Danger to Palestine Prompts Jewish Agency to Issue New Appeal for Jewish Army

With the danger to Palestine becoming more imminent because of the situation on the Egyptian front, the Jewish Agency for Palestine today issued a renewed appeal to the British Government for the immediate creation of a Jewish fighting force to face the Nazi armies on the battlefield as well as a Home Guard in Palestine to secure the safety of the population within the country.

“It is urgent that the 12,000 Palestine Jews who are already serving with the British forces in the Middle East should be unified and supplemented by an additional 20,000 in a Jewish fighting force within the British Army, and that 40,000 to 50,000 Palestine Jews should be embodied into a Home Guard for the defense of the country,” the appeal said. “The Jewish people everywhere look to His Majesty’s Government to give the Jews in Palestine full opportunity to participate in the great struggle and to defend their families and their national home.”

The question of whether the Middle East is reaching its “zero month” is on the lips of every resident of Palestine. The gravity of the situation is felt all over the country, but no panic prevails. On the contrary, Jews in the cities as well as in the settlements are preparing themselves for all eventualities and the demand for the establishment of Jewish fighting units and a Jewish Home Guard is growing from hour to hour.

PRECAUTIONS TAKEN IN TEL AVIV. HAIFA AND JAFFA

Tel Aviv, Haifa, Jaffa and other coastal towns have literally dug themselves in. There are shelters for civilians everywhere and excellent first-aid stations. Each of the several hundred busses in Tel Aviv can be easily converted into an ambulance. The seats are detachable and each bus is equipped with stretchers strapped to the inside of the roof.

In Jerusalem, the population has great faith in the holy status of the city, and believe that the city will never be bombed by the Axis from the air. Jerusalem has never had an air raid. Sirens have wailed in practice alerts several times and there have been some false alarms, but no actual raid. The cities where Axis raids are expected are Haifa and Tel Aviv. Haifa has experienced a number of bombings, but the damage has been negligible.

The tenseness of the population awaiting the “zero hour” has not been allowed to interfere with the normal work of the central Jewish organizations or with the industrial activities which are being conducted on a three-shift basis in many of the factories engaged in war industry.