ARAB-JEW BATTLES

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22618, 22 April 1948, Page 5

ARAB-JEW BATTLES

PALESTINE VIOLENCE ASSAULT ON CONVOY JERUSALEM, April 20. Violent incidents continued throughout Palestine today, and Jews, Arabs and British troops were among the wounded and killed. Arabs attacked a Jewish convoy of 200 vehicles which had brought food into Jerusalem. The attack started as the convoy began its return journey to Tel Aviv. Numbers of vehicles were disabled before the Haganah (Jewish defence force) units drove the attackers into the mountains. The Haganah spokesman claimed that 100 Arabs were injured in the raid. He admitted that six Jews were killed and a number injured Arabs who held up a Post Office van in Allenby Square in Jerusalem stole 76 mail bags and forced Post Office employees to accompany them to the garden of Gethsemane where they later released them. Two British soldiers were killed and another injured when 20 Jews overpowered the crew of a Bren-gun carrier which was announcing a curfew in the Jaffa-Tel Aviv no-man’s-land. The Jews disappeared with the carrier towards Tel Aviv. Telephone communications in Palestine are deteriorating daily. Jerusalem, Haifa and Tel Aviv were cut off from each other today. The Palestine Government press censorship ends d'n April 30 and will be replaced by a Haganah censorship of local publications. Sixty Jews were killed in fighting for the frontier post of Heni Yushe on the Syrian border which the Arabs occupied yesterday after British police had evacuated it. Six hundred Jews tried to rush the barbed wire defences. The Arabs fought them off and called up reinforcements. Jews and Arabs today started fighting in Safed for strategic buildings in the town. The Arabs are reported to have occupied a school and a hotel. Heavy fighting is also reported to be going on in Tiberias where Arab Legion troops have arrived.