A British major was kidnapped from the Metropole Hotel in Nathanya today by 10 armed members of the Irgun Zvai Leumi and flogged in retaliation for the flogging in Jerusalem prison on Friday of Benjamin Kimchin, who had been sentenced to 18 lashes and 18 years imprisonment for participation in a bank robbery at Jaffa. In Tel Aviv two non-commissioned officers were seized and flogged.
In posters which appeared on walls through the city today, the Irgun announced that it would continue its fight against British forces in Palestine. “There is no ‘cease fire’ in the struggle for the freedom of the nation,” the posters said.
The Irgun’s statements came on the heels of an appeal from Rep. Joseph Clark Baldwin, which appeared last night in the Palestine Post, urging Menachem Begin, leader of the Irgun, to suspend the organization’s terrorist activities until Baldwin had an opportunity to acquaint the American Government and the American people “with your fight, and Jewry’s at large.”
Referring to an interview he had with Begin while in Palestine recently, the Congressman, who returned to New York last week, said that he will do everything in his power to “present your point of view and that of other Palestine Jewish leaders in an effort to expedite action and avoid further bloodshed.”
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