JEW CONDEMNED TO DEATH

Rotorua Morning Post, Issue 5292, 3 January 1947, Page 5

JEW CONDEMNED TO DEATH

(Press Assn-

WAS BRITISH SOLDIER ANOTHER COMB-OUT OF TEL AVIV

-Rec. 9.S0 p.m.)

LONDON, Jan. 2. A British Military Court in Jerusalem to-day sentenced to death a 33-year-old Jew, Dov Gruner, for his part in an attack on the Ramat Gan police station on April 23, 1946. The British United- Press correspondent says Gruner, who was charged with possessing and ^rlischarging firearms, claimed the privileges of a prisoner of war. He refused to plead and sat in the dcck reading the Bible. Elahorate precautions were taken to guard the courthouse, in the former Italian Consulate building, whieh was surrounded by barbed wire and sandbags. Correspondents entering the building- were searched several times. The prosecution alleged that Gruner was a member of the Irgun Zvai Leumi. He served five years and six months with the British Army. The sentence is suhject to confirmation by the G.O.C., Palestine, LieutenantGeneral Sir Evelyn Barker. Gruner, when sentenced, exclaimed: "With fire and blood Judea has fallen; with live and blood it will rise." The Irgun Zvai Leumi's secret radio in Jerusalem to-day broadcast that "night attacks against British Army transport will be resumed." Strong forces of the Sixth Airhorne Division have begun to comb out Tel Aviv's slum quarter, known as the Yemenite Yineyard, says the British United Press correspondent. British Casualties in 1946 Pc-sts were' set up for questioning Jews, soms of whom were sent to brigade headquarters for further (iiiestioning. A curfew has been imposed, on Yemenite. -British casualties in Palestine from terrorism in 1946 were: — I olice, 35 killed, 28 wounded; Army and Air Force, 45 killed, 93 wounded. In addition, 300 British, Arab and j'ewish civilians were killed or wounded by terrorists. The Jewish Agency in Jerusalem has published a cablegram frc-m Agency leaders, Messrs Shertok and Sneh and Mrs. Golda Myerson, condemning the floggings of British soldiers whieh, they say, are "revolting brutality, deseerating the Jewish community's good name." The Zionist leader, Mr. David BenGurion, has issued a statement calling for consolidation of the Jewish "sccurity forces" in Palestine and expressing the* hope that Jewish co-operation with Britain will be resumed on a satisfaetory basis. The Mayor of Nathanya has pubHcly protested ahout the flogging of Major Brett and paid tribute to Major Brett's etforts to improve relations between the military and the populace. Seeking out Suspects Widespread searches are coptinuing for the men responsible for the floggings. At a "screening" of suspects, Major Brett identified one of the six Jews who flogged him. II e is to-uring" the holding centres where 49 special suspects have been . detained out of 2666 persons questioned. Mrs. Brett, who lives in Sutton, Surrey, told Reuter's that she had not yet been told by the War Office that her husband had been flogged by terrorists. She added that she could fiot understand the references in the reports that Major Brett's wife" was with him when he was kidnapped. Major Brett, who has two children, returned to Palestine only a few weeks ago, after leave. Abraham Mizrahi, one of the four members of the Irgun Zvai Leumi qaptured when their taxi attempted to crash a road hlock, has died of wounds. Reports from Tel Aviv say that a police offieer is missing. It is feared that he has been kidnapped by the Stern Gang, whose activities he previously helped to curb. Alleged Informer Escapes Jews, believed to he members of the Stern Gang, kidnapped Moshe Saadia, a 20-yeal"-old Jew, from his home in Tel Aviv, and later told his parents that he would be tried hy the gang's secret court, on a charge of being an informer for the British military authorities. Reuter's Jerusalem correspondent reports that Saadia later called at . the Tel Aviv police station. He said he had escaped from the trial. He*showed signs of severe injuries. and torture, and was admitted to hospital. The vice-president of the«Amerj^an •League for Free Palestne, Professor Smertenko, said that if the . immigration authorities detained him when he reached Britain as a result of the British Government's steps to exclude him from England, he would appeal to the United States Embassy in London as an American citizen.