Ben Gurion Calls for Total Mobilization for War Warns of New Arab Attacks

The total mobilization of Jewish manpower, funds, scientific skill and technical ability to prosecute and end the Arab war on the Jews of Palestine was demanded this week-end by David Ben Gurion, chairman of the Jewish Agency, at an extraordinary meeting of the Mapai–Palestine Labor Party. He called for the fullest cooperation of all strata of society in village and city in order to stretch to the ultimate the meager supplies available to the Jews.

The Agency chief said that the first round of the war had ended in failure for the Arabs, “but warned that they are preparing for renewed and stronger attacks. “To this we shall reply with force, not only in the Jewish areas of Palestine but in the Arab areas and in those countries where Arab bands are concentrating,” he declared.

He charged British Foreign Minister Ernest Bevin’s policy as a “double-cross” and attacked those Zionists who “demand an. orientation to either bloc–East or West.” Those groups, he continued, “undermine the very foundation of the Jewish state. The Jewish people as an entity must lean solely on the United Nations, which is the world’s ‘conscience as well as its hope for democracy.’

18 JEWS AND ARABS DIE DURING WEEK-END VIOLENCE

At least eighteen Jews and Arabs were killed this week-end in a number of Arab attacks on Jewish traffic and Haganah operations against the headquarters of Arabs guerrilla units. In Haifa, three Arabs were killed today and one seriously injured in a fight which broke out after several Arabs fired on a party of Jews. The police broke up the melee, but not before they had come under fire from both sides.

Two Jews were killed and the food trucks which they were driving ware completely burned out after an Arab attack on the vehicles in Upper Galilee. One of the Jews was found alive, with both arms and an ear severed, but died on route to a hospital. Another Jew died in a similar ambush on the Jerusalem-Tel Aviv road.

Ten Arabs died when the Haganah blew up a base of a large band operating in Upper Galilee. At Ein Zeitim a new attack was beaten off after a battle that lasted from early morning to late afternoon, and two Arab houses were blown up in nearby Safad after a Jew was wounded by sniper fire from one of the homes. On the Tel Aviv Jaffa border heavy sniping continued and several Jews were badly wounded, while in Jerusalem two Jewish shops were blasted and later an Arab-owned store was blown up in retaliation. It was reported today that the long and protracted negotiations to proclaim Jerusalem an open city have failed following rejection of such a proposal by Arab leaders, who feared that a truce would weaken the morale of Arab fighters. A Jewish Agency spokesman disclosed that Arabs had hidden thirty tons of high explosives–enough to destroy the entire Old City–in Arab Holy Places in the city. The explosives were taken from a military dump east of Latrun to Trans Jordan and returned the next day to the Old City, he charged.