Five Jews were wounded today from ambush by Arabs who disregarded newly-proclaimed penalties of death and life imprisonment for terrorism as disorders against the Jews and the Government entered their ninth week.
Losses sustained by the Government in eight weeks of disturbances were estimated today at $2,500,000, resulting from Arabs’ non-payment of taxes, increased military expenditures, decreased income from customs and sabotage.
Jewish damages were placed at $2,500,000 from incendiarism in fields and groves, destruction of other property, paralyzed trade and communications, loss of livelihood by Jews in predominantly-Arab Jaffa and loss of business by Jewish owners of cafes, theatres and stores in Jerusalem as a result of curfew regulations.
The cost to the Arabs of conducting the general strike against the Jews was estimated at $5,000,000.
Jacob Gerson, 30, was gravely wounded and Moshe Gerat, 35, slightly injured when a truck they were driving from Tel Aviv was ambushed this morning near Motza. Both were removed to Hadassah Hospital, where Gerson underwent an operation for removal of a bullet from his liver.
Moshe Kraus, 32; Schmuel Yanovsky, 20; and M. Stein, 25, all laborers, were wounded in an ambush nineteen kilometers from Jerusalem on the way to Jericho to work at the Dead Sea. They were removed to Hadassah Hospital.
38,000 TREES DESTROYED TO DATE
The Jewish National Fund said in a statement that 38,000 trees have been destroyed to date in the Mishmar Haemek and Balfour forests, and appealed to the Jews of the world to reply to this sabotage by raising a fund to plant 100,000 new trees. July 10 and 11 were designat-
The latest destruction of trees occurred at Mughrabi near Ramleh last night where 4,500 trees valued at $32,500 and covering a sixty-dunam grove were uprooted.
Replying to the Jewish community’s demand for mobilization of 2,500 special Jewish policemen, the Government agreed today to mobilize an additional 400, making a total of 800 special Jewish police, who are armed with rifles.
The Great Religious Tribunal of Palestine cabled a call for worldwide prayers next Thursday in behalf of the Palestine Jews. “The Jewish community is in danger. Join in prayers on Thursday,” said the message, which was addressed to rabbinical associations in the United States, England, Poland and Lithuania.
TO MARK HANGING OF ARABS
The Arabs proclaimed a three-day fast commencing Monday. Unsigned leaflets were issued in Jaffa calling on Arabs to observe June 17 as the anniversary of the hanging of three Arabs during the 1929 anti-Jewish riots. The Arab Supreme Council urged Arabs to gather at mosques for special prayers on that day. The police prepared for possible disorders.
The Arab Supreme Council gave permission to striking dock-workers at Jaffa to unload German merchandise. Granting of permission culminated rumors of a Nazi link to the Arab disorders.
Stevedores at Jaffa were reported to have been ordered by the authorities to resume work within three days or lose their licenses. Haboker, Hebrew daily, said instructions would be issued shortly to District Commissioners to order the opening of striking Arab stores. Davar, Laborite Hebrew daily asked in an editorial whether the Government actually intended to apply the drastic measures announced yesterday.
A touching scene was enacted when a train on the Jerusalem-Lydda line reached the Bitar station, three miles from Jerusalem, after running a gauntlet of Arab gunfire. Arab passengers surrounded the Jewish engineer. Jacob Penini, and kissed his hand for bringing the train through without damages or casualties.
The eighteen persons wounded in an explosion in a railway car Friday at Kalkillia were improving tonight, except Mrs. Miriam Feirstein, whose condition remained grave. The authorities closed the Kalkillia station.
TROOPS FIRE ON MARAUDERS
An official communique reported that troops exchanged fire with Arabs at several places in the Galilee area and at Jenin, with casualty totals so far unascertained. Two Arabs were wounded at Jaffa when a mob refused to obey a curfew order. The body of an
Sniping was reported in the Jerusalem suburbs of Neve Jacob, Mekor Haim and Ramat Rachel. Shooting also occurred at Tel Litwinsky and Beit Wegan near Tel Aviv. Shots were fired at troops near Hebron. Two hundred dunams of wheat were destroyed at Hulda and three dunams at Balfouria.
Telephone wires were cut at Acre, Nablus and Nazareth. A fire broke out in Government forests near Majdal, at Athlit and in northern Palestine. Bomb explosions occurred at Jaffa, Ben Shemen, Gaza and Beersheba. Crops were uprooted at the Yachin grove. A railway bridge was damaged by explosives near Gaza.
A Jewish truck-driver, Mendel Cohen, and his assistant were slightly injured tonight when their truck was stoned by Arabs while passing Ramleh.
Military escorts today replaced police convoys for Jewish buses plying between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. The Grand Mufti, Haj Amin el Husseini, had cabled King Edward in London complaining that the police were mistreating Arabs and asking his intervention “for justice.”
NEW MEASURES ANNOUNCED
Drastic new measures to restore order without recourse to martial law were announced yesterday in the official gazette, fixing a sentence of death or life imprisonment for persons firing on troops or police, damaging telephone and telegraph wires, railways, aircraft and ships and for obstructing the work of the same.
Other new measures include:
1- Any policeman or soldier may order all or any of the inhabitants of a town or village to remove from the road barricades, glass or nails.
2- All Palestine newspapers must obtain new permits which the District Commissioner is entitled to refuse without giving reason or to revoke at any time after issued.
3- The District Commissioner is entitled to demolish houses from which firearms are discharged.
An Arab was wounded and captured last night after a band of thirty Arabs had fired on a patrol near Nablus, precipitating a battle with military forces.
A watchman was wounded near Hedera when he refused to halt at the order of a police patrol. An Arab, wounded in the morning in Bethlehem when three Palestinian constables attacked by an Arab opened fire, died in the hospital.
A bridge between Hebron and Beersheba was blown up. Another near Hebron was damaged by a blast.
Eighty dunams of melons at Kfar Jonah were destroyed.
SPECIAL CAMP FOR COMMUNISTS
All Communists already arrested and those arrested in the future will be transferred Monday to a special concentration camp at Sarafend. This action results from the refusal of colonies to accept them as exiles.
Troops were fired upon military between Jerusalem and Nablus and opened fire with machine guns. Renewed shooting was reported at the Jewish settlements of Kfar Ezekial, Tel Yosef and Hugim. Arabs also sniped at Jewish settlements at Kfar Azar, Pardess Hana and Motza.
Jewish homes in Tiberias were bombed, but none was injured. An Arab was caught with a bomb near the home of the Southern District Commissioner.
Railway sleeping cars were burned near Lydda. A fire set at the Jaffa station damaged goods. A patrol trolley-car was derailed near Artuff by the removing of a section of the rail. No casualties occurred.
Soldiers searched in vain for Arabs who fired on Meshek Hapoaloth in the Ramath Rachel section, near the home of High Commissioner Sir Arthur Grenfell Wauchope. No casualties were reported.
Police circles confirmed that the Government had offered rewards of $2,500 each for the capture of the murderers of 25 Jews, three Arabs and a British constable since April 19.
The right-wing Zionist daily, Hayarden, was suspended for one month.
ARABS AMBUSH DAIRY TRUCK
Two Jews were reported wounded when Arabs ambushed a dairy truck on route to Ataroth from Jerusalem. One of the wounded, Abraham Ben Yehuda, was believed dying.
A communique reported a Jewish bus fired on as it traveled the Ramleh road, two of its passengers being wounded. Another Jewish bus was ambushed near Tel Aviv, the passengers escaping unscathed. One Arab was arrested by police as a suspect in the shooting.
The Nablus post office was bombed, but escaped damage. Arabs and police exchanged shots in the vicinity of Nablus.
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.
