Word: altalena
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...Minister as well as Prime Minister and shrewdly defended his fledgling country on four fronts. At the same time, he prevented civil war by ordering Israeli soldiers to fire if the Jewish terrorist organization Irgun Zvai Leumi (National Military Organization) attempted to land weapons for itself from the freighter Altalena in defiance of a Ben-Gurion order that "there shall be one army, one nation, one people." The Urgun, headed by present Knesset Opposition Leader Menahem Begin, backed down and obeyed Ben-Gurion...
...nosed in toward the shores of Israel. She called herself the Altalena now, and aboard were 750 supporters of the terrorist Irgun Zvai Leumi and enough weapons and ammunition (so the Irgun boasted) to arm a brigade of 6,000. In defiance of the U.N. truce and of the Israeli government, the Irgun intended to land the arms...
...terrorists got part of their arms ashore at Kfar Vitkin. But in the fight they lost six killed, 20 wounded, while Haganah suffered two dead, three wounded. Beigin boarded the ship, ordered it southward. At midnight the Altalena rammed on to the beach at Tel Aviv for another attempt. When noon came, an assault boat with a few steel-helmeted Irgunists ventured toward the beach, and despite Haganah fire set up a small beachhead. But when Haganah turned mortar fire on the Altalena, and smoke began to pour out amidships, the rest of the Irgunists jumped over the sides, swam...
...Down ..." Correspondents and U.N. observers had been watching from deck chairs on the balcony of the beachside Kaete Dan Hotel. Many departed hastily, expecting the Altalena to blow up. Other civilians were evacuated from the waterfront. But boxes of ammunition went off without serious damage. Next morning the Altalena was a smoldering hull...
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