1948: A History of the First Arab-Israeli War (57 page)

The upshot of these small successes was that a new, less vulnerable road to Jerusalem became available to the Israelis, paralleling and south of the Burma Road. At the end of the Ten Days, IDF units along the front lines were ordered "to prevent the return of the Arab inhabitants to their towns and villages conquered by us, also with live fire."129 Refugees encamped near the front lines were driven off. 130

In sum, by the end of Operation Dani the IDF had made substantial territorial gains, but it had failed in its major strategic objective. Lydda and Ramla and their rural hinterland to the east were in Israeli hands, yet the key fortress of Latrun (not to speak of the town of Ramallah) remained firmly in Legion hands. Glubb had managed to stabilize a south-north line along the Judean-Samarian foothills from Latrun-Beit Nuba to Beit Sira, Budrus, and Qalqilya and retain the bulk of the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Yet the Latrun police fort and its satellite villages-Latrun, Imwas, Deir Aiyub, Yalu, and Beit Nuba-though heavily defended, were now precariously held, constituting a thin wedge of land jutting into Israeli territory. And Glubb's position was doubly precarious, given his munitions shortages. Indeed, on 18 July, in the middle of the last skirmishes of the Ten Days, he had informed Kirkbride's deputy, Christopher Pirie-Gordon-who in turn informed London-that "his supplies of shells and mortars will finally give out some time today or tomorrow at the latest." Without a last-minute resupply, "there will be only the alternatives of the positions being overrun or a general withdrawal [from the West Bank]."'-"

During the Ten Days, as in previous bouts of the war, air operations had little impact on the battles, chiefly because all the air forces were extremely small and weak. Nonetheless, the appearance and actions of aircraft over battlefields and, even more, over capital cities had a certain, if ultimately unquantifiable, effect on military and civilian morale.

The most striking air operation was the attempted bombing on 15 July of King Farouk's Abdeen Palace in Cairo by a lone IAF B-i7. Three B-17 Flying Fortresses had been purchased by the Haganah in the United States before iS May, had been flown to Czechoslovakia to be outfitted and armed, and on iS July had set out for Israel. Their orders were to bomb Egyptian targets on the way. One headed for Cairo, where it failed to hit the palace but caused some damage nearby,132 causing Ben-Gurion satisfaction if not joy. 133 The bombing certainly raised morale in Tel Aviv. 131 Some thirty Egyptians died and a railway line was hit.'--' The two other airplanes bombed Rafah (instead of El Arish, their ordained target) before landing at `Egron Airfield. 136 The Egyptians responded on 16 and 17 July by repeatedly bombing Tel Aviv with Dakotas, accompanied by a Spitfire fighter escort, killing at least fifteen Israelis. The Egyptians lost one Dakota. 137 In the following days the B-17s bombed El Arish and Syrian positions around Mishmar Hayarden. On the night of 17-18 July an IAF Dakota bombed Damascus itself, killing about sixty and injuring another eighty to one hundred people. The bombs blew out the windows of the Syrian parliament building. 138 A further bombing, by a lone B-17 bomber on the morning of 18 July, aimed at Maze Airfield but missed, hitting Damascus itself, with bombs and crates of large bottles (to "heighten panic"). Twenty persons were killed and eighty injured, and windows and doors in the apartment occupied by the US charge d'affaires shattered. This provided "an unpleasant introduction" for the American minister, James Keeley, who had arrived in the Syrian capital the night before.13`9 Rich families reportedly fled Damascus, and the Syrian government began building air raid shelters. The Syrians (and Iraqis) reacted that evening by bombing the Ramat David Airfield and Haifa but failed to hit anything. 140

The IAF Messerschmitt Squadron flew ground-support missions and occasionally intercepted Egyptian aircraft. The Arab air forces were almost completely ineffective; only the Syrian air attacks around Mishmar Hayarden had a serious impact.

The UN Security Council resolution of 15 July brought hostilities to a halt, calling for the reinstatement of the truce no later than 18 July; failure to comply would trigger sanctions against the offender. The Arab media were outraged. One Arab newspaper greeted the announcement this way: "No justice, no logic, no right, no equity, no understanding, but blind submission to everything that is Zionist."'41 The Iraqis, too, argued-or pretended to argue-for continuing the war, mainly to assuage public opinion. 142 The Iraqi prime minister, Salih Jabr, had been remarkably honest about this to the British charge in Beirut: "He [said that he had decided to speak out against accepting the truce as he had seen] an opportunity for increasing his political stature in Iraq, where public opinion was strongly in favour of continuing the fighting."143 But for the more level-headed observers, the results of the Ten Days had demonstrated Israel's military superiority, and the Arab leaders were clearly eager that the world force them to comply (though the Arab media routinely broadcast "news" of "fictitious Arab victories to keep at fever heat the already inflamed imagination of the people," as one British diplomat put it).144 Jordan argued that its lack of ammunition compelled it to cease fire. Indeed, the severe shortage of mortar and artillery rounds left Glubb and Kirkbride in grave doubt whether the Legion could hold the West Bank if fighting was renewed. 14-1, Pirie-Gordon feared that the Legion "would have difficulty even in protecting the road to Alnman."146 And Egypt, also severely short of ammunition, 147 hadn't the "stomach for further fighting." 148 In August, the British moved some military stores from the Suez area to their bases in Jordan, including twenty-five-pounder and mortar rounds, but they assured the Americans that these would not be handed over to the Legion unless Israel "threatened" to attack Transjordan itself. 149 In effect, Jordan was left with a grave shortage of ammunition that quashed any thought of participation in renewed hostilities. It appears that Iraq, too, was not resupplied.

And so the situation was to remain during the following months: the Arabs were reluctant to renew the war whereas the Israelis-at least in the Cabinet and General Staff-were at least agreeable to, if not eager for, war. In contrast with the First Truce, the Second thus witnessed a reversal of roles. The Arabs henceforward labored to prevent renewed hostilities while the Israelis, who wanted the invaders out of Palestine and the Arab leaders to agree to peace, increasingly understood that neither would be achieved through diplomacy. 150

No major battles or strategic changes occurred during the Second Truce, which lasted until 15 October. But the period was marked by continuous eruptions of violence. Both sides, especially during the truce's first days, tried to improve their tactical position in various areas; large numbers of Arab refugees continuously tried to infiltrate through Israeli lines to return to their homes or reap crops; and the Egyptians, contrary to the truce terms, barred the passage of convoys to resupply Israel's Negev settlement enclave. All of these resulted in firefights and, occasionally, in skirmishes. Noteworthy in this connection were three large-scale Israeli attempts in late July and August to push convoys to the enclave (one of them was successful).

The biggest military operation during the truce was the Israeli conquest of a cluster of villages south of Haifa dubbed "the Little Triangle": Ijzim, `Ein Ghazal, and Jaba. The villages repeatedly fired at Israeli traffic along the coast road and were supplied by the Iraqis from northern Samaria. During the Ten Days Ben-Gurion had brushed aside a call for immediate action: "These villages are in our pocket. We can act against them also after the [reinstitution of the] truce. This will be a police action.... They are not regarded as en emy forces as their area is ours [that is, inside Israeli territory as defined by the UN partition resolution] and they are inhabitants of the state."151

Israeli-held areas at the end of the Ten Days, 19 July 1948

Sniping at traffic continued after the start of the Second Truce, and the villages refused to desist or surrender. The problem had to be resolved.

For several days IDF artillery and aircraft intermittently bombarded the villages, and on 24 July Israel launched mivtzashoter(Operation Policeman). The aim was "to gain control" of the coast road between Zikhron Ya`akov and Haifa "and to destroy all the enemy in the area."152 Alexandroni deployed four infantry companies, armored cars, and several batteries of artillery and mortars. The troops also received air support. 153 By 26 July it was over. Most of the inhabitants fled before and during the attack, reaching northern Samaria; hundreds of others were forcibly expelled during the following days. At least a hundred militiamen and civilians were killed. The IDF blew up most of `Ein Ghazal and Jaba. Bernadotte subsequently declared the attack unjustified and demanded that the villagers be allowed back. Israel refused. 154

As with the First Truce, the Second Truce benefited the Israelis more than the Arabs. True, the Arab armies, like Israel's, expanded during the three months of quiet. By early September, according to Yadin, the Egyptian expeditionary force numbered "12,000" soldiers, with a 30 percent increase in armor and artillery and a supplement of three Saudi Arabian battalions and thousands of local auxiliaries; the Legion had recruited additional manpower so that its regiments now had "full complements"; and the Iraqi force had grown to sixteen battalions. All the Arab armies had improved their fortifications. 155

Nonetheless, the truce favored the Israelis, who used the time more efficiently. The poor UN supervision of sea- and airports ended up working in Israel's favor, since it alone had the wherewithal to buy and transport arms and men into the area. The boost in light weaponry assured "the [Israeli] infantry platoon ... more firepower than its Arab equivalent," Yadin said. In heavy weapons, such as tanks, combat aircraft, and antitank gulls, the IDF remained abysmally deficient. 1-16 But there were rays of light. Between June and October, Israel's artillery had grown from five to iso gulls. 117 Foreign volunteers-Maha"l-and foreign conscripts-Gaha"1-accounted for about twenty thousand of Israel's eighty-five-thousand-strong army in October and November 1948; almost all arrived after 15 May.158

During the truce, the Arabs and Bernadotte pressed Israel to agree to a return of all or some of the refugees. But the Zionist leaders had decided against this. By late summer 1948 a consensus had formed that the refugees were not to be allowed back during the war, and a majority-led by Ben-Gurion and Shertok-believed that it was best that they not return after the war either. The Israelis argued that a discussion of refugee repatriation must await the end of hostilities: in wartime, returnees would constitute a fifth column. But, in private, they added that after the war, too, if allowed back, returnees would constitute a demographic and political time bomb, with the potential to destabilize the Jewish state.

The Arabs, for their part, began to speak of a refugee return as a precondition to opening peace talks. The Arab leaders argued that elementary justice demanded that the refugees be allowed to return to the homes from which they had fled or been ejected. In pressing this demand, they were also aware of the political and military harm to Israel that would attend a mass refugee return; it wasn't simply a matter of "justice."

The Israeli decision to bar a refugee return had consolidated between April and August. The April exodus from Haifa and Jaffa had brought the matter into focus. Initially, the leadership was of two minds. During April, when the Yishuv switched to the offensive, local military and civilian leaders gradually shifted to a "good-bye and good riddance" approach. For months, the Arabs had attacked settlements and traffic; once gone, it was felt, it was best that they not return. The switch in policy among Alexandroni's Arab affairs advisers, as recorded in the minutes of their meetings in late March and early April, is indicative.'-"

On the political plane, though, no policy decision had yet been taken. In early May, after a visit to Haifa, Golda Myerson (Meir), the powerful acting director of the Jewish Agency Political Department, noted the "dreadful" exodus of the town's Arabs and how they had left "the coffee and Pita bread" on the tables. She told her colleagues, "I could not avoid [thinking] that this, indeed, had been the picture in many Jewish towns [that is, in World War II Europe].... [Should the Jews] make an effort to bring the Arabs back to Haifa, or not [?] We have decided on a number of rules, and these include: we won't go to Acre and Nazareth to bring back [Haifa's] Arabs. But, at the same time, our behavior should be such that if, because of it, they come back-[then] let them come back. We shouldn't behave badly with the Arabs [who have remained] so that others [who fled] won't return." 1611

This was all pretty vague. But during the following weeks the leaders were compelled to take the bull by the horns as Arab leaders began to press the refugees to return and refugee spokesmen began to press Bernadotte to facilitate it.161 Without doubt, the pan-Arab invasion of 15 May hardened Israeli hearts toward the refugees. The onslaught of the armies, which threatened to destroy the Yishuv, left the Israelis with little room for error or humanitarian misgivings. As one local official put it: "There are no senti ments in war.... Better to cause them injustice than that [we stiffer] a disaster.... We have no interest in their returning."162 A powerful anti-return lobby galvanized, consisting of local officials, army commanders, and senior executives in the national bureaucracies. Jewish leaders from Safad, the Mount Gilboa area, and Western Galilee wrote or traveled to Tel Aviv to demand that a return of refugees to their area be prevented.163 The head of the IDF Intelligence Department wrote, "There is a growing movement by the Arab villagers ... [to] return now.... There is a serious danger that they will fortify themselves in their villages ... and with the resumption of warfare, will constitute at least a [potential] Fifth Column." 161 Yosef Weitz, head of the JNF Lands Department, Elias Sasson, head of the Foreign Ministry's Middle East Affairs Department, and Ezra Danin, an old intelligence hand soon to be named a senior adviser at the Foreign Ministry, banded together as a self-appointed Transfer Committee, advising the Cabinet to bar a return and how to do it. Shertok agreed with Weitz that "the momentum [of Arab flight] must be exploited and turned into an accomplished fact."165 Weitz, Darin, and Sasson submitted a three-page proposal, "Retroactive Transfer: A Scheme for the Solution of the Arab Question in the State of Israel," to Ben-Gurion. The document set out the means-destruction of abandoned villages and fields, Jewish settlement of Arab sites, prevention of Arab cultivation, help in the orderly settlement of refugees in Arab countries-by which a return was to be prevented.166 Indeed, the Transfer Committee, led by Weitz and using JNF equipment, in summer 1948 off its own bat leveled about half a dozen villages.167