With the Arabs in Jerusalem
239
LAST DAYS OF THE MANDATE
ONLY a few days now remained until the British mandate
over Palestine expired. Tension had reached the exploding
point. The United Nations Trusteeship Council showed
marked impotence. First, it proposed a truce, which neither
side obeyed. Then it tried to postpone partition. There was a
proposal to send United States Marines to enforce—no one
was sure what. The Council suggested a special British High
Commissioner to rule over Jerusalem. Later it thought a Red
Cross official might do better. A dozen last-minute schemes
and a hundred speeches were delivered in an atmosphere of
great theatrical importance—but far removed from the reality
in Palestine.
At Lake Success, Sir Alexander Cadogan, the British delegate, read a telegram to the Security Council stating that "all
units of the Arab Legion had left Palestine for Trans-Jordan
prior to the end of the Mandate." I smiled when I read this.
For I had seen the Arab Legion in Gaza, in Hebron and in
Katamon.
Far better than I, the defenders of Kfar Etzion had tasted
the sting of Legion guns. They, too, knew the truth. . . . For
weeks these settlers in their hilltop kibbutzim had beaten back
assaults by the Arab Legion and guerrilla bands. At four a.m.
on May 12—two days before the Mandate's end—guerrillas
joined with Arabs from Hebron and the Arab Legion to launch
an all-out attack on Kfar Etzion with two battalions and two
thousand irregulars. They hammered at the isolated community and its 164 men and women defenders, with cannon,
mortars, and heavy machine-guns. The tanks charged sixteen
times, followed by wave after wave of howling fanatics. Kfar
Etzion sent desperate calls: "Tanks penetrated our rear into
the farmyard. . . . Overrunning the dining-room and children's house. . . . Swarming in from all sides." Ferocious