Rabbi Abba Silver Addresses U.N. General AssemblyCIE+
In an address on behalf of the Jewish Agency, Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver calls upon the United Nations to honor the 1917 Balfour Declaration.
Lehi Teenager DisappearsCIE+
May 6, 1947 Alexander Rubowitz, 16, is abducted in the Rehavia neighborhood of Jerusalem while on a mission for Lohamei HaHerut b’Yisrael (Fighters for the Freedom of Israel), known by the acronym Lehi or as…
Britain Seeks Special U.N. Panel on PalestineCIE+
April 2, 1947 The British government notifies the United Nations of its intent to bring the question of Palestine’s future before the next U.N. General Assembly. The United Kingdom also requests a special General Assembly…
Truman Delivers His DoctrineCIE+
In a speech delivered to a joint session of Congress, President Harry Truman outlines a new, decidedly anti-Soviet direction for American foreign policy.
Britain to Seek U.N. Help on PalestineCIE+
The British respond to rising violence in Mandatory Palestine by asking the United Nations to figure out what to do.
White Paper Didn’t Halt Land Sales, Report FindsCIE+
A Land Transfer Committee report reveals that Arabs in Palestine willingly continued to sell land to Zionists in the early 1940s despite the British legal prohibition on doing so.
Jewish Resistance Blows Up Rails Across PalestineCIE+
November 1, 1945 The newly formed Jewish Resistance Movement sets off explosions at more than 150 sites along the railway system of British Mandatory Palestine and blows up three British gunboats in the Jaffa and…
Harrison Report Confirms Deplorable Conditions of DP CampsCIE+
The Harrison Report, an inquiry into the conditions of displaced persons camps in occupied Germany, reveals that many of the rumors of poor treatment of Jews are indeed true and that “we appear to be treating the Jews as the Nazis treated them, except that we do not exterminate them.”
Bergen-Belsen Is LiberatedCIE+
April 15, 1945 The British 11th Armored Division liberates the Nazis’ Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in northern Germany, discovering 60,000 starving prisoners, most of them seriously ill, and 13,000 unburied corpses. They are the remnants of…
Nazis Kill Palmach Paratrooper Haviva ReikCIE+
November 20, 1944 Haviva Reik and two other paratroopers from British Mandatory Palestine are among about 40 Jewish fighters executed by the Nazis after the suppression of an uprising in Slovakia. Reik, who was born…
Harold MacMichael Ends Term as High Commissioner of PalestineCIE+
Rattled by numerous attempts on his life, and fearing for the safety of his family, MacMichael steps down in August 1944.
U.S. Reveals It Will Not Bomb Nazi Death CampsCIE+
In a letter written to Leon Kubowitzki, head of the Rescue Department of the World Jewish Congress, US Assistant Secretary of War John J. McCloy states that the War Department would not order the bombing of Nazi Death Camps because they did not see it as a priority for US military resources.
U.S. Republican Convention Supports Jewish State in Palestine
At the 1944 Republican Party National Convention, New York Senator Thomas Dewey’s strong support for the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine captures the attention of Zionists in Palestine and, more notably, American Jewry.
Bermuda Conference Concludes Saving European Jews Is Not Feasible
A joint communiqué is issued, and it is clear that no widespread action to rescue Jews will be forthcoming. This bolsters the Zionist argument for a Jewish homeland.
Extraordinary Zionist Conference Begins at Biltmore Hotel in New YorkCIE+
The Biltmore Conference will set the framework for Zionist policy in the years during and after World War II.
Russian Sub Sinks Refugee Ship StrumaCIE+
After being mistaken as an enemy ship, the SS Struma, carrying nearly 800 Jewish refugees hoping to immigrate into Palestine, including 70 children, is sunk by a Russian submarine in the Black Sea.
Nazi Plan for “Final Solution” Is Drafted at Wannsee ConferenceCIE+
Nazis draw up a plan for the “Final Solution” of European Jewry in the Berlin suburb of Wannsee.
Louis Brandeis DiesCIE+
Louis Brandeis, retired United States Supreme Court Justice and celebrated American Zionist, passes away in Washington DC at the age of 84.
Munich Olympic Massacre Victim Yossef Romano Is BornCIE+
Weightlifter Yossef Romano, one of the eleven Israeli athletes murdered at the 1972 Munich Olympics, is born in Benghazi, Libya.
Mufti of Jerusalem Rejects Majority-Arab StateCIE+
The Mufti has enormous power in his hands, yet he chooses non-engagement with the British, who controlled Palestine.
Rambam Hospital Is EstablishedCIE+
December 22, 1938 The Rambam Health Care Campus opens as the British Government Hospital of Haifa and is hailed by the British high commissioner for Palestine, Harold MacMichael, as the “finest medical institution in the…
Kfar Ruppin Is FoundedCIE+
Kibbutz Kfar (Village) Ruppin is established under the framework of the “Tower and Stockade” movement in Zionism, which takes place primarily between 1936-1939.
British Parliament Debates Future of PalestineCIE+
In the midst of the 1936-1939 Arab revolt, a debate over British policy in Mandatory Palestine is held in the House of Commons.
Arab Congress Rejects PartitionCIE+
At the conclusion of a four-day conference in Cairo, Egypt, Arab leaders adopt the Resolutions of the Inter-Parliamentary Congress. The conference and resolutions are a response to the British Peel Commission Report of 1937.
