What I have just seen can best be described as a “model operation.” In searching the settlement Ramat Rachel, just outside Jerusalem, British soldiers and Palestinian police used the utmost restraint: there were only a few bloody noses among the settlers, one short loss of consciousness and a number of hoarse women exhausted from screaming.
At 4:30 a.m. troops surrounded this stony, hillside settlement overlooking Jerusalem on the one side and the awesome wastes of the Dead Sea on the other. The diminutive, gray-haired Mukhtar (leader) named Bar Hayim was asked that the gates be opened.
He replied: “The British army took all of Germany, so you can take this place, too. You have a thousand men and you can do what you want.”
An estimated three hundred troops, armed with tommy guns, machine guns, mine destroyers and Bren gun carriers, then took up positions behind rocks protected by barbed wire and the British commander asked that the men in the settlement be separated from the women and children. Bar Hayim countered this request by asking for permission to communicate with the Jewish Agency for advice but he was turned down.
The Mukhtar then declared that he did not wish to let the children in the colony see their fathers arrested and therefore refused to separate the men. At this point a dozen soldiers equipped with axes approached the iron gate, which proved to be unlocked.
A reconnaissance car followed by jeeps and soldiers on foot, as well as three newspapermen, entered the colony to find the settlers continuing their normal Sabbath day pursuit. Bearded, elderly men sat around sunning themselves, while the few essential caretakers continued to work in the stables, and a few women were busy sweeping the dining room floor. White Sabbath cloths covered the tables, which were soon to serve as desks for the “interrogation teams” of the Criminal Investigation Department and the Army.
Like all collective colonies, Ramat Rachel consists of a huge, central dining hall so built that it could be turned into a defense post. Dormitory cottages, with a room for each family, are located nearby.
WOMEN TRY TO TEAR MEN AWAY FROM INVADING TROOPS
In quick order troops proceeded to enter the cottages, searching for men to be brought to the dining room for questioning. In many instances women and children surrounded their men, struggling and screaming to stop the seizures by the troops. In one of the upstairs cottage rooms, four screaming women fought to prevent the seizure of a middle-aged man by scratching and biting the troops. Then, when the soldiers finally got out to the landing, a small boy attached himself to the stair railing, blocking the way until two soldiers pried his fingers loose.’
Across the farmyard, soldiers were carrying men, some of whom resisted passively by turning themselves into dead weights. Other men tried to struggle loose from the troops, and each settler required an average of four soldiers and policemen to keep him in hand.
A detachment of troops tried to pen a dozen of the most active women into a small garden patch in front of the dining hall, but, led by a short, excited red-headed girl, the women broke loose and attacked the arrest parties, beating and cursing them.
A few of the soldiers momentarily lost their tempers and hit back at the women, but officers, one with a megaphone, kept yelling; “Don’t manhandle them, make them calm down.”
Many of the women were shrieking in Hebrew and some in English: “This is all ours. What do you want here? This is my home. My child is here. Do whatever you like in your country, but leave us alone.”
One British soldier who held a torn shirt remarked wryly: “They’re not very cooperative.” Another soldier, holding the leg of a struggling settler who required four men to carry him to the dining room, said: “We’re giving them a ride.”
Six soldiers were needed to drag a bear-like settler across the yard, with one holding on to his hair, so furious were his struggles. A group of hysterical women followed the soldiers, attempting unsuccessfully to free the captive.
One settler, his eyes burning with emotion, told this correspondent of the twenty-year-old struggle to establish Ramat Rachel as a dairy farm.
The settlers said they expected Arab disorders this summer and that today’s attempt to break up the Hagana and disarm the settlements was exposing them to the mercy of the Arabs.
One soldier, listening to a settler speaking in English, asked him where he learned to speak the language. The settler said: “In the British Army. I’ve just returned from five years of service, which is probably more than you saw.” There were 18 British Army volunteers in this settlement.
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