SECRET LANDING

Evening Star, Issue 25676, 27 December 1945, Page 5

SECRET LANDING

JEWS ENTER PALESTINE SCHOONER TRANSPORT FOUNDERS ON BEACH (Rec. 11.10 a.m.) HAIFA, Dee. 26. Several hundred Jewish refugees from Europe were landed clandestinely from the motor schooner Hanah Seneth on the Nahariah Beaeh ? eight miles south of the Lebanese frontier. They dispersed inland without incident. Reuter’s correspondent at Haifa says the Hanah Benesh foundered when approaching the shore early last night, and was discovered this morning on the beach lying on her side at the Jewish holiday colony of Nahariah. The only signs of the clandestine landing of the Jewish immigrants were a number of United States Air Force “Mae Wests” and a blue and white banner (the Jewish national colours), with the newly-printed inscription: “ This boat has disembarked immigrants here with the help of the Jewish Resistance Movement. May this boat remain as a memorial to the 6.000,000 brothers and sisters who died hi Europe, and as a token of our accusation against the British Government.”

The correspondent adds that apparently . the vessel had been spotted by a British aeroplane on Christmas Eve after a fortnight at sea. It managed to slip away and elude the close patrol of two destroyers and a number of police boats as well as the. coastal searchlights. The landing point, however, had to he changed at the last minute, and there were no small boats ready to take off the immigrants. The Hanah Senesh had to come close to the shore, and foundered. Stevedores from Hagana constructed a rope bridge and all the passengers got ashore safely. The Jewish defence organisation at Hagana claimed that it did not assist the landing. ,