"Beit Gidi", the 1947-1948 Etzel Museum in Tel Aviv

On the border of Tel Aviv and Jaffa are the ruins of an old house overlooking the beach and the Mediterranean Sea, with an incongruous black cube rising from its remnants. This is the Etzel Museum, also known as "Beit Gidi". It is dedicated to fighters of the Etzel organisation, better known as the Irgun in English, a Jewish militant organisation that operated in Mandate Palestine between 1931 and 1948. Along with the nearby Hassan Bek mosque, the ruins are one of just two structures that remain from Manshiyya, formerly the northernmost neighbourhood of Jaffa. The house was built in 1900 by a Jewish businessman who came to build his home in Israel. In 1914 he travelled to Russia for business and was killed during World War I. Arabs from Jaffa then used the building for residential, industrial and commercial needs.

The Etzel, whose emblem is a hand holding a rifle over the whole of Palestine and Transjordan, fought for the realisation of the idea of establishing a Jewish state in the Land of Israel. The organisation was established in 1931 as an offshoot of the older and larger Jewish paramilitary organisation, the Haganah. They retaliated against attacks by Arabs on the Jewish population and rebelled against the British government's White Paper policy that imposed restrictions on Jewish emigration to Palestine.

In 1947, the UN resolution divided mandatory Palestine into a Jewish and an Arab state. The Arabs began terror attacks against the Jews throughout the country. Jaffa was the largest Arab city in the country, so the Tel Aviv-Jaffa residents suffered greatly. Worse yet, the hostile city in the middle of the Jewish state made it impossible to create a stable state.
The Etzel's leadership saw Jaffa as a great problem, especially because of its proximity to Tel Aviv. Jaffa's residents were specifically targeted by the Etzel and the Lehi, or Stern Gang, another extremist organisation. In one case, Etzel operatives dropped a barrel bomb from a vehicle on a busy avenue that rolled down the street and it blew up outside a café, killing 6. In another, Lehi militants exploded a car bomb that destroyed Jaffa's old town hall, killing 28. These strikes were denounced as acts of terrorism. Jaffa's upper and middle classes began to flee, leaving behind an increasingly desperate situation as the city's economy faltered.
In April 1948 Amichai 'Gidi' Faglin, in whose memory the Etzel Museum is dedicated, led the Etzel's operations against Jaffa and, as the museum's displays indicate, Jaffa was bombarded into submission. Some 40,000 residents of the city fled, in addition to the 20,000 that had already left. More would flee by boat in the following days, until, along with the casualties, only 3,000 to 5,000 residents remained in Jaffa, out of a population of 70,000 to 80,000.

It must be noted that at this time Albert Einstein, among others, denounced the Etzel as a terrorist, right-wing, chauvinist organisation in an open letter to The New York Times.

"Beit Gidi", the 1947-1948 Etzel Museum, focuses on the battle to liberate Jaffa and as well as other battles that Etzel members fought in during the 1947-8 War of Independence. It is dedicated to the memory of the 41 Etzel fighters who fell during the conquest of Jaffa and their operations officer, Amichai 'Gidi' Faglin.

The first part of the museum deals with the organisational structure of the Etzel. A map of Israel according to the UN partition resolution of 29th November 1947 is displayed on one wall. Another electronic map, along with documents and photographs, shows Etzel positions, attacks and raids during 1947 and 1948, including the infamous attack on the village of Deir Yassin in the Jerusalem corridor.

Another section of the museum concentrates on the Altalena affair. The Etzel's armaments-carrying ship had embarked from the port of Marseilles. Upon arrival at the shore of the newly-founded State of Israel, David Ben-Gurion's demands that the armaments be handed over to the unified Jewish forces were refused. An attack on the ship was ordered, and a massive explosion set off by a shell destroyed the ship and cargo. A large encased flag of Israel, above, flown on the deck of the Altalena, hangs on the wall. In the accompanying text one reads that the flag was saved minutes before the ship blew up, an Etzel fighter risking life and limb in an effort to rescue it.

One exhibit is dedicated to the taking of the Wadi Nisnas Arab neighbourhood in Haifa - in present times the venue for an annual co-existence festival of art, music and culinary delights held during the month of the Chanukah, Christmas and Ramadan holidays.

After the establishment of the state, the Etzel fighters were integrated into the newly-formed Israel Defence Forces (IDF), in an agreement signed by the Etzel's commander-in-chief Menachem Begin and the government of Israel. But even after the agreement was signed, there remained a great deal of bitterness between Begin and Ben-Gurion. Begin founded a new political party, Herut, which he later merged with other right-wing parties in 1973 to form the Likud, the same party that Benjamin Netanyahu leads today.

* This post has been shared on My Corner of the World, Little Things Thursday, The Weekend Link Up, All Seasons, Sharon's Souvenirs, Wordless Wednesday (on Tuesday), Our World Tuesday, Tuesday's Treasures and Travel Tuesday.