The striking Israeli Seamen’s Association today offered to provide men to sail immigrant vessels to North Africa to remove Libyan Jews who are being evacuated to Israel on an emergency basis before January 1, 1952, when the Arab country becomes independent. The Jewish Agency accepted the offer and three immigrant vessels will sail for Tripoli shortly.
Meanwhile, the union has approached two private shipping lines, the Shoham and M. Dizengoff companies, and has offered to man their vessels if the companies agree to deal with the Association directly, as a trade union. The companies turned down the offer, stating that they were acting on instructions from the Ministry of Communications.
The Histadrut was reported today to be considering the establishment of a separate seamen’s union, in opposition to the Association which began the strike in a dispute with the Histadrut over the Association’s demand for autonomy within the labor federation. Several other vessels were reported preparing to leave Israeli ports with volunteer crews provided by the Histadrut. Police cordoned off the S.S. Kedma this morning when she docked, and refused to permit any of her sailors to land. In the evening however, those sailors who joined the Seamen’s Association strike were permitted to land.
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