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March: The passengers of the illegal immigrant vessel "Darian 2" are taken to Atlit detention camp where they will stay for a year and a half.

October 2: Death of Menachem Ussishkin, one of the founders of the Zionist movement.

November 9: Dr. Chaim Weizmann reports on the failure of talks with the British aimed at establishing a Jewish combat division in the British army.

In 1941, immigration slumps as a result of the wartime conditions and British restrictions. Only some 4,600 Jews enter Palestine. The illegal immigrant operation comes to a near halt.

During 1941, five settlements are established.

Chairman of the Jewish Agency Executive: David Ben Gurion.

Treasurer of the Jewish Agency: Eliezer Kaplan.

Chairman Youth Aliyah Department: Henrietta Szold.

Chairman of the Immigration Department: Eliahu Dobkin and Moshe Shapira.

February 17: The British release Haganah prisoners.

The Tel Aviv Museum exhibits Wooden Synagogues in Poland, with photographs of about 20 synagogues.

April: The Haganah formulates an overall defense plan for the Yishuv, called Program A, in the event of a German invasion of Palestine.

1,500 Jewish soldiers from Palestine are taken prisoner by the Germans in Greece.

May 15: The National Headquarters of the Haganah decides to set up a mobilized fighting division, made up of active battalions - the Palmach. The need for a mobilized defense force which can go into immediate action is stressed by wartime developments on the borders of Palestine. During the first year of its existence the Palmach numbers 600 enlisted men who are organized in six battalions. The first commander of the Palmach is Yitzhak Sadeh.

May 17: A group of four Etzel fighters, among them the Commander in Chief David Raziel are flown to Iraq by the British order to carry out a sabotage and intelligence operation against the Germans and the pro-Nazi regime in Iraq. Three days later Raziel is killed in a German air raid on the British air base at Habbaniya. In another British expedition 23 Haganah men lose their lives when they set out on May 18, in a British motor boat to blow up the refineries at Tripoli in Lebanon. All trace of the 23 men and their British commander is lost. 41 Haganah fighters take part in a further enterprise - the British and Free French raid into Syria and Lebanon on June 8 (both countries are under the rule of the Vichy government). The two reconnaissance units include Yigal Allon, Moshe Dayan (who loses an eye in action) and Yitzhak Rabin.

June 10-12: Haifa and Tel Aviv are bombed by Italian aircraft. For fear of further raids, many inhabitants flee to Jerusalem and the nearby agricultural settlements. On July 3, an Italian plane will be shot down while bombing Haifa. The pilot will be caught by Jewish Auxiliary Police.

July 1: Moshe Sneh is appointed head of the Haganah national command.

August 7: Kibbutz Ein Harod is searched for weapons by the British.

September 1: An income tax ordinance is issued for the first time in Palestine.

1941 marks 60 years of the American Colony in Jerusalem. A reception is attended by High Commissioner Sir Harold MacMichael.

Poet Saul Tchernikhovsky is awarded the Bialik Literary Prize.

Nazi Germany and World War II in 1941.

January: The Nazis begin rounding up Polish Jews for transfer to the Warsaw Ghetto.

February: 1,000 Jewish men per week for five weeks are deported from Vienna to the ghettos of Kielce and Lublin.

March: Adolf Eichmann is appointed head of the Gestapo section IV B 4 for Jewish affairs and the expulsion of Jewish populations.

Adolf Hitler personally orders the destruction of the grave of Heinrich Heine in the Montmartre section of Paris.

May: All German consulates are informed that Herman Göring, Nazi leader, has banned the emigration of Jews from all occupied territories.

June: The Germans occupy Bialystok and immediately begin killing Jews.

Romanian soldiers slaughter 260 Jews in Jassy and deport over 5,000.

Several thousand Jews are murdered in Lvov.

July: The Germans start executing Jews at the empty fuel pits at Ponary, outside Vilna. In 12 days, 5,000 Jews from Vilna are shot. In 1943, a song contest will be held in the ghetto. The winning song, "Ponar" or "Shtiler Shtiler", is written by an 11 year old boy who eventually will make his way to Israel and become renowned pianist Alexander Tamir.

German troops begin executing Jews in Kishinev. In 14 days, 10.000 Jews are murdered.

Adolf Eichmann visits Minsk, Bialystok and Lvov to observe the mass murder of Jews.

Herman Göring issues a memorandum to Reinhard Heydrich, instructing him "to carry out all the necessary preparation with regard to organizational and financial matters for bringing about a complete solution of the Jewish question in the German sphere of influence in Europe."

Reinhard Heydrich advises Adolf Eichmann that Hitler had ordered the physical extermination of the Jews.

August: Drancy, near Paris, is used as a Nazi internment center for Jews.

11,000 Jewish forced laborers from Hungary who are deported to Kamenets-Podolsk are machine-gunned by the Germans.

September: The Vilna Ghetto is established.

German posters throughout Kiev order the assembly of Jews for resettlement. The Jews are brought to Babi Yar and 34,000 are machine-gunned by the SS.

October: The Germans destroy seven Paris synagogues.

19,000 Jews are burned alive in Odessa by Romanian and German troops. The next day, another 10,000 are killed.

A second concentration camp is established in Auschwitz, called Auschwitz II or Auschwitz-Birkenau. It will become the main extermination camp.

The Nazis begin the discussion of a new policy concerning the extermination of the Jews - to murder by gas and not by shooting.

November: The Germans begin with the establishment of the Belzec extermination camp.

Outside Minsk 12,000 Jews are murdered.

In the Rumbuli forest near Riga 10,600 Jews are murdered. In December, a further 25.000 will be murdered, including historian Simon Dubnow.

The first deportees arrive at the Theresienstadt Ghetto. In December, Jacob Edelstein, Czech Zionist leader, will be appointed head of the Jewish council by the Nazis.

December: Henryk Erlich (1882-1941) and Victor Alter (1890-1941), leaders of the Polish Bund are executed by the Russian authorities.

The Germans begin gassing Jews at Chelmno, Poland, by funneling exhaust fumes into mobile vans.

Marc Chagall arrives in New York from France at the invitation of the Museum of Modern Art.