Arab dynamiters partially crippled railway service in Palestine by their activities over the weekend, it was revealed today, and thereby forcibly demonstrated the vulnerability of an important point in Great Britain’s Near East imperial defenses.
Terrorist-planted land mines wrecked a freight train between Hartuf and Dir-es-Sheikh and a railroad bridge near Lydda, forcing suspension of Lydda-Jerusalem traffic. Arab snipers fired from the hills into the Hartuf wreck. A stretch of tracks was uprooted near Kalkillia. Many other acts of railway sabotage were reported in the past two days.
The Palestine railways are considered to have great strategic value as a communication link for troops defending the Suez Canal, the Mesopotamian oil fields and other vital points on the eastern Mediterranean. With the citrus season practically over, hampering of railroad traffic does not create a great problem for Palestine commerce since the automobile transport facilities in the Holy Land are considered better than the rail.
Arab bands increased their activities in the Safed area. Troops concentrating in the Safed Jewish quarter were fired upon. Some 130 banana trees were uprooted and a watchman’s hut set afire on a Jewish plantation between Safed and Rosh Pina.
Safed Jews protested against the barring of Jews from the road to Acre for a month, a measure taken by the authorities after six Jews had been killed in an attack on a taxicab.
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