“Mr. Mizrahi, I assume that you have practical steps in mind?”
“Indeed we do, General. We think that for the good of the future world the British Empire has to be preserved, at least for a while. It will have to be dissolved eventually, but the dissolution can be beneficial for everyone – including Britain. Colonies have to gain independence. It is our belief that if they are prepared for it and are granted it instead having to fight, both Britain and the colonies will gain and there will be a potential for a more peaceful world. We are not prophets and we may be wrong, but it makes no sense to repeat the mistakes that were made in our time. Please convey this message to Mr. Churchill. We are being open about our plans for the future and expect an open and truthful British policy in return.”
“I would like to go back to the original reason for your visit,” Wilson said. “How soon can the undersupply of cannon be remedied?”
“The rate of supply dropped by only 10%,” Mizrahi said, “and if your troops had been using their tanks efficiently you wouldn’t even notice the change. The problem is that your army has only a vague idea of how to use armor. As a result, Rommel - who is an expert in armor warfare - is beating you even though you have better weapons. The theories he is using were proposed by one of your own Liddell Hart, in the 1920s. His ideas were rejected by your establishment and the same establishment has only a foggy idea of how to implement them. The Germans adopted his ideas and developed them, which is what makes Rommel so dangerous, besides his personal talent, of course.
“If we increase the supply of cannon, you will keep losing tanks at an unacceptable rate and Rommel will come close to Cairo, or even take it, as this time-line is different from ours and there is no guarantee that history will repeat and hand you a victory.”
“Actually I am one of the few military supporters of Liddell Hart. You are right though that the establishment rejected him. I assume that you have a proposal,” Wilson said.
“Yes, we have a solution. We will establish, with your written agreement, a number of bases in the Sinai where we’ll train your commanders in what we call combined arms operations. In the end, it will be much more effective than just increasing the supply of cannon.” Mizrahi leaned back in his seat and relaxed. It was up to Churchill to make a decision, though the way the options were presented gave him little choice. Mizrahi assumed that if he persuaded General Wilson, Churchill would accept the General’s recommendation.
“How long would it take you to set up a training program, assuming that we agreed?”
“We can start training the first batch of officers in slightly over two weeks. We suggest running several parallel courses for different command levels and for different specialists. It will take somewhat longer to set up the full curriculum.” Mizrahi paused. “And it will take us a while to set up the shooting and maneuvering ranges. I think that we will have a full armor school running in about a month or so. That is, a month after the Foreign Office resolves to acquiesce to our modest requests.”
“Why not start immediately? From what I saw of your troops and equipment, you must have an advanced armor school. Why not use it now?” Wilson asked.
“There are a number of reasons,” Mizrahi paused for emphasis. “The main being that our trust in benign, or even rational, behavior on the part of the Foreign Office is extremely limited. The other is that our facilities are not designed to accommodate the number of trainees the British army will have to send us, and we would rather not have large, or even small, numbers of British military personnel in Israel. I am not sure we could guarantee their safety. Where we came from, Britain is not a very important power, a socialist country that is kowtowing to the Arabs and the left, making our relations, and our population’s attitude, somewhat unfriendly. As far as we are concerned, you have to prove to us that you are better than the Nazis, since history tells us otherwise. There is also a security concern: we don’t want large numbers of Britons realizing that we exist. Up to this moment you are the only Briton of this time that visited Israel. As long as the training is done in the Sinai by instructors that speak English, you will be able to sell your troops a reasonable story of who we are – that is if you think that any story is needed. Since most of our instructors speak English with a foreign accent you could pass them off as Americans or Russians or a mix of the two or somebody else all together.”
Wilson seemed to accept the open, undiplomatic, show of anti-British sentiment. Sometimes it was an advantage to talk to a military man and not directly to the Prime Minister. He sipped his tea for a while saying nothing.
“If this is how you feel, why are you helping us at all?” he asked finally.
Mizrahi hesitated for a moment. “General Wilson, you are not Jewish and have no idea what it is to be Jewish in this world. Both your country and the U.S. know about the plight of Jews under the Nazi regime. What have you done to help them? Did you try to bomb the railroads leading to the concentration camps? No, you are too busy bombing German cities. You have the resources to bomb Berlin from time to time, but not Dachau. Neither you nor the Americans, or anybody else for that matter, have even told the Nazis that genocide of Jews, Gypsies or any other group, is unacceptable. The message to the Germans is clear: do what you want - we don’t care. President Roosevelt sent a strong message when his administration refused to accept Jewish refugees. They sent them back to Germany. Britain had its opportunity in 1939. Opening Palestine to Jewish immigration would have saved Jewish lives and would have also told the Germans: ‘We care’. Instead you published and enforced the White Paper, and Jews were forced to stay in occupied Europe. Is this not being an accessory to murder?
“The only reason we are helping you is that the Germans, or rather the Nazis, are much worse. You are only an accessory to their murderous policies, and you will, in the history that we came from, become an accessory to the Arab’s attempt to murder the refugees that survive Hitler’s holocaust. Our judgment is that the world cares not a bit what happens to its Jews or any other group that is too weak to protect itself. Just remember the slaughter of Armenians by the Ottomans in the First World War. For this reason we will help those that are least offensive, but only as long as they behave like civilized human beings.”
The General looked somewhat shaken: “Mr. Mizrahi, I appreciate your candor. I have some things to say in Britain’s defense, but maybe we should postpone this conversation. I will let you know the Prime Minister’s decision as soon as possible. Some of the issues will have to be approved by parliament, which will take a while. I hope you can be patient.”
“General Wilson, it has been a pleasure discussing these issues with you. We are in no hurry, please take your time. We are a democracy and we know how democracies work.” Mizrahi shook the extended hand and left on his way to London.
***
The two young men that asked to be admitted to see Yitzhak Stern looked like typical Vilna residents, except for their bearing. There was a pride in their posture that their worn clothing and three day old beards could not suppress. Stern was careful of who was admitted to see him. It was a reasonable precaution. He was the leader of the left-wing Zionist youth movement Hashomer Hatzair in Vilnius and as such was the target of the Gestapo, who considered him a Communist. Though the Germans seemed to be leaving the Jews in peace, for now, you could never know what might happen next. For this reason Yitzhak urged his followers, of whom there were several thousand, to arm themselves and leave the ghetto for the forests to join the partisans there. Not many followed his advice. Obtaining firearms was next to impossible in a community that never favored armed resistance. Under the brief Soviet rule private ownership of firearms was outlawed, making guns scarce. The general hostility of the partisans didn’t help either. In the summer of 1941 there were not many partisans in the forests surrounding Vilnius. Some of them were Polish and Lithuanian units that killed Jews on sight. There were several small units of Soviet army soldiers trapped behind German lines – they sometimes accepte
d Jews. You had to be very lucky to meet one of the small bands of Jews hiding in the huge forest. Even then it was not safe: the Germans, Poles and Lithuanians all hunted them down.
“Who are you and why do you want to see Yitzhak?” the young man standing nonchalantly in the entrance to the inner courtyard of the house where Stern had his headquarters that day asked.
“We were sent from Palestine, by the Jewish Agency, to contact leaders in a number of communities in Lithuania. Stern is the first we are visiting.”
“Your names?”
“Yossel Lebovitz and Menachem Goldman.”
“Wait here.”
The young man was back in a couple of minutes: “Yitzhak will see you. I have to search you for weapons first.”
After the search he led the two inside the courtyard, into a narrow door and up several flights of a dark staircase. They entered an apartment filled with people, like every other space in the ghetto. They passed through several rooms before stopping in front of a door. Their guide knocked.
“Come in.” They entered the room. It was small, with a bed and a small table with four chairs. A young man with a head of wild hair sat at the table writing in a bound notebook. There was another burly young man sitting on one of the chairs.
“Please sit, I will be done in a moment.” The man with the wild hair, who they recognized as Yitzhak Stern, pointed to the vacant chairs. They sat, with their guide next to them. Yitzhak kept writing for a moment, apparently finishing a thought, then put down the pen and closed the notebook.
“Gershon tells me that you come from Palestine. How did you get here and why have you come?”
“It is a long story. Maybe it would be best if we tell it in chronological order,” Menachem, the older of the two guests smiled. “If you don’t mind - it will make more sense that way.”
“Go ahead.”
“As you know, the Yishuv has been pressuring the British for some time to lift the restrictions of the White Paper. After the recent fighting in Syria, when the Palmach gave them critical help, they started negotiating with us in earnest. It took a while, but we arrived at an agreement. I don’t know whether you can hear the BBC here, but a new White Paper was issued by the Foreign Office several weeks ago. Jews are now welcome to come to Palestine. The Germans agreed to move all the Jews under their control to Brindisi, Italy. From there British and German ships will transport them to Palestine. This is it in a nutshell.” Menachem smiled again. “Now it is up to us to convince our people to go.”
“Wait a minute. I have a number of questions. First: why would the Brits change their mind all of a sudden?”
“A number of reasons. They still have a problem with the Arabs, who despite the 1939 White Paper support Hitler and fight the Brits wherever they can. The other reason is that the Yishuv showed them that we are organized and can be of help. They realized that we can also cost them the Middle East if we rebel now. The British decided, wisely I think, that if the Yishuv is with them and is several million strong it will solve the Arab problem and be of help with the general war effort as well” Yossel, the other guest that responded.
“That sort of makes sense of sorts.” Stern was still dubious. “What about the Germans?”
“Ah, this is a bit sensitive,” Menachem said. “Do we have an absolute assurance of secrecy from all of you?”
“Yes,” Yitzhak looked at his companions, who nodded.
“Just so we have no misunderstandings, what I am going to tell you cannot leave this room. If it does, it will cost many thousands of Jewish lives.”
Everybody nodded.
“Our leadership sent an emissary to meet with a representative of Himmler. We offered him a deal: if they give us all of Europe’s Jews, we will declare independence in Palestine. The Nazis had plans for Europe’s Jews – you may have heard what was going on in Polish territories conquered by them in 1939 – and didn’t agree easily to give their Jews a safe haven in Palestine. We finally persuaded them that it would be a great bonus for them if the Jews left without their intervention. The troops and resources they are wasting now on guarding you will be freed for the war effort. An agreement was reached and we are ready to move everybody to Brindisi in Italy and from there to Palestine.”
“And when did that happen?” Yitzhak Stern was even more skeptical than before.
“We finalized our negotiations with the Germans at the end of June. Maybe you noticed their anti-Semitic propaganda stopped about then. That was part of our agreement. Also there have been no pogroms since then, and food supplies have stayed at reasonable levels.”
“How did you get here from Palestine?” the young man sitting next to Menachem wanted to know.
“We have an ID that was issued by the Palestinians that allows us to travel to any Jewish community in Europe.”
“Please show me.”
Menachem handed over his plastic ID card. It was closely examined by all three hosts and finally returned to him.
Yitzhak Stern was the first to speak. “If you don’t mind we will talk later about who exactly sent you here. I want to make sure you are who you say you are. But this is for later. Do you expect me to tell everybody to get on the next train that the Germans claim goes to Italy? Based only on your unlikely story? You know I can’t and won’t do that.”
“Wait a minute.” Yossel rose slightly from his chair. “We ask no such thing. We expect you to send volunteers, people you trust, on that first train. They will be free to inspect the facility and ascertain that it is indeed run by our people and that we are transporting everyone to Palestine, as promised. They can even go to Palestine. We will assure their return here within a week or so to report. Then you make your decision. In the worst case, if your emissaries don’t return, you will know not to trust the Germans’ promises and resist them.”
The interview went on for another hour or so. The visitors were interrogated on the situation in Palestine, who sent them, how did they get to Europe and other details. They apparently passed the test, since in the end Stern said: “I will give you the names of our delegation tomorrow. Come here at three in the afternoon.”
“I hope this will not disappoint you,” said Menachem, “but from here we are going to visit some of the other Zionist leaders, including the Revisionists. We want everyone to come home to Eretz Yisrael and will try to persuade even non-Zionists, Communists, Orthodox and all other Jews are welcome.”
***
Jacob’s mother was not at all happy about his connection with the Revisionists. In her opinion it wasn’t much better than his involvement with the Communists in 1937. The Polish authorities arrested him for that and he spent a couple of days in jail. They released him after he promised to abandon his connections. Mostly it was because his parents pleaded for him. Being a teenager the Polish police couldn’t do much anyway since his only crime was having been named by one of his friends. That experience didn’t make Jacob abandon his interest in politics. He analyzed his previous support of the Communists and decided that he was wrong. The party did not support him in jail and after his release he heard from them only once. They threatened him to keep quiet about their activities, of which he knew nothing anyway. When the Soviet Union signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact he decided that these people were not much better than the Nazis. Jacob was also suspicious of the left-wing Jewish organizations, like the Hashomer Hatzair and the Bund. They all seemed to share a similar ideology, and by now Jacob was deeply suspicious of Socialism.
There was one Zionist organization that appealed to him: the Revisionists. It was a movement led by Ze’ev Jabotinsky and decidedly not Socialist. They also thought that Jews must be able to use force and trained their followers in the use of weapons and self defense. Led by Jabotinsky, they taught that the land of Israel will belong to Jews only after having been fertilized with Jewish blood; in other words, nobody will give them a country out of the goodness of their heart, they will have to fight for it. Jabotinsky also pushed for the immediat
e establishment of a Jewish state. It was not a popular view and the movement was small. Most Jews in Vilnius, like everywhere else in Eastern Europe, did their best to make a living and not to annoy the authorities and their neighbors. Jacob finally decided to join the Revisionists after he attended a public appearance where Jabotinsky said: “You can walk with us on the right or with the others on the left. The only ones in the middle of the road are horses.”
Being somewhat stubborn and independent Jacob was not very popular with the Revisionist leadership in Vilna, but he was respected for his integrity, wisdom and ability to judge a situation beyond what it seemed to be. He was surprised at the weekly meeting of his cell when they were given the information brought by the Palestinians. He was asked, with another member, to volunteer for the first train to Italy. He was supposed to evaluate the truth in the Palestinian’s story and report back to the leadership.
***
The mid-July day was hot; the cattle cars parked at the Vilnius railway station radiated heat. Sergeant Bohdan Kovalenko, now costumed as a Jew, was in the large crowd waiting on the platform. Like everyone else, he carried a package with his belongings and talked in Yiddish.
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