JERUSALEM FREED.

Taranaki Daily News, 9 May 1918, Page 3

JERUSALEM FREED.

LAST DAYS OF TURKISH RULE. ENTRY OF BRITISH FORCES. x\ correspondent has contributed to the London Times an account of the exciting days in Jerusalem which immediately preceded ihe advent, of the British army under General Allenby, and of the impressions produced upon its inhabitants by the change of rule. ft was whispered in Jerusalem on November '..) that the British were at Huj, behind the centre of the tlaza-Beersbeba line, and that Tel-el-Sheria and Gaza had fallen- The Germans and Austrians were even now preparing to evacuate the Holy City. Rumor for once was trueDuring the next few days lame or exhausted Turks, wounded and stragglers, whom tire German motor-lorry drivers refused to pick up, and Turkish officers shaken into truthfulness by the extent of their defeat, brought news of the victory. Turkish officials at once began to leave the city with their families. Tim German depots were hurriedly emptied of unessential supplies, such a3 sugar, which were sold for a song. Munitions and essential stores were then sent north to Shechem (Nabhia), or east cf Jericho. FALKENHAYN'S MOVEMENTS. The great commanders hastened to Jerusalem. Enver, the Turkish Minister for War, who had hurried from the Imperial headquarters at Constantinople to haraugue his defeated generals, departed as suddenly and silently as lie had come. Falkenhayn came from Aleppo to reorganise the beaten army. Meanwhile the British treops had pushed up the passes into the highlands at Judea. Their guns were faintly heard at Jeruselam as they fought their way up the valley of Sorek, and thenceforward the sound of battle grew louder day by day. Falkenhayn himself departed from Shechem on November 10, and on the 19th Latin, Greek, Armenian, and Coptic patriarchs, with the principal ecclesiastics from the churches, left for the same place. Falkenhayn having gone, the control of policy reverted to Turkish hands, and Ali Fuad Pasha, Commander of the Turkish Forces in Jerusalem, issued two proclamations to the. people of the city. He first warned all civilians that streetfighting was to be expected, and when it begun thev were to keep indoors and assist the troops in the impending house-to-house conflict under pain of severe penalties. The second proclamation stated that the Turks had held Jerusalem for 1300 years—an exaggeration !>y only nine centuries—and would not abandon it. On December fi and 7 the fighting on the hills west of Jerusalem and the rapid advance of a British force from Hebron began to revive the hope of a decision. On the morning of December 8 larga numbers of the inhabitants, with the remaining religions chiefs, were personally warned by the police to be ready to leave at once •

PANIC-STRICKEN TURKS. Toward dusk the British troops were reported to have passed Lifta, and to he within sight of the city. On this news being received a sudden panic fell on tne Turks west and south-west of the town, and at five in the afternoon civilians were surprised to see a Turkish transport column galloping furiously citywards along the Jaffa road. In passing they alarmed all units within sight or hearing, and the wearied infantry arose and fled, bootless, and without rifles, never pausing to think or to fight. Some were flogged from behind by officers and were compelled to pick up their arms; others staggered on through the mud, augmenting the confusion of the retreat. After four centurieg of conquest the Turk was ridding the land of his presence in the bitterness of defeat, and a great enthusiasm arose among the Jews. There was a running to and fro; daughters called to their fathers and brothers concealed in outhouses, cellars, and attics from the police who sought them for arrest and deportation. "The Turks are running," they called; "the day of deliverance is come." The nightmare was fast passing away, but the Turk still lingered.

Towards midnight the governor, Izzet Bey, went personally to the telegraph office, discharged the staff, and himself smashed the instruments with a hammer. At 2 a.m. on Sunday tired Turk 3 began to troop through the Jaffa Gate from the west and south-west, and anxious watchers, peering out through the windows of the grand new hotel to learn the meaning of the tramping, were cheered by the sullen remark of an officer, "Gitmaya mejbooruz" (We got to go), and from two till seven that morning the Turks streamed through and out of the city, which echoed for the last time their shuffling tramp. On this same day 2082 years before, another race of conquerors, equally detested, were looking their last on the city which they could not hold, and inasmuch as the liberation of Jerusalem in 1017 will probably ameliorate the lot of the Jews more than that of any other community in Palestine, it was fitting that the flight of the Turks should have coincided with the national festival of the ITanookah. which commemorates the recapture of the Temple from the heathen Seleusids by Judas Maccabeus in 165 B.C.

FLIGHT OF THE GOVERNOR. The Governor was the last civil official to depart- Before the dawn he hastened down the Jericho Road, leaving behind him a letter of surrender which the Mayor, as the sun rose, set forth to delivcn to the British commander, accompanied by a few frightened policemen holding two tremulous white flags. The la=t Turkish soldier is said to have left Jerusalem at about seven o'clock by the east gate of the city, which is named after .St. Stephen, but even later when the British patrols had entered the town to keep order armed stragglers were still trickling along the road just outside the north wall, requisitioning food and water at the point of the bayonet. As the Turkish flood finally ebbed awav into the shadowy depths of the Valley of .Tehosanhat. the townsfolk vmned themselves from the lethargy into which hunger and the Turkish police bad ■pluu?od them, and fell upon a variety of buildings, official or requisitioned for official purposes, and looted them, even stripping roofs, doors and floors from the Ottoman barracks next to the Tower of David, for firewood. It must he admitted that, as the Government had furnished and maintained itself almost entirely by uncompensated requisitions, the mob was only trying to indemnify itself. But this disorder ceased as snddenlv f.s it hfld arisen on the appearance of the <Britl»h infantry. The outbreak, how-

ever, had at least the effect of thawing the people from the state of eowed humility into which they had been beaten and dragooned by their foreign masters, for it is well to remember that the Turk is as much a foreigner to Jerusalem as his British conqueror. _ When the time came for the great and simple act of the solemn entry of General Allenby into Jerusalem, and the Arab prophecy was fulfilled that when the Nile had flowed into Palestine the prophet—Al Neb—from the west should drive the Turk from Jerusalem, then the inhabitants mustered courage to gather i n a great crowd. They were themselves amazed, for during more than three years an assembly of more than three persons in one place was discouraged by the police by blows, fines, imprisonment, and even exile. Eye-wit-nesses of all three events state that the crowd gathered at the Jaffa gate to greet the general was larger than that which met the Emperor William when on his fantastic political pilgrimage in 1898, and denser than the gathering which greeted the revival of the ConstL tution when it was proclaimed 10 years later at the Damascus gate, where there is more space. Many wept for joy, priests were seen to embraco one another, but there were no tbeatricalitiog such as the 'hollow reconciliations which made the triumph of the Young Turk: in 1908 memorable, and which sickened the memories of those who know tho horrors and calamities whicb that triumph, alas! was doomed to bring. The general entered the city, on foot, and left it on foot, and no pageantry profaned the solemnity of the moment.