SPECIAL FROM ARUTZ
7:
The Jewish Community of Hevron marked the 70th anniversary of
the 1929
pogrom, in which 67 Jews were slaughtered by their Arab neighbors, at a
public ceremony on Sunday, August 1, 1999.
Survivors and descendants of victims of the carnage were present, as well as rabbis and
public figures.
The massacre destroyed the Hevron Jewish community and shook the
entire Jewish "yishuv" in pre-State Palestine at the time. Though these
riots
were foreshadowed by earlier attacks in 1920 and 1921, the country-wide
scope of the riots in 1929 surpassed the previous ones in severity.
Fortunately, an early formation of the 'Hagana' defense forces
prevented
the massacre of the Jews of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Haifa, as well as
holding at bay thousands of Arabs who had come to kill the Jews of Hulda.
The riots brought about the long-time existence of the Jewish
community of
Gaza City, when local Arabs threatened the Jews there and caused their
emergency evacuation by British forces. The Hagana had not yet made its
presence felt in Hevron, the Galilee city of Tsfat, or the Jerusalem-area
community of Motza, and all three of these, especially Hevron, suffered
heavy losses.
Attorney Elyakim Ha'etzni, a Kiryat Arba resident and a student of history
of the era, told Arutz-7 that two main population sectors were seriously shaken by the
massacres:
"The first group shocked by the murders was the 'Old Yishuv,'
Jews who
were either anti-Zionist or were not part of the pro-Zionist camp.
According to their own accounts, these Jews had been living
peacefully with
their Arab neighbors in Hevron for generations, and had even received
promises from them that nothing bad would happen to them. The Jews were convinced
that the murderous Arab opposition was aimed only at the Zionists and Zionism, and they
never prepared any defense against this violence, thinking that they were not part of the
dispute. They also did not wish to upset the Arabs by giving them the impression
that they didn't trust them."
"The second group traumatized by the massacres," continued Haetzni, "was
the Zionists. The depth of their trauma can only be appreciated by
studying the Zionist ethos of that period. The Zionists believed that as
soon as a Jew set his foot on this soil, new rules would apply to him.
The Zionists felt that the conditions of the exile simply did
not apply here. But if you compare the accounts of the 1929 Arab massacre of Jews
in Hevron to the accounts of the Kishinev pogroms 25 years earlier, you will be
startled by the parallels. The fact that a pogrom could take place here,
simply did not jibe with the Zionist worldview…"
Seventy years have
passed since the 1929 massacre of 67 Jews in the Hevron Jewish community. One of the
survivors is Rabbi Dov Cohen, who was 17 at the time.
Arutz-7 spoke with him about the tragic events: |
Arutz-7: What were you doing at the time of the massacre?
RC: I was a yeshiva student learning at the Yeshiva of
Hevron, Knesset
Yisrael - Slobodka.
Arutz-7: Prior to the massacre were there signs of what was about to happen?
RC: Until that time, in Hevron, the Jews lived in peace and
quiet with the
Arabs. There was tension in the country for a whole a week or two before
the massacre. Not only in Hevron, but all over the country, although in
Hevron it was a bit worse. As I said, relations with our Arab neighbors,
prior to that night, were very good. After a day of studies, the yeshiva
boys used to go for long walks on the outskirts of the city even very late
at night, and feared nothing...
Arutz-7: Did the Arabs also attack the yeshiva in Hevron on the night of
the massacre?
RC: Not exactly. Allow me to explain: On
Friday, Arab youths started to
throw rocks at us in our part of the city. Late that afternoon, a young
student named Shmuel Rosenholtz went to the yeshiva before the rest of the
students. He was there alone, and some time later, Arab rioters broke into
the yeshiva and murdered him. After Shabbat began, we were informed that Shmuel had
been murdered, and that he was lying dead [in the study hall]. We were instructed not to
go to the yeshiva over Shabbat.
Anyhow, that night, the son of Rabbi Slonim, who was the manager of what
later became Bank Le'umi, went from house to house, telling people that,
upon his father's instructions, whomever was concerned for his own safety
could stay in his home. Rabbi Slonim was highly-regarded in the community and even
had a gun. I was personally not so worried about the danger, and so I did not go to
the Slonim home, although many people did. In the course of that Shabbat, the Arabs
murdered more people in that house than anywhere else.
On Shabbat morning, almost the entire Jewish population gathered at the
Police Station, Beit Romano. Everyone recounted what had happened in his home the
previous night. We prayed the morning service. There was no Torah there from which
to read, just a Bible. After completing the Musaf
service, we prepared to recite the Kiddush. All of a sudden, we began
hearing noises outside the building; masses of Arabs were gathering on the
streets outside of the police station. I looked out the window, and saw
that thousands of Arabs were descending from Har Hevron to the valley below - all
shouting, "Itbach el Yahud!" ("Kill the Jews!") At one point, some of
them tried to break down the door of the police station. [Ed. note: The
survivors remained in Beit Romano for three days. The Arabs rampaged their houses,
and destroyed their property. A religious quorum of 10 men was allowed to
participate in the funeral for the murdered Jews, held at night, in the ancient Jewish
cemetery in the city. The surviving Jews were taken to Jerusalem - exiled from their
homes, the city of the Patriarchs. For the first time in hundreds of years, Hevron had no
Jewish residents.]
Arutz-7: What do you think today of the Jewish settlement in Hevron?
RC: I am very happy ...but I am still sad that we
were exiled from Hevron,
I still have a heavy heart when I think of it. When there wasn't a Jewish
community there at all, it was painful. It is a little bit of a consolation
[that a Jewish community exists there today]...but it is still impossible
for Jews to reach certain neighborhoods where we used to live...
Arutz-7: There is a portion of the Israeli population that believes that
Jews there are guilty of harming the relations with the Arabs.
RC: Why? The Jews have no right to live there? The Jews, who were
bequeathed the city from the patriarchs? And who lived there hundreds of
years?
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