The Real Exodus [the ship]

Guardian ^ | 6-30-07

[SJackson]

When the tale of Jewish illegal immigrants sailing for Palestine was turned into a bestselling book and film, it came to symbolise the birth of a nation. But was the story true? Sixty years on, Linda Grant separates fact from fiction

On the terrace of an Italian restaurant in a small town in central Israel, two men have had a good lunch and, over coffee, start to reminisce about events 60 years earlier. "Remember how we nearly missed the ship because I couldn't find the ticket to get my cleaning out of the Chinese laundry?" one says. "And that trip we tried to take to Montreal until we got a message to go back to Baltimore?" says the other. The memories come flooding back: of the crew member who turned up at the pier in a chauffeur-driven limo, dressed in a captain's suit; the ship's chef who gave up a radio cookery show to join the voyage. The other diners are oblivious to the identity of the frail old man who lights yet another cigarette and then fixes the listener, his friend Avi Livney, with piercing eyes. He is 83-year-old Ike Aronowitz, former captain of the illegal immigrant ship Exodus. Who would recognise him? He is known to the world in an entirely different incarnation: as the blond, blue-eyed Paul Newman, who played Aronowitz in Otto Preminger's 1960 film Exodus, based on Leon Uris's blockbuster novel of the same name.

[Darksheare]

Ah.. the Guardian.
Love the use of their words ‘illegal immigrant’ to describe the return of Jews to their homeland.

[SJackson]

If you'd like to be on this middle east/political ping list, please FR mail me.

High Volume. Articles on Israel can also be found by clicking on the Topic or Keyword Israel. or WOT [War on Terror]

----------------------------

The real story would have made for a good read too, most of them made it to Israel eventually. There was a second ship Exodus as well.

As the ship neared the Palestine coast, it found itself hemmed in by British destroyers. Harel said the point had been made and they should give in. "He didn't want us to resist the British," Aronowitz says. "He wanted us to surrender. But most of the passengers were more courageous and had more guts than any of us - they had seen terrible things." Aronowitz rebelled. The crew had prepared plans to repel the British soldiers by placing nets over the deck, but they didn't have time to get them out when the surprise raid took place at midnight on July 18 and they resorted to throwing cans of kosher corned beef at the boarding party. There were three casualties: two passengers - one a 16-year-old boy, shot in the face, according to a witness - and one of the young crew, Bill Bernstein, who was clubbed to death with a rifle butt. He died in Aronowitz's bunk.

The battle with the British was not only played out on radio and in the newsreels. Representatives of the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine (Unscop) had been sent to Haifa as observers. The brutal treatment of the Exodus's passengers had become a powerful propaganda tool in the Zionist campaign, but in Jaffa, 15-year-old Hasan Hammami, the son of a wealthy Arab businessman, watched and listened with foreboding: "I remember seeing pictures of the Exodus as it was being towed into port in Haifa. Its pictures were in the papers. I remember clearly the news about this and other illegal immigrant ships. Most were regularly reported on the official radio station, which broadcast in Arabic and was located less than half a mile from our house.

"The mood was one of sorrow for the poor, weak, hungry Jews who had come from European concentration camps, and of the condition they'd been driven to," Hammami says. "But it was mixed with fear of being overrun by European Jewish immigrants. There was bewilderment and anger - why were they being sent to Palestine, given all this aid to settle in a land that did not belong to the power that was admitting them and that they did not own?"

All the passengers were forcibly disembarked at Haifa - the crew had hiding places on board and were able to slip away and evade arrest. The rest were loaded on to three British ships, imprisoned in cages and returned to Europe. On arrival in France, they refused to disembark and after three weeks at Port-de-Bouc, amid worldwide publicity, British foreign secretary Ernest Bevin took what seems now the inconceivable step of returning them to Hamburg, where they were re-incarcerated in refugee camps. It was a PR catastrophe. "Back to the Reich," one US newspaper put it. "Return to the death land," said another. "If there is an Almighty," Aronowitz says, "he sent us Ernest Bevin in order to create a Jewish state."

The story of the voyage of the Exodus ended there. The ship remained in Haifa harbour until 1952, when it caught fire and burned to the waterline; the hulk was towed to Shemen beach.

Jewish DPs from Exodus (ship) were sent to Germany aboard the prison ship Runnymede Park. In protest they painted a swastika on the Union Jack. This photo by Ruth Gruber became the Life magazine photo of the week.

[SJackson]

The illegal thing going on was the Brit’s refusal to honor their obligations under the Mandate.

[Darksheare]

Ah.
I forgot about that part.
*D’uh!*

[massgopguy]

My friend’s uncle Frank Levine of Medford MA was the radio man in the original crew. This ship was lucky. The other exodus ship was towed to the Black Sea where the Soviets torpedoed it and killed everyone on it.

[Spok]

“the crew member who turned up at the pier in a chauffeur-driven limo, dressed in a captain’s suit”

They are, after all, all filthy rich. Hitler told us that. /sarc

[Darksheare]

Guess what isn’t taught in history class anymore?

[Non-Sequitur]

Love the use of their words ‘illegal immigrant’ to describe the return of Jews to their homeland.

From the British point of view they were.

[Darksheare]

Yeah, I got reminded of that bit of history.

And history has ALOT to remember and keep in mind.

[Sherman Logan]

Not to mention the Arab POV.

[Sherman Logan]

Love the use of their words ‘illegal immigrant’ to describe the return of Jews to their homeland.

You do realize this is exactly the way many Mexicans view their "illegal immigration" into this country?

[Darksheare]

Yes.

[Darksheare]

Deleted most of my post..
*snort*

Was wondering if that was what the Guardian was tiltawhirling at.
Didn’t bother to see the entire article.
Was stuck by the use of the word, especially in light of the Jews heading home.

[Just another Joe]

I saw that the author got in some sympathy for the "palestinians" also, stating that they were driven from their homes.

That's BS!
They were told to leave by their Arabic masters. Jews begged them to stay and take part in rebuilding what had been destroyed during the Jewish War for Independence.

They trusted their Arabic master's word that they could come back in about three weeks and take over what they Jewish people had owned also.

Too bad, so sad, they weren't driven out, they left VOLUNTARILY.
No "Right of Return" should exist for any 'palestinian'.

[SJackson]

You do realize this is exactly the way many Mexicans view their "illegal immigration" into this country?

Yes, they view the border as invalid, just as the British viewed the British Mandate as invalid.

Give the Mexicans credit for being honest in their duplicity vis a vis the Brits.

[VOA]

This ship was lucky. The other exodus ship was towed to the Black Sea
where the Soviets torpedoed it and killed everyone on it.

Now there's an under-reported story of The Workers' Paradise
(aka, "The Evil Empire")

[Non-Sequitur]

Not to mention the Arab POV.

Everybody is somebody's illegal immigrant.

[SJackson]

I saw that the author got in some sympathy for the "palestinians" also, stating that they were driven from their homes...That's BS!...They were told to leave by their Arabic masters. Jews begged them to stay and take part in rebuilding what had been destroyed during the Jewish War for Independence.

True for probably 70% to 75%, some fled in fear. Though they could have returned.

BTW, during the Mandate years they were called Arabs, which came in two varieties, peaceful Arabs and the Mufti's killers. The palestinians were the Jews. Though not historically accurate, those are two points the book/movie bring out.

[Sherman Logan]

The Mayflower Pilgrims were illegal immigrants from the POV of the natives. Cortez certainly was according to the Nahuatl.