading into Palestine. Dayan and his fellow prisoners were released and assigned to this task on the northern borders of Palestine. In one engagement, Dayan was looking through his field glasses when struck by a sniper’s bullet that drove one lens into his left eye, hence dayan’s famous black eye-patch. Another soldier seasoned during these battles was Yitzhak Racers, Shimon (Koch) Avidan and Israel Karmi. During the Hitler period German Fews had fled to Palestine by the tens of thousands. It was from these immigrants that the special units were formed. Armed with captured German weapons and uniforms, they gave an excellent account of themselves. A fictionalized version of their exploits was told in the Hollywook film Tobruk.
Toward the end of 1943,parachute units of Jewish Palestinians, who had come from countries under Nazi domiwas raging another battle against the edicts of the British White Paper was being waged in Palestine. Jewish underground forces were divided into three groups: the Hagana, representing the majority of the population; the irgun Zvi-Leumi, a large right-wing group formed by Vladimer Jabotin sky, developer of the Jewish Legion of WW I, and the smallest group, the Lechi (fighters for the freedom of Israel) or Stern Gang, as the British called them. During WW II, unlike the Hagana and the Irgun, the Lechi (led by Abraham Stern)considered the British just as much the enemy as the Nazis, attacking British facilities and personnel with the same gusto the Irish Republican Army displayed during the “Irish Troubles.” After the war, the Irgun and then the Haganajoined in attacks on the British in palestine.
The small arms of these underg. round forces ran the gamut of weapons available around the world. As a general rule, French arms prevailed in the north because of its proximity to the Vichy French battlefields. British arms were found in the rest of Palestine. Milk cans, cut in half, then rewelded and hermetically sealed, were a favorite hiding place for arms since they could be safely placed underground. The Sten SMG was most desired because of its simplicity, protability, and the ease with which it could be broken down and hidden in the skirts of female members of the resistance groups.
