Situation on Syrian Border “deteriorating,” Haganah Says; Arabs Block Negev Roads

The situation in Upper Galilee, which has been tense since the first Arab raids from Syria on Friday, is deteriorating steadily and Arab roadblocks have been erected on all main roads, a Haganah spokesman stated tonight. He said that “the general feeling is that there is no authority in the region, no police.”

The one incident reported from the area was an attack on a milk truck travelling between Kfar Szold and Dafneh by a large band of Arabs. Guards assigned to the vehicle returned the fire, but there were no casualties on either side. Later, troops arrived and a brief engagement developed.

At the other end of the country, in the Negev, a Jewish convoy was attacked near a British military camp by a large guerrilla unit, which had erected roadblocks and were lying in ambush on both sides of the road. Although Haganah guards accompanying the convoy replied to the Arab fire, the vehicles were forced to turn back. Later, however, several convoys broke through roadblocks and proceeded to their destinations after inflicting casualties on the Arabs. One driver was killed.

A Haganah “punitive squad” blew up an Arab flour mill at Beth Safa, near Jerusalem, killing four and wounding five guerrillas. The mill had been used as a base for a 200-man guerilla band.

A cousin of the Mufti, who was acting as commander of the units operating in the Jerusalem district, was wounded, and Ibrahim el Chelmoni, a unit commander, was killed today when a Haganah unit counter-attacked Arabs who had been sniping at the Mekor Haim suburb of Jerusalem for several days. Seven British soldiers were wounded, three seriously during an engagement with an Arab band at Bit Safafa on the outskirts of Jerusalem, Three Arabs were killed.

ARAB “CIVIL WAR” DEVELOPS WHEN VILLAGERS OPPOSE GUERRILLA OPERATION

A minor civil war developed in Deir Yassin, an Arab village adjoining the Montefiore quarter of Jerusalem, when a group of non-resident Arabs arrived to launch an attack on the Montefiore section. The inhabitants, fearing that their village would become a battleground, opposed the operation and in the clash that developed one member of the band was killed. Police subsequently evacuated three of the leading villagers, apparently fearing that the guerrillas would seek revenge.

Two Jews were killed today at Wadi Bushmen and seven wounded during a day of sporadic exchanges. In Haifa, two Jewish truck drivers were killed and their vehicles set afire, and a British soldier was killed when troops who were sent to the scene clashed with the Arabs. Another Jew was later stabbed to death in the same vicinity. A body of an unidentified Jew, who had been stabbed and shot to death, was found near Tireh, on the coast directly below the Lebanese border.

An armed band, identified as Jews, held up Barclays Battle in Tel Aviv at the height of the rush hour and escaped with bags of currency estimated to total $40,000.

The official casualty toll from Nov. 30 through Jan. 10 was given today as 2,074, of whom 634 were killed and the remainder wounded. Of the dead, 330 were Arabs, 262 were Jews and the others were British troops and police and civilians. However, unofficially it is reported that the death toll has reached 698 Arabs and 281 Jews.