British Mandate: A Survey of Palestine: Supplement - Page 83

Dafne settlement discovered by accident 12 rifles of foreign manufacture. The inhabitants became hostile and prevented the police from seizing the arms. A collective fine of £P.400 was imposed on the settlement when the committee refused to hand the arms over to the authorities. An interesting feature is that, at that time, the settlement contained 200 inhabitants, with a Jewish supernumerary police force of 2 N.C.Os. and 20 constables armed with 35 Government rifles and two Greener guns.

(ii) During large scale operations on the 29th June, 1946, military and police searched Mesheq Y agur settlement near Haifa. The search lasted a week and disclosed twenty-one caches containing arms and twelve empty caches concealed with great ingenuity in various parts of the settlement. The articles seized included 10 machine guns, 325 rifles, 1 anti-tank rifle, 78 pistols, 96 mortars, 5,267 mortar bombs, 41 Verey pistols and 1,206 cartridges, 5,017 grenades, 800 lbs. of explosives, 425,000 rounds of small arms ammunition, 1,085 ballistic cartridges, 1,404 assorted magazines and 62 bayonets. In addition, large quantities of weapons spare parts and accessories, British uniforms and equipment were discovered.

(iii) A search of Doroth and Ruhama settlements in the Beersheba area by military and police on 28th August, 1946, led to the seizure of 2 machine guns, 20 sub-machine guns, 3 rifles, 20 pistols, 2 mortars, 14,928 rounds of small arms ammunition, 106 assorted magazines, 700 shotgun cartridges, 10 bombs, 44 grenades, 5 mines, 24 explosive charges, 25 bayonets and large quantities of weapon spare parts, accessories, British uniforms and equipment, two war transmitters, signalling apparatus, field telephones and numerous maps, military training manuals, and documents covering illegal training. Many caches and arms containers in various parts of the settlements were found to be empty.

(iv) The accidental discharge of a machine' gun in a flat in Tel Aviv in June, 1943, led to the discovery of an Irgun arms cache. A German heavy machine gun, 11 pistols, 607 cartridges, 13 grenades, 2lbs. of gelignite, numerous explosive articles and items of equipment including notes on the use of firearms and bombs were found concealed in the room in which the discharge took place. One of the documents examined proved to be an inventory of another arms cache called "District Store No. 29- 15.10.42", which apparently contained 116 pistols, 4 rifles, 29 spare barrels, 63 bombs, 59 kilogrammes of gun cotton, 970 detonators, 200 metres of fuse, and 44,198 rounds of ammunition.

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