Wars and ConflictsÌý permalink
Mandated PALESTINE: 1946 -1948.
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Message 1.Ìý
Posted by David James Wall (U14752090) on Wednesday, 26th October 2011
Wednesday 26th October, 2011. BST:1327
Re: Mandated PALESTINE: 1946 - 1948.
With respect to 'HMG / UK' and the present State of Israel; has any record of the so called 'H - BLOCK' which was constructed within the curtilage of the 'Spider Signal Hut' compound beside the 'ANNEX' of the 'King David Hotel' been preserved in any 'national archive'?
I ask this question because it has come to my attention that 4 (four) members of the so called 'Stern Gang' were interrogated in the 'H - BLOCK' in the winter of 1947. One man was beaten to death during interrogation, one man was executed, one man was driven insane and bizzarely enough the fourth man sat down with the interrogator (a certain Col. WALL: MI / BM) and over a cup of tea discussed the history of the so called 'Jewish Information Service'. What intrigued the interrogator enough to allow the fourth man 'safe passage' to Antioch (in present day Turkey) was that the subsequent information on the 'COMITERN' (CCCP / Central Committee of the Communist Party) and its activities in Athens: Greece in 1946 during the so called 'Civil War' ensured that there were mass arrests of members of the 'IRGUN' in January 1948. -
Message 2
Posted by Bluesea10 (U1711888) on Saturday, 29th October 2011
In 1937 or thereabout, the Peel Commission concluded that the only viable alternative to mayhem and bloodshed was to partition. All subsequent blue-ribbon international panels affirmed this solution.
The Jews said yes at every turn while the Arabs rejected every reasonable offer including UN General Assembly Resolution 181 in 1947. Therefore, the Arab side mustn't claim today or tomorrow or whenever that international law upholds their rights while they have flagrantly ignored and violated treaty law going back to the 1940s. -
Message 3
Posted by LairigGhru (U14051689) on Saturday, 29th October 2011
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Message 4
Posted by David James Wall (U14752090) on Monday, 31st October 2011
Monday 31st October, 2011. GMT:1102
Re: Bluesea10
As far as I understand the 'stern gang' was founded by ARIEL STERN on the 1st January, 1937 as a direct response to the 'Peel Commission' of that year. Ariel Stern's intention was to build a so called 'Jewish Brigade' which would be the core of a putative IDF (Israeli Defence Force) in the new State of Israel.
As far as I am aware Ariel Stern was executed in the winter of 1947 after being arrested with 3 (three) other members of the 'stern gang' and interrogated at the H - BLOCK within the so called 'Spider Signal Hut' compound, beside the ANNEX of the King David Hotel; Jerusalem: Mandated PALESTINE. The reason for this was that Ariel Stern had been 'under sentence of death' since 1st January, 1941. He was seen as a TRAITOR to the 'British Empire' since working with the Italian Army in Ethiopia during 1940. His continual activities with the Italian Army in North Africa during 1941 and 1942 were a constant thorn in the side of British Military Intelligence. It should be noted that whilst Ariel Stern was born Jewish, he was also born a British Citizen. As far as I understand Ariel Stern was born in Stoke Newington, North London on the border with Stamford Hill in 1870. He was 47 years old when as a Captain in the Tank Regiment he fought at Cambrai in November 1917. At the end of the First World War he moved to Italy and in 1922 joined the so called 'March on Rome'; led by Benito Mussolini. He was known as an intense FACIST but for the record was not a 'Neo - Nazis'.
The weird detail is that whilst the FACIST Italian State was not necessarily 'anti - semitic'; the Armistice of 13th September, 1943 led to the occupation of Northern Italy by the OKW / KOMMAND and so called 'transports to AS' began in ernest. Where Ariel Stern was at this moment is a mystery and how he survived until 1947 is a matter of dispute. -
Message 5
Posted by David James Wall (U14752090) on Monday, 31st October 2011
Monday 31st October, 2011. GMT:1355
Re: ARIEL STERN
For the record; as far as I am aware ARIEL STERN was active in North Africa during 1941 and 1942. His work as a linguist / interpreter; given that he purportedly spoke 5 (five) languages (English, French, German, Italian and Spanish) was instrumental to the success of an Italian Army wireless 'intercep' station based near Bengahzi in present day Libya. As a Signals Officer of the Tank Regiment during the later stages of the First World War he was fully trained and educated in 'Y - station' perticular. As far as I know the 'intercep' station near Bengahzi was built to the designs of MARCONI. The 'transmission and receiving tower' was within sight of the 'field COMMAND & CONTROL base' of Erwin ROMMEL / AFRICA K. Purportedly during the so called 'Keyes Raid' on the 'Field Headquarters' of Erwin ROMMEL; a number of 'commando' noted that the 'wireless station' should be destroyed. As far as I know Ariel Stern or 'Agent ARIEL' as he was known to the 'Abwer' (German Naval Intelligence) was in Benghazi that night... -
Message 6
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Monday, 31st October 2011
I ask this question because it has come to my attention thatÌý
As far as I understandÌý
For the record; as far as I am awareÌý
As far as I knowÌý
±Ê³Ü°ù±è´Ç°ù³Ù±ð»å±ô²âÌý
As far as I knowÌý
How? (if you don't mind me asking) -
Message 7
Posted by David James Wall (U14752090) on Tuesday, 1st November 2011
Tuesday 1st November, 2011. GMT:1336
Re: suvorovetz
With respect; most of the information regarding the 'stern gang' and in particular the information regarding ARIEL STERN was placed in the hands of my maternal Grandfather; Wilfred James Sellers by Col. Wall: MI / BM.
Terry or rather Terence Edward Wall; otherwise known as Viscount Scarsdale: Lord Curzon was associated with a nascent British Military Intelligence from 1907. In 1946 - 1947 he was active as a Colonel in Military Intelligence attached to 457 Signal Security Section; NSD (Naval Signal Division): D. NI (Directorate. Naval Intelligence). This anti - terrorist unit was primarily concerned with the activities of the COMITERN in Greece during the so called 'Civil War' of 1946 but became more active in Mandated PALESTINE when the relationship between the COMITERN and the IRGUN was more easily understood through 'decription' of VENONA FILE 'coded' wireless transmissions. It should be noted that the 'field agent or agents' associated with the so called VENONA FILE had a particular interest in Agent: ARIEL.
It should be noted that Terry was posted missing in Haifa; Mandated PALESTINE on the 31st December, 1947 and his death was declared by the High Court of Chancery on the 1st January, 1957. For the record; Terry was born in Edinbrugh; Scotland on the 1st August, 1884. -
Message 8
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Tuesday, 1st November 2011
With respect; most of the information regarding the 'stern gang' and in particular the information regarding ARIEL STERN was placed in the hands of my maternal Grandfather; Wilfred James Sellers by Col. Wall: MI / BM.
Terry or rather Terence Edward Wall; otherwise known as Viscount Scarsdale: Lord Curzon was associated with a nascent British Military Intelligence from 1907.Ìý Why would Wall give this information to your grandfather, and in what form - intelligence reports or something? And who's Lord Curzon and what does he have to do with Wall and your grandfather? -
Message 9
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Tuesday, 1st November 2011
Are you related to Terence too?
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Message 10
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Tuesday, 1st November 2011
In 1937 or thereabout, the Peel Commission concluded that the only viable alternative to mayhem and bloodshed was to partition. All subsequent blue-ribbon international panels affirmed this solution.
The Jews said yes at every turn while the Arabs rejected every reasonable offer including UN General Assembly Resolution 181 in 1947. Therefore, the Arab side mustn't claim today or tomorrow or whenever that international law upholds their rights while they have flagrantly ignored and violated treaty law going back to the 1940s.
Ìý That's a bit simplistic, IMHO....
There are other factors you need to bear in mind. For example, the Arabs had been occupying Palestine for centuries, which was then under the rule of the Ottomans. It was only when Britain took over the mandate after WWI that Jewish immigration took place on such a large scale, spurred by the provocative Balfour Declaration in 1916, which was made for political purposes, but which had consequences that were much greater than the former prime minister envisaged....
Jewish immigration was slow leading up to 1933. For example, in 1932 there were 9500 Jews arriving in Palestine, but the following year, when Hitler seized power in Germany, three times as many Jews came to the mandate. There was a further 50 percent increase in Jewish immigrants in 1934, and another similarly sized leap the following year, when the anti-Semitic Nuremburg Laws came into force in Germany. The arrival of over 61,000 Jews in Palestine that year brought the Jewish population in that mandate to 355,000 - a total reached at a speed that the British had never envisaged. Jews now made up more than a quarter of the population of Palestine, up from nine percent 15 years earlier. (pp166-7, 'A Line in the Sand', James Barr)
Now, given that heavy influx of Jewish immigration, is it any surprise that the Arabs felt resentment? There were tensions that led to riots in 1929, and the British handled these problems poorly, and as a result encouraged both the Arabs and the Jews to take matters into their own hands, and both groups started attacking and killing British soldiers. The Peel Commission was a public relations disaster, because it came at the time when the British occupying forces needed some good news. But instead the Peel Commission recommended taking homes away from quarter of a million Arabs, and giving them to Jews, and understandably the Arabs were up in arms over this - literally!
Think of it this way...suppose a lot of Scots and Welsh started migrating to England, and then re-asserted their claim to English land, based on the "fact" that they occupied the land before the English drove them off the land. A commission is set up, which takes the land away from a quarter of English people, and gives it to the Celts. England would be in uproar!
Ultimately, it all comes down to how the British mismanaged the mandate at the time. When the Arabs rose up against the Peel Commission, the British government backed down, and showed a distinct lack of spine. Instead, they resorted to the principle of 'economic absorptive capacity', a scientific-sounding but meaningless formula that Churchill had invented when he was responsible for Palestine a decade earlier. In effect, the British just let the situation ride, and they let it get so bad that an explosion was inevitable....
Why?
Because oil had just been discovered in another British mandate, Iraq, where specifically Mosul spouted the black gold that was becoming the new coal. A pipeline was constructed through British mandates to Haifa, and it was this pipeline that determined British policy in Palestine, not the needs of the Arab and Jewish people. This Mosul oil served the entire Mediterranean fleet during WWII, and so was more valuable to the Brits than solving this problem one way or another. Arab rebels had already pierced the pipeline, and set fire to it, and disrupted the transportation of oil from Mosul to Haifa. Because of that action, the British came down hard on the Arabs, and totally mishandled the situation.
At the start, the rebels were a minority, but the British attacked the Arabs as a people, and ended up alienating the Arabs, and driving them to support the Mufti and his rebels. For example, say a village was 'suspected' of assisting a rebellion...then, the British would visit a demand a hefty fine, and when that's not paid, houses would be burnt down. (p186, Barr) British soldiers would take Arab hostages on roads where suspected bombs were planted, and carelessly kill these hostages with impunity. (p185, Barr) The British increased the number of capital offences from a list that included arson, sabotage and intimidation to embrace possession of a firearm, wearing a police or military uniform without authorisation, and damaging Tegart's beloved fence. This kind of collective punishment only succeeded in alienating the Arabs.
The Arabs were right to suspect that they might not get proper compensation for the loss of their land to the Jews, as proposed by the Peel Commission. When the British built their treasured pipeline to Haifa, a lot of Arabs lost land to this pipeline, astonishingly without compensation! (p167, Barr) Local water supplies were scarce, but the British made sure that the Iraq Petroleum Company got the rights to the water supplies ahead of local Arab farmers.
In essence, the British came to be seen as unwanted dictators, especially when during WWI the British had promised the Arabs independence, if they fought for them against the Ottomans. Instead, the British went back on those promises, and created their own mandates in Palestine, Transjordan and Mesopotamia, while the French greedily grabbed Syria and Lebanon. Both the British and French were also intrigued by the idea of getting their hands on the oil of Mosul, but neither thought properly about what their actions would have on the people who lived there, and sadly, the consequences of those actions are still with us today.... -
Message 11
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Tuesday, 1st November 2011
the Arabs had been occupying Palestine for centuries, which was then under the rule of the OttomansÌý That seems to be quite an overstatement. At the end of the 19th century, most of what is called Palestine was occupied by malarial swamps; and most of the Arabs in the area did not occupy anything, because they were nomads.
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Message 12
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Tuesday, 1st November 2011
David,
did some quick research in a search robot about Ariel Stern and there came up hundreds of Ariel Stern's. I was nearly sure to find something like this. I was aware of the Stern-group or Stern-gang I found this about Avraham Stern and his gang:
You seems to make fictional stories with some historical keywords and fictional names to mix it all in an unbelievable tower of Babel.
Only to say that when putting "Terence Edward Wall" in my Belgian located Google search robot it gave unbelievable for such a combination of three words (but present day search robots work with billions of combinations I guess), a site in Spanish from:
And the article was about an American youngster who turned to become a Roman-Catholic father in I suppose Puerto Rico under the name of Padre Damian (and I who thought that there was only one Father Damiaan in the world and it was the Belgian one, who lived in Molokai. One of the first stories I learned at school when I was 5 years old)
But after all your "tales" have nevertheless "ignited" some interesting polemic from Shivfan and Blue....
Kind regards,
Paul. -
Message 13
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Tuesday, 1st November 2011
the Arabs had been occupying Palestine for centuries, which was then under the rule of the OttomansÌý That seems to be quite an overstatement. At the end of the 19th century, most of what is called Palestine was occupied by malarial swamps; and most of the Arabs in the area did not occupy anything, because they were nomads.Ìý Semantics, suvo....
The Palestinians have been in the area we're talking about for a very long time.... -
Message 14
Posted by David James Wall (U14752090) on Wednesday, 2nd November 2011
Wednesday 2nd November, 2011. GMT:1112
Re: suvorovetz
For the record my maternal Grandfather; Wilfred James Sellers or 'Jim Sellers' as he was refered to by his enemies was a 'Old Scotland Yard Special Constable' from 1927 until his death in 1951. Between 1946 and 1948 he was a 'Special Branch Constable' attached to the 'Flying Squad' on active service in the LEVANT: his operational base being the island of CYPRUS. Information in the form of written intelligence reports and verbal descriptions were passed between 'British Military Intelligence' including 'Military Intelligence' the 'Security Service / MI5' and the 'Secret Intelligence Sevice / MI6' during the 'MANDATE Period'.
For the record my maternal Grandfather; Wilfred James Sellers was attached to the Tank Division (which included the Naval Division and the Tank Regiment) with the rank of Colonel in 1917. He was formally a Colonel in the Royal Artillary / KTRHA (Kings Troop Royal Horse Artillary) and had fought at Le Cateau, 1915 with 'J Battery' / KTRHA. He first met Terry (Terence Edward Wall esq. Viscount Scarsdale, Lord Curzon) on the battlefield of Le Cateau and later during the Cambrai Offensive of the 20th November, 1917. More than that he had actually sat in the same tank (a Mother Rhomboid) as Ariel Stern the night before the Cambrai Offensive and could 'visually' identify him by sight.
ps: It should be noted that all three of the men noted; that is Wilfred, Terry and Ariel were 'British Union of Fascism' in 1938. -
Message 15
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Wednesday, 2nd November 2011
It should be noted that all three of the men noted; that is Wilfred, Terry and Ariel were 'British Union of Fascism' in 1938Ìý So, when you wrote that you'd been given the information - is it written, or verbal, or what?
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Message 16
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Wednesday, 2nd November 2011
Semantics, suvo....
The Palestinians have been in the area we're talking about for a very long time....Ìý Speaking about semantics, Palestinians and Faisal. Nobody actually called local Arabs, including themselves, that until well after the end of the Mandate. In fact, local Jews used to be called Palestinians for a long time. In fact, the short-lived Weitzmann- Faisal agreement stipulated division of the Mandate into [Jewish] Palestine and the neibouring Arab State, the Palestine implied to be larger than the present-day Israel. -
Message 17
Posted by David James Wall (U14752090) on Wednesday, 2nd November 2011
Wednesday 2nd November, 2011. GMT:1350
Re: PaulRyckier
With regards to the foundation of the Jewish terrorist cell 'Lehi', it should be noted that they were essentially COMITERN in construction. They based themselves on a 'deadicated communist cell type structure' (usually three in number) that was alien to the 'stern gang'. The 'stern gang' were FACIST; intensely anti - communist and based their structure on 30 (thirty) man troops. At no time was there more than a Company (sixty men) of the 'stern gang' on operations; principally 'men at arms'. They were not known to include women at any level unlike the 'Lehi' who used women primarily for 'gun running'.
Purportedly the 'Lehi' attempted to penetrate the 'stern gang' and made the mistake of calling it 'a group'... -
Message 18
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Wednesday, 2nd November 2011
Semantics, suvo....
The Palestinians have been in the area we're talking about for a very long time....Ìý Speaking about semantics, Palestinians and Faisal. Nobody actually called local Arabs, including themselves, that until well after the end of the Mandate. In fact, local Jews used to be called Palestinians for a long time. In fact, the short-lived Weitzmann- Faisal agreement stipulated division of the Mandate into [Jewish] Palestine and the neibouring Arab State, the Palestine implied to be larger than the present-day Israel.Ìý I still don't get your point....
Surely, you're not disputing the fact that the majority of Palestinian Arabs lived there longer than the majority of Palestinian Jews?
And not all of Palestine was a malarial swamp. There were Palestinian Arabs living in villages in Ottoman-controlled Palestine in the centuries leading up to the 19th century. The Jews migrated in small numbers in the 1920s, and in large numbers in the 1930s, and bought up land owned by heavily-indebted Arab farmers. The Jews turned malarial swamps and arid land into productive land. These are the same lands which were not producing much in Arab hands.
But here's where I feel the British abdicated their responsibilities of running the mandate in Palestine....
In the Subcontinent, when tensions boiled over regularly into violence, the British took the hard decision of partitioning their cherished colony into the newly-independent states of India and Pakistan. Yes, it had its flaws, and yes, a lot of people died as a result of the movements, but in the end India and Pakistan had a solution that was workable - for everyone except the Kashmiris, maybe. The British pushed thru this partition despite the objection of most Indians.
But while Britain exhibited a firm hand in the partition of India and Pakistan, they were surprisingly spineless in Palestine. They knew the results of the Peel Commission in 1937, yet when the Arabs protested, the British govt backed down. Why were the British firm in dividing India and Pakistan, but did very little to resolve the problems in Palestine?
Instead, the British pulled out of their mandate and allowed the Arabs and the Jews to fight it out, and unsurprisingly the stronger side won the spoils. We're living the after-effects of that seemingly uncaring behaviour to this day.... -
Message 19
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Wednesday, 2nd November 2011
Surely, you're not disputing the fact that the majority of Palestinian Arabs lived there longer than the majority of Palestinian Jews?Ìý The point exactly is that this stance is the matter of pure semantics. It does not clearly define either territorial limits, or time-line criteria that is supposed to determine who lived where and how, let alone land ownership. We've had this discussions many times over.
The Jews migrated in small numbers in the 1920s, and in large numbers in the 1930s, and bought up land owned by heavily-indebted Arab farmersÌý The Jews in small numbers were always there - particularly in and around Jerusalem. The Zionist immigration began in 1890s. The land was being purchased predominantly by the Jewish Agency from predominantly absentee owners. -
Message 20
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Wednesday, 2nd November 2011
Nobody's denying that there were small pockets of Jews who'd lived in and around Jerusalem for a long time, and nobody said that the length of time one's ancestors lived there gave one more rights over another. It's puzzling to me why you'd pick up on that relatively minor point....
But it is still factual that the number of Jewish migrants increased by thousands in the years following Balfour's declaration in 1916, and picked up to the tens of thousands after Hitler started to persecute them in Germany. I just raised this point to highlight that the fact that the influx of large numbers of Jews was creating a lot of tensions.
And on top of that, the Peel Commission of 1937 suggested depriving a quarter of all Palestinian Arabs of their land, and giving it to the Jews, was bound to create an uproar. It matters little whether the offer then is better than what Netanyahu is offering Abbas now. It also matters little what agreement Weizmann came to with Feisal, because Feisal was the king of Iraq. The rulers of Palestine were the British, and they inexcusably allowed the situation to spiral out of control. -
Message 21
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Wednesday, 2nd November 2011
It's puzzling to me why you'd pick up on that relatively minor pointÌý Again, this is the matter of perspective. Why is it minor?
But it is still factual that the number of Jewish migrants increased by thousands in the years following Balfour's declaration in 1916, and picked up to the tens of thousands after Hitler started to persecute them in Germany. I just raised this point to highlight that the fact that the influx of large numbers of Jews was creating a lot of tensionsÌý ...not to distract ourselves with the local combat theater, as part of the first and then the second world war, that is.
And on top of that, the Peel Commission of 1937 suggested depriving a quarter of all Palestinian Arabs of their land, and giving it to the JewsÌý Oh. Semantics again.
It also matters little what agreement Weizmann came to with Feisal, because Feisal was the king of IraqÌý Not yet. There was no Iraq at the moment either. And why not Faisal? -
Message 22
Posted by Bluesea10 (U1711888) on Wednesday, 2nd November 2011
Monday 31st October, 2011. GMT:1102
Re: Bluesea10
As far as I understand the 'stern gang' was founded by ARIEL STERN on the 1st January, 1937 as a direct response to the 'Peel Commission' of that year. Ariel Stern's intention was to build a so called 'Jewish Brigade' which would be the core of a putative IDF (Israeli Defence Force) in the new State of Israel.
As far as I am aware Ariel Stern was executed in the winter of 1947 after being arrested with 3 (three) other members of the 'stern gang' and interrogated at the H - BLOCK within the so called 'Spider Signal Hut' compound, beside the ANNEX of the King David Hotel; Jerusalem: Mandated PALESTINE. The reason for this was that Ariel Stern had been 'under sentence of death' since 1st January, 1941. He was seen as a TRAITOR to the 'British Empire' since working with the Italian Army in Ethiopia during 1940. His continual activities with the Italian Army in North Africa during 1941 and 1942 were a constant thorn in the side of British Military Intelligence. It should be noted that whilst Ariel Stern was born Jewish, he was also born a British Citizen. As far as I understand Ariel Stern was born in Stoke Newington, North London on the border with Stamford Hill in 1870. He was 47 years old when as a Captain in the Tank Regiment he fought at Cambrai in November 1917. At the end of the First World War he moved to Italy and in 1922 joined the so called 'March on Rome'; led by Benito Mussolini. He was known as an intense FACIST but for the record was not a 'Neo - Nazis'.
The weird detail is that whilst the FACIST Italian State was not necessarily 'anti - semitic'; the Armistice of 13th September, 1943 led to the occupation of Northern Italy by the OKW / KOMMAND and so called 'transports to AS' began in ernest. Where Ariel Stern was at this moment is a mystery and how he survived until 1947 is a matter of dispute.
Ìý To refer to the Lohamei Herut Yisrael or Lehi as the ... quote-unquote Stern gang is akin to calling Oliver Cromwell a drunk or something along these lines.
By and large, concerning Lehi, you state hearsay as facts.
This is History. Folder afterall, where personal bias and prejudice must be checked at the door.
Harking back now, I won't do a blow-blow retort. Suffice to say that Whitehall in 1938 or thereabout all but stopped Jewish immigration to Eretz Yisrael, condemning millions to Auschwitz and other camps.
This ignoble undertaking materialized to placate the so-called Arab street; which was shortsighted and foolish to start with. The vast majority of Arabs sided with Germany just the same.
Some poignant stats : in 1939, 88% of Arab population in the Mandate favored Germany over England and only 9 % wanted Britain to beat the nazis.
Last but not least, mufti Husseini sought refuge in Berlin during WWII and,among other things, he helped put together Muslim SS battalions in the Balkans. That Muslim cleric was a committed nazi who hated England.
That's about it in a nutshell. -
Message 23
Posted by Bluesea10 (U1711888) on Wednesday, 2nd November 2011
" That's a bit simplistic, IMHO.... For example, the Arabs had been occupying Palestine for centuries"
There is a big qualitative difference between simplicity and oversimplifying .
I prefer the former.
This retort however seems to favor the latter.
I appreciate the effort on your part...but ...and there is always a but ... one way or another, you kinda answer your own query.
The term occupation -even for centuries- stipulates a foreign takeover of someone else's real estate.
Khalidi, Jerusalem's Arab mayor in the 1880s or thereabout fully acknowledged it.
Many thanks for your comment nonetheless. -
Message 24
Posted by David James Wall (U14752090) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
Thursday 3rd November, 2011. GMT:1000
Re: Bluesea10
With respect; I would suggest that you read 'message 17' in response to 'message 12'.
Perhaps you would feel happier discussing 'Lehi' (Lohamei Herut YisraeI) with PaulRyckier?
My particular interest is the 'stern gang' and ARIEL STERN. More to the point; the claim that he (Ariel Stern) was 'Agent: ARIEL', aiding and abetting the Abwer (German Naval Intelligence) during the 2nd World War. The real point of discussion should be why any JEW would 'aid and abet' the REICH. Ariel Stern; as a paid up FACIST since 1922 was happy to 'aid and abet' the Italian Army in Ethiopia, 1940 and North Africa, 1941 - 1942 but what the 'dickens' was he doing working with the NAZIS in 1943 according to British Military Intelligence? -
Message 25
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
Surely, you're not disputing the fact that the majority of Palestinian Arabs lived there longer than the majority of Palestinian Jews?Ìý The point exactly is that this stance is the matter of pure semantics. It does not clearly define either territorial limits, or time-line criteria that is supposed to determine who lived where and how, let alone land ownership. We've had this discussions many times over.
The Jews migrated in small numbers in the 1920s, and in large numbers in the 1930s, and bought up land owned by heavily-indebted Arab farmersÌý The Jews in small numbers were always there - particularly in and around Jerusalem. The Zionist immigration began in 1890s. The land was being purchased predominantly by the Jewish Agency from predominantly absentee owners.Ìý That was only true of the early days, suvo....
"Whereas, in the early days of the mandate, Jews bought land from rich Arab landowners living in Syria and Lebanon who wanted to dispense with swathes of their estates in Palestine that had been cut off by the frontier, by the late 1920s they were buying from the Arab fellahin, the peasants." (p167, 'A Line in the Sand' James Barr)
High Commissioner Chancellor said these peasants were "distressingly poor and...heavily in debt to usurious money lenders", and they had, "no alternative but to sell their land in order to clear themselves of their liabilities." (Chancellor Papers, 27 May 1930)
The Arab sellers' tenants were usually evicted by the Jewish purchasers. "Unfortunately it was part of our job to make sure they did leave," said policeman Robert Kitson. (p167, Barr) -
Message 26
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
It's puzzling to me why you'd pick up on that relatively minor pointÌý Again, this is the matter of perspective. Why is it minor?
But it is still factual that the number of Jewish migrants increased by thousands in the years following Balfour's declaration in 1916, and picked up to the tens of thousands after Hitler started to persecute them in Germany. I just raised this point to highlight that the fact that the influx of large numbers of Jews was creating a lot of tensionsÌý ...not to distract ourselves with the local combat theater, as part of the first and then the second world war, that is.
And on top of that, the Peel Commission of 1937 suggested depriving a quarter of all Palestinian Arabs of their land, and giving it to the JewsÌý Oh. Semantics again.
It also matters little what agreement Weizmann came to with Feisal, because Feisal was the king of IraqÌý Not yet. There was no Iraq at the moment either. And why not Faisal? Ìý Why not Feisal? Isn't it obvious? He was the son of the king of Hejaz, and had no authority over Palestine. In that case, why not sign an agreement with Ibn Saud? Or how about Feisal's brother Abdullah? Or the rulers of Egypt? They had just as much authority over Palestine as Feisal....
The mandate for Palestine was given to Britain during negotiations at the Treaty of Versailles. This was an underhand gesture, because when Weizmann met Feisal in 1919, it was probably with the understanding that the British were going to honour the pledge they made during WWI to TE Lawrence that Feisal was going to be made king of a Greater Syria that embodied Palestine. As we all know, the British backtracked on that decision, and Feisal was not made king of a Greater Syria including Palestine, so any agreement signed with Feisal would have little relevance to a Palestine ruled by the British.
In the end, any decision about the partitioning of Palestine lay with the country who had the mandate. -
Message 27
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
Monday 31st October, 2011. GMT:1102
Re: Bluesea10
As far as I understand the 'stern gang' was founded by ARIEL STERN on the 1st January, 1937 as a direct response to the 'Peel Commission' of that year. Ariel Stern's intention was to build a so called 'Jewish Brigade' which would be the core of a putative IDF (Israeli Defence Force) in the new State of Israel.
As far as I am aware Ariel Stern was executed in the winter of 1947 after being arrested with 3 (three) other members of the 'stern gang' and interrogated at the H - BLOCK within the so called 'Spider Signal Hut' compound, beside the ANNEX of the King David Hotel; Jerusalem: Mandated PALESTINE. The reason for this was that Ariel Stern had been 'under sentence of death' since 1st January, 1941. He was seen as a TRAITOR to the 'British Empire' since working with the Italian Army in Ethiopia during 1940. His continual activities with the Italian Army in North Africa during 1941 and 1942 were a constant thorn in the side of British Military Intelligence. It should be noted that whilst Ariel Stern was born Jewish, he was also born a British Citizen. As far as I understand Ariel Stern was born in Stoke Newington, North London on the border with Stamford Hill in 1870. He was 47 years old when as a Captain in the Tank Regiment he fought at Cambrai in November 1917. At the end of the First World War he moved to Italy and in 1922 joined the so called 'March on Rome'; led by Benito Mussolini. He was known as an intense FACIST but for the record was not a 'Neo - Nazis'.
The weird detail is that whilst the FACIST Italian State was not necessarily 'anti - semitic'; the Armistice of 13th September, 1943 led to the occupation of Northern Italy by the OKW / KOMMAND and so called 'transports to AS' began in ernest. Where Ariel Stern was at this moment is a mystery and how he survived until 1947 is a matter of dispute.
Ìý To refer to the Lohamei Herut Yisrael or Lehi as the ... quote-unquote Stern gang is akin to calling Oliver Cromwell a drunk or something along these lines.
By and large, concerning Lehi, you state hearsay as facts.
This is History. Folder afterall, where personal bias and prejudice must be checked at the door.
Harking back now, I won't do a blow-blow retort. Suffice to say that Whitehall in 1938 or thereabout all but stopped Jewish immigration to Eretz Yisrael, condemning millions to Auschwitz and other camps.
This ignoble undertaking materialized to placate the so-called Arab street; which was shortsighted and foolish to start with. The vast majority of Arabs sided with Germany just the same.
Some poignant stats : in 1939, 88% of Arab population in the Mandate favored Germany over England and only 9 % wanted Britain to beat the nazis.
Last but not least, mufti Husseini sought refuge in Berlin during WWII and,among other things, he helped put together Muslim SS battalions in the Balkans. That Muslim cleric was a committed nazi who hated England.
That's about it in a nutshell.Ìý I'm not sure how you've come to the conclusion that Britain trying to place limits on immigration into Palestine led to millions dying in Auschwitz....
Those who went on boats to Palestine, and were turned away, didn't go back to Germany. And it wasn't Britain alone who put restrictions on Jewish immigration at the time. The US and other European countries were doing the same, too.
It was hardly surprising that both the Jews and the Arabs in Palestine at some stage or another tried to form allegiances with Germany. As the above poster pointed out, Avraham Stern, the founder of the Stern gang, tried to get Hitler's support for his violent resistance against British rule in Palestine, and Arab resistance fighters did the same. It's the principle of the enemy of my enemy is my friend. The Finns allied themselves with Hitler when they tried to secure their independence from the Soviets.
Even the Jews took advantage of Jewish immigrant boat people being turned away. In November 1940, the 'Patria' was in harbour in Haifa with Jewish refugees at Haifa were attempting to claim asylum in Palestine. The British detained the ship, expressing the fear that some of the Jewish refugees might actually be German spies. But Haganah used a mine to blow a hole in the ship, and in the end 263 people died, despite the efforts of the British to save those on the ship. Now, either Haganah wanted to just cripple the ship so it couldn't leave, but that plan went wrong, or they wanted the death of their fellow Jews to be blamed on the British, I don't know. But it is indeed a terrible event which leaves a dark stain. (pp266-7, 'A Line in the Sand', James Barr) -
Message 28
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
High Commissioner Chancellor said these peasants were "distressingly poor and...heavily in debt to usurious money lenders", and they had, "no alternative but to sell their land in order to clear themselves of their liabilities." (Chancellor Papers, 27 May 1930)Ìý Try to make me understand, where you see a problem here. If a person entering a land deal is incapable of developing it to make his mortgage payments and is consequently offered a deal to shed the liability, what's wrong with that? And is it appropriate for the person so relieved from the said liability to claim that the Jews stole the said land? What do you think an Arab debtee do to an Arab debtor unable to pay?
[who cares - we are here to watch the joos and occupy wall street] -
Message 29
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
High Commissioner Chancellor said these peasants were "distressingly poor and...heavily in debt to usurious money lenders", and they had, "no alternative but to sell their land in order to clear themselves of their liabilities." (Chancellor Papers, 27 May 1930)Ìý Try to make me understand, where you see a problem here. If a person entering a land deal is incapable of developing it to make his mortgage payments and is consequently offered a deal to shed the liability, what's wrong with that? And is it appropriate for the person so relieved from the said liability to claim that the Jews stole the said land? What do you think an Arab debtee do to an Arab debtor unable to pay?
[who cares - we are here to watch the joos and occupy wall street]
Ìý Nobody said anything was wrong with the transaction....
I was just correcting your erroneous assertion that the Jews were buying unoccupied land. When I first said that the Jews were buying land from indebted Arabs, you were trying to tell me otherwise. I believe I've refuted that point. I'm just telling it as it is, without passing judgment.
My issue, which I've asserted many times on this thread, is that the British missed an opportunity to divide Palestine while they ran the territory under a mandate, the way they did to India and Pakistan. And it's not like they didn't have the opportunity. The Peel Commission submitted its recommendations in 1937, and Lord Moyne and Sir Edward Spears took up the Peel Commission recommendations, and came up with a proposal that they thought would be workable.
Moyne and Spears were both personal friends of Churchill, who in turn protected them from their many critics, including Eden and MacMillan. Moyne and Spears believed in the creation of a Greater Syria that would comprise Syria, Transjordan, Iraq, Lebanon and parts of Palestine, while allowing for land to be put aside for a Jewish autonomous state. Eden and MacMillan were sceptical that this could work, but neither came up with a viable alternative.
Unfortunately, Spears was constantly in conflict with the French, and that eventually proved to be his downfall. After one clash too many, he was recalled to London, and never held a position of such prominence again. That just left Moyne in Palestine....
As you can see from this thread, even though the Free French and the British 'conquered' Syria in 1941 from Vichy France, the Vichy French there refused to accept deGaulle as their leader, and still acknowledged Petain as the legitimate ruler of France:
Despite this, deGaulle reappointed a lot of Vichy French to positions of power in Syria, because he couldn't bear the thought of relying on Arabs in similar positions. However, the repercussions were significant, because while the Free French were pro-British and anti-German, the Vichy French were pro-German and anti-British. One such Vichy Frenchman who ended up working in Gaullist Syria, a Colonel Alessandri, armed and supported the Haganah and the Stern Gang, and it was two Stern Gang members who assassinated Moyne in 1944. (pp276-288, 'A Line in the Sand', James Barr)
Churchill was very upset at the assassination of his friend Moyne, and his speech to the House of Commons makes for interesting reading....
"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." (Barr, p291)
Unfortunately, with Lord Moyne died the policy of dividing the region into Greater Syria and a Jewish homeland. His successor, Sir Edward Grigg, felt that they could seek a revised mandate to govern Palestine as a "peaceful biracial state". (Barr, p293)
Sadly, Grigg lacked the vision of Moyne, and was not prepared to make the hard decisions that Moyne seemed prepared to take. Who knows, if Moyne had lived, maybe his dreams would've come to fruition, and a proper partition would've taken place, instead of the self-deluded dream world Grigg seemed to be living in, supported by the equally-blind Eden and MacMillan.... -
Message 30
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
When I first said that the Jews were buying land from indebted Arabs, you were trying to tell me otherwise. I believe I've refuted that point. I'm just telling it as it is, without passing judgment.Ìý Excuse me. You were complaining about semantics the other day, if I remember correctly. The Jews certainly did not exclusively buy land from indebted Arab land owners actually living on the land, if that's what you're trying to say. In fact, most of the land was bought from absentee land owners. I never said that ALL land was bought from the absentee owners.
-
Message 31
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
When I first said that the Jews were buying land from indebted Arabs, you were trying to tell me otherwise. I believe I've refuted that point. I'm just telling it as it is, without passing judgment.Ìý Excuse me. You were complaining about semantics the other day, if I remember correctly. The Jews certainly did not exclusively buy land from indebted Arab land owners actually living on the land, if that's what you're trying to say. In fact, most of the land was bought from absentee land owners. I never said that ALL land was bought from the absentee owners.
Ìý That's were you're wrong....
I was talking primarily about land bought during the late 1920s and the 1930s, but you're talking about the decades before that.
Most of the land bought in the years I'm discussing was not bought from absentee landowners. -
Message 32
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
That's were you're wrong....
I was talking primarily about land bought during the late 1920s and the 1930s, but you're talking about the decades before that.
Most of the land bought in the years I'm discussing was not bought from absentee landowners.Ìý This is all an old shell game with the language, even without playing with the timeline, and here's why. Most of the land JNF bought after WWI in "Western Palestine," including Negev and Israeli South at present, was state owned by the British, no less. And that's not all. JNF also bought land in other parts of the Mandate, including Syria and Transjordan. Guess what happened to that land? Yes, it was taken, or stolen, or expropriated - whichever you prefer - by the respective rulers there, who happened to be Arabs. -
Message 33
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
A wonderful snippet of information, suvo, and I will definitely file it away in my databank, but it has nothing to do with the point I was making about the late 1920s and the 1930s....
I'm not disputing anything you've said about the purchase of land between the 1890s and the early 1920s. The only point I was making - and, more importantly, the point Barr was making - is this: Jewish immigration increased dramatically from 1933 onwards, and this "Jewish immigration created a demand for land that the growing but poor Arab population was under mounting pressure to sell off. Whereas, in the early years of the mandate, Jews bought land from rich Arab landowners living in Syria and Lebanon who wanted to dispense with large swathes of their estates in Palestine that had been cut off by the frontier, by the late 1920s they were buying from the Arab fellahin, the peasants." (Barr, p167)
I'm sure I gave you a part of that quote earlier in the thread....
I'm not trying to pass judgment one way or another, but just to point out that increased immigration and demand for land led to increased tensions between Arabs and Jews that inevitably led to violence.
Clear now? -
Message 34
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
I'm not trying to pass judgment one way or another, but just to point out that increased immigration and demand for land led to increased tensions between Arabs and Jews that inevitably led to violence.
Clear now?Ìý Well, you can file away another useful snippet of information: the increased immigration was not just Jewish immigration. Arabs migrated into "Palestine" per se all along. -
Message 35
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
I'm not trying to pass judgment one way or another, but just to point out that increased immigration and demand for land led to increased tensions between Arabs and Jews that inevitably led to violence.
Clear now?Ìý Well, you can file away another useful snippet of information: the increased immigration was not just Jewish immigration. Arabs migrated into "Palestine" per se all along.Ìý Yes, but not in the great numbers that Jews migrated into Palestine from 1933 onwards....
1932: 9,500 Jews migrated to Palestine
1933: about 30,000 Jews migrated to Palestine
1934: about 45,000 Jews migrated to Palestine
1935: over 61,000 Jews migrated to Palestine
1920: Jewish population in Palestine was about nine percent of the mandate's population
1935: the Jewish population in Palestine grew to about 25 percent of the mandate's population
That's bound to cause serious problems.... -
Message 36
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
1920: Jewish population in Palestine was about nine percent of the mandate's population
1935: the Jewish population in Palestine grew to about 25 percent of the mandate's populationÌý Again, not to overlook a meaningful bit, Mandate was much more than what is now Israel, Gaza and West Bank. -
Message 37
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Thursday, 3rd November 2011
1920: Jewish population in Palestine was about nine percent of the mandate's population
1935: the Jewish population in Palestine grew to about 25 percent of the mandate's populationÌý Again, not to overlook a meaningful bit, Mandate was much more than what is now Israel, Gaza and West Bank.
Ìý Not disputing that, but hindsight's a wonderful thing, isn't it?
What the Peel Commission was offering was also significantly less than what the Arabs currently had, so it's not surprising that they objected. How were they to know that the British would abdicate their authority, and allow civil war to break out when they left?
It would've been so much better if Moyne had not been assassinated, and the obtuse Grigg hadn't taken over....
Quite a few Americans and Brits at the time seemed to have the misinformed opinion that the Arabs in Palestine were still nomads. That was no longer true.... (Barr, pp312-3) -
Message 38
Posted by David James Wall (U14752090) on Friday, 4th November 2011
Friday 4th November, 2011. GMT:1101
Re: ARIEL STERN
As far as 'Special Branch' were concerned; looking back to 1943 and the Armistice of the 13th September that year: Ariel Stern was believed to be living on the Island of Rhodes in the Eastern Mediterranean. A 'Y - Station intercep' on the day the Italian Fleet surrendered to the Royal Navy at Valetta Harbour, MALTA seemed to indicate that 'Agent: ARIEL'was about to board a German Warship bound for Istambul, TURKEY. The Inference was that he was heading for 'Antioch' in present day Turkey. Note that the British Embassy in Istambul was contacted by 'Special Branch' the day after the surrender and a 'field agent / espionage agent' of SIS / MI6 was despatced to Istambul via Lisbon, PORTUGAL on a commercial 'US - Continental' flight to KILL 'Agent: ARIEL' as soon as he arrived in 'Antioch'.
ps. The weird detail is that the 'field agent / espionage agent' of SIS / MI6, a so called 'HARRY detail'; was actually a member of the British Union of Facism in 1938. He purportedly ignored 'Agent: ARIEL' and drove overland to Tehran, IRAN over a period of three months.
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