The Irgun Zvai Leumi last night threatened British officers in Palestine with 18 strokes of a cane, if the authorities carried out a military court’s sentence of 18 strokes of the lash as well as 18 years imprisonment passed on 16-year-old Benjamin Kimchin, who was convicted of attempting to rob a bank in Jaffa.
The broadcast on the Irgun’s secret transmitter, “Voice of Fighting Zion,” termed Kimchin a “Jewish soldier taken prisoner by the enemy.” The announcer paid tribute to the British airmen who assisted in the rescue of the 750 Jews shipwrecked on Sirini island. However, he added: “This episode does not change the fact that we are in a state of war with a cruel enemy endangering our very existence.”
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
