Lt. Col. Moshe Dayan and Commander Joseph Hamburger, Israeli officers who accompanied the body of the late Col. David Marcus to the United States, told a press conference today that if fighting in Palestine resumes after the expiration of the truce, the Israeli Army can take all of Palestine within Four to six weeks.
Speaking at the Israeli Office of Information, they said that not one inch of Jewish territory was captured by the Arabs during the month-old war, while the Is-Israelis seized 400,000 square miles of non-Israeli territory, including several strategic coastal points. They estimated that 1,800 Jews were killed and 2,000 wounded in the war.
Both of the Israeli officers paid high tribute to the late Col. Marcus, stating that many Jews would rather have lost a battle than “our Mickey.” Col. Dayan, who lost an eye while leading a scouting party into Syria for the British during the war, commanded the Haganah units which routed the Arab Legion in the Jordan Valley. Commander Hamburger, a fifth-generation Palestinian, participated in special sabotage missions for the British during the war and saw action on several fronts, including Jerusalem and in the Negev in recent weeks.
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.
