Charges that Brigadier David Shaltiel, who was wartime commander of besieged Jerusalem, made mistakes which led to the loss of the Old City’s Jewish quarter to the Arabs provoked a request today in the Knesset, Israel’s Parliament, for the appointment of a parliamentary committee of inquiry. The charges were made by Dov Joseph, member of the Jewish Agency executive and wartime Governor of Jerusalem, in a book of memoirs published here today. The request for an inquiry was made by the Herut Party.
In his book, Dr. Joseph expresses the opinion that the Old City of Jerusalem could have been held and its siege by the Arabs could have been lifted by capturing the entire area during the War of Liberation in 1948. Dr. Joseph levels his most severe criticism at Brigadier Shaltiel.
“It is my opinion one of the fundamental mistakes of Shaltiel was that he failed to apprise the civilian authorities of the true state of affairs. He never indicated how grave was the situation of the Jewish quarter defenders and the success of our forces in the new city created among us the belief that our men in the Old City would also be able to stand up until we could relieve them by a breakthrough,” Dr. Joseph charges.
If he had known of the true situation, Dr. Joseph writes, he would have asked Ben-Gurion to transfer some special commando units from the Tel Aviv area to Jerusalem.
Shaltiel rejected criticism of his tactics saying he was primarily responsible for the defense of 100,000 Jews in the new city and only secondarily to capture the Old City. Dr. Joseph agrees this was basically correct but charges the attempt to capture the Old City would not have been contrary to this primary responsibility.
The author claims that only after the Jewish quarter had fallen did he learn that there were still considerable stockpiles there and a way existed to supply the defenders with ammunition. Dr. Joseph also criticizes former Foreign Minister Moshe Sharett for being too scrupulous about observing United Nations’ orders and instructions while the Arabs disregarded them.
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