When "Palestine Resistance" Was All Jewish

Here is an archival document of the US Palestine Resistance Committee from 1947. The "resistance" then, of course, was that undertaken by the armed underground forces of the Irgun and the Lechi.

In September 1939, despite Hagana and Irgun attacks against the British Mandatory regime in Mandate Palestine following the publication of the White Paper policy statrement that, in effect, subverted the decision of the Leasgue of Nations to reconstitute the Jewish national home, a cease-fire was declared. This was due to the outbreak of World War II when both Jabotinsky and Ben-Gurion decided that the war in Europe deserved primary attention. Avraham Stern broke away in June 1940 to continue the war for liberation and with Menachem Begin's arrival, the Irgun launched its revolt in February 1944. For a short period between late October 1945 and July 1946, the Hagana joined the urban guerilla campaign and the United Hebrew Resistance was formed.

The document deals with the resignation of an activist who felt that the main Bergson group, the American League for a Free Palestine, should be devoting more energy and participation and support for the actual armed operations in the Palestine Mandate against the British occcupation.

Note, too, the name Y. Ben-Ami, Jeremy (of J Street) Ben-Ami's father as well as the many public figures who aligned themselves with active Jewish resistance in the fight for freedom:-

When "Palestine" was Jewish through and through.

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