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They’d be returned to the camp on Cyprus where the British had crammed in thirty thousand Jews, all survivors of the Holocaust and all with only one goal: to reach Palestine.
The mosque’s golden dome shone in the morning sun, above the rock upon which Abraham had nearly sacrificed his son.
Hana knew what everyone in Palestine knew. If the British left, it could only mean more violence.
“One can hardly blame the Arabs,” he continued. “I mean, they’ve been living here for centuries, and now here come the Jews and say: this is our homeland, it says so in the Bible, so you better make room for us.”
“We Jews in Europe, we just learned firsthand what violence means,” Judith blurted. “We were victims. Must we now be perpetrators? Shouldn’t we be the very ones who are most committed to finding a peaceful solution?”
Everyone knew that the event taking place some six thousand miles from here would change their lives, one way or another.
“There will be war, no matter what they decide. The Arabs have already declared they won’t accept a partition of Palestine under any condition.
Didn’t refugees like her need a place where they belonged? Did the Jews always have to be a people with no right to their own homeland? Oppressed forever?
Should Palestine be divided into a Jewish and an Arab state, with the city of Jerusalem under international control?
Two-thirds of the fifty-six UN member states had to agree to the plan—a goal that was by no means certain.
“The United Nations General Assembly,” they heard over the speaker, “in a vote of thirty-three in favor, thirteen against, and ten abstentions, has decided to partition Palestine.”
Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth—that’s what the Torah said. But did Jews have the right to make this the doctrine for their struggle to found a new state?
Abbu Moussa had led the Arab uprisings in Palestine a decade earlier.
Now he had only one goal: preventing the Jews from founding their state on Palestinian land.
“The war against the Jews is about to start in a big way. And here in Qantara, you’ll meet some men who used to fight alongside us. We Germans are in great demand as instructors. As you can see, there’s plenty to be done.”
But Aaron had an important mission. He wasn’t only the Jewish spy in this training camp—he was also the liaison between Fritz and the Haganah.
His sister had survived Germany. How could he let her end up in danger again? He needed to warn her, he needed to make sure that she left Palestine immediately.
a decisive battle between Jews and Arabs was imminent, and it would be a bloody one.
“They attack us, we strike back. We must fight this battle. It’s now or never. It’s our only chance, we must take it.”
“Don’t be so naive. And stop playing the victim. The Holocaust is over, you hear me? When they try to kill us, we have to defend ourselves.
“If they think they’re going to drive us from this city this way, they’re
wrong. Jerusalem belongs to us, just as it has for three thousand years.”
Why fight? she thought. For what? For a piece of land? A piece of land that was still half stones and thornbushes even after months of hard work?
Since al-Husseini’s return, the Arabs’ will to fight had intensified. He’d given them courage and a clear goal: encircle the Holy City and starve the Jews.
What more had to happen for it to be clear to everyone that Jews and Arabs could never, ever coexist equally. Not in Palestine. Not in Jerusalem.
The British were withdrawing from this city of three world religions in two large columns: one headed north, passing Ramallah and on to the port of Haifa, and the other to the south toward Egypt.
To whom does Jerusalem belong? And who is right when it comes to a just resolution to the Middle East conflict?
Even the founding of Israel itself began with a war. This was the direct consequence of the 1947 United Nations decision that divided the British Mandate between Jews and Arabs.
The Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem, founded by and largely maintained by Jews from the United States, was then and remains now an island of humanity amid a sea of mistrust and hostility.
