FROM OUR ARCHIVES
65 YEARS AGO
A meeting was held at the Great Synagoue in Tel Aviv, in protest against the mobilization of women into the army. A spokesman for a group opposed to women in the army said that “the chastity and the body of Jewish woman suffered in the army, the moral standard of which was of the lowest order.” We are not prepared he said, “to supply the army and the prime minister with guinea pigs.” He charged prime minister David Ben-Gurion with building up the state on Greek morals and not on those of the Jewish heritage. In Jerusalem, several hundred fasting demonstrators, including women and children, joined a protest march against the conscription of Orthodox girls for military service. Sounds of the shofar accompanied the procession from Mea She’arim to the grave of chief rabbi Yosef Tzvi Dushinsky.
“A policeman off duty and dressed in civilian clothes is not entitled to arrest a person and deprive him of his liberty,” magistrate Levenburg ruled in Petah Tikva when he cleared two men of charges of resisting arrest.
50 YEARS AGO
In the second day of “Operation Refugee,” as the return of West Bank residents from Transjordan to their homes was designated, 1,876 crossed over, compared to only 361 on the first day. Myer Silverstone, director-general of the Interior Ministry, said that the Jordanians had been sent approved forms for 2,500 people. “They say that not all of the people turned up. Maybe the number will be bigger tomorrow.”
Individuals convicted of desecrating holy places in the West Bank, or damaging them in any other way, would be liable to seven years imprisonment, under an order by military governor Uzi Narkiss. Sentences of up to five years were provided for people doing anything detrimental to the freedom of access of persons to places holy to them, or to their feelings towards such places.
The Histadrut announced that representatives from east Jerusalem would be co-opted into the Jerusalem Labor Council. Histadrut secretary-general Aharon Becker said that it would not be long before a major permanent center would be built to serve both sides of Jerusalem. He announced that a Kupat Holim clinic would open very soon in east Jerusalem, and promised to strengthen existing unions in east Jerusalem and set up new ones.
25 YEARS AGO
The United States consulate in east Jerusalem confirmed that American citizens who wished to visit Jordan after visiting Israel would no longer need to carry two passports. “Previously, a US citizen whose passport was stamped by Israel immigration couldn’t gain entry to Jordan, so they were issued a second passport, which is a practice we follow only in exceptional circumstances of that kind,” consul Donna Sherman said. It was unclear what was behind the change in Jordan’s policy.
The Jewish Agency began preparing to bring the entire 1,000-member Jewish community of Abkhazia to Israel, an agency official said. Georgian troops retook the breakaway region of Abkhazia after heavy fighting in which more than 50 people were reportedly killed. “In fact, the entire area between the Black and Caspian Seas is engulfed in ethnic strife,” Lev Bardani, the agency’s emissary to Azerbaijan and the northern Caucasus, said.