Acco (Getting Israel Together)
Acco (Getting Israel Together)
Acco is a pleasant coastal town, less than an hour's drive from Haifa. It
is a city of contrasts; it has an old city and a new city, a long and rich
history, and a mixed Arab and Jewish population.
Looming over large sections of the town is a great Crusader fortress, its
presence threatening and forbidding in the evening light. Even today,
the fortress, nearly a thousand years old, has something of the gloom of
a prison. This is quite understandable, for just 40 years ago, it was a
prison. Indeed, it served as one of the main bases for the British during
their attempt to break the will of Jewish groups who fought them with
armed struggle.
In this fortress, the British imprisoned people suspected of anti-British
activities. Into its tiny cells the detainees were crammed - 20, 25, 30 to
a cell. They slept on floors covered with flimsy rags to keep out the
cold. Acco jail soon became a by-word for all that was hated in British
rule of Palestine - especially when the British started executing Jewish
captives. Today, you can still see the gallows where the British hung
Jews convicted of terrorist activity. The first hanging took place in
March, 1942. In all, 12 members of Etzel and Lechi were hung.
Dov Gruner was one of the men hung on April 16, 1947. In a letter to
Menachem Begin he wrote:
“Of course I want to live. Who does not? But if I am sorry I’m
about to “finish” it is mainly because I did not manage to do
enough. I too could have let the future fend for itself - taken the
job I was promised or left the country and lived securely in
America. But that would not have given me satisfaction as a
Jew and certainly not as a Zionist....That should be the way of
the Jewish people in these days, to stand up for what is ours
and be ready for battle even if in some instances it leads to the
gallows. I write these lines 48 hours before the time fixed by our
oppressors to carry out their murder and at such moments one
does not lie. I swear that if I had the choice of starting again I
would choose the same road, regardless of the possible
consequences to me.”
The 'underground' responded quickly. On May 4, 1947, the Etzel
staged its most daring operation. Its members attacked the seemingly
impregnable fortress at Acco, and organized a prisoner escape. Some
20 Jews succeeded in escaping. Although the British carried out
immediate reprisals, the escape caused a tremendous loss of face.
The raid on the Acco prison was a large and complex operation.
Menachem Begin, the leader of the Etzel and subsequent Prime
Minister of Israel, remembered it this way:
“Acco was not just a town inhabited only by Arabs. It was
surrounded by a ring of military camps. Our commando unit was
not operating behind the enemy line. It was right in amongst the
enemy lines. And the attack could not succeed unless the
enemy were prevented from bringing reinforcements, and unless
the line of withdrawal for the attackers was kept open. The
operation had been planned in great detail and was carried out
precisely. One unit rained down mortar sheds on the nearby
army camp - at once a diversionary and a preventive action.
Other units planted mines.
Hours had been spent going over the ground. Many eyes had
'reconnoitered' the terrain before the 4th of May. Sometimes
they appeared to be 'Arab' eyes, sometimes 'British.' But always
they were eyes of our fighters. Thanks to this very thorough
reconnaissance, a second ring was built inside the ring: inside
the belt of army camps was fashioned a ring of Etzel security
posts. Thus Acco was surrounded.
Now the main force turned towards the fortress. Built by the
Crusaders, restored by the Turks, it had withstood the artillery of
Napoleon Bonaparte. Now our men had come to break the walls
open and to bring freedom to their prisoners.
Behind the walls the prisoners waited impatiently. They had a
quantity of explosives introduced into the prison by the
underground in various ways. There was not much of it, but
sufficient to blow up, from within, the heavy iron bars separating
the long dark corridor from the assault group who had pierced
the wall outside.
The really decisive explosion, however, was effected outside
the fortress. The walls of rock, which had remained
unbreachable through the centuries, submitted finally to the
assaults of our unit. There were more than one hundred and fifty
armed police guarding the fortress, apart from the indirect
defense provided by the police post close by and the military
camps in the neighborhood. The high towers of the fortress were
manned by guards, armed with machine guns and rifles, to
whose fire the attackers were fully exposed. The attack was
carried out by daylight, for the liberated prisoners had to be
brought to safety before the hour of the night of the curfew on
the roads.”
A struggle developed and three prisoners were taken. Before their
execution one of them, Avshalom Haviv, made this statement to his
captors:
“You tyrants will never understand the spirit of Lechi men going
to their death, with a song springing from their hearts. And this
too you will probably never understand. l, a young Jew, facing the
sentence of death, lift my heart to my God and give praise and
thanks for the privilege of suffering for my people and my country
and say, with all my heart: Blessed art Thou, 0 Lord our God,
King of the Universe, who has kept us alive and maintained us
and enabled us to reach this time.”
It was this spirit that finally caused the British to raise their hands in
defeat. Even before the raid on Acco jail, the British were having
trouble controlling the situation in Palestine. They returned the mandate
they had received to the United Nations, but continued their
administration of Palestine until an alternate arrangement could be
made. The attack on the Acco jail emphasized their inability to deal
with the situation and was a further blow to British prestige. In addition,
the members of the Jewish Yishuv - even the majority who condemned
violence against the British - wanted the British out. They wanted
independence.
Three weeks after the Acco jail escape, the United Nations began to
debate the future of Palestine. The discussions lasted several months.
In November 1947, it was decided that Palestine should be partitioned
into two states: one Arab and one Jewish. Although the plan envisioned
a very small Jewish state which would exclude the entire Western
Galilee from Haifa northwards, the Jews accepted the plan. It was, after
all, something! And it provided Jews sovereignty in Israel for the first
time in two thousand years.
The Partition Plan was rejected and the result was the War of
Independence.
Etzel
The Etzel (Irgun Tzvai Leumi ), was organized in 1937 by people who
wanted to take an active policy against Arab attacks. In 1939 with the
publication of the British White Papers (which severely limited Jewish
immigration to Palestine), the Etzel started to operate directly against
the British. With the outbreak of the Second World War, this activity
was temporarily suspended. However, in 1944, anti - British activities
were renewed, and continued until independence.
Lechi
Lechi (Lochamei Herut Yisrael - Fighters for the Freedom of Israel) split
from the Etzel in 1940, when they decided to suspend operations
against the British for the duration of the war. The Lechi was a small
group of only a few hundred members, but it carried out operations
including the assassination of political figures whom it considered as
jeopardizing the Jewish cause.