A general strike of all Palestine Arabs is urged to-day by the “Jamea el Arabia”, the organ of the Grand Mufti and the Moslem Supreme Council, to commemorate the first anniversary which occurs on Wednesday of the execution of the three Arabs convicted of murder during the anti-Jewish massacres in Palestine in August 1929.
The feeling in favour of the observance of the anniversary by a general strike has extended beyond Palestine into Transjordan, the paper says, making a further suggestion that a big procession should be organised to the graves of these “Arab martyrs”.
The three Arabs who were executed at Acre gaol on the morning of June 17th. last year, while the Muezzins from the Minarets of the Mosques called the faithful to prayer, and the bells of the Catholic Church were tolling, were Atta Zeer, a porter of Hebron who was convicted of the murder of Rabbi Kastel and his family, Mohamed Jam Joun, of Hebron, who was convicted of the murder of the Aboushdid family, and Fuad Hedjazi, of Safed, an official in the Government Department of Health, who was convicted of the murder of the Mizrachi school teacher Afriat of Safed.
The Arab Executive called a general strike on the day of the executions, and not only Arab shops, but also some Jewish shops in the Old City of Jerusalem were closed, on account of the fear of disturbances. Black flags were flown from some Arab shops. the “El Carmel” of Haifa urged at the time that the anniversary of the executions should be observed each year as a day of national mourning. The “Meraat el Shark” appeared with a big black border and referred to the executed men as “martyrs” whose gallows were trees of Arab independence.
Professor Einstein, Rabbi Baeck, of Berlin, and the Jewish poet Ernst Toller, sent a telegram to the High Commissioner as opponents of capital punishment asking for pardon for the three Arabs, “however great their individual crime may be, “to “help towards the establishment of peace between Jews and Arabs, for which we are all working”.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
