QUELLING REVOLT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 19 October 1938, Page 5

QUELLING REVOLT

MILITARY ACTION TAKEN IN JERUSALEM HIGH BUILDINGS OCCUPIED ROUND OLD CITY. PLANS FOR “MOPPING UP” ON LARGE SCALE. JERUSALEM. October 18. Troops in full fighting kit have occupied all high buildings surrounding the old walled city and the rebels are congregating in fee Moslem area. Gathering in the dusk, heavily armeu Arabs encircled the old city, adopting a threatening attitude, and also delivering arms to their countrymen in the mosque area by means of ropes over the walls. A detachment of the trans-Jordan frontier force reinforced the troops and additional armoured cars and military patrols surrounded the new city, in which the curfew was imposed last night. Steel-helmeted troops with fixed bayonets are patrolling the suburbs, “shoot on sight” being the new order of the day. Under the shadow of the holy places rifles are crackling intermittently all through the day and night as the military exchange shots with the rebel snipers.

The steady arrival of additional troops and the summary treatment of terrorists is the only evidence of the tightening of British policy throughout Palestine since Sir Harold Mac Michael’s London conferences.

Specific measures are being formulated, however, whereby a large-scale mopping-up process will be initiated preparatory to discussions for a scheme of settlement following the issue of the Woodhead report.

EXTREME TENSION FEARS OF MASS TERRORISM. POLICE UNDER MILITARY CONTROL. (Received This Day, 9.35 a.m.) JERUSALEM, October 18. Two thousand troops surrounded the old city, which is now in a complete state of siege. Tension is at its highest point, as it is feared hourly that there will be an outbreak of mass terrorism, eclipsing the sporadic murders of the last few months. The sound of machine-gun and rifle fire has been heard throughout the city since dawn. It is officially announced that the police force henceforth will be under military control.