Israeli War of Independence:
The Battle For Jerusalem
(1947 - 1948)
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On November 29, 1947, the United Nations approved a plan to partition the country. A day later, while Jews in Jerusalem as in all parts of the country were still celebrating the resolution that effectively established a Jewish state, Arab mobs attacked the Jewish commercial center near Jaffa Gate. The Haganah tried to defend the site, but the Arabs, under British protection, destroyed the center. The War of Independence had begun.
Jerusalem was totally isolated from other Jewish settlement centers in the country, surrounded by numerous Arab villages and still subject to British rule which, though ostensibly neutral, in fact, tended to side with the Arabs. Haganah forces fought valiantly in every Jewish neighborhood and area. The Arab Legion from Trans-Jordan, under British command, was poised on the outskirts of the city, ready to join the battle for Jerusalem.
Jewish Jerusalem fought for its life for more than half a year. War raged not only all around, but deep inside. Two bombs, one at the National Institutions and the other on Ben Yehuda Street, took their toll of casualties. Jerusalem was cut off from the rest of the country, and Haganah forces had to break through in large convoys engaged in bloody battles. The siege tightened. It was time for Jerusalem's "protective belt" - the agricultural villages established on its outskirts on JNF land - to prove themselves.
Through the winter of 1948 Atarot and Neveh Yaacov in the north withstood recurrent attack. Transportation was conducted under battle and there were casualties. Upon the establishment of the State of Israel and the invasion of the Arab Legion, they could no longer hold out, and the settlements were abandoned under cover of night. Atarot and Neveh Yaacov were conquered by the Jordanians and remained under Jordanian rule until the reunification of the city in June 1967.
In the southwest, Jewish Jerusalem was defended by the small border neighborhood of Makor Haim, which faced large Arab villages, including Malha and Beit Tzafafa. Makor Haim was far from the city's other Jewish neighborhoods, and the road to it passed though Arab areas. Haganah forces took up position there, withstood attack and shelling, used it as a base for counter attack and prevented infiltration from this direction. The staunch war fought by Makor Haim stands out in the annals of Jerusalem under siege.
Kibbutz Ramat Rahel stood at the southern and southwestern entrance to the city. Flanked by the neighborhoods of Talpiot and Arnona, it defended the city on the southern front against numerous Arab forces from Hebron and Bethlehem.
Upon the British departure from the city at the conclusion of the Mandate, Haganah forces captured various neighborhoods and centers in the new city. On that day, May 14, 1948, the Arab Legion, accompanied by armored corps, began to advance on Jerusalem from the north and the east, while Egyptian forces made their way up from the south, based themselves at Bethlehem and attempted to break through to Jerusalem to join up with the Jordanian forces in the heart of the city. The Jordanians, advancing from the north, cut off access to Mt. Scopus and moved into the city. The points at which they were stopped by Haganah forces were to delineate the border between Israeli and Jordanian Jerusalem for 19 years: Mandelbaum Gate in the north and the Notre Dame Church opposite the Old City walls.
At the same time, an Egyptian armored column set out from Bethlehem to try to break through northwards. At the boundary of Jerusalem it was stopped by the defenders at Ramat Rahel. The Egyptians shelled the kibbutz for several days, succeeding in breaking through and forcing the defenders to retreat. Palmah reinforcements were called in, soldiers of the Fifth Brigade, who, together with the Ramat Rahel defenders, recaptured the kibbutz on May 22. The Egyptians in the west and south, and the Jordanians in the east, from the direction of the Judean Desert, for days shelled the city in waves, but were unsuccessful and retreated south, along the Hebron Road, in order to reinforce the areas they held in the foothills.
Ramat Rahel had stopped the assault on Jerusalem from the south.
Sources: Shmuel Even-Or Orenstein, “A Crown for Jerusalem,” JNF, 1996.
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