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Britain Urged to Establish Home Guard in Palestine

March 14, 1941
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Establishment of a home guard in Palestine was urged today by The Zionist Review, organ of the British Zionist Federation, in view of the increased Nazi threat to the Holy Land.

The paper pointed out that in addition to tens of thousands of young Palestine Jews who had volunteered for a Jewish army there were scores of thousands of men ineligible because of age for the regular forces but who were eager to be enrolled in a home guard.

“The Arabs in Palestine, under Hitler, would find conditions rather worse than those of the Arabs of Libya under Italian rule,” the editorial asserted. “But the Jews could only expect a multiplication of the worst Nazi horrors enacted in Germany and Austria. Can they be denied the right to prepare themselves for self-defense against such a terrible eventuality?”

Palestine Jews, asked to provide 2,000 lorry drivers for the North African desert campaign, complied with the request within a week, Theodor Kollek, delegate of the Palestine Foundation Fund (Keren Hayesod), reported today at a meeting of the Federation of Women Zionists.

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