Emphasizing that a right censorship has been imposed by the Israeli Government on news concerning the battle yesterday between the Irgun and Israeli Army forces, the Palestine Resistance-Defense Fund, a pro-Irgun group, today issued a statement blaming Premier David Ben Gurion and Foreign Minister Moshe Shertok for the clash.
The statement charged the two Israeli leaders want “to wipe out the Irgun and thus rid themselves of the chief obstacle in the way of totalitarian control “adding that they “tried to choke off Irgun’s funds” by a campaign abroad. “Finally yesterday they get their main chance,” the statement declared, pointing out that the number of lives lost in the blowing up of the vessel “Vladimir Jabotinsky” on the Tel Aviv waterfront is not known because “even the telephone service in Tel Aviv was suspended so that the public might not learn too quickly of this outrage.”
“The politicians, who have placed narrow party interests above the national safety and the lives of Hebrew people, will be held by the Hebrew people strictly to account. They have launched a civil war in the midst of a crisis which threatens the existence of the whole Hebrew population, not only in Palestine, but wherever they survive in exile,” the statement said.
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.
